& ^ 
 
 
 &*> 
 
 3 "^ 
 
 o „ o ,0 *k * . , , • aV O^ • o „ o - ., 
 
 M ■£ ^ 
 
 <^ ' ^ ^ 
 
 '•£» " ° " ° A" 
 
 «i v" . « . 
 
 6 V °^ 
 
 ^ *• • » * A <> 
 
 ^ A 
 
 V* 
 
 /% 
 
 
 
 J? ^ '->*" A 
 
 ^ 
 
 * ... 
 
 ^ °^ * • - ° ^° <f\ * • » * * 
 
 * A v 
 
 
 
 
 
 ^^" 
 
 ^ *"T.« S «o 
 
• A>"^ 
 
 
 <^> JL.9 
 
 ^\ •»'' & 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ,* v ^ -. 
 
 VV 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 V V-, » V JRAK * AT «>V ^ii^ * <P V, ^m^ * aV 
 
 
 
 
 ♦*flfi/72fc»* ° 
 
 ,i>- . 
 
 ^fS^v< 
 
AN 
 
 ®iBii^a©sr 
 
 ^ 
 
 ]E)©Mv®ff®<ffl ®im ^csFomiiFiLIh a£Sv^j 9 18$® £ 
 
 AT P£E17, LA SALLE COUNTY, ILL. 
 
 BY 
 
 / 
 
 GEORGE W. HOLLEY 
 
 -^®^- 
 
 Printecl at the Chicago American Office, 
 
 Corner of Clarke and South Water Streets. 
 
 1839. 
 

 Peru, July 8th, 1839. 
 George W. Holley, Esq. 
 
 Dear Sir — At a meeting of the Committee of arrange- 
 ments for celebrating the Fourth of July at Peru, it was UNANIM- 
 OUSLY RESOLVED, That the thanks of this committee be returned 
 to Geo. W. Holley, Esq., for the able, eloquent and patriotic address 
 with which he favored the citizens of Peru, on the late Anniversary of 
 our National Independence, and that he be respectfully requested to fur 
 nish the committee with a copy of the same for publication. 
 
 H. Leonard, Chairman, 
 L. Pearl, Secretary. 
 
 Peru, July 10th, 1839. 
 To II. Leonard, Esq. Chairman, and L. Pearl, Esq., Secretary.. 
 
 Gentlemen — I have received your flattering note of 
 the 8th inst., and in complying with the request of the committee, 1 can. 
 not but feel that their kindness and partiality are greater than the mer- 
 its of the address they propose to publish, a copy of which is herewith 
 transmitted. Very respectfully, gentlemen 
 
 Your friend and fellow citizen 
 
 Geo. W. Holley. 
 
ORATION. 
 
 Friends and Fellow Citizens : — 
 
 We are met to welcome the annual return of 
 our country's natal day. We are met to welcome the annual return of 
 that day, on which the minions of tyranny and oppression were told in 
 a voice of fearful and decided- earnestness, that they could no longer 
 hold dominion in the land which our fathers claimed as their own. We 
 are met to offer our tribute of respect and gratitude 10 those illustrious 
 men who won, for us, our freedom, and to consecrate their memory 
 anew in our hearts. We are met to offer the sincere homage of hum. 
 ble and grateful hearts, to that Being who crowned with success the ef- 
 forts of our Fathers in their struggle for liberty, and who hath vouchsaf- 
 ed the continuance of that liberty with all its attendant blessings, to us, 
 their children. 
 
