The American Union Speaker

by John D. Philbrick

LVI.

ON SENDING RELIEF TO IRELAND.

We have assembled, not to respond to shouts of triumph from the West, but to answer to the cry of want and suffering which comes from the East. The Old World stretches out her arms to the New. The starving parent supplicates the young and vigorous child for bread. There lies, upon the other side of the wide Atlantic, a beautiful island famous in history and in song. Its area is not so great as that of the State of Louisiana, while its population is almost half that of the Union. It has given to the world more than its share of genius and of greatness. It has been prolific in statesmen, warriors, and poets. Its brave and generous sons have fought successfully all battles but their own. In wit and humor it has no equal, while its harp, like its history, moves to tears, by its sweet but melancholy pathos. Into this fair region God has seen fit to send the most terrible of all those fearful ministers who fulfil his inscrutable decrees. The earth has failed to give her increase; the common mother has forgotten her offspring, and her breast no longer affords them their accustomed nourishment. Famine, gaunt and ghastly famine, has seized a nation in its strangling grasp; and unhappy Ireland, in the sad woes of the present, forgets, for a moment, the gloomy history of the past.

Oh, it is terrible, in this beautiful world: which the good God has given us, and in which there is plenty for us all, that men should die of starvation! You who see, each day, poured into the lap of your city, food sufficient to assuage the hunger of a nation, can form but an imperfect idea of the horrors of famine. In battle, in the fulness of his pride and strength, little recks the soldier whether the hissing bullet sings his sudden requiem, or the cords of life are severed by the sharp steel. But he who dies of hunger, wrestles alone, day after day with his grim and unrelenting enemy. The blood recedes, the flesh deserts, the muscles relax, and the sinews grow powerless. At last, the mind, which, at first, had bravely nerved itself for the contest, gives way, under the mysterious influences which govern its union with the body. Then he begins to doubt the existence of an overruling Providence; he hates his fellow-men, and glares upon them with the longings of a cannibal, and it may be, dies blaspheming!

Who will hesitate to give his mite to avert such awful results? Surely not the citizens of New Orleans, ever famed for deeds of charity and benevolence. Freely leave your hearts and purses opened, heretofore, to the call of suffering humanity. Nobly did you respond to oppressed Greece and to struggling Poland. Within Erin's borders is an enemy more cruel than the Turk, more tyrannical than the Russian. Bread is the only weapon that can conquer him. Let us, then load ships with this glorious munition, and, in the name of our common humanity wage war against this despot Famine. Let us, in God's name, "cast our bread upon the waters," and if we are selfish enough to desire it back again, we may recollect the promise, that it shall return to us after many days. S. S. Prentiss.

LVII.

THE NEW ENGLAND COMMON SCHOOL.

Behold yon simple building near the crossing of the village road! It is small, and of rude construction, but stands in a pleasant and quiet spot. A magnificent old elm spreads its broad arms above, and seems to lean towards it, as a strong man bends to shelter and protect a child. A brook runs through the meadow near, and hard by there is an orchard; but the trees have suffered much, and bear no fruit, except upon the most remote and inaccessible branches. From within its walls comes a busy hum, such as you may hear in a disturbed beehive. Now peep through yonder window, and you will see a hundred children with rosy cheeks, mischievous eyes, and demure faces, all engaged, or pretending to be so, in their little lessons. It is the public school,—the free, the common school,—provided by law; open to all; claimed from the community as a right, not accepted as a bounty.

Here the children of the rich and poor, high and low, meet upon perfect equality, and commence, under the same auspices, the race of life. Here the sustenance of the mind is served up to all alike, as the Spartans served their food upon the public table. Here, young Ambition climbs his little ladder, and boyish Genius plumes his half-fledged wing. From among these laughing children will go forth the men who are to control the destinies of their age and country; the statesman, whose wisdom is to guide the Senate; the poet, who will take captive the hearts of the people, and bind them together with immortal song; the philosopher, who, boldly seizing upon the elements themselves, will compel them to his wishes, and, through new combinations of their primal laws, by some great discovery, revolutionize both art and science.

The common village-school is New England's fairest boast,—the brightest jewel that, adorns her brow. The principle that society is bound to provide for its members' education as well as protection, so that none need be ignorant except from choice, is the most important that belongs to modern philosophy. It is essential to a republican government. Universal education is not only the best and surest, but the only sure, foundation for free institutions. True liberty is the child of knowledge; she pines away and dies in the arms of ignorance. Honor, then, to the early fathers of New England, from whom came the spirit which has built a school-house by every sparkling fountain, and bids all come as freely to the one as to the other. S. S. Prentiss.