into absolute religious liberty, and in two centuries it had burst beyond the limits of New England, and John Carver of the Mayflower had ripened into Abraham Lincoln of the Illinois prairie. [Great and prolonged applause.] Why, gentlemen, if you would see the most conclusive proof of the power of this principle, you have but to observe that the local distinctive title of New Englanders has now become that of every man in the country. Every man who hears me, from whatever State in the Union, is, to Europe, a Yankee, and to-day the United States are but the "universal Yankee nation." [Applause.]

Do you ask me, then, what is this Puritan principle? Do you ask me whether it is as good for to-day as for yesterday; whether it is good for every national emergency; whether it is good for the situation of this hour? I think we need neither doubt nor fear. The Puritan principle in its essence is simply individual freedom. From that spring religious liberty and political equality. The free State, the free Church, the free School these are the triple armor of American nationality, of American security. [Applause.] But the Pilgrims, while they have stood above all men for their idea of liberty, have always asserted liberty under law and never separated it from law. John Robinson, in the letter that he wrote the Pilgrims when they sailed, said these words, that well, sir, might be written in gold around the cornice of that future banqueting-hall to which you have alluded, "You know that the image of the Lord's dignity and authority which the magistry beareth is honorable in how mean person soever." [Applause.] This is the Puritan principle. Those men stood for liberty under the law. They had tossed long upon a wintry sea; their minds were full of images derived from their voyage; they knew that the will of the people alone is but a gale smiting a rudderless and sailless ship, and hurling it, a mass of wreck, upon the rocks. But the will of the people, subject to law, is the same gale filling the trim canvas of a ship that minds the helm, bearing it over yawning and awful abysses of ocean safely to port. [Loud applause.]

Now, gentlemen, in this country the Puritan principle in its development has advanced to this point, that it provides us a lawful remedy for every emergency that may arise. [Cheers.] I stand here as a son of New England. In every fibre of my being

am I a child of the Pilgrims. [Applause.] The most knightly of all the gentlemen at Elizabeth's court said to the young poet, when he would write an immortal song, “Look into thy heart and write." And I, sir and brothers, if, looking into my own heart at this moment, I might dare to think that what I find written there is written also upon the heart of my mother, clad in her snows at home, her voice in this hour would be a message spoken from the land of the Pilgrims to the capital of this nation - a message like that which Patrick Henry sent from Virginia to Massachusetts when he heard of Concord and Lexington: “I am not a Virginian, I am an American." [Great applause.] And so, gentlemen, at this hour we are not Republicans, we are not Democrats, we are Americans. [Tremendous applause.]

The voice of New England, I believe, going to the capital, would be this, that neither is the Republican Senate to insist upon its exclusive partisan way, nor is the Democratic House to insist upon its exclusive partisan way, but Senate and House, representing the American people and the American people only, in the light of the Constitution and by the authority of the law, are to provide a way over which a President, be he Republican or be he Democrat, shall pass unchallenged to his chair. [Vociferous applause, the company rising to their feet.] Ah, gentlemen [renewed applause] - think not, Mr. President, that I am forgetting the occasion or its amenities. [Cries of "No, no," and "Go on."] I am remembering the Puritans; I am remembering Plymouth Rock and the virtues that made it illustrious. [A voice "Justice."] But we, gentlemen, are to imitate those virtues, as our toast says, only by being greater than the men who stood upon that rock. [Applause.] As this gay and luxurious banquet to their scant and severe fare, so must our virtues, to be worthy of them, be greater and richer than theirs. And as we are three centuries older, so should we be three centuries wiser than they. [Applause.] Sons of the Pilgrims, you are not to level forests, you are not to war with savage men and savage beasts, you are not to tame a continent nor even found a State. Our task is nobler, diviner. Our task, sir, is to reconcile a nation. It is to curb the fury of party spirit. It is to introduce a loftier and manlier tone everywhere into our political life. It is to educate every boy and every girl, and then leave them perfectly free

to go from any school-house to any church. [Cries of "Good," and cheers.] Above all, sir, it is to protect absolutely the equal rights of the poorest and the richest, of the most ignorant and the most intelligent citizen, and it is to stand forth, brethren, as a triple wall of brass around our native land, against the mad blows of violence or the fatal dry-rot of fraud. [Loud applause.] And at this moment, sir, the grave and august shades of the forefathers whom we invoke bend over us in benediction as they call us to this sublime task. This, brothers and friends, this is to imitate the virtues of our forefathers; this is to make our day as glorious as theirs. [Great applause, followed by three cheers for the distinguished speaker. ]

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