The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-07-09

God pity such man as Philip Nolan, whom Edward Everett Hale pictures in his famous story, who. on account of his own sins, has lost the confidence and the respect of the people among whom he was born and who on account of those sins is excluded from the land of his birthl God pity the man who does not glory in the sacrifices and triumphs of his na- tion's heroes and heroines, who does not live in his country's hopes and who does not feel thrill of honest pride when he mentions his birthplace and avows, as did Paul, T am a man which am Jew of Tarsus. city in Cilicia, citizen of no mean city" God pity, I say again, the man who does not feel in every part of his body, mind and soul that the land of his nativity Is the best place in all the world in which to be born, that his people are the best people in all the world with whom to associate, does not hope that the place of his cradle will be the place of his sepulcherl
 Such Is the patriots boast wnere'er we
 roam;
 His first best country ever is at home.
 That man is little to be envied," wrote Inch Kenneth, whose patriotism would ilol Sdln IOTCt upon HIS country pldllS of Marnathon and whose piety would not grow warmer among her ruins of Iona" That Americans life Is not to be envied who, with a cold. lethargic ten- perament and unmoved heart, could so and look at the Lexington commons where a little handful of farmers dared defy the British soldiers, or upon Breed s hill, comonly called Bunker Hill. where the first canon sounded forth the call for the minutemen to rally for America s liberties, or upon Valley Forge. where in the awful winter of TIT and 177S George Washington and his brave wife shivered and shook in camp with the common sol diers, or upon old Independence hall Of Philadelphia, where the immortal docu- ment of the Declaration of Independence was signed or upon Yorktown where Cornwallis and his officers were compelled to surrender their swords to the allied French and American troops, which sur render practically ended the bloody con flict for American freedom.
 But as I began to think over my sermon which was to precede our national holi- day of the Fourth of July I said to myself: Have we truly triumped over England? Are we truy independent or our mother land? Has not the British nation conquered us in truth and in fact Has she not and does she not annually send over great invading armies ana an- nually demand that we pay her not only godly but things more precious than gold? Yes yes" I said to myself, Eng land is not a conquered rival but con oueriug friend. Instead of preaching natriotic sermon to show how the Amer ican nation has triumphed over the brlt- ish empire will twist my theme around. I would tell how the British empire mas conouered America And when sno" how the British empire has eonquereo us
 l.. Es,o,and and Scotland and Ireland have mt their impress upon us, so we in turn through them are helping to put our lm- nress upon the whole world for civiliza- tion and for Christi
 How British Conquered America.
 The British empire. in the first place. has conouered America by the power or inc tongue. The first words that we learned to lisp at our mothers khee' 'he words that we shouted on the play ground and spoke before the school desk, the words that we read in the morning news paper, and in library book and near rom our lecture platform and pulpit are Ens lish words The language Of the American neople Is the language Of Englands rose and scotland's thistle and of lrelanda shamrock. The same tongue we speak was spoken for centuries In the Britlsh isies. Therefore though new nation was porn on July A. IT'S, 1t was not new race. It was simply the Goddess of Liberty as a bride leaving the old English nomesteau and setting up in housekeeping for herself She still belonged to the old English fam fly. More than that. she was dominated by her mothers accustomed ways of thinking and doing things And this tie of lan- guage which binds the American people to their British kindred cannot be found binding us to any other nation on earth
 When two nations like the British peo- pie and the American people speak the same language they must enevitably be one in feeling. It does not make much difference who sits upon the English throne or who is in America's presi- dential chair, the two nations are one They are one because they have the same teachers They are one because thew have the same legends. Thy are one because they naturally think alike, whether they will or no This fact was beautifully illus trated some years ago when John Hay then American ambassador to London. spuolxe at the unvei1ing of the bust of Sir Walter Scott in Westminster Abbey.
 'The books a poy reads" said MT Hay, "are those most ardently admired and longest remembered, and America re- yeled in Scott when the country was young. I have heard from my father, pioneer in Kentucky, that in the early days of this century men would saddle their horses and ride from all the neigh boring counties to the principal post town of their region when a new novel by the author of 'Waverly was expect ed Through all the important forna- tive days of the republic Scott was the favorte author of the Americans. and. while his writings may not be said to have had any special weight In our ma terial and political development. yet. their influence was enormous upon the taste and the sentiments of a people peculiarly sensitive to such influences from the very circumstances of their en- vironment" What John Hay said in reference to the influence of the pen of the Wizard of Abbotsford upon America can be said to greater or a less ex- tent of all the leaders of English and Scottish and Irish thought.
 EngIands Associations.
 British thinking cannot be divorced from American thinking. To the Amer ican mind map of the British isles is not mere collection of city or town names. Each spot has its sacred history on account of the men who have lived there and whose fields of influence were transatlantic as well as cisatlantic. Some years ago I rode through Scotland and England on a bicycle. From Glasgow went to Ayr. There I found that my youthful idol Burns, once lived. From Ayr I went to Bannockburn and Stirling castle. There I found that Bunker Hill was only an echo of Stirling castle. Those old Scottish chiefs inspired Americas in- dependence.
 From Bannockburn I went to Edin- burgh There I stood at the graves of