The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1889-12-03

married her on the spot. Never any
thing else have ever earned has made
me half so glad. 1t isn't the numerical
measure, it is the relative measure, o
the good Lords gifts to US that deter
mines our, Joy of them. There is many
a poor family in the city to-day thai
will be made gladden. by the turkey you
have sent them than some prosperous
folk you know of will be made by all the
dear Lords bounty. So, no doubt, il
was with the Pilgrims in their poverty
1t did not take great things to make
them thankful. A little prosperity was
enough to set them upon keeping some
glad festival. And they had had little
prosperity. They had built them homes
on Leyden street. Rude homes, to be
sure cabins, you would call them, but
they gave them shelter, and they were
their own, and love illumined them and
prayer hallowed them; and, though il
be only cabin, if it be a home, and
ones own, and have Gods presence in
it, and the light of holy love to illum-
inc it, it is thing of beauty-remember
it young man-it is thing of beauty
and a Joy forever. Such sweet homes
the Pilgrims had to bless God for at
that first Thanksgiving. Even they had
had harvest, a bountiful harvest il
seemed to them, though the wheat had
failed them and 1.-The pease were moi
worth the gathering" and "the barley
was only Indifferent good" yet they had
twenty acres OF rustling corn, yellow
Indian corn, sound and sweet and golden.
Nauar opr Ofhnr horuocf coopoaA on
bountiful. 1t meant more to those exiled
men, with wives and babes to save
from hunger, than all the millions OF
acres of our undiscovered prairies.
When you think of it, you do not wonder
they kept feast of Thanksgiving.
Then, too, health had come back into
their househoulds with the coming of the
spring bloom and the summer sun.
And after the long winter of wasting and
dying, that was a wondrous Joy to feel
the thrill OF new life and the kindling of
new hope for their holy mission. And
for that, we may be sure, they would
want to keep glad Thanksgiving.
And with the coming of new health
and hope had come new love, and
there had been wedding bells on Leyden
street in our Plymouth this side of the
sea. And what else is there in any
land or cline or time for which men
may be more glad and thankful than the
Ginning of wedding bells, the sweet
prophecy and promise of hallowed homes
and household love? Let US think of
that to-day.
And then, besides all this, they had
found the thing they sought, the end
and the aim of all their sacrifice. What
was it? ALI the world knows.
What sought they thus afar?
Bright Jewels of the mine?
The wealth of seas? The spoils of war?
They sought faiths pure shrine"
And they had found it:
Freedom to worship God"
And having found that, why shouldn't
they have been glad and grateful? And
they were. And SO they kept their feast,
that first Thanksgiving. The corn was
gathered in and the wild ducks we're in
all the harbors and the wild turkeys
were waiting in great flocks in the
autumn woods. And there was such
plenty everywhere that the people began
to think they must have a feast of in
gathering. And this is how they had it.
There was no formal proclamation and
there was no sermon preached that any
body knows of, and it lacked something
of our Thanksgiving song and solemnity.
1t had only this official author
ity, that the Governor ordered
four men to go out hunting and bring in
all the game they could get for the feast.
And they went and brought in turkeys
enough to last the whole colony week
And then they Toasted. Three whole
days they kept their glad festival, with
prayer and praise, we may be sure, for
they acknowledged God in everything,
and with innocent mirth, we know, for
the history tells about the recreations.
And they had some happy guests to en-
terrain, as everybody ought to have at
Thanksgiving, ninety wild Indians.
And they fed them beautifully the whole
three days of the feast. And SO they
made merry in token of the Lords great
goodness. Three whole days of gladness
and thankfulness, with all the heather
out of the wild woods round about shar-
ing in the cheer and the plenty. That
was the way they kept the first Thanks
giving. And when l think of it, compar-
ing their twenty acres of corn, and moth
ing but corn, with our modern surfeit of
all sorts of luscious fruits, and all the
luxuries of all the chimes under the whole
circuit of the sun, and our elegant homes
with their cabins, and the dear home
land of sixty million happy people with
that little hamlet of fifty struggling exiles,
and the free schools, and free churches,
and freedom of every sort, with their
just dawning hope of chance to pray
unhindered and to serve God now with
hands and hearts unfettered, and when
1 remember how our modern peace and
plenty and large liberty, are very much
the fruit of the little seed they sowed in
such loving and grateful trust, say to
myself, it will be grievous sin and
shame to us, if to-day in the plentitude
of Gods bounty to us, we do not call
upon our souls and all that is within us
to praise and magnify his great and holy
name.
Synopsis of Rev. H. H. Governs Sermon.
Eph. v. 20: Giving thanks, always, for
all things.
The Reverend gentleman spoke of
prayer and praise as the Christians two
great levers by which he can move
heaven and earth. Prayer is the lever
by which God is brought down to mans
praise, by which man is
raised to the dwelling place of God. The