The Chairman—Those of us who heard Dr. Wiley, the other evening, give his impressions, may be interested in giving to Miss Lathrop another fact which will prove the value of birth registry. Dr. Wiley said that no one across the water could marry unless he could prove that he had been born. It would be impossible for many to marry in this country, if that were the case here.
We have always admired the way the Daughters of the American Revolution have taken the history of our country, have looked up the old stamping grounds and marked them, and have taught the children in schools the traditions of the country, to honor the makers of our country and to make them good American citizens. But we are really more pleased that the Daughters of the American Revolution have recently taken up more modern things, and that they are preserving the resources of the children. The speaker has been very much interested in modern life, in community life for the rural life of our country.
As a loyal Daughter, I have great pleasure in introducing to you Mrs. Matthew T. Scott, of Washington, D. C., President General of the Daughters of the American Revolution.
Address, Mrs. Matthew T. Scott
Mrs. Scott—Madam President, Members of the Fourth Conservation Congress: Among the many opportunities for service, which today are open to women in this country, there are three to which I wish to call attention for a few moments this evening. The first is that of the unrealized possibilities of the home life of the nation. If we only were endowed with a larger share of that priceless attribute—the constructive imagination—we should be able to see the untold resources which still lie latent, waiting only to be discovered, developed and enjoyed in the mysterious precincts of that laboratory of the soul—that forging-room of character, that fountain-head of those subtle forces which add temper and edge and distinction to our ordinary human attributes—that civic and social Holy of Holies—which we call Home.
And let us remember that the sources of our country’s permanent prosperity and glory lie not in the form of our government, in the wisdom of its administration, nor even in its written laws and constitution, but deep in the intellectual and moral life of society, and potentially in those nameless influences, radiating from the women who give its halcyon charm to hearthstone and library and to all the intimacies and inspirations of the home. For, after all, it is the home—the sanctuary to which we women must hark back—the home, with its sanctity, which is the palladium, the corner-stone, the key to the arch, of all that is most precious in the life and destiny of America.
Again, let us never forget, that to us women—the home-makers of our land—as never before in the world’s history, is entrusted the healthy development of the social and moral fabric of society in our country, in the innumerable and intricate complications of this Twentieth Century civilization. A distinguished educator has recently said:
“At the present time the world is awakening to the teachings of the old prophets. Now, as then, the morals and ethics of a nation are just what the wives and mothers, the home-makers of the land, make them.”
Again, the home is also the place where the future citizens of this nation are to be trained. The place that fosters patriotism, obedience and love, reverence for authority, the finest elements of character. Some day the present generation will have to hand this country over to the sons and daughters who are being trained by fathers and mothers of today to administer the affairs of the home, in preparation for the larger field and wider duties of government. It is well for youth to learn that honest toil is never hopeless or degrading. It is well for youth to be at one with Nature and to learn of her; to know and feel the joy there is in bountiful, glorious Nature; to be familiar with her song—the ripple of the river on its stones, the murmur of trees, the rhythm of the sap that rises in them, the thunder in the hills, the stars shining in perennial beauty, the song of the thrush, and the carol of the lark; to watch the sun in its course and learn the dim paths of the forest.
“It is the song of infinite harmonies.”