“Gibbet?” echoes a fierce, bold voice through the hall. “Gibbet? They may stretch our necks on all[1492] the gibbets in the land; they may turn every rock[1493] into a scaffold; every tree[1494] into a gallows; every home[1495] into a grave, and yet the words of that parchment[1496] there can never[1497] die! They may pour our blood[1498] on a thousand scaffolds, and yet from every drop that dyes the axe a new champion of freedom will spring[1499] into birth. The British King may blot out[1500] the stars of God from the sky, but he cannot blot out His words written on that parchment[1501] there. The works[1502] of God may perish; His words, never![1503]
“The words of this declaration will live in the world long after our bones are dust. To the mechanic[1504] in his workshop they will speak hope; to the slave[1505] in the mines, freedom; but to the coward kings,[1506] these words will speak in tones of warning[1507] they cannot choose but hear.
“They will be terrible as the flaming syllables on Belshazzar’s wall![1508] They will speak in language startling as the trump of the Archangel[1509] saying: ‘You have trampled on mankind long enough! At last the voice of human woe has pierced[1510] the ear of God, and called His judgment down! You have waded[1511] to thrones through rivers of blood; you have trampled[1512] on the necks of millions of fellow-beings. Now kings, now purple hangmen, for you[1513] come the days of axes and gibbets and scaffolds.’
“Such is the message of that declaration to mankind,[1514] to the kings of the earth. And shall we falter now? And shall we start back[1515] appalled when our feet touch the very threshold[1516] of Freedom?
“Sign[1517] that parchment! Sign,[1518] if the next moment the gibbet’s rope is about your neck! Sign,[1519] if the next minute this hall rings[1520] with the clash of the falling axes! Sign[1521] by all your hopes in life or death, as men, as husbands,[1522] as fathers,[1523] brothers,[1524] sign your names to the parchment, or be accursed[1525] forever!
“Sign, and not only for yourselves, but for all ages,[1526] for that parchment will be the text-book of freedom,[1527] the Bible[1528] of the rights of men forever. Nay,[1529] do not start and whisper with surprise! It is truth,[1530] your own hearts witness it; God[1531] proclaims it. Look at this strange history of a band[1532] of exiles and outcasts, suddenly transformed into a people,[1533] a handful of[1534] men, weak in arms, but mighty[1535] in God-like faith; nay, look at your recent achievements, your Bunker Hill,[1536]
your Lexington,[1537] and then tell me, if you can,[1538] that God has not given America to be free!
“It is not given to our poor human intellect to climb to the skies,[1539] and to pierce[1540] the councils of the Almighty One. But methinks I stand among the awful clouds[1541] which veil[1542] the brightness of Jehovah’s throne.
“Methinks I see the recording angel[1543] come trembling up to that throne to speak his dread message. ‘Father,[1544] the old world is baptized[1545] in blood. Father, look with one glance of Thine eternal eye, and behold evermore that terrible[1546] sight, man trodden beneath the oppressor’s feet, nations lost in blood, murder and superstition walking hand in hand over the graves of the victims, and not a single voice[1547] to whisper hope to man!’
“He stands there,[1548] the angel, trembling with the record of human guilt. But hark![1549] The voice of Jehovah speaks from out the awful cloud: ‘Let there be light again! Tell my people, the poor and oppressed, to go out from the old world, from oppression and blood, and build my altar in the new!’