Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1877-08-22

| DclOIc uuuioCOFClCu ihau iol tlio oiheS
that the opportunity creates the iran for
the opportunity; and the great occasion
makes the man great for the occasion,
who, without such stress, would have
seemed but common clay; and have died
without giving sign of The greatness that
was potential in him. SO it is, that in the
dull times of peace aud the hum-drum
quiet of easy life, the shades of the great
men of heroic past loom high, and are
enlarged to our vision by the misty dis
lance that lies between. This Is well,
since it keeps alive reverence and aSpra-
ton, and kindles divine emulation to be
like them. But as there were brave men
before Agamemnon, so, as l think, YER
mont has had heroes since Ethan Allen
and Seth Warner; wise Governors since
Thomas Chittenden; accomplished diplo-
matists since Ira Allen; able statesmen,
legislators and jurists since Nathaniel
Chapman, if not as great as he.
Those improved means Of intercourse
among men and reader intercommunica-
ton of thought and knowledge, the result
of novel inventions and new applications
of science which have marked the pres
ent century and affected the civilization
of the world have not passed Vermont by,
and her people have thereby leone less
provincial, more cosmopolitl IN, less II
peculiar people than our fathers were. -
And yet, being largely an agricultural
people, with no very large towns or
cities, with few mllionnaires and few
very poor, and little chance to become
rich by speculations, we have not been
temp ted to stray very far from our faith
er's ways of industry, economy, simplicity
Of living and providence for the future
And since we are gathered here about the
old hearth-stone, we may be allowed, in
the freedom and confidence OF the family
circle, to felicitatc ourselves as Vermont
crs, not only for what our fathers were,
for their heroic lives and historic deeds
and the institutions they created and
transmitted to us, but that their posterity
have so faithfully guarded, preserved and
wisely improved them, and have so well
kept alive the spirit of those institutions
and the temper Of that heroic age that
education is free, and that we have free
dom in religion, both moving in wider
and deeper channels than aforetimc Of
culture and Christian charity that Il
greater softness of manners has not made
US ctieminate that we are in good de-
gree temperate, sober, sclf-restrained
people, standing by good order and obedi-
ence to law, conservative and yet pro-
crossing, having steadfastness that may
be counted on, and will of our own; not
having parted with practical wisdom and
common sense, nor yet far departed from
the religion Of paying our debts.
From this little hive and nursery of men,
how many have gone forth to the broader
and more inviting fields Of the expanding
West, to the great marts of commerce,
and VIII erever the spirit Of adventure has
impclled, or of gain or ambition lured,
carrying with them the temper and train
ing of their birthplace, and planting in
virgin fields the seed germs they gather
ed in boyhood upon these mountain sides.
And as we have seen the emblematic pine
tree of our State come Of such planting,
towering oftimeS above the 1nulgenuu.
trees Of the land, with branches wide
spreading and royal crown of leaves, sing
ing to the winds the music ofits ancestral
home proudly have we checred such Wis
ion, crying, "Grace, grace unto it." This
seed of Vermont sowing, wherever cast
has bOurgconed into hIfveSts to the en-
richment Of many States, aud credit tc
seed and sower and we rejoice to-day tt
welcome the return of so many of the
sons Of Vermont, bringing to our festiva
golden sheaves of their culture and harry
est.
One hundred years hence, when Yer
mont shall celebrate the second centcnnia
year of her life as State, when we who
to-day commemorate the virtues of oul
historic fathers shall have long passed
into silence, and shall then, perchance. by
search of genealogical records, be dis
covered as the fathers Of that agc,-alas
how few of us will have attained historic
immortality,-w search among the
musty papers of the then Vermont His
torical Society, to find the record Of thu
doings of this first centennial year, shall
withdraw from oblivion these poor words
which now stir the air, may they, who
shall then gather to look upon the mOnu
mcnts which we now rear as memorials
of an heroic age, as they look back Owe
the field Of Vermont history for two hun
dred years, and compare the past will
the then present, find a State and people
SO softened by culture, yet true to TIN
spirit of the primeva State and of thos'
who founded it,-a people free, independ
ent, intelligent, industrious, sober, hon
est, conservative of the good, aggressive
towards the wrong, virtusuS, religious
a happy people whose God is the Lord.
When James Boswell took Dr.
Johnson to his fathers house in Scot
, land, Lord Auchinleck remarked tina
f jamie had brought an odd kind of (
I chiel wi him. "Sir.' said Boswell