New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1870-12-29
ORLEANS, THURSDAY DECEMBER 2,

HglOE, III your land. Arc there none
among you who "seek unto them that
have familiar spirits and unto wizards
that peep and that mutter-for the living
to the dead!" Are you doing your
full part in carrying the Gospel to the
heathen; or are you waiting until the
heather shall have come over into your in
heritancc, bringing their idols with them,
to cheaper labor, and to dilute your own
civilization and Christianity? Are your
schools and colleges still dedicated. as We
dedicated at least one of them, ''tO Christ
and the Churchl n Is there no fear that q
sentimental. sensational, licentious litera-
ture is sapping the morals of your children
Are your charities, pnblic and private. nn-
merous and noble as they are, altogether
commensurate with your wealth, Or
u the larger half Of your, sur
plus incomes absorbed in "a cankering and
debasing luxury, destructive alike to the
physical, intellectual and spiritual energy
of all who indulge in it9 Are integrity and
virtue enthroned in your hearts and homes I.
Have they % recognized and undisputed
sovereignty in the market place and on the
exchange. Orare vice and crime making
not few days dark, and not a few nights
hideous, in your crowded cities! Is there
purity and principle and honor in your
public servants Or are corruption and
intrigue and fraud threatening to make
havoc of your free institutions. rendering
all things venal, and almost all things, ex-
cept mere party disloyalty, venial, in your
State and national capitals
HOW THEY WOULD WARN Us.
Can we not hear them at this moment
solemnly warning us, lest in the pride of
our prosperity and greatness, our hearts be
lifted up to say. each for himself, "My power
and the might Of mine hand hath gotten me
this wealth. while the great lesson Of our
stewardship to Him to whom we owe it all
is forgotten or neglected! Can we not hear
them ut this moment, sOlemnly warning us,
lest, in the pride Of our freedom ard indie
pendence, We forget. that 1.-THE liberty we
are to stand for with the hazard not only of
our goods, but our lives, if need be," is "a
liberty for that only which is good. just and
honest" and not liberty to be used as a
cloak Of maliciousness and icentiousness
Can we not hear them at this moment. from
yOnder hill OF graves, solemnly warming lis,
lest. i'll the pride Of our science, an eclipse
of faith be suffered to steal and settle over
our land, whose beginning may be imper-
ceptible and it's end beyond calculation. Oh.
let us hear and heed these warnings of the
fathers to the children, as they come to us
to-day, enforced not only by all the precious
memories of their faith and piety. their vir-
tues and sacrifices and suttcrings. but by ali
which we live. We need not look beyond
the events of the single year which is just
closing-a year more marvellous in its mani
testations than almost any which has pre-
ceded it since the great year OF our Lord; G
year whose Christmas. alas! is clouded by
the continuance, in land bound TO us by
the memories not yet obliterated, Of a con-
tiict which must fill every Christian heart
with terror. We need not, say, look be-
~, "a
the landing to find evidence OF the vanity of
all human ambitions, and the impotence of
human power, and to see renewed and
startling proof that while
thousand years scarce serve to form STATE.
Al hour may lay IL in the dust.
PERoRATION.
Let Us not be deaf to the warnings OF the
fathers. Let us resolve that no national
growth Of grandeur, no civil freedom or
social prosperity or individual success shall
ever render us unmindful Of those great
principles of piety and virtue which the
Pilgrims incHlcated and exempliticd. Let
shall be. or shall fail to be, it shall still and
always be Christian nation, in the full
comprehensivenes and true significance of
that glorious term. And then, us year after
year shall roll over our land, as jubilee
shall succeed jubilee, and our children
and our cliildren's children shall
gather on this consecrated spot to
celebrate the event which has brought
us here to-day, those great closing
words of Webster fifty years ago-the only
words worthy to sum up the emotions of an
hour like this, and send them down all
sparkling and blazing to the remotest pos
terity-shall be repeated and repeated by
those who shall successfully stand where
he then stood, and where l stand now, not
with any feeble expectation or faltering
hope only, but with that firm persuasion.
that assured trust and faith, with which !
adopt and repeat them as the closing words
of another jubilee discourse:
Advance, then, We future generations :.
We would hail you. as you rise in your long
succession to fill the places which we now
fill, and to taste the blessings Of existence
where we are passing, and soon shall have
passed, our own human duration. We bid
you welcome to this pleasant land of the
Fathers. We bid you welcome to the
mirthtul skies and verdant fields of New
England. We greet your accession to the
great inheritance which we have enjoyed.
We welcome you to the blessings of good
government and religious liberty. We well
come you to the treasures Of science and the
delights OF learning. We welcome you to
the transcendent sweets Of domestic life, to
the happiness of kindred and parents and
children. We welcome you to the i'm
measurable blessings of national existence.
the immortal hope Of Christianity and the
light OF everlasting TRUTH
A prayer by the Rev. Joseph p. Thomp-
son, OF New York. followed the Grafton,
after which the following hymn, by William
Cullen Bryant. was read by the Rev. 7. E.
st. John, OF Worcester:
HYMN.
Wild was the day; the wintry sea
hoaned sadly on New Engiands strand,
When first, the thoughtful and the free,
Our Fathers, trOd the desert land
They little thought how pure light,
With years, should gather round that day;
How love should keep their memories bright,
How wide a realm their sons should sway.
Green are their bays; and greener still
Shall round their spreading fame be wreathed.
And regions now untrod, shall thrill
With reverence, when their names are
breathcd.
Till where the sun, with softer fires,
Looks on the vast Pacifc's sleep,
The children OF the Pilgrim sires
This hallow'd day like shall keep.
The benediction was then pronounced by
the Rev. +. N. Knapp, pastor of the church,
and some music by GilmOre's band brought
the proceedings to a close.
LETTERS.
Dinner was served in the new passenger
station immediately after the close of the
services in the church. After it had been
disposed Of, the assembly was called to
order by Hon. William I. Davis in short
speech. A long list of toasts was an
nounced, and appropriate responses made,
and u large number of letters of regret at
inability to attend the celebration were
read. The poet Whittier, in his commrni-
cation, said:
''No one can appreciate more highly than
myself the noble qualities of the men and
women of the Maytiower. 1t is not of them
that l, as q descendant OF the sect called
Quakers,' have reason to complain in the
matter of persecution. A generation which