The Minute Man on the FrontierPuddefoot, William George
History
The Minute Man on the Frontier
Puddefoot, William George
Frontier and pioneer life -- West (U.S.); Missions -- West (U.S.)
One of the mightiest factors in human life to-day is the language we
use. Three centuries ago there were about 6,000,000 using it; to-day
125,000,000 speak the English tongue. The Duke of Argyle was once
asked which was the best language. He said, "If I want to be polite I
use the French, if I want to be understood I take the English, if I
want to praise my Maker I take the Gaelic, my mother-tongue."
Foreigners coming here think in their own language, even though they
may be able to speak in ours; gradually they come to think in English,
but still they dream in their mother-tongue; at last they dream,
think, and speak in the language of the land, and become homogeneous
with the nation.
God's greatest gift to this New World is the foreigner. The thought
came to me while on my way to Savannah: Why did not the discoverers of
the Western Hemisphere find a higher civilization than the one they
left? Why should God have kept so large a portion of the world hidden
from the eyes of Europe for thousands of years? Had he not some grand
design that in the fulness of time he would lead Columbus, like
Abraham of old, to found a new nation?
Take your map and find those States which the stream of immigration
has passed by, and in every case you find them behind the times.
Strange how prejudice warps our vision! Jefferson said, "Would to God
the Atlantic were a sea of flame;" and Washington said, "I would we
were well rid of them, except Lafayette." Strange words for a man who
would not have been an American had his ancestors not been immigrants.
Hamilton, the great statesman, was an immigrant. Albert Gallatin the
financier, Agassiz the scientist, and thousands of illustrious names,
make a strong list. One-twelfth of the land foreigners!--but
one-fourth of the Union armies were foreigners too.
WHAT THEY BECOME.
When Linnæus was under gardener, the head gardener had a flower he
could not raise. He gave it to Linnæus, who took it to the back of a
pine, placed broken ice around it, and gave it a northern exposure. In
a few days the king with delight asked for the name of the beautiful
gem. It was the Forsaken Flower.
So there are millions of our fellow-men in Europe to-day, in a harsh
environment, sickly, poor, and ready to die; but when they are
transplanted, they find a new home, clothes, food, and, above all, the
freedom that makes our land the very paradise for the poor of all
lands. These immigrants have made the brown prairie to blossom as the
rose, the wilderness to become like the garden of the Lord. They drove
the Louisiana Lottery out of North Dakota; they voted for temperance
in South Dakota. Their hearts beat warm for their native land, but
they are true to their adopted country.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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