Volume I Part 11 (1/2)
As compared with the existence of the world only a short s.p.a.ce of time has intervened between the 19th of April, 1775, and this day, yet three generations of men have trodden these fields and aided in the great work of perfecting and preserving American inst.i.tutions. With what confidence, fellow citizens, did your ancestors look to independence and the establishment of the form of government under which we have lived and prospered as a people? Beyond this form neither the patriot nor statesman can look with hope.
Who will propose to the now united American people either a return to the almost forgotten confederacy of 1778, or the establishment of several governments? n.o.body,--n.o.body. When we contrast our inst.i.tutions with those of any other country, how ought we to thank G.o.d for the measure of personal happiness and political security we have enjoyed.
Not that our inst.i.tutions are perfect,--nor that there is nothing which the philanthropist may deplore or the statesman condemn. All the antic.i.p.ations of our ancestors have not been realized. The past is not all perfect; the future will not always cheer us with suns.h.i.+ne and smiles; but he is a misanthrope who allows his opinions to be controlled by the exceptions to the general current of our national career.
Our years of independence have been years of almost uninterrupted prosperity, but they have borne to the grave those who took part in the later as well as earlier contests of the Revolution. Of Lexington and Concord, one only remains; and from all the battlefields of the war this occasion has brought together but two.
But, fellow citizens, the few survivors are not only venerable, they are sacred men. They are the last of a n.o.ble generation. They periled their lives in behalf of liberty, when
”'Twas treason to love her and death to defend.”
Fortunate all are you whose eyes rest to-day on these few surviving soldiers of the Revolution. Fortunate are the youth and children who on this occasion and in this presence can pledge themselves to the cause of const.i.tutional liberty. Of these men the next generation shall know only from history. Fortune then that your lives began before theirs ended.
The patriot should do homage to these men, the statesman may sit at their feet and learn lessons of fidelity to principle, and citizens all may see how n.o.ble ends the life begun in the performance of duty.
To-day the commonwealth of Ma.s.sachusetts and the town of Acton dedicate this monument to the memory of the early martyrs of the Revolution, and consecrate it to the principles of liberty and of patriotism. Here its base shall rest and its apex point to the heavens through the coming centuries. Though it bears the names of humble men, and commemorates services stern rather than brilliant, it shall be as immortal as American history. The ground on which it stand shall be made cla.s.sical by the deeds which it commemorates. And may this monument exist only with the existence of the republic; and when G.o.d in His wisdom shall bring this government to nought, as all human governments must come to nought, may no stone remain to point the inquirer to fields of valor or to remind him of deeds of glory. And finally, may the republic resemble the sun in his daily circuit, so that none shall know whether its path were more glorious in the rising or in the setting.
XVII SUDBURY MONUMENT
At the session of 1851 the Legislature made an appropriation of five hundred dollars to aid the town of Sudbury in building a memorial to Captain Wadsworth and the men of his command who were cut off at Sudbury in the year 1676 in the war known as King Philip's War.
As Governor I was made a member of the committee for the erection of a monument. The first subject was the style of the memorial. The artists of Boston and vicinity sent designs and plans. Some of these were very attractive. It happened, however, that a member of my Council, the Hon. Isaac Davis, of Worcester, had returned recently from a visit to Europe. He informed me that he had seen at Lucca in Italy, a pyramidal structure which was considered the finest monument of its sort to be found in Europe. I sent immediately for the proportions of the pyramid and the Sudbury monument was modeled upon the same plan. I am of the opinion that it fully justified the claim made in behalf of the original.
A serious difficulty occurred in regard to the inscription upon the Sudbury monument. The original slab was erected in the year 1692 by Benjamin Wadsworth, a son of Captain Wadsworth. The son was then President Wadsworth of Harvard College. The inscription stated that the fight took place April 18, 1676. In later times it was discovered that two old almanacs, one kept by Minister Hobart of Hingham and one by Judge Sewall, contained entries of the fight _on the 21st of April, 1676._ I examined the question and became satisfied that those entries were made on the day when the intelligence was received by the writers.
Accordingly I followed President Wadsworth as to the date. The _Genealogical Register,_ under the charge of a Mr. Drake, in two articles criticized my inscription. I replied in the _Register_ and ended my article with a sentence which Drake struck out. The sentence was this: _”The testimony of President Wadsworth as to the time of his father's death is of more value than all the theories of all the genealogists who have existed since their vocation was so justly condemned by St. Paul.”_
A few months later I appeared in the court to try a case which involved my client's reputation for truth, and a thousand dollars in money. To my dismay I saw that Drake was foreman of the jury. I lost my case, but I think justly upon the evidence. My princ.i.p.al witness failed to make good upon the stand the statement that he had made to me in my office. One of the perils in the practice of law is that clients and clients' witnesses either make misstatements or fail to make full statements of the facts.
