The promise of the bell

COPYRIGHT, 1924, BY AGNES REPPLIER
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
The Riverside Press CAMBRIDGE · MASSACHUSETTS PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.
Christmas in Philadelphia
By Agnes Repplier With Illustrations by John Wolcott Adams
BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY The Riverside Press Cambridge 1924
JWA
THE OLD TOWER OF INDEPENDENCE HALL WHERE RANG THE LIBERTY BELL
THE PROMISE OF THE BELL
When from the wooden steeple of the Philadelphia State House (the Nation’s birthplace, and the most sacred spot on American soil) the Liberty Bell rang out its message of freedom “throughout the land,” it did more than proclaim the Declaration of Independence, and it did more than summon the colonists to defend that independence with their lives. It promised them in a beautiful and borrowed phrase the reward of their valour. It affirmed their inalienable right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”; thus linking with bare existence two things which give it worth, thus striving to ennoble and embellish the length of years which lie between man’s cradle and his grave.
Never was phrase more profoundly English or more profoundly Greek in its rational conception of values. It means a vast deal more than the privilege of casting a ballot, which privilege has been always praised and glorified beyond its deserts. “The liberty to discover and pursue a natural happiness,” says Santayana, “the liberty to grow wise, and live in friendship with the gods and with one another, was the liberty vindicated by the martyrdom of Thermopylæ, and by the victory of Salamis.” It is also the liberty which England has always prized and cherished, and which has promoted the thoroughly English qualities of “solidity and sense, independence of judgment, and idiosyncrasy of temperament.” To the colonists it opened a fair vista, a widening of their somewhat restricted horizon, a very definite and shining goal, well worth their resolute endeavour.
When on the 23d of October, 1781, three hours before sunrise, a watchman called through the quiet streets of Philadelphia, “Past three o’clock, and Lord Cornwallis is taken,” the city awoke to a refreshing sense of safety and exhilaration. The war was not over; but victory was assured, and, with it, life and liberty. There remained the pursuit of happiness, and it was undertaken in good faith, and without undue delay. A sober and sedate community, kept in order by Quaker dominance, Philadelphians had always shown a singular capacity for enjoying themselves when they had the chance. They had danced twelve hours at the Mischianza,—a notable achievement. They had promoted horse-racing, condoned bull-baiting, and had been “decently drunk” from time to time at punch parties on the river. Now, deeming pleasure to be one approach to happiness, they opened the old Southwark theatre, which had led a life of sore vicissitudes, rechristened it cautiously the Academy of Polite Science, and gave a performance of Beaumarchais’s “Eugénie,” in honour of Washington, who graced the occasion with his presence. He was escorted to his box by attendants bearing wax candles in silver candlesticks, a deferential courtesy which made him distinctly and desirably visible to the audience in the dimly lit theatre.