New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1875-07-08
PRESTON,S COMPLAINT.

1t IA greatly 10 DE rcgrctteu tnat MI. john D.
Preston of South Carolina should not enjoy
freedom of conscience. For he seems quite I'M
happy about It himself and somewhat disposed
to make other people miserable on account OF
it. 1t was the subject of an address which he
delivered the other day, before what he called,
with fond emotion, "the whole brood OF
nurselings-the offspring of fifty years annual
"parturiti0n of the foremost school OF letters,
"scicncc, and philosophy in the New World
which being lOosencd up little and let down
to lis may be freely translated, meeting OF
the Alumni of the University Of Virginia. lie
said he considered the call to stand by the
"nlirsery cradle" and address the nurse
lingsr the most notable honor of his life, and
that he undertook it with n tremulous rcver-
"ence for the high responsibility" it imposed.
Then he said his theme was one whose pur-
port was "to measure the deep relations of
Fright and wrong, of justice and liberty" and
that he would "talk of it here to-day, before
"thcso affairs and under this sky" because.
SAYS he, grasping himself after the manner of
man taken with sudden pain, 81 cannot
"stand in the shadow OF Monticello with my
"heart Ovcrf!owing with sacred memories and
"not ease it by utterance." And then he
eascd it. 1t took him great while and many
columns, but he must have eased it,
The burden of Mr.. Preston's complaint
seemed to be that the cargo of the MaytiOwer
instead of "the laws and usages growing out
the charters of English liberty" consisted
only of " crude and shallow systems of theO-
illogical, philosophical, and political fictions,
scarcely above the vain babblings of medieval
speculations, mingled with the poisons of
lccntious fanatIcsm, establishing upon them
municipal forms of mere superficial restraint
and himsy systems of educational training,
"calcuated to perpetuate ignorance and sub
"stitute individual craft for public virtue"
This scholarly and statistical description of the
Mayfower's bill of ladng he cOndenscs little
later in the concise, though somewhat abrupt,
statement that "the MaytlOwer freight, under
"the laws of England, was heresy and crime"
On the other hand he says-fOr the address
opens with a historical CONTRAST the James
town immigrant was an English freeman, loyal
"tO his country and his God, with English
"honor in his heart and English piety in his
"soul, and carrying in his right hand the
"charters, usages, and the laws which were
"achieving the regeneration of England"
Was ever historic accuracy more closely welded
to rhetorical elegance7
With this picturesque contrast between the
Plymouth Pilgrim and the jamestown immi-
grant, Preston begins to ease his overlooking
heart He SAYS there was a feud between
them that "began beyond the broad Atlantic
"and has never ceased on It's western shores"
"Not space" says Preston, cor time, or the
convenience of any human law, or the power
"of any human arm, can reconcile institutions
for the turbulent fanatic of Plymouth Rock
land the God fearing Christian of jamestown.
"You may assign them to the closest terrific
"rial proximity, with all the forms, modes,
"and shows of civilization; but you can never
"cemcnt them into the bonds of brotherhood.
Great Nature in her supremest law forblds
dit" If this were Preston's opinion merely,
we might be inclined to doubt it, but when he
cites Great Nature in her suplemest law
why-of course-theres nothing more to be
said. And lest the "nWselngs" might not I'M
derstand how Great Nature forbids it, he cx-
plains the operation i'll the clear and lucid
statement that mature, in her various recon-
"dite, inappreciable but most potential organ
citations, imposes conditions evolving neces-
sites and results which the arbitrary or con-
"ycntional institutions of man cannot control,
land fail even to assimiate. Her stern de-
"creeS forbid mans resistance, and punish his
"violation of them" Which, as will readily be
seen. discloses the whole business.
SO much being settled, Preston proceeds to
state the duty of the Alumni of the University of
Virginia which il " to transmit to posterity the
true narration of the facts and the irreversible
logic of these three-scOre and ten years,
and with il to exhibit the seemingly dying
"ciiort of moral, civil, and religious truth in
" its struggle with fierce intolerance and greedy
fanaticism sustained by merely mechanical
land physical forces aud energies, and thus
to Justify before God and postcrity how val
:" liant, how virtuous and how heroic men,
women and children may be who, inheriting
:" the promises of Gods holy spirit to an Illus
trous ancestry, impelled by iilial piety and
/" sustained by the divine sentiment of patriot
ism, in asserting that their liberty shall not be
Judged by other mems consciences." Long,
but well Sustained and beautiful to the
last. This narration, he says, twill unyail
/" the foulest crime which stains the annals
"of human history;r it will put upon record
"that less than seven decades and a lustrum
sufliced to uproot and dispel all veneraton
for the past countless centuries and TO in
graft upon the chronicles and the civilization
of the nineteenth century of grace, as It's
"most vital attribute and essential element
| 4" and power the most unnatural crime God
has permitted man to perpetrate." Seven
decades and q lustruml How good he talks