Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1876-07-13

lives, their fortunes and their sacred
honor in its inception, and those who
went out in the late Rebellion to
grapple with the mighty fond who
sought to rend in twain the falrest
of Freedoms shrines. However you
may i fer upon questions of Ma
nional polity, or in respect TO men
and measures, cling to the integrity OF
the Union and the great fundamental
principles upon which it is based,
All your happiness, all your glory,
all your power and influence upon the
destiny OF the worlds nations, de-
pend upon it, cling to the institutions
of your country. These under God,
are its political ark of safety. The
ark that contains the plant that has
budded and blossomed and borne
fruit untasted by former generations,
The ark that contains the palladium
of all our liberties, and the urn which
preserves the sacred relics of our
forefathers. The ark, if undehled by
impious hands, before which the
dagons on the thrones of tyranny will
fall down and be broken in pieces,
and before which the Philistines OF
oppression shall not prevail
And when the beating storm
of time has sung its death
dirge DER the broken fanes and
ruined affairs of the mighty fiend,
whose name usurps her honors,
and the blood through ages clotted
there, has floated down the tainted
stream of time, that shrine shall stand
mistaken by the beating surge OF
change, and only washed to purer
whiteness by the deluge that DER
whelms all other fabrics.
The Presinent remarks were well
received and frequently applauded.
After music and the reading of tho
Declaration of Independence, Hon.
J T. Mills, orator Of the day, made
the following address, - speaking
without notes:
We meet here to-day with emotions
too deep, peculiar and various for ut
terance. The outstreohed wing of
the mighty Past overshadows US.
Its hand is consciously upon US and
we feel its power and inspiration.
Centuries and milleniums are en-
ployed to measure the existence of
nations as months and years that of
individual life. "Our fathers, whore
are they A? and the prophets, do they
live forever ?" The ears that on the
4th of July, 1776, heard the startling
peal that woke great nation into
being, the hand whose pen of fire
sketched the mighty truths We have
Just read, that hand writes no more.
The Washingtons, the Adams. the
Hamiltons, the Franklins, tho Hen
rvs, so conspicuous in the great dra-
ma of '76, they have disappointed be.
hind the curtains. The patriots, the
statesmen, the orators, tie poets of
that grand era-the generals, the
colonels, the captains, the soldiers
who barred their breasts to the MUIR
derous tempest OF Wharf.-The people,
the men, the women who laid the
foundations of the new world empire
on the immovable basis of the rights
of man, they arc not present to-day
in visible form to witness the OUT
pourings of our gratitude.
But we do not meet here to-day as
on u funeral occasion; our hearts
throb with no grief over the exit of
the glorious dead. No, spirits of '76,
aye cannot die. Ye greatly live a
life on earth, unkindled, uncon-
ccived." Who does not know that
the reign and the power of the pat
riot, the martyr, the good, the just,
but begins when death has denuded
them of all that can perish. The
great Teacher understood this fact
when he said, "except q corn .ot
wheat fall into tho ground and die it
abideth alone, but if it die it produc-
eth much fruit" He was we'll aware
that as long as he was the object of
sense and measured by tho mortal
standard, his everlasting reign could
not begin.
To establish an empire over the
spiritual nature of man to erect an
invisible throne above the rifted sep
ulchure; to live in the hearts, love
and hopes of mankind through the
coming generations; to enable frail
humanity to triumph over death, and
thrill the hearts of the living with
the rapture Of the dying saint the
conception, form, and character of
such an empire was entirely original
with the founder of the Christian re-
Iigiop. Said Napoleon in St. Helena:
81 and Charlemagne have established
empires founded ON force. Such
must perish, but Jesus Christ has es.
tablished an empire on love, and it
shall endure as the ages" And anal
ogous to his post vitam, posthumous
power, however less in degree, is the
all-prevailing, conscious, though in
visible presence of our fathers, with
the millions that honor them to-day.
Whether we account for it as some
would do, in supposing that the spir-
itual essence of the departed holds
communion with the living, or
whether our fancy images their form
before oar eyes, who does not recog-
nize the fact that the revolutionary
patriots sit on thrones to-day more
august than that occupied by earthly
potentates, or that they exercise an
influence over the thoughts, hopes,
and conduct of mankind that they
could not possess were they here in
visible form, and subject to the er-
rors, frailties and weakness OF NOR
tality.
We cannot comprehend the causes
which led to, or the consequences
| which flowed in all directions from
the day we now honor, unless we
take q survey, however brief, of the
ever receding ages Of the past. The
American Revolution was not sud
den upheaval, isolated and detached
from antecedent events; not like