 And, on this auspicious day, if some ethereal spirit with a voice that 
 could be heard throughout our land, should bid it 'rejoice, 'the invisible 
 winds, as they stirred in the foliage of our groves and forests, would rus- * 
 tie forth, 'rejoice,' — the birds from their left^ haunts would warble forth ^^ 
 'rejoice,' — and the insects from their flowery homes, would prolong the / 
 sound, 'rejoice;' — the gentle streams and mighty rivers, as they wound I 
 
 their way to the home of the waters, would mnrmur forth, 'rejoice,' — 
 the foaming torrent, with its voice of thunder would say, 'rejoice ;' — and 
 the fathomless ocean, with its deep and solemn tones, would answer back 
 'rejoice;' — the flocks on a thousand hills, and the herds in a thousand 
 vallies, would utter forth, 'rejoice, — and the united acclamation of mill- 
 ions of freemen, would be, 'rejoice !' And wherefore should we not 
 rejoice ? Why should we attempt to restrain that natural, enthusiastic, 
 and almost irresistible impulse, which promptjjikts to manifest, by eve- 
 ry rational method, our heartfelt gratitude for countless blessings received 
 and enjoyed ? Why should not the song of joy be mingled with the an- 
 them of praise, and the shout of gladness be heard with the voice of 
 thanksgiving, on a day like this ? When we compare our condition as 
 a nation, with that of most ofihe civilized nations of the earth, we find 
 abundant cause to rejoice and be glad that our lines have been cast in 
 such pleasant places, and that our heritage is such a goodly one. And 
 
what, in brief, is the condition of those nations ? Sweden and Denmark 
 occupying their places more because their inhospitable clime and rug- 
 ged soil oiler no temptation to the conqueror, than for any other reason; 
 Germany, divided into petty states, and metaphysiced, so to speak, into 
 a perpetual fog ; — Austria, cunning and intriguing, her sceptre leaning 
 upon the sword, and the bayonet being the chief conservator of her tran- 
 quility ; Prussia, governed, at present, with prudence, but with an iron 
 sceptre; Switzerland and Portugal, holding their stations through the 
 jealousy of their more powerful neighbors; Russia, grasping and am- 
 bitious, and ruled with more than an iron despotism ; Spain, once re- 
 nowned and chivalric Spain, ruined by the long reign of a "booby 
 king," and now divided against herself, her children pouring out their 
 blood like water, for what or for whom, they scarcely know ; France, 
 enlightened and powerful, but torn by factions and internal discords, 
 rendering her government unstable and her people unquiet ; the Italian 
 states seeking their chief freedom, limited as it is, in the masks of the 
 carnival, and finding scarcely any thing more fallible than the infallibili- 
 ty of him who isalike the head of church and state ; England, the na- 
 tion from which we are proud to boast our descent, and whose youthful 
 queen is the only reigning $o\ereign whom we can wish "Godspeed," 
 extending her empire into every part of the world, honored and respect- 
 ed abroad, but burdened with a debt which the income of a universe 
 could hardly liquidate, and her people borne almost to the earth by 
 tithes and enormous taxes ; Ireland, enthusiastic, whole-souled, whole- 
 hearted Ireland, bound in the fetters of a union which represses her 
 generous spirit and retards her onward progress ; Scotland, with her 
 "kirks and caulds," content with the protection of the same union ; and 
 Poland, unhappy Poland, — 
 
 "O'er beauty, worth and'bravery's cheek 
 Should fall the tear that's shed for thee," — 
 
 thy name stricken from the list of nations, — thy territory divided as the 
 spoil of implacable foes, — thy children dragging out the miserable rem- 
 nant of existence on the desert wastes of Siberia, or wandering as exiles 
 over the world ! 
 
 How grateful the contrast — how delightful the contemplation, when 
 we turn to our own favored land ! With an empire extending over 
 nearly half a continent, embracing every variety ot climate and of soil, 
 producing, in overflowing»^bundance, all the comforts and most of the 
 luxuries of life — with inexhaustible mineral wealth — (tee. Irom public 
 indebtedness and perplexing alliances — with a peopi.' i lustrums', 
 enterprising, virtuous, intelligent, and more than all, and ibove all, 
 enjoying the greatest possible degree of freedom, in thought, word, deed 
 and conscience, holding themselves amenable only to then laws and 
 their God — choosing their own rulers and their own teat -sitting 
 
 under their own vines and fig trees with none to molest or : <ke them 
 afraid. 
 
