It is equally safe to say that the Quitman of fifty years to come (and much sooner) will gladly bury in oblivion the story of the burning school-house and frightened and helpless females and children, which the Quitman of to-day has put upon the page of current history.
There is a very patent moral to this "Canterbury tale." It reads about as follows: Twenty-five years after the Canterbury persecution, its repetition would have been an impossibility. Twenty-five years after the Quitman persecution—or any other acts, in any southern state, of like character—what?
Let us, who are only fifty years away from similar deeds at our own doors, go our way, doing the works of charity, humanity, patriotism, and wait and see.
For present wrongs atonement comes in bitter tears,
By children shed for deeds of sires in other years;
Brute passion rules but for a day, then hides its head,
And justice, born of love and mercy, rules instead.
Archdeacon Farrar, in a recent article in the North American Review, pays a tribute to the virtues of the founders of New England which has been rarely excelled in fervor of rhetoric and laudatory statement by the most gifted of after-dinner orators among the sons of Puritans and Pilgrims.
"Those virtues," he says, "gave to James Otis and to Patrick Henry the prophet's tongue of flame. They nerved the arm of Washington in battle, and kindled the embattled farmers to fire 'the shot heard round the world.' They kindled the eloquence of Phillips and the song of Longfellow. They gave to Abraham Lincoln the faith at whose bidding a hundred thousand men sprang to their feet as one—the faith which brightened the six and thirty stars round the forehead of liberty, and flung the broken fetters of the last slave beneath her feet. If the church keep the people in their allegiance to those awful virtues, America shall still be the enlightener of the nations, the beautiful pioneer in the vanguard of the progress of the world. But if she spread a table to Fortune, or enshrine Mammon above her altars, if her commerce become dishonest, and her press debased, and her society frivolous, and her religion a mere twilight of wilful and self-induced delusion—she in her turn shall fall like Lucifer, son of the morning, and the double oceans which sweep her illimitable shores shall only plash to future empires a more sad, a more desolate, and a more unending dirge."
We suspect that this eloquence is expressive not only of impartial admiration, but of the pride that is partial. The parties concerned have common interests in the matter of grandfathers.
The presidential message has met, as might have been anticipated, with a very varied reception from the great political parties, from the many-minded press, and from what may be designated the non-partisan or politically colorless section of the American people. Nor has it been more fortunate in securing unanimity of judgment as to its political merits and significance from the public organs which reflect with more or less precision and exactitude the opinions of the great community of nations on the other side the Atlantic. Party feeling, unless it be of a very enlightened, patriotic, and unselfish kind, is apt to breed the worst types of mental perversity, and give birth to paradoxes of the most startling character. And when a great national document, discussing matters vital to the well-being, prosperity and political advancement of the republic is declared by one influential paper to contain "no pregnant thought of statesmanship, no conspicuously original idea, no new issue to inspire discussion in Congress and among the people," and by another equally competent to frame a judgment to be "a model of good English, and forcible statement," while a third hesitates not to pronounce it "a message that will rank among the best documents of its kind," one naturally wonders what can be the cause of this curious conflict of sentiment; and after looking at the matter for a moment one is driven to the conclusion that the reference of the phenomenon to an invincible and uncompromising party sentiment is probably as scientific, comprehensive, and correct an explanation as any that can be thought of.
We are not disposed, however, to discuss the general merits of the recent message. We will only say that, in our opinion, the patriotic American citizen, whatever political party may enjoy his allegiance and support, will never have reason to complain—nay more—will never be without just occasion to feel proud of his country so long as she can produce a style of statesmanship, and a power of political exposition like those displayed by the present Chief Magistrate of the Republic.