The Greenville times. [volume] (Greenville, Miss.) 1868-1917, 1907-07-27

has advanced their day in all that
makes life worth living more than it
had in all the centuries that had gone
before. The moment that restrictive
laws were repealed, and the human
mind was unclaimed from all its
bonds, their was such a sudden, SPLEEN
did, continuous outburst of genius
that the invention and discovery the
last one hundred and fifty years
matched with those of all the years
that have gone before as moonlight
unto sunlight as water unto wine"
Now,what makes and keeps us free?
No man alone can protect himself
against the aggressions and tyranny
of others Each to preserve his own
freedom must have the help of others.
There men organize and states and
governments are formed Therefore,
it is our country which makes and
teaches that mans first and highest
duty is to his country. This stands
before his religion and his family, for
it is the state that preserves his re-
ligion and his family Without its
protecting power they would be at
the mercy of the first chance agrees
sor, as the history of man has shown.
| We love our country first because
it IS our country, and next because it
makes us free. North Africa is Mo-
! hamedan today because the state
could not protect the Christian from
| his sword
There is no life SO low that it does
not love its native land The wheel
eagle loves the mountain crag to
which its eyrie ciings, even the moth
that hangs poised above the bloom
upon whose honied breath it feeds
loves the skies whose light have
wooed and warmed its wings to liv-
ing gold. So man loves the brute
land that gave him birth Indeed,
men are but their native land trans
formed Its soil and products, lis
clays and lines build his bone and
flesh. Its airs and winds and skies
throb and redden in his blood But
country means more than land ard
natal air to man. 1t means not only
field and farm and city home and
town but government and law, his
tory and tradition and those lofty
ideals compact of thousand patriotic
dreams handed down to him by his
fathers, whose bodies once evoked
from earth have crumbled back to
clay, but whose lives in the institp.
tons Of the nation they wakened into
life
No nation has stronger claim to
its peoples love than ouds. Waving
aside its mere material greatness,
which is obvious and unchallenged
let rs center our thoughts upon its
civic glories and IFS humanitarian
ideals. There we find it matchless
and supreme.
It was the first nation built d9on
mans faith in man. It first effective
ly proclaimed that man was free. It
first gave the lie to that cruel creed |
which had taught one man was born
apother's rightfnl lord, and that BY |
virtue Of being begotten from partic-
ular 1oins a baby had a right 10
others lives
For nearly two thousand darkened |
years pulpit ard altar proclaimed the /
fatherhood OF God and the resultant
brotherhood Of man, and the slowly
dripping blood from the outstretched T
arms and wounded hands Of Christ
bore witness that a God had died III /
attestation to this truth. Vet word /
Of saint and blood Of god alike were
powerless to make the truth prevail.
Earl and duke and king and car held
The men who toiied and made al
wealth. their rightful thralls. Even
priest and bishop had called them
selves lords spiritual and lords tenn
pora1 No toneue could tell the
cruelty Of those years. no pen depict
mans inhumanity to man perpetrated
under the sanction Of law. Injustice
wore a crown and cruelty sceptered
sat in marble halls while honest toll +
croeebed in noisome dens beggered
slave.
Less than two centuries ago Ros-
seau penned the opening words Of
his Contrast Social ia which he said
Man is born free, and yet every
where We find him in chains and ar
gued the Interchangeable rights OF man.
Vet we find his principles hercely
challenged by even the great and
cod The book was burned BY the
, s61ic execut:oner It's author was
hunted into exile Land after land n
which he sought asylum cast him
forth until at last he died suicides
bitter and lonely death and welled
the scarlet stream OF martyrs blood
But the truth soorned in Europe
found echo in disciples in our native
land. Our ancestors proclaimed Ros-
seau's principles of government not
only true in the abstract but as