5 
 
 There is upon the pages of history no sublimer record of merely- 
 mortal events, than that which contains the story of our rise and progress 
 as one of the independent nations of the earth. An 1 may God, in his 
 mercy, grant that it may need no human hand to write the story of its 
 decline and/all, but that that story may only be found among those 
 celestial archives which shall contain the records of by-gone worlds! 
 And surely, on this occasion, there can be no more thrilling nor 
 appropriate retrospection, than that which carries us back to the days 
 and scenes of our Pilgrim Fathers. And from such retrospection we 
 may, perchance, appreciate more fully the vastness of the debt of 
 gratitude we owe to those illustrious men ; arid also discover the mo. 
 mentous responsibility that is devolved upon us as their legatees. A 
 little more than two centuries since, they accomplished that voyage, and 
 formed that compact, which was to constitute them, not merely the pio- 
 neers of an isolated and dependant colony, but the founders of the migh- 
 tiest and freest nation of the earth. Forgiving and forgetting all the 
 injuries they had leceived at the hands of their countrymen — foregoing 
 all the social comforts and habits of early life and maturer years — sac- 
 rificing all the endearments of home and the domestic hearth — severing, 
 at once and forever, all the ties of kindred, of country and of friends — 
 with a purity and firmness of motive and of purpose which knew no com 
 promise, with a boldness that, in any other cause, would have put auda- 
 city to shame, — with a trust and confidence in God, which neither prin- 
 cipalities **ui powers, nor any other thing utitler heaven could shake, 
 they committed themselves to the terrors of the mighty deep, and 
 sought on a savage continent that civil and religious freedom which had 
 been denied them in their father land. They came not as refugees 
 from justice, they came not as adventurers, they came not as reformers 
 of any of the old social or civil poli6es, they came not as enthusiastic 
 seekers after some imaginary good, some theoretic excellence, but they 
 came as christians, as free?nen, and to seek in a new world, an asy- 
 lum from religious intolerence and spiritual servitude ; to find a home 
 where they and their children might worship their creator in the man- 
 ner that should seem to them the most appropriate; to establish a com- 
 munity where each person, in seeking his own good, should meet with 
 the surest success in promoting the good of all ; where selfishness in the 
 individual should be, not disarmed, but won over as the champion of 
 the community. Upon the trackless ocean, before they had even caught 
 a view of the rugged land whither the chilling winds were bearing them, 
 they drew up, adopted and swore allegiance to the First Charter of 
 Freedom. In the depth of winter they landed upon the dreary, and 
 then, inhospitable shores of Plymouth. They met only a strange and 
 savage race of beings, with whom they could exchange none of the 
 comities or sympathies of life, and from whom they could only obtain, 
 in scanty.. allowance, the merest necessaries to existence. Disease 
 rendered the,m feeble, death thinned their ranks, famine threatened their 
 extinction- But afflictions only increased their devotion, misfortunes 
 only strengthened their fortitude. Undaunted by adversitv ; unsubdued 
 A* 
 
by hardships, they still struggled with their destiny- -confiding in, and 
 adoring, more and more, that God who chastened but never forsook 
 them. And on the barren rock of Plymouth they kindled the first pale 
 beacon-fire ofliberty — a fire whose spreading flame burned up through 
 a revolution that was destined to change all the political theories and 
 polities of ages past ; and which, at this moment consumes not, but 
 warms into delightful and glorious exisience the inhabitants of an em. 
 pire extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific; from near the tropic to 
 the arctic circle ; and which illuminates and cheers onward the whole 
 civilized world ! 
 
