the frown of Ahab and the wiles of Jezebel; this was what caused the Apostle Paul to look with perfect calmness on the cruel face of Nero; this was what nerved Hampden, Pym and Cromwell for their work; this was what caused John Endicott at Salem to tear the red cross out of the King's banner when royal authority was unjustly used to oppress the conscience. And yet those stalwart men did not mistake liberty for license. There is a scene which should be kept forever in the memory of the lover of America. It is the picture of the Pilgrims gathering in the cabin of the Mayflower to draw up and sign the first written constitution of free government. There they covenant "with God and with each other" to maintain the glory of God, the advancement of the Christian faith and the honor of king and country; they promise to frame just and equal laws for the general good of the coiony, unto which they declare that they will render all due submission and obedience. Here are qualities sorely needed at the present day, obedience to righteous law, and firm resistance unto tyranny. Apply these principles to the case of corruption, the rule of the boss in politics, the cowering of freemen beneath the threats of the saloon. From twenty-five to thirty-five saloons in Adrian, and a city of ten thousand people ruled by them to its great loss! Oh for the spirit of 1861 when men could send back word to the haughty South, "Our goods are for sale, but not our principles!" Woe worth the day when men look with indifference upon the spectacle of evil triumphing simply because of the indolent permission of the better minded, when those who seek to have the law enforced are told that they would better be in other business, when men think it impolitic to even humbly petition the sworn officers of the law to keep their solemn oaths! III. A third quality because of which these men may well be patterns to us, is their possession of Dauntless Courage. They never faltered amidst difficulties that would have crushed weaker souls. Three times they tried to escape from England, that in Holland they might find liberty to live and worship God; and only at the third trial did they reach their refuge. Even there it was necessary to move from Amsterdam to Leyden. Then when they found their children ceasing to be Englishmen, because of constant association with a foreign people, they bravely formed their great resolve. They would create a new and freer England across the billowy ocean. Twice they embarked from Plymouth and twice put back because the Speedwell was reported unfit to sail. At last, determined to be gone, one hundred and one persons crowded into the Mayflower, and with God's good hand upon them came hither, but not as they expected. By blunder or treachery they were landed far north of their intended destination. Hunger, cold and sickness welcomed them. The first winter one-half of the whole number were buried in graves that were leveled and sown for fear the Indians would learn how weak the survivors were. The Mayflower still swung at anchor in the bay, but when in the spring she spread her wings for England, not one of the fifty that were left ever spoke of returning with her. The well worked and cared for the sick, often stopping their nursing to bury a comrade's body in the snow-clad ground; but, with unshaken faith in God, they came back from the funeral to the sick room again. Such courage conquered obstacles, as it always will. And it needs to be commended and imitated in these days of limp and effeminate humanity, which has through disuse so weakened its back-bone, that it has not strength to stand erect. Endurance, self-control and fortitude were Spartan virtues, the historians say. If that is so, the Pilgrims, men and women, were Spartans of the purest blood. I say both men and women, for the lot of women in a new and desolate country, separated from all they love, is always harder than the lot of men. Men drive away their sorrows by adventure and activity; but grief abides at home with women, and the confinement of their lives affords opportunity for bitter anguish. All honor to the Pilgrim Fathers and the Pilgrim Mothers, for they taught us how to face difficulty and bear sorrow with self-control that was majestic in its dignity. IV. And finally, the Pilgrims should be patterns. to us, in that they practiced Purity of Life. Admit that they were grave, too sober if you will; admit that life with them was robbed of much of its cheer and Godintended beauty, still there is one fact which forever honors them. They bore white shields and wore unstained garments throughout life. Leaving an England that reeked with gross licentiousness, they kept themselves pure. They had one standard for both men and women. They could not bear the echo of profanity, and set the swearer in the stocks; they branded their thieves and pilloried the gossip-monger. They sought to reproduce the Sermon on the Mount and the Golden Rule, together with the thunders of the Decalogue, in New England; they believed that loyalty to God and consideration for humanity required that the Sabbath should be observed as holy to the Lord, and they recognized the modern doctrine of the solidarity of mankind by making it an offense against the colony for one to be immoral or a Sabbath breaker. Their preachers were prophets like Elijah, Isaiah and John the Baptist, and when the voice of God spoke through them it found its echo, as Je hovah's voice will always find an echo, in the soul. Men listened to the message and obeyed. It is the fashion now to ridicule the Puritan virtues which those men possessed, who trod upon that boulder on the Massachusetts coast, and we see the consequences in the condition which prevails in certain circles of society. If it be Puritanism to keep one's soul unsullied, one's life chaste, one's thoughts and speech free from defilement, and one's hands clean from unjust or dishonorable gains, then I declare that the very hope of this land is hanging on a revival of Puritanism. If Welcome the earnestness of the Plymouth colony with its stern condemnation of all sin, in high or low, in man or woman; with its reverence for God and loyalty to conscience; even though we have less fashion and frivolity, fewer gilded youth and reckless maidens, fewer ruined lives and heart-broken women's tears. we must choose between the gaiety and wickedness of Paris and the righteous, sober life of Plymouth, in the name of poor humanity for which Christ died, I pray that God will let the mantle of the Pilgrims fall on us who have inherited the riches of their labor and have too far departed from the teachings of their lives. 'Depart from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it."[The Psalmist. "To the counsellors of peace there is joy."-[Solomon. "For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulders; and his name shall be called * The Prince of Peace." * * "Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end." "And the work of righteousness shall be peace, and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance forever." "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace."-[Isaiah the Prophet. "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you."-[The Christ. "For the kingdom of God is not meat aud drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Let us, therefore, follow after the things which make for peace."-[Paul, an Apostle of Jesus Christ. "For where envy and strife is there is confusion and every evil work; but the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits. And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace."-[James. a servant of God. "For others a diviner creed Is lived in the life they lead; The Holy Guest came from above.'"-[Longfellow. "There are two sorts of souls. Those who seek for themselves the advantages of things as they are, and those who seek to give themselves to the advantage of things as they ought to be, and therefore may be made to be; those who accept advancement and those who confer it; those who would exploit the world, and those who would save it,-benefactors and malefactors,― Christ and the thieves! If shadows are to fall from truth, and falsehood die, the times challenge and demand souls who shall be filled with the instinct of help, souls ablaze with that love which ever 'Seeketh not her own,' who, born for resolute, aggressive and undaunted leadership, are exemplars in interpreting every lost task by the largest ideals."-[M. Woolsey Striker. |