The Owosso times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1897-1926, 1897-11-26


thank God for civil and religious liberty ant
for the popular affirmation OF 1t as the set
tied policy of this nation.
Liberty is emphatically the watchword o
this land. By liberty we flourish, for lib
city we live, in the cause OF liberty we vow
that we should die The grand end and
aim of all civil progress is human freedom
To this end hath tended all political pro-
gress; this is the harvest of earth's politica
husbandry, and we are reaping 1t. Our
American nationality Is the first fruits OF
true civil and religious liberty, and 1t Is, we
believe, but germ; the first sowing for
| great harvest of republics which we know
not as yet, handful of corn on the mount
! aims, that I'm the diffusion OF enlightened
| liberty and universal self-g0vernment shall
| yet wave like Lebanon I'm the grand harvest
of the world. For this grand inheritance
under God we are indebted to the founders
of this nation. But we are to remember that
no government, however skilfully framed
and sagaclously balanced, can realize and
perpetuate true liberty without intelligence
and Christianity No government can do 1t.
Our religion is free and can develop accord
ing to its own inherent energies. In prin-
ciple, at least, all are equal before the law,
and the same privileges belong to the poor
depends on the energy and ability of the in
dividual. We glory in the fact that we be-
long to land in which rail-splitter and a
boatman attained the presidency. 1t was
no disgrace to one of our best orators, who
passed away few years ago, that he was
born a slave. Many OF our greatest men
have come up from the humblest walks OF
life. Wealth, position, influence are prizes
offered for energy; and every farmers boy,
every apprentice and clerk, every frendless
and penniless emigrant Is free to enter the
list.
An Englshman told one of our great
statesmen few years ago, that in twenty
five years of careful study of the agricul-
tural class of England, he had never known
one who was born and reared In the ranks
of farm laborers that rose from his class and
became well-to do citizen. That's most
terrible sentence, that three million of peo-
pie should lie at the bottom of society with
no power to rise. Above them the gentry,
the hereditary capitalist; above them, the
nobility; above them, the royalty; above
| them and browning all-the sovereign-all
impossible barriers of caste. No man born
under such institutions can understand the
mighty difference between them and us in
this country. Thank God and thank the
fathers of the republic who made and the
men who carried out the promises OF the
declaration, that In this country there are
no classes, fixed and impossible. There is
no American boy, however poor, however
humble, orphan though he may be, that, If
he have clear head, true heart, a strong
arm, he may rise through all the grades of
society and become the crown, the glory,
| the pillar of the state.
| And as we review the Christian progress
| we have no reason to be discouraged. When
| we reflect that tho numerical strength of the
church has augmented three times as rapid
ly as the population, when we note the rise
and progress of Sunday schools which this
century has witnessed, when we recall the
| fact that nearly all the great missionary,
phianthropc and refOrmatory societies are
less than hundred years old, when we
contemplate the vast sums that are given
for Christian education. and the troops of
colleges which, as one has said, go lowing
over our western plains like Jacobs 'kine,"
when we jOyfully remember that on every
day fifteen new church buildings are erect
ed on the soil covered by the national flag.
and that on every Lords day ten thousand
new cOnfessors of the divine Man of NaZar-
eth are enrolled beneath the standard of the
Cross, we surely have good reasons for be-
lieving that our people will render their du-
tiful homage to the Great Author Of every
public and private good. Is not all this
enough to call forth the deepest gratitude?
The triumphs of the past and the needs of
the present should combine to stimulate our
zeal and deepen our conservation. Emigra-
ton is no longer slow; the pioneers wagon
does not toll heavily through the deep mud
of the western prairie. The locomotive has
taken the place of the emigrant team, viii
lon hu nf al oh M
er's wand, and
'.'Clty lots are staked for sale
Above old Indian graves"
full of idols. and shall we lag far behind
man told the truth who said that america
Is bounded on the west by the Day of
Judgment" All our lives are bounded on
the west by the Day of Judgment, and God
will hold us responsible for the use we make
of them. Did you ever hear of the Illinois
circle? 1t Is said that an Illinois farmer
plants corn to feed swine to buy land, to
plant more corn to feed more swine in order
to get more money to buy still more land,
to plant still more acres Of corn 70 feed still
more herds of swine. And woe be unto us
IL our boosted America ends in swine or the
fruits of material civilization merely.
would that In the midst Of our selfish and
spendthrift lives we might catch something
of the spirit of that western preacher who
once had vacation, and went to board
ing house in Saratoga, and thence wrote
home to his wife that certain fashionable
woman's habiliments and adornments, as he
reckoned, were equivalent to one meeting
house, seven cabinet organs, and forty-two
Sunday school libraries. The old Scotch
city of Glasgow once had upon its escutch-