 And it is neither boasting nor vanity to say, that the eyes of tbe whole 
 enlightened portion of the human race are now turned, with anxious 
 solicitude, to the progress of our experiment in self-government. Their 
 dearest hopes; their best interests; their highest good; are staked upon 
 the result of our efforts to illustrate and prove to the world that civil- 
 ized men are capable of well and truly governing themselves. And if, 
 with all our past experience, and all our present Knowledge; if with the 
 searching light of the Gospel streaming upon and illuminating our way f 
 revealing the path of duty and making it so plain that the wayfaring 
 man need not err therein; if with all these advantages, we still prove 
 recreant to our high trust, and permit our experiment to fail ; if as Amer- 
 ican Citizens, we forget the ties and duties of patriotism; if we become 
 dead to the thrilling memories of the past, and the glorious fruitions of 
 the future and prove a patricidal people; the bitterness of regret, remorse 
 and shame; the greater bitterness of a world's taunts and a world's 
 scorn; the superlative bitterness of anarchy or despotism will be the 
 just retribution of our more than folly — our fool-hardy madness. There 
 is no other world for another Columbus to discover, and unless the 
 wheels of lime can be stayed in their tracks, unless the fountains of 
 knowledge can be dried up, unless that revelation which brought life 
 and immortality to light, can be stricken into oblivion, and its sublime 
 prophecies and sublimer teachings can be erased from the records of 
 heaven, unless the immortal aspirations of the human mind can be sum. 
 moned back from their high soaring and their higher destiny, so that 
 the human race may commence again the journey of mortality, there 
 can be no possible combination of circumstances, no possible series of 
 events, that shall be so favorable to the formation of a pure represent, 
 alive democracy, as those circumstances which were combined, and 
 those events which did transpire, to consummate the establishment of 
 our Government. Freedom, driven from all the old states, sought in 
 this virgin world her last asylum, her noblest, fairest, final home. And 
 here she hath scattered with lavish hand her choicest gifts, her richest 
 blessings; here she hath established her altars and reared her fanes, 
 and accursed forever be the sacrilegious hand that would mutilate or 
 rend asunder either of the twenty-six columns that support tW hallowed 
 dome ! /l4^u 
 
 The discovery and colonization of the American continent, the com- 
 mencement, progress and termination of the American revolution, the 
 
achievement of American freedom, with the new, inestimable and itf* 
 numerable blessings resulting from that freedom to the whole human «. 
 race, are not merely the epochs of a single nation, or a single o qu . i » toy ; C&t*4 
 they form one of the sublime eras of a world. And if we of the pres- 
 ent generation but appreciate our situation as the inheritors of that free- 
 dom, as AW guardians and protectors, as the instruments through whom 
 it is to be transmitted, not mutilated and abridged, but enlarged and 
 adorned, to future times, we cannot but be impressed with the momen- 
 tous responsibility devolved upon us. And it behooves us with anxious 
 solicitude to enquire for, and seek out those means that shall seem most 
 certain to enable us to- perpetuate it, and with all our might and an j^< 
 earnest zeal to make a practical application of those means to the de- 
 sired end. First and foremost among those means we hold to be the 
 establishment and support of the Christian religion. The truth of a 
 proposition which the events and experience of more than eighteen hun- 
 dred years have demonstrated to a certainty, and have placed beyond 
 controversy, requires neither comment nor illustration. Next to the 
 progress which religion has made in a nation, and the estimation in 
 which it is held, the prosperity and happiness of its people may be meas- 
 ured by the degree of knowledge and virtue which are found among, 
 and practiced by them. Knowledge and virtue are the surest promo- 
 ters and preservers of liberty, as well as the best and surest sources of 
 happiness to the individual; while on the contrary, ignorance and vice 
 are the worst, foes of freedom, and also most fatally destructive, in eve- 
 ry sense, to individuals. It does not necessarily follow that, because 
 a nation is free and prosperous, it will therefore be enlightened and vir- 
 tuous. But it does necessarily follow that, if a nation is enlightened 
 and virtuous, it will, sooner or later, be free and prosperous. Eternal 
 vigilance is the price of liberty ; and vigilance is a concomitant of wis- 
 dom. Therefore, will the ignorant never be vigilant ; and the vicious 
 will seldom be wise. But knowledge is born to none — to none be- 
 queathed. Unremitting application is the price of its attainment, and 
 whatever progress maybe made therein, it becomes a perpetual source 
 of enjoyment which no earthly power can take away. And must em- 
 phatically true are the words of Israel's sacred lyrist, that " the ways 
 of wisdom are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are paths of 
 peace." 
 