In the middle-third part of the nineteenth century, the date of Sudbury Fight was a topic of serious controversy by genealogists and historians. I was responsible for the date that appears upon the monument that was erected in the year 1852. The conclusion that I had reached was condemned by the _Genealogical Register_ and by a committee of the Society. In the year 1866 I reviewed the evidence, on which my opponents relied, and I marshaled the evidence in support of the accuracy of the date that appeared upon the monument. In the year 1876 the town of Sudbury observed the bi-centennial on the 18th day of April, thus giving sanction to the date on the monument.
At the dedication of the Sudbury monument I made the following address:
ADDRESS
Families, races and nations of men appear, act their respective parts, and then pa.s.s away. Political organizations are dissolved by influence of time. At some periods and in some portions of the world, barbarous races appropriate to their use the former domain of civilization, while at other points of time and s.p.a.ce nations are rapidly advancing in wealth and refinement. If savage communities have been exterminated by superior races of men, so have the arts and civilities of the most enlightened people been displaced by the rude pa.s.sions and rugged manners of barbarism. As in the natural world there is a slow revolution of thousands of years, by which every part of this globe is brought within the tropics and beneath the poles, so there appears to be a great cycle of humanity, whose law is that every portion of the race shall pa.s.s through each condition of social, intellectual and moral existence.
But whatever may be the fate of families, races and nations, their influence is in some sense perpetual. The Past is not dead. By a mysterious cord it is connected with the Present. Could we a.n.a.lyze our life, we should perhaps find that but few of the emotions we experience are to be traced to events and circ.u.mstance which have occurred in our own time.
We admire the heroes of Grecian history and even of Grecian fable. We are inspired by ancient poetry and eloquence, as well as by the bards and orators of modern times. Painting and sculpture are the equal admiration of every refined age. The virtue of patriotism has been ill.u.s.trated by savage as well as civilized life. Thus every recorded event of the past has somewhat of value for us. Hence men seek to connect themselves by blood and language with Europe, or even with Asia, and delight to trace their family and name into the dark centuries of the Past. We search for the truth amid the myths and fables of Grecian and Roman history, and have faith that the ruins of Ninevah, Memphis and Palmyra shall yet declare the civilities, learning, and religion of ancient days.
Few nations have had a perfect history. Valuable history can be derived only from the continued record of the transactions of a people.
Wherever governments have existed in fact before they have existed in form, or wherever the proceedings of a government have not been matters of record, there can be no trustworthy history. In these respects Ma.s.sachusetts has been fortunate. Her government is older than her existence as colonies, and from the first a faithful record of her proceedings has been made. The foundations of New Plymouth and Ma.s.sachusetts were laid more than two centuries ago; the circ.u.mstances of this occasion lead us to consider the least defensible portions of their history; yet the world cannot charge them with suppressing any fact necessary to a true appreciation of their policy and character.
Whatever they did was in the fear of G.o.d and without the fear of man.
Conscious of their own integrity of purpose, they shrunk not from the judgment of posterity. And though in this hour we may not always approve their policy, so neither can we comprehend their principles or appreciate their trials. The human family has ever been subject to one great law. It is this: Inferior races disappear in the presence of their superiors, or become dependent upon them. Now, while this law shall not stand as a defence for our fathers, it is satisfactory to feel that no policy could have civilized or even saved the Indian tribes of Ma.s.sachusetts. The remnants that linger in our midst are not the representatives of the native n.o.bility of the forest two centuries ago. Nor did Williams or Eliot, by kindness or religion, ever command the fierce spirits of Miantonomo, Canonchet and Philip.
Nevertheless, let history exalt these men. Let it speak truly of their genius, their courage, their patriotism, their devotion to their race, and, as for Ma.s.sachusetts, she shall be known and read of all from the dark day when the colony of Plymouth had not ten efficient men, to this auspicious moment when within our borders a million of free and happy people speak the language and glory in the descent of the Pilgrim Fathers!
The existence of Ma.s.sachusetts is properly divided into three parts.
First, as a colony from the settlement of Plymouth in 1620, to the loss of the Ma.s.sachusetts charter in 1684. Second, as a province from the charter for the Province of William and Mary in 1691, to the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Third, as a State from 1780 to the present time. As a colony, the civil rights of our ancestors were those of British subjects, but their political and religious privileges were much greater. As a province their civil rights remained, religious freedom was extended, while their political privileges were materially limited.