The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1872-11-28
Thanksgiving, Past, Present and
GEORGE G. STACY,
Secretary of State

Ii the descendants OF tne furlCdnS were u
ritans also what difference there would be
in this days celebration! Like most OF the
observances which have come down to us
from the heroic age of New England history,
the festival has been secularized. Fancy the
Boston of to-day going to hear some John
Cotton or one of the Mathers preach four or
five hours, before eating its dinner! Imagine
the prayer in which an elder of the genuine
old stamp would invite our impatient young
Miles Standishes and John Aldens to join
1t would refer to all the current topics of the
day, glance at the latest remarkable provi-
dences," and controvert the religious errors of
Huxley, Darwin, Emerson, Tyndall, Herbert
Spencer, the Boston Radical Club and the
Atlantic Monthly. An hour or two of such
an outpouring would be severe draft on the
devotional feeling of the Portland or Boston
of to-day. No such fund of religious enthusi-
asm now exists among the descendants of the
orgnators of the Thanksgiving festival. The
minimum Of sermon with the maximum of
dinner is the modern ideal of Thanksgiving.
But we should not too hastily conclude that
the asceticism of the grand old men of Pym-
outh was on the whole more in accord with
the spirit of Christianity than the modern
exhibition of good will to men.
The care taken to-day that no
man, woman or child in all America is unfed
or unprovided with the comforts of life does
perhaps as much to cultivate the generous
impulses of human nature and that spirit Of
benevelence and mutual kindness which is so
desirable among men, as the Puritan aban
donment to the service of the tabernacle.
To spend few seconds in praying for the
poor and half an hour in seeing that they
are not left to starve is better than to throw
the burden of providing for the INDECENT on
the Lord in no matter how sincere and pro-
tracted agonies of prayer. The modern
method of serving God by practical benevo-
lence COMFORTS well with the economy of
time and strength we have learned to prao-
tice in the other fields of human activity.
Modern benevolence, like modern philosophy,
has grown almost wholly on its objective
side, while on the subjective side there has
been almost corresponding diminution.
prayer-and do more. They wrestle less with
the Lord and more with the natural causes
which render this mysterious existence SO
full of wretchedness to the unfortunate.
Thanksgiving and Christmas coming so
near to each other, little rivalry between
them is natural, especially since the former
has also come to be a national holiday. At
present Thanksgiving shares in some meas
ure the humber estate of younger brothers.
1t is the more Democratic festival of the two,
coming in its hearty, rough good-nature, to
humble homes. The splendors and pomps of
Christmas, with its impressive religious ac-
cessories, its ages of solemn memories and its
magnificent celebration in gorgeous cathe-
drals are yet happily wanting. But who Can
tell whether the feast that was first ceebrat-
ed in the seven log houses that stood between
the forest and the Plymouth shore, between
boundless waste of water and a boundess
waste of land, may not likewise put off in
some future time its humble guise? The
ticker for the purity of ancient observances
may already notice something less of the
time-honored pumpkin pie, the honest but
unpretending indian pudding and other
homely fare on the Thanksgiving table, and
tendency to set forth the richer viands that
better grace the Christmas board. In hum
dred years will the spirit of this be apprecia-
ted by the urchins of the period?-
cover the river and through the wood
Now graudmothers cap spy!
Hurrah for the fun
Is the pudding done?
Hurrah for the pumpkin pie!'
And this little scrap ofrhyne reminds us that
Thanksgiving has few, very few, such tributes
paid to it. 1t sadly needs to have done for it
what Dickens and thousand poets have
done for Christmas. Poetry and story have
not yet hallowed It, The Christmas carols
and Christmas stories are among the English
classics. But the muse is too proud to cele-
brate the praises of Thanksgiving with like
prodigality OF verse. 1t is too much matter
to-day There is no glamour about it., and it
has no sacred origin. 1t does not appeal to
the imagination SO much as to the feelings
and the-stomach. So the Thanksgiving
poets are chiefly those who flourish in the out
of the way corners Of weekly newspapers.
THE st. John Neps mourns over the