The Newtown bee., 1900-06-08

gold, placed foot on the soil of the New World, the Old World, the world in gen. eral, the whole world became in truth a new world to man. It's history was des- tined to be changed. Men were destined to 8 larger and 8 nobler life. But yet the day of liberty had not dawned. Years rolled on and time revealed the plans of God.
 When, in the early days of 1900, some f Eng lish gentlemen. In search of wealth and adventure, took up their abode on Virginia's soil; but, more especially, when, little later, those strong, resolute, noble men and women disembarked from the Mayf1ower, and landed at Plymouth, then the first faint rays of the sun of free dom gave promise of the glorious day of liberty. A day which should dispel 8 long and dreary night of oppression and bondage.
 Oliver Wendell Holmes, in reply to an inquiry as to when the training of child should begin, said, IA hundred years before he is born" Children inherit ten- dencies to good and evil. The character of one's ancestors often times has much inf uence on the deve lopmeDnt and for. nation of one's own character. AS one has said: Ut is easier to form than to reform; easier to mold molten iron than to file the old cast" Nations are infiu. enced long before they are born. The character of the settlers generally leaves ! s lasting impression on the future nation ! If the foundation is good and secure 1t is then safe to erect an elaborate super. | structure.
 Going back to the days of the Plymouth Colony, we find in the Pilgrim settlers certain qualities and characteristics which have given to the American Re- public nearly century and quarter oi permanence and progress. Not forget ting our obligations to the Huguenots ] and to the noble Dutch settlers, we be. lieve that the debt which Americans owe to the Pilgrim settlers in New England cannot be overestimated. As patriots we should learn to sing:
 "Thauks be to God for winter timsI That bore the Mayfiower up.
 To pour amid New England snows the treas ures of its cup.
 To fold them in it's icy arms, those sturdy Pil.
 grim sires,
 And weld an iron brotherhood around their
 Christian fires."
 DURING THOSE LONG YEARS OF HARDSHIP, suffering and toll the foundation stones of republican liberty were being laid. Those men loved truth and liberty more than home or life. By their words and by their deeds they expressed the sublime sentiment of 8 later American when he cried, "Give me liberty or give me death." One in those times with the prophetic instinct might have said:
 "I hear the tread of pioneers,
 Of nations yet to be;
 The first low wash Of waves, where scon
 Shall roll human sea.
 The rudiments of empire here
 Are plastic yet, and warm;
 The chaos ot 8 mighty world
 Is rounding into torm.'
 Oh, be grateful for the past for the sterling character of our New England ancestors! The legacy which they left to posterity consisted in a profound rev. erence to God, constant loyalty to the right, an eagerness for the truth. an ir- resistible demand for liberty, and the habit Of 8 progressive life. It is not claimed for the Pilgrims that all their opinions, convictions and customs were best; but their motives and principles were such as to ennoble their own lives, and to leave to posterity the key to all truth and liberty. Most of our New En- gland towns have borne through all these years the impress of the Puritans. And to this, directly and indirectly, do we attribute much of our loyalty to the truth, our passion for freedoms and our faith fuIness to American institutions.
 Those great and noble men, whose memory we all revere, who rocked the cradle of the Revolution in and around Boston; who kindled the beacon fires of liberty and justice on every hilltop from
 
 the pine forests of Maine to the sunny land of the South, those men nuraed the same fond theories of liberty and right, and asserted the same claims as their Puritan fathers. When the English crown became oppressive, and the yoke became grievous to be borne, then the strength and meaning of our fathers principles were made known. A blow was struck and the yoke was broken. Above the suffsrings, the roar and the thunder of war the sun of freedom con- tinued its stately march up the heavens, until, at last, breaking through the over- hanging clouds and smoke, its golden rays proclaimed to the whole world be- low that the day of liberty had fully dawned. Oh glorious day Long mas