 Among a people, then, desirous of preserving and enjoying the only 
 freedom worth being preserved and enjoyed, a rational, chnsti.m free- 
 dom, the sources of knowledge and the means of* acquiring it, should be 
 abundant and easy of access. Not of that knowledge which is derived 
 from speculative theories, or the vain imaginations of men, nor from 
 the arrogant creeds and systems of sectarians and partisans ; but of 
 that knowledge which results from a true comprehension of Philoso- 
 phy, the sciences, and the arts, diversified, enlivened, embellished, with 
 the refinements of an elegant literature ; the whole tempered -hasten- 
 ed, leavened, with that sublimer knowledge — that diviner w\* i which- 
 is revealed in the Book of Books, by the King of Kings. 
 
§ 
 
 If our premises be true, it follows that wherever we find the places 
 of public worship and the means of public instruction the most abundant, 
 the most fully thronged, the most eagerly sought after, and the most 
 assiduously improved, there we shall also find the most virtuous, the 
 most enlightened, the most free, and consequently the most happy com. 
 munilv. What is it that has rendered England the mightiest and 
 freest of the old States, but her system of high schools, of elemosynary 
 education, her richly endowed academies and colleges, and the sure ba- 
 sis upon which the Christian religion is placed by the State? And 
 what is it that has raised New England above old England, and most of 
 the Eastern States to so high a rank among J***»-sistcr States, hut the 
 system of public education, of common school instruction, and the un- 
 compromising firmness with which the laws of God are enjoined upon 
 and practiced by their citizens ? Every church is a magazine of virtue; 
 every school house is an arsenal of knowledge, and every school fund 
 a sinking fund for vice and crime, and consequently for public expendi- 
 ture and private charity. 
 
 Of what vital importance, then, does it become, that we of the West 
 should make unremitting efforts to bring to our aid these powerful 
 means, these mighty levers for raising ourselves to that exalted station 
 among our sister communities, to which our transcendent natural and 
 local advantages permit us to aspire ? Every year, every month, every 
 day that wo neglect to avail ourselves of these important means for 
 promoting our best interests, is a more than loss, a waste of time 
 which ages cannot repair. Hitherto our apology for inactionh as been 
 found in the circumstances of our situation. Most of us having left 
 the homes of our childhood to seek our fortunes and anew home in this 
 delightful region, where the lingering echo of the Indian warwhoop 
 may yet be almost heard, and where the Indian footpaths are yet un- 
 erased, have hitherto found ourselves sufficiently occupied in obtaining 
 and securing the comforts and conveniences of life. But now that our. 
 numbers are multiplied, our means increased, and our prosperity based 
 upon a foundation as deep as our soil, and as broad as our prairies, let 
 us consider delay inexcusable, if not criminal, and resolve upon a 
 speedy consummation of these high purposes. 
 
 Next to the promotion of the interests of religion and knowledge, the 
 most important means for preserving the public liberty, is a strict 
 observance of and obedience to the laws. The laws of our country, of 
 our slate, of our community, which every citizen has sworn to obey and 
 support at all limes, in all places, and under all circumstances, should 
 be deemed paramount over every other obligation — should be placed 
 beyond every exigency — should be considered supreme over every 
 question of expediency. We cannot sufficiently admire the conduct 
 of that ancient magistrate, who, forgetting the father in the judge, con- 
 demned his own son to death for an offence against the State, wheM^t 
 tenable position of the law, aided by a petition of his fellow. citizens, 
 would have permitted him to pardon his child. It was a noble and illus- 
 trious triumph of justice over affection — of the duties of patriotism over 
 
 o\ 
 
the ties of kindred. Such a spirit cannot be too prevalent in a civil- 
 ized community, however deplorable the recurrence of such peculiar 
 instances of requiring its manifestation may be. 
 
