The record-union., 1897-07-03
PATRIOTIC
ADDRESSES
Delivered Yesterday to the Pub
lie School Pupils.
Exercises Commemorative Of the Struggle for
National Liberty.

I you, watching the window of the hail.
and in the tower above this hall stood
an old man with his hand upon bell
rope and his lips firm set and eyes
flashing under his gray eyebrows. FL
nally the paper was signed by the last
delegate and the little boy shouted with
all his might, Ring, grandfather, ring
and the old bell in the tower gave peal
on peal, and the cannOns took up the
news and doomed it far and wide
through all the country. That paper
which had just been signed was the
Declaration of Indepedence, and the
bell that that old man rang on that
Fourth of July, until it cracked from
top to bottom, was the Liberty Bell,
and upon it's sides We're engraved the
words, Proclaim liberty throughout
all the land to all the inhabitants
thereof" and the old bell was fulfill
ing its destiny. That, my friends, was
the birth of our country, but before IL
could really be a country of its own
there We're many years of hardship and
of war, and many struggles and trials to
be undergone, and it was in those days
of doubt and tribulation that some of
the greatest men the world has ever
known gave their all that you and /
might to-day enjoy the blessings of
freedom and live in peace and happl-
| ness.
Those We're the days of Washington
and Franklin, and Adams. and Jeffer-
san, and a score of men like them, who
| never failed their country when it
needed them, and who have handed
o,7t co x-icp1U
constructed that it seems almost beyond
the power of man to have conceived 1T.
We are the descendants of those men,
and every Fourth of July it is our duty
to remember this, and to remember
that our country and we who live in it
must always be striving upwards, never
sliding down. AS soon as We are grown
each of us has an equal voice in our
Government, and we must do our best
to fit ourselves for that responsibility.
And do you know that the reason our
country has grown larger and larger,
and stronger and stronger, all these
years, is because all the boys and girls
who live in it have schools to go to, and
go to them. In a country where every
man has an equal share in the Govern
ment it is necessary that every man
shall know what is best, and the only
way he can know that is by going to
school when he is a boy and learning
what is there taught. 1t may
seem strange to you, but it is true just
the same, that every day and every
hour you are at school you are helping
your country, and making it better and
| nobler, and are preparing yourselves to
become better citizens in a land where
the citizens are the sovereign power.
We have been given everything that
God can give to any people-health and
strength and intellect, and land
abounding in whatever is needful for
our sustenance or our comfort, and our
| future is in our own hands. We must
bear this in mind to-day, and determine
each for himself to do what in us lies
for our country's good. We must try
to be always kind and forbearing and
honest and straightforward, stunning
all forms of meanness and deceit, so
that each one of us may become wor-
| thy man or woman and a good citizen,
and that our beloved country may con-
tinue TO increase in strength and free
dom and greatness to the glory of God
and the good of all mankind.