Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1883-01-24
General Woodford's Tribute to
New England.

The New England creed, and the New
England doctrine Greed is belief, doctrine
is teaching. What New England believed,
New England bravely taught, and what New
England taught, New England has always
Loyalty lived up to. In what did New Eng
land believe First and foremost she be-
lieved in men. She recognized that it was
for man that labor had wrought, that science
had taught, that art had cultured, and that
Christ had died. When the Puritan stood
covered before the king, it was because he
believed that the Puritan hat covered an
embryo state, and that man was greater than
king or throne. New England believing in
man, believed in liberty for man. True, she
passed her blue laws; true, she burned her
witches; but through all her doings there
ran this current of her better thought; and
Just as the stream, muddy at its source,
grows brighter and fresher in its course sc
New England thought at last ran clear, so
her thought is free to-day, and man is free
among New England's hills, and under New
England laws, as he is free nowhere else Oh
earth. New England believed in men and
liberty at Plymouth Rock, and when on the
the shore of that far island on the southern
coast one of New Englands sons lay buried
with the dusky men he led-for they bur
led Shaw with his niggers at Fort Wag-
ner-Shaw still represented New England,
and the New England idea of manhood and
liberty. But New England not only be.
lieved in men--she not only believed in lib
erty for men, but she believed in liberty
that was regulated by law. She recognized
the doctrine of responsibility. She recog
nizes forever the doctrine of penalty. She
teaches that, saint or sinner, if man puts
his finger in the fire it will be burned that
free or slave, if the state err against justice,
the state will suffer. Thus she taught this
final truth that penalty follows the violation
of law, and that the truest liberty is the lib
erty that recognizes the rights of others and
bows to the sanctity of law. And so New
England logically believed in work. Her
founders came and they built the new state
in the shadow of the old New England for
est, and on the hard soil of old New England
rock. But with work of brain and hand,
New England has made an Eden out Of
rock and wilderness. More than this she
believed in education. The clereymen who
gathered their poor three hundred books and
founded Yale College, and those who founded
Harvard, were the same men that built the
common school. Thus she educated her
children through and through. More than
this, recognizing manhood, recognizing lib
erty, recognizing responsibility, believing in
work, believing in education, New England
believed in self-government, and she laid the
town.meeting, as the very cornerstone Of
our free institutions The pendulum has
swung far, but | believe, gentlemen, that
this original New England idea is the only
seed corn from which good government can
come in free state-the town-meeting.
would that we could go back here in our
own loved city of Brooklyn to the idea OF
the town-meeting and have just what gov
eminent and no better government than
we are fit for and capable of giving to our
selves. New England believed that the pub
lie service is for the public good, and not for
the party, or for the politician. She believed,
and this crowned New England belief
New England believed earnestly, manfully,
Loyalty, in the divine duty Of believing. She
recognized that faith underlies human effort
She recognized that there is divine power
above; she recognized that there is an eter-
nal hereafter. She believed that no man
does a great work unless he is energized
and impelled by the tremendous power of
an absolute belief; and so New England
crowned all Der creed with that sublime,
that hottest, that highest attitude of man,
belief in what is above, belief in what is
beyond, and in this belief New England has
gone forth and conquered the thought and
culture and compelled the progress of our
people.