 . The means to which I have alluded are the most important for the per- 
 petuation of our liberties ; and ours be the fault, nay, the crime, if they 
 are not faithfully and efficiently applied. And there is every thing to 
 encourage us — every thing to cheer us onward. If -we- may judge of 
 the future by the past; if we may reason of probabilities from facts, 
 we can hardly fail to believe that America is, politically speaking, (if 
 the expression may be allowed) God's present Israel. He who sees 
 not the hand of God, in our rise and progress as a nation, must have 
 lost the power of perception, the capacity for comprehension. The 
 evidences of providential direction are crowded thick upon every page 
 of our nation's history. And hereafter, though foreign or civil 
 war may harass or bleed us ; though our pride may be humbled ; 
 though oar iniquities may be chastised ; though our prosperity 
 may be checked ; though nullification may rear its horrid head ; 
 though the over-zealous may become the slaves of bigotry or 
 
 prejudice on the subject of slavery; though the sublime mysteries 
 or magnificent mummeries of masonry may disturb the public 
 tranquillity ; though sectional interests and prejudices may create sec- 
 tional animosities; though questions of internal policy may distract and 
 divide our people ; though that legal system, or rather illegal usurpation, 
 which makes of a single individual judge, jury, sheriff, and executioner, 
 may occasionally Lynch our citizens; though heartless demagogues 
 may occasionally bear sway in our land and their councils prevail ; 
 though foul treason may plot to betray us ; though unholy faction may 
 mature their schemes among us ; though the madness of party may 
 threaten the permanency of our institutions ; though the spirit of mo. 
 bocracy, with iron heel, may sometimes trample upon our dearest rights, 
 still shall these things all pass away like the storm-clouds of summer, 
 and work together for our good ; still shall the mighty strength of out- 
 constitution, the inherent vigor of oul» institutions, and the latent virtues 
 of our people, bear us triumphantly through every danger and every 
 trial ! still shall the spirit of American freedom cdme out mightier and 
 purer from every conflict ; still shall the chosen Israel pass unscathed 
 through every fiery ordeal. And just so surely as God, in the course 
 of his good providence, has designed that righteousness shall triumph 
 over iniquity ; that vice shall be brought captive to the footstool of 
 virtue ; that tyranny and oppression in all their forms shall be banished 
 from the earth, and that liberty, as it is the natural, shall also be the 
 political condition of man; just so surely shall the whole human race one 
 day be brought to share the full fruition of that glorious period when wars 
 shall cease among men ; when the sword shall be beaten into plough- 
 shares, and spears into pruning hooks ; when the lion and the lamb 
 shall lie down together, and the little child, as it sports with the one, 
 shall twine its fingers unharmed in the mane of the other ; when th« 
 world shall be fkee ; when knowledge and virtue shall be the chief 
 
10 
 
 objects of pursuit ; when the golden rule shall be adopted a3 the rule *i ' • 
 life by each and by all ; when religion and the laws shall be supreme ; 
 when all men shall be brethren in deed and in truth, acknowledging 
 Christ as their common Saviour — God as their common Father ! Then, 
 on the annual return of this day, shall the joyful songs of freedom, min- 
 gled with the stirring anthems of praise, be heard through our vallies, 
 and echoed tl> r w. ugh our mountains, until the rolling waters shail take up 
 the glad sounds, and bear them to the habitants of every nation of the 
 earth — every island of the sea — from whom they shall meet a cheer- 
 ing welcome and a joyous response, the rapturous notes rising and 
 swelling on every breeze, while the universal heart of humanity shall 
 thrill with the harmonious strains of that sublimest melody ! 
 
