Kentucky Irish American. (Louisville, Ky.) 1898-1968, 1914-02-28
ARCHBISHOP ON WASHINGTON.
Liberty Birthday
and Banquet Louisville knights o um
busa a the

owned by between two and three
million of our citizens, becoming
more and more popuiarized day by
day because of that instinct of self.
preservation and the STRINGS of oul
Righteousness for individual liberty
and the continuance of that blessed
influence of freedom secured for us
by the constitution and continued in
the tradition of hundred years.
Men are not made virtuous BY
legislation. No man becomes a saint
by secular training. Law aims tc
direct external action that it MAJ
not infringe the sacred rights oil
individuals. But to make a people
virtuous you must secure the influ-
ence of some force that will appeal
to conscience. Ruskin says that the
great cities of Athens, Rome, Venice
and Naples secured their ascendancy
and maintained their power to teach
the world wisdom by and so long as
they were conscious of presiding
Deity which dwelt in the Acropolis,
the Capitol or the great Cathedrals
of st. Mark and st. Peter. It would
be quite as easy to show that the
period of decadence set In when that
faith was repudiated and as the de-
pendence of man upon God and re-
ligion was forgotten.
We need not emasculate that
great heirloom which has built up
the most wonderful people the world
has known, people great in enter
prise, in courage, in chiyalrous de-
votion to high ideals. There are
other remedies for present evils.
The great source of uneasiness,
that which leads through it's un-
happy effect to complaint is selfish
ness. There must be some Influence
that will cure its causes and yet
leave the power of initiative to
honest individuals. There is no
power to effect that change but the
power of religion, and that is why
the Christian church has always
been a popular institution, protect
ing and encouraging the parents of
the poor, stirring external resistance
to arbitrary encroachments of the
State, which will always encroach
If it can. :. And no people will ever
enjoy liberty long but by resisting
auch encroachment ~ IA
You have heard the story of the
horse and the stag. They roamed
over a common field, and in occa-
sional conflicts the horse suffered
defeat. Yet he had a large measure
of liberty. He might have gone
unmolested IL he had had the wis
dom to keep his place and know his
limitations. But disheartened by
his lack of success he asked the man
to lead him to victory. He was
bridled and saddled and the man
vaulted upon his back and took
after the stag and killed the victor.
The horse rejoiced in the victory,
but discovered that he was a slave.
Bridled still, the fields were no
longer his.
If individuals are put to some
little imaginary inconvenience be-
cause men of genius and courage
have taken advantage of economic
and acquired power, the
individual who feels that he suffers
is unwise IL he asks the State to take
his part. II may curb ambition and
restrict the power of initiative, but
he will awake from his dream only
to realize that he has become more
enslaved. | have no patience with
the illogical promises of Socialism,
millennium of freedom.
Once an individual let's the State
put a rope around his neck II de-
prives him of all source of power
and that product of liberty. the safe
guard of private property. am
impatient with II because II is not
the remedy and can not fulfill its
promises. | would ask fair America
in this hour of trial-for methinks
II is a hour of trial. for that force
has been growing alarmingly and
our National Government has been
yielding to the pressure of the in
fluence and the clamor OF the pro-
test restricting associations and cur
failing activities of individual en-
ergy-I would ask fair America to
look into the past and ask itself to-
night on it's anniversary OF its great
father whether II fancies the future
with less liberty is to be more pros
porous and happier than the blessed
past?
Ineed not remind you OF the great
social task which the author OF
Christianity said was the liberation
of the individual from the tyranny
of the State. Men we're slaves. They
were all slaves, because they had a
wrong idea. II was wrong because
II was false. The highest ambition
of the Roman was to serve his coun-
try, and his greatest and highest
act OF devotion was the worship OF
the Emperor. He was subservient,
for he knew not his worth. 81 am
a Roman citizen" was his loudest
and highest boast.
III was into that world that the
Nazarene looked when He said. 81
will set men free" Through what
'nstrumentality? War? No! He
bade the disciple who drew the
WORD on that mysterious night In
he garden, "Put that sword in its
scabbard He who .draweth the
word by the sword shall perish"
Vas II by legislation? No. not b.
egislation. How, then? "You shall
now the truth and the truth shal
st you free" The Greek philoso
hers and the Roman Statesmen
card the new gospel. He echoed
'gher truth than this. "T am
oman citizen" you are citizen Q
re eternal sky. He gazed upon n
ttered rags Of the beggar boy WI
m the streeta/ OF seQuestere
vIIIa0o and w.. arof.I him for A