great problems of the strife between labor and capital, and of the government of cities where vast masses of men born on foreign soil, of different nationalities and of different races, strangers to American principles, to American ideas, to American history, are gathered together to exercise the unaccustomed functions of selfgovernment in an almost unrestricted liberty. You have to deal with a race problem rendered more difficult still by a still larger difference in the physical and intellectual qualities of the two races whom Providence has brought together. If there be a single lesson which the people of this country have learned from their wonderful and crowded history, it is that the North and the South are indispensable to each other. They are the blades of mighty shears, worthless apart, but, when bound by an indissoluble Union, powerful, irresistible, and terrible as the shears of Fate; like the shears of Atropos, severing every thread and tangled web of evil, cutting out for humanity its beautiful garments of Liberty and Light from the cloth her dread sisters spin and weave. THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT ROBERT C. WINTHROP The corner-stone of the Washington Monument at the national capital was laid on the Fourth of July, 1848. Mr. Winthrop, who was the Speaker of the House of Representatives, was chosen to deliver the oration on that occasion. The following extract is taken from his address. Let us seize this occasion to renew to each other our vows of allegiance and devotion to the American THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT 141 Union, and let us recognize, in our common title to the name and fame of Washington, and in our veneration for his example and advice, the all-sufficient centripetal power which shall hold the thick-clustering stars of our confederacy in one glorious constellation forever. Let the column we are about to construct be at once a pledge and an emblem of perpetual union. Let the foundations be laid, let the superstructure be built up and cemented, let each stone be laid and riveted, in a spirit of national brotherhood. Lay the corner-stone of a monument which shall adequately bespeak the gratitude of the whole American people to the illustrious Father of his Country. Build it to the skies: you cannot outreach the loftiness of his principles. Found it upon the massive and eternal rock you cannot make it more enduring than his fame. Construct it of the peerless Parian marble : you cannot make it purer than his life. Exhaust upon it the rules and principles of ancient and modern art you cannot make it more proportionate than his character. But let not your homage to his memory end here. Think not to transfer to a tablet or a column the tribute which is due from yourselves. Just honor to Washington can be rendered only by observing his precepts and imitating his example. He has built his own monument. We, and those who come after us in successive generations, are its appointed, its privileged guardians. The widespread Republic is the true monument to Washington. Maintain its independence; uphold its constitution; preserve its union; defend its liberty. Let it stand before the world in all its original strength and beauty, securing peace, order, equality, and freedom to all within its boundaries, and shedding light and hope and joy upon the pathway of human liberty throughout the world,—and Washington needs no other monument. Other structures may fitly test our veneration for him; this, this alone can adequately illustrate his services to mankind. CENTENNIAL ORATION WILLIAM M. EVARTS An extract from the Centennial Oration delivered at Philadelphia, July 4, 1876, on the one hundredth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. The spirit of the nation is at the highest-its triumph over the inborn, inbred perils of the Constitution has chased away all fears, justified all hopes, and with universal joy we greet this day. We have not proved unworthy of a great ancestry; we had the virtue to uphold what they so wisely, so firmly established. With these proud possessions of the past, with powers matured, with principles settled, with habits formed, the nation passes, as it were, from preparatory growth to responsible development of character and the steady performance of duty. What labors await it, what trials shall attend it, what triumphs for human nature, what glory for itself, are prepared for this people in the coming century, we may not assume to foretell. "One generation passeth away and another A CENTURY OF NATIONAL LIFE 143 generation cometh, but the earth abideth forever"; and we reverently hope that these our constituted liberties shall be maintained to the unending line of our posterity, and so long as the earth itself shall endure. In the great procession of nations, in the great march of humanity, we hold our place. Peace is our duty, peace is our policy. In its arts, its labors, and its victories, then, we find scope for all our energies, rewards for all our ambitions, renown enough for all our love of fame. In the august presence of so many nations which, by their representatives, have done us the honor to be witnesses of our commemorative joy and gratulation, and in sight of the collective evidences of the greatness of their own civilization with which they grace our celebration, we may well confess how much we fall short, how much we have to make up, in the emulative competitions of the times. Yet even in this presence, and with a just deference to the age, the power, the greatness of the other nations of the earth, we do not fear to appeal to the opinion of mankind, whether, as we point to our land, our people, and our laws, the contemplation should not inspire us with a lover's enthusiasm for our country. A CENTURY OF NATIONAL LIFE JAMES A. GARFIELD This extract is taken from President Garfield's Inaugural Address, delivered from the east portico of the Capitol at Washington, D. C., March 4, 1881. It is now three days more than a hundred years since the adoption of the first written Constitution of the United States-the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union. The new Republic was then beset with dangers on every hand. It had not conquered a place in the family of nations. The decisive battle of the war for independence, whose centennial anniversary will soon be gratefully celebrated at Yorktown, had not yet been fought. The colonists were struggling not only against the armies of a great nation, but against the settled opinions of mankind; for the world did not then believe that the supreme authority of government could be safely entrusted to the guardianship of the people themselves. We cannot overestimate the fervent love of liberty, the intelligent courage, and the saving common sense with which our fathers made the great experiment of self-government. When they found, after a short trial, that the Confederacy of States was too weak to meet the necessities of a vigorous and expanding republic, they boldly set it aside, and in its stead established a National Union, founded directly upon the will of the people, and endowed with full power of self-preservation and with ample authority for the accomplishment of its great objects. Under this Constitution the boundaries of freedom have been enlarged, the foundations of order and peace have been strengthened, and the growth of our people in all the better elements of national life has vindicated the wisdom of the founders and given new hope to their descendants. Under this Constitution our people long ago made themselves safe against danger from without, secured for their mariners and flag equal |