The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1921-03-05

EN- IN PEORIA BY THE CREVE
CoEUR CLUB OF THAT CITY,
HE SPOKE ON THE THEME OF
THE MELTING POT AND THE
MOLD, AND HIS REMARKS
WERE SUBSTANTIALLY AS FOL.
LOWS.
A grateful nation that has been we'll
served by many illustrious sons, cher
ishes with singular honor the names
of only two of them and bids us keep
in perpetual memory the birthdays of
Washington, whose prudence, sagac-
ity, resourcefulness brought our coun-
try into being-and of Lincoln whose
simple honesty, shrewd common sense
and courageous steadfastness saved it
from destruction at the moment of its
gravest peril. The country gentleman
and the country lawyer, unlike in sta
ton, in training and in cast OF mind,
had this at least in common-that
they were both self-taught, both had
been disciplined in the rude school of
the frontier and both had learned to
trust the integrity and good faith of
the common man.
The stern handsome face of Wash
ington as depicted in Gilbert Stuart's
familiar portraits needs the text of his
heroic life and the sober eloquence of
his wise speech to convey to the dis
turbed minds of the present day the
lesson of his exalted patriotism. The
18th century gentleman, even though
he was the father of our country and
the first American in honor and desert,
finds his merit challenged by those
who condemn him with the class he so
singularly adored. Lincoln, however,
still wins hearts-wins more in death
stories, his superb phrase, his tragic
end. But we who know them both ac-
cept them both without qualification.
partly for the unique services it was
their privilege to render to our coun-
try, and partly also because. differing
as they did in many traits of / N 5sPyssas
character, they still embo1y that type
of citizenship which we Z soasocihate With
the name American-simple, strong,
reverent men who, without the train
ing of court or camp, developed in the
face of danger those qualities of lead
erShip which in the one case created
a nation out of chaos and in the other
snatched it out of the jaws of impend
ing ruin.
Many more brilliant men have given
to their country the service of their
splendid talentS-Orators, statesmen,
warriors, scholars and have been priv
ileged to spend longer years in her
service than did they, but there were
never yet any more steadfast in their
devotion to liberty than they were,
none whose lives resume more strik-
ingly the poise and the power and the
tenacity of purpose that Freedom be-
slows AS a birthrioht on her children.
America and Europe.
America has always been and in all
Likelihood is long destined to be foil
for Europe Though men of all the
races and all the continents have come
here and have without distinction been
incorporated into the great body Of
our citizens, still it will be always
true that European ideas and Europe
an civilization and European memories
will vastly predominant over all other
strains in our national life. To meet
a European crisis and find the gold
which the Moslem wall in the East was
shutting out of the depleted markets
of Italy, Columbus first set out for
India and found a new World. The
Italian mariner, now driven from the
inland sea by the corsairs of Islam,
gave a name to the new continent and
the fruits of his discovery to every
maritime power. The Portuguese, the
Spaniard, the French, the English and
the Dutch transplanted old Europe to
the New World. The quarrels and the
rivalries, sharpened by the racial and
religious differences that became sc
keen in Europe from the 10th century
on, found their repercussion beyond
the broad reaches of the Atlantic IN
the struggling hamlets of New Eng
land and on the banks of the st. Law
renee or in the settlements along the
Spanish Main. Then an old world wal
between the French and English, thai
incidentally called for New Worle
campaign, quite accidentally as i
seemed furnished the chain of Incl
dents which, by leading up to the for
nation of the United States, changed
profoundly the history of the whole
world Had not Washington discov
cred the weakness of British arm!
at Ft. Duuuesne, had not the New Eng
landers discovered the strength or
Colonial army in their attack on Can
ada the Revolution would never have
been attempted. The colonists Woult
have swallowed their chagrin at th'
loss of their backlands on the oni'
which the Quebec Act included in tn
limits of Canada, and would have pal'
the G12,000 which the Stamp Ac
was intended to raise and Europ'
would have gone on exploiting tn
New World, making it its penal SCI
Element or using it merely as a paw
to play with on the chess board
diplomacy But the over-audaclou
colonies picked quarrel with tn
mother country which led them farthe
than they ever dreamed OF golns
That they might not be hanged sci
arately, they followed Franklin's at