Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1868-12-30
Political Progress.

! We give an extract from an address on
this subject, delivered by the historian
Motley, before the New York Historical
Society, last week
After the almost infinite space already
traversed by mankind, at last something
1 like tradition, record and monumental his
tory began. And cotemporaneous with
the epoch of Egyptian and Hebrew gran
deur there was siege-so men say-of
city in Asia Minor. and it chanced that
blind man sang some songs about it, if he
was a man and was blind. Wonderful
power of poetic genius! The leading per-
sonages IN that war, their passions and
sentiment, the minute details Of their cos
tune, the color Of their hair and eyes, the
names of their soldiers, and their ships.
their habits of social life, the scenery sur
rounding them, the daily military and
household events Of that insignificant quar-
rel are almost as familiar in this remote
hemisphere to-day as the siege of Vicks-
burg with all its heroic, picturesque, and
passionate circumstance and its momentous
consequences for all time. And out of the
confusion of songs, monuments and records
there comes at last glimmer Of chronolo-
gy. There was once a cook in Athens
Whether he was skillful or not in the
kitchen is not known, but he was swift ST
foot lie ran race at the Olympic
games, his name was the first TO be re-
corded as victor. in the archives of those
festivals, and accordingly the subsequent
history Of Greece, with all her heroes,
poets, sages. is registered from the Olym-
piad i'll which Corebus won his race
Strangely enough, too, the date of this first
registered Olympiad has a sacred but fam
liar sound in our ears. 1t was 776 before
Christ One thousand seven hundred and
seventy-six years after Christ another
epoch was established, from which this
great Republic dates its records a day on
which equal rights were proclaimed as the
heritage of mankind, a nober era for the
world than any that cooks or racers are
ever likely to establish. At exactly the
same period with Corebus-as chronolo-
gists have settled it among themselves
there was a certain she wolf in an Italian
swamp with pair of human foster chill
dren. And, as we all have read in the
story books, the foster children founded q
city which has had much influence for
good and evil upon the cause of human
progress. The orbit of civilization, SO far |
as our perishing records enable us to trace
it, seems preordained from east to vest
China, India, Palestine, Egypt, Greece,
Rome, are successfully lighted up as the
majestic orb Of day moves over them, and,
as he advances still further through his
storied and mysterious zodiac, we behold |
the shadows OF evening surely falling on |
the lands which he leaves behind him.
Religion, poetry, aesthetic art have already |
ennobled the progress of man. What
would the world have been without Pales-
tine? What present idea Of human civil
ization would be possible without the poe
try, scu pture, architecture, the magnificent
drama, the subtle, lofty, almost divine
philosophy of Greece-witLout the impe.
rlous and cruel nationalism, the all-sur-
passing military art, the colossal self
esteem, the cynic materialism, the massive,
sharply y-chiseled Jurisprudence which made
Rome the mistress OF the world ? Dead |
Athens shines there forever-not constel
lation, but whole universe of luster-
with the milky way of her exquisite, half
nebulous fables; with the pure starry light
of her fixed and unchanging truths, illum-
mating vast spaces of obscurity before and
since her brief mortal existence. Rome.
both in her military and legal glory, and
in her shameful decrepitude, remains
perpetual memory to encourage human
progress, and to warn from the dangers
Of luxury, ambition, and ineffab!e disdain
of human rights by which she justly per-
ished. And then came the wandering of
the nations. the northern deluge. Rome
sank miserably beneath the glacial food,
which, like that in early geological.ages,
had become necessary in the grand scheme |
of civilization. And at last, as the deluge |
subsided, Germany conquered Rome, and
the new civilization began. But low