 But whatever m;»y be tlie changes and revolutions among the nations 
 of the earth, the VVesi, the mighty valley of the Mississippi, witli a soil 
 of surpassing fertility, traversed and enriched by the noblest rivers of 
 the world, with exhaustless mineral wealth, contains within itself the 
 best elements of national wealth and power ; and with a people true 
 to its interest, might defy a world in arms. With such advantages, 
 every free citizen, so far as equality of condition would permit, might 
 become a Rasselas in all save his discontent ; and, beholding the happy 
 valley a thousand fold enlarged, might also behold it bear the palm of 
 superiority even from his storied home. 
 
 But why should 1 attempt to speak to you of the west, in the com. 
 mon place language of truth 1 You, who have seen it, as it were,fresh 
 and glorious from the hand of its Creator, and who know what it ?nay 
 become ! What hopes may you not cherish — what anticipations may 
 you not indulge, concerning a land which requires a new dictionary of 
 words of more emphatic meaning, of terms of mightier import, in order 
 to describe it ! A land whose rivers throw those of the old world into 
 brooks, in the comparison; in whose sky the georgeous and magnificent 
 are done up in a style that renders discription impotent; where the 
 thunder storms are of the mnmmolh sort, the rain-bows full grown, and 
 the thunder and lightning of tJ* bill cut dimensions ; where generosi- 
 ty and hospitality walk open handed, offering the thickest gum, with the 
 same good will, to t4* friend or stranger ; whose soil compared with 
 which, that of old Palasline in its primeval days, was nothing but a 
 sandy beanpatch ; a soil which might even turn to good account the 
 ingenuity of our Yankee brethren, and astonish them, (if any thing 
 could astonish a Yankee, who is the shrewdest and keenest animal that 
 ever went untrapped,) by showing them that even bass-wood cucumber 
 seeds would sprout in a week, and soft maple nutmegs, if planted in 
 June, come forth fully flavored in August ! ! 
 
 Excuse this facetious magniloquence, this seeming exaggeration. — 
 In speaking of the West — the glorious, the unrivalled West — magnilo- 
 quence is but ;is the sluggish speech of dotage, and the quick step of 
 exaggeration can hardly overtake the dead march of truth ! 
 
 Bui pleasantry apart, — when our population shall have becom<; 
 e-y.a! to that of the oldest states ; when our broad prairies, those roll- 
 
11 
 
 ing seas of verdure, of bloom and of fragrance, shall have been divided 
 into fields, and rendered subservient to the uses of husbandry ; when, 
 along all our streams, shall be heard the busy hum of every species of 
 machinery that can relieve the labor of man, and add to his wealth and 
 comfort ; when our rivers shall be burning, as it were, with the fires of 
 that peculiar vessel \v4aich, alone is competent to their navigation ; when 
 cities, towns and villages, increasing in beauty and in wealth, shall 
 have sprung up on every hand ; when the whole wide landscape shall 
 have been enriched and adorned by the efforts of art, and over all its 
 broad surface the temples of God, and the places of public instruction 
 shall be thickly sown ; when our spiritual and temporal teachers shall 
 be numerous, enlightened, and abundantly patronized ; when good 
 morals, good habits and good laws shall have been permanently estab- 
 lished armdrtg our people ; who then shall attempt to limit our wealth 
 and prosperity---our happiness and renown ! The West may then be 
 a new and enlarged paradise, occupied by a whole nation, instead of a 
 single pair, of the human race. And let us cherish the hope that it may 
 encounter the wiles of no second serpent ; may meet with no second 
 fall. 
 
