Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1907-08-13
WARNING BY WATTERSON

/ WARNING D1 w Al ENoOlN
Lexington, KY, Aug, l2-Thousands
came here today from all parts of the
State for the Bluegrass Fair. The lead
ing feature was an address by Henry
Watierson. He said, in part:
ri protest against that religion which
sands the sugar and waters the milk be-
fore it goes to its prayers. | protest
against that morality which poses as
saint in public 10 do as it pleases in
private. As tee old woman said of the
old mans swearing If there's anything
do hybOminate, it is hypocrisy In
my opinion that which threatens Ken
lucky are not the genllemanly vices
Of the race course and The sideboard,
but perfdy and phariseeism in public and
in private life. "'The men who made
the Bluegrass famous, who put the brand
OF glory upon lis women, its horses, and
vintage, we're not ashamed to take drink
nor to lay wager, though they paid
their losses and understood where to draw
the line. They marked the distinction
between moderation aud intemperauce.
They did not need to be told what honor
is. They believed, as | believe, that
there is such thing as pretending to
more virtue than honest mortals hope to
attain.
81 warn our people against the intru-
sion of certain 'isAs' which describe
themselves as Progress, and muster un-
der the standards of what they call God
aud Morality but which fifty years ago
went by very different name; 'isms'
which take their spirit from Cotton Math-
er, not from Jesus Chris; lens which,
where they cannot rule, would burn at
stake; 'isms' which embrace the sum of
all fansticism and intolerance, propos-
ing that, instead of the rich, red blood
of Viy-'~'e, ice water shall flow through
the veios - he people; fsms' which,
in one word, would blot Kentucky out
of the galaxy of stars and recreste her in
the dread image of Maine and Kansas.
81 refuse to yield to these. Holding the
ministry in reverence IS spiritual adj
visions. rejecting them as emissaries of
temporal power, | do not intend, i'll can
help it, to be compelled TO accept rule
of modern clericalism, which, if 1t could
have its bent and sway, would revive for
US the priest-ridden systems of the
Middle Ages. do not care to live in a
world that is too good to be genial; too
sscetic TO be honest, too proscriptive to
be happy. | do not believe that men can
be legislated into sngels-even red-nosed
angels. The blue laws of New Eng
snd-dead letters for the most part
did more harm to the people, while they
lasted, than all other agencies united.
would leave them in the cold storage to
which the execratiOn of some and the
neglect of all consigned them long ago,
not embalm them and import them to
Kentucky to poison the meat and drink
aud character OF the people.
81 shall leave my home life, my pro-
iessiousl career and my familiar associates
to say whether do not place, aud have
not always placed, the integrity of man,
the purity of woman and the sauctity OF
religion above all earthly things; but |
hope never to grow too old to make merry
with my friends and forget for a little
that am mo longer one and twenty
When the time arrives for me to 60 to
my account, mean to 90 shouting; to
go with my flag flying and, as | never
have lied to the people of Kentucky,
please God never shall.
81 have told them great many un-
palatable things. have met their dis
approval full in the face. / have lived to
see most of my admonilions against this,
that and the other vain hope indicated
by events. ! want to live yet little
longer still to tell the truth and shame
the devil; but if obscurity and adversely
and neglect shall oyertake me it will be
comfort even in the valley of the shadow
of death that from first to last fought,
not for the speckled gospels of the short
haired women and the long-haired men
of Babylon, but for the simple manhood
and lovely womanhood of old Kentucky
meyer New Kentucky, but always and
forever, Old Kentucky--your birth right
and mine"