The Pascagoula democrat-star. (Pascagoula, Miss.) 1878-1920, 1890-07-18
OUR O0UNTRY-THE SOUTH

swept onward from East to West
From the plains of Babylonia, AS
syria and Chaldea, they have come
on over Palestine and Egypt,
across the Mediterranean, over the
continent of Europe, and to the
British Isles. Westward still the
star of empire takes its way" the
Atlantic is crossed and our eastern
coast is occupied by the advance
guard of the Caucasian race.
Westward, still westward, the tide
of emigration flows, and at length
the Alleghanies are crossed, the
western wilds are occupied, the
Rockies and the Sierras are scaled,
and from the sunset shores of Cal
ifornia, the East and the West join
hands across the broad waters of
the Pacific. Here the tide of en-
igration must stop; here it breaches
the bounds which God hath set for
the habitatiOn of man, for there are
no new worlds to discover. Now,
is it visionary to hope and believe
that out of our own land will
spring the GROWING ace of hui
man kind? We believe that we
speak the words of calm reason
when we say that God has a mis-
sion for this nation of ours which
He has never before intrusted to
any other people.
Ours is a land of liberty and in
telligence. Our doors are open to
the East and West. Peace spreads
her wings over the length and
breadth of our land, and there is
no speck of foreign war. Here we
have the meeting and commin.
Cling of all the races of man, and
out of all this a new race, a higher
type of manhood, is being born,
that will help on the world to its
final completeness. If, as a ma
ton, we but rise to the height of
hat vocation to which God is call
ing us, who can prophesy what
the future greatness Of our coun-
try may be?
''Sail on, oh Ship o State!
Sail on, o Union, strong aud great!
Humanity, with all its fears,
With all its hopes of future years,
Is hanging helpless On thy fate"
But, in speaking of our country,
we want to speak more particular.
ly Of the South-her hopes and
prospects, and her needs. When
we consider the natural advan-
tages of our beautiful Southern
land, with a climate unequaled by
any other section, coursed by riv-
ers and streams, the fertility of
whose valleys alone could supply
the market of our common coun-
try ; when we remember that from
her borders, presidents, great ora.
tors, and statesmen have gone
forth to battle for the honor and
prosperity of the whole Union, we
can but feel a just national pride.
But it is a fact, and none the less
true because its contemplation is
painful, that the power of the
South is not to day what it was in
the earlier days of the republic, or
even what her position and pres
ent natural resources demand.
Would we account for it by the
loss of property sustained by her
in the late civil war? Political
economy at once shows the falla-
of such an argument. Or shall
we attribute to herpeople that Ian.
guild inactivity peculiar toSouthern
and, because little energy
is required, little is exerted9 This
may account for the indulgence of
a large portion of the illiterate
whites and negroes, but it is abb
surd to apply it to the South as a
whole. The evil must be sought
in some other source The per
pleXities which beset the South
are many and grievous. With a
large percentage of what ought to
be the leading and influential
of the country possessed of
lntellects enfeebled by inactivity,
with constitutions debilitated
through the luxury and afiuence
of their early days and, finally,
with a horde of illIterate and su-
perstitiOus negroes enfranchised,
whose only ambition is notoriety.