 But if our people remaintrueto themselves, to their constitution, their 
 laws, and their institutions, by what standard shali we attempt to meas- 
 ure our country's future glory ; in what language shall we attempt to 
 speak its fame ; in what strainJJShall we sing its praise 1 But on a theme 
 like this, 
 
 "Imagination's utmost stretch 
 In languor dies away," * 
 
 and the noblest sallies of reason sink impotent in weakness. I will 
 not mar, by minuter details, those reflections upon it which must sug- 
 gest themselves to every enlightened mind, but will only add, that 
 if some enthusiastic artist should attempt to give you an emblematical 
 sketch of America's future glory, he would represent to you a colos. 
 sal statue, standing with one foot upon the Atlantic, the other upon the 
 Pacific ocean, with one hand receiving the furry wealth of the frigid 
 zone, with the other gathering in the varied riches of tropical climes. 
 Before that statue he would place the tree of liberty, its roots deep and y « 
 firmly stricken into the earth, itsJoliaged branches overspreading, but rr*4 
 not shading, the whole of America's vast empire, blooming in perennial/ 
 beauty, its fruits and flowers offered to all without money and without 
 price. Leaning against that tree, he would picture to you the benign- 
 ant spirit of a tolerant and evangelizing religion, respected and rever- 
 ed by every member of the wide community, and their free will off- 
 ering| strown in lavish abundance at his feet. Upon all her waters he 
 would show you the smoking chimnies or the white sails of a humani- 
 zing and enriching commerce, bearing home from every navigable wa- 
 ter of the globe, the varied wealth of every clime. Her sea-coasts and 
 her rivers would be dotted with magnificent cities, and the whole inte- 
 rior studded with thriving and delightful villages and hamlets, or, resting 
 in the rural and enchanting quiet and beauty of agricultural districts. 
 

 
 12 
 
 And everywhere through the wide landscape, he would show you the 
 cheerful countenances of free and happy beings, giving life and vigor 
 to the scene ; and, from the highest summit of her loftiest mountain. 
 he would represent to you, in gigantic proportions, the Banner of Free- 
 dom — the American Flag — streaming to the free winds in triumph * . 
 and in glory, waving in splendor over time's l»e9fernoblest empire ; and,^*^/ 
 in the enthusiasm of the moment, perchance his overwrought imagina- 
 tion would whisper to him that there that banner should continue c<> 
 wave, until the contents of the seventh vial shall be poured over the 
 world ; and when the thrilling fiat shall go lorth, that time shall be no 
 longer, and the heavens and the earth shall be rolled together as a 
 scroll, that then that flag shall be, not the emblem of a fore i gn nation, 
 but the winding-sheet of a departed world ! / /* . 
 
 " Flag of the free hearts' only home ! J 
 
 By angel hands to valor given, 
 Thy stars have lit the welkin dome, 
 
 And all thy hues were born in heaven. 
 For ever float that standard sheet ! 
 
 Where breathes the foe but falls before us. 
 With Freedom's soil beneath our feet, 
 
 And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us ! 
 
H 33 89 '1 
 

 r oK 
 
 ^tf* 
 
 >* 
 
 ^ <4 ♦ j 
 
 
 
 
 Hq 
 
 
 -» o 
 
 *<» •» 
 
 
 f V 
 
 
 
 
 * «? <^, o^ 
 
 
 
# 7* <\ s. *;«W^»* ,*y <£> • ^^» v 4 *» <<£ • 
 
 ^ • M° ♦ ^ ft* . * ' • * "*« <J> o •> . ^5* 
 
 
 
 *0 a * • 
 
 <s> o « * <& * • • * *& , o. 'o,,' ,A <\. 
 
 c° sJm&*. °o ^ .^%^* ,o*. 
 
 t» * «^cs*^4 ft ■**, t^ z tzy/]r&> * N.» a>^U\\\>Si> n y tf\. * 
 
 ^ •il?" % ft* .*'•.. ^ *> ... <*> ••' «A° 
 
 HECKMAN t -^ 
 
 BINDERY INC. P| U% %, 
 
 ^ > ^ S * 
 
 n. manchester, 
 
 indiana 46962 i 9> -^ 
 
 aV^ <* 
 
 ^^APR 89 
 
 • • • ^0^ C5 *o . » * .A,