Select Speeches of Daniel Webster, 1817-1845Webster, Daniel
General
Select Speeches of Daniel Webster, 1817-1845
Webster, Daniel
Speeches, addresses, etc., American
The hours of this day are rapidly flying, and this occasion will soon
be passed. Neither we nor our children can expect to behold its return.
They are in the distant regions of futurity, they exist only in the
all-creating power of God, who shall stand here a hundred years hence,
to trace, through us, their descent from the Pilgrims, and to survey,
as we have now surveyed, the progress of their country, during the
lapse of a century. We would anticipate their concurrence with us in
our sentiments of deep regard for our common ancestors. We would
anticipate and partake the pleasure with which they will then recount
the steps of New England's advancement. On the morning of that day,
although it will not disturb us in our repose, the voice of acclamation
and gratitude, commencing on the Rock of Plymouth, shall be transmitted
through millions of the sons of the Pilgrims, till it lose itself in
the murmurs of the Pacific seas.
We would leave for the consideration of those who shall then occupy our
places, some proof that we hold the blessings transmitted from our
fathers in just estimation; some proof of our attachment to the cause
of good government, and of civil and religious liberty; some proof of a
sincere and ardent desire to promote every thing which may enlarge the
understandings and improve the hearts of men. And when, from the long
distance of a hundred years, they shall look back upon us, they shall
know, at least, that we possessed affections, which, running backward
and warming with gratitude for what our ancestors have done for our
happiness, run forward also to our posterity, and meet them with
cordial salutation, ere yet they have arrived on the shore of being.
Advance, then, ye future generations! We would hail you, as you rise in
your long succession, to fill the places which we now fill, and to
taste the blessings of existence where we are passing, and soon shall
have passed, our own human duration. We bid you welcome to this
pleasant land of the fathers. We bid you welcome to the healthful skies
and the verdant fields of New England. We greet your accession to the
great inheritance which we have enjoyed. We welcome you to the
blessings of good government and religious liberty. We welcome you to
the treasures of science and the delights of learning. We welcome you
to the transcendent sweets of domestic life, to the happiness of
kindred, and parents, and children. We welcome you to the immeasurable
blessings of rational existence, the immortal hope of Christianity, and
the light of everlasting truth!
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT.
This uncounted multitude before me and around me proves the feeling
which the occasion has excited. These thousands of human faces, glowing
with sympathy and joy, and from the impulses of a common gratitude
turned reverently to heaven in this spacious temple of the firmament,
proclaim that the day, the place, and the purpose of our assembling
have made a deep impression on our hearts.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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