Leander Ker

“ In the providence of God, we are destined to be the file leader to all the nations of the earth, to lead them to liberty, honor and happiness. And how long shall this be our post of honor, glory and power? Just as long as the American people are true to their duties, their rights and their responsibilities. Just as long as each and every succeeding generation of the American youth prepare themselves to resume and carry on the great and glorious work which their fathers laid down, and meet all their responsibilities fearlessly and faithfully ”

“ And what distinguishes us as a nation, in this work of regeneration, from all the nations that have preceded us, is not the sword or physical power and force; but the mild, pacific and gentle spirit of liberty and our institutions; a mighty moral and political influence emanating from us invisibly, and which, like light, will penetrate to the utmost limits of the earth, becoming both visible and tangible in the great and beneficent results produced. ”

“ But that supremacy, yielding to that mysterious law which has impelled the march of empires westward, is passing from her to another nation and another people; which people and nation, I need scarcely tell you, are ourselves. England, like all nations that have preceded her, has had her day: her destiny is nearly completed, her mission is drawing to a close, her work is done. And, under the providence of God, she has done much good, if she has done much evil. The world owes her much, and will owe her much more ”

“ Persecuted to the death they must have been; and liberty, finding no home and resting place on earth, would have fled to her native heaven, and left the world one frightful waste of the most hideous and appalling despotism. And now behold the wisdom of God in placing this continent, liberty’s own soil and home, so far away from the other grand sections of the earth. ”

“ Human foresight and wisdom could as little have foreseen all these contingencies, as human power could have provided for them. Oh, how much is here for meditation and reflection, and to fill the American with gratitude, pride and joy; filling us with assurance that God is on the side of liberty and the rights of humanity, and that we are now his peculiar people, called in his providence to work out the redemption and regeneration of the world. ”

“ And in order, young gentlemen, to set before you the magnitude and importance of the responsibilities of the youth of our country—the length and breadth, the depth and height of those responsibilities—it will be necessary to present to you, first, those subjects which have created those responsibilities, which now, in all the weight and force of a high and mighty moral obligation, the obligation of the Most High God, rest upon the American people in general, and upon the American youth in particular. ”

“ Great, indeed, will be the reward that awaits you, if you are found faithful and true in your day and in your generation. But oh, a heavier curse and a deeper infamy than ever were hurled upon the heads and characters of any, by divine justice, will rest upon your names and memories forever, if to your station you are false, and if to your responsibilities you prove faithless. ”

“ Christianity is at eternal war with falsehood, impiety and superstition; nor will she lay by her panoply of war until the last territory of falsehood, superstition and impiety is reclaimed, redeemed and annexed to her pure, pacific and holy domain. Truth of every kind is aggressive, and will not cease her acts of aggression and usurpation until the whole realm of error is subdued and annexed to hers. And liberty, too, is aggressive—oh yes, most aggressive—warring and will war against oppression and wrong ”

“ Were America as contiguous to the other three quarters of the globe as they are to each other, then she could not and would not have been what she has proven herself to be—the home and abiding place of liberty—because she would be in character and condition like all the others, possessing the same or similar forms of despotic government and religion, ruled by the iron rod of despotic power. ”

“ And I know of no wiser or better employment for rulers, statesmen, and all who have the interests and welfare of humanity at heart, and likewise for you, my young friends, than to examine well and peruse carefully those providential revelations of God furnished by history, that you may understand your responsibilities, and become the honored co-workers with Him for good to man, glory to God, and honor, fame and immortality to yourselves. ”

“ And Christianity without liberty is, of all forms of despotism, the most despotic on the part of those who rule; and of all forms of slavery, the most abject and degrading on the part of those who are ruled. ”

“ And the Bible, which must ultimately become the rule of life and conduct for all men—in authority and out of authority, for the ruler and the ruled—furnishes no more legitimate objections or arguments against the institution of domestic slavery, than it does against any other institution of man or society; and they who demand the total and unconditional abolishment of slavery on moral and religious grounds, must first produce a special message and revelation from God, on which to sustain their demand. ”

“ In answer to the second question, we say, that it is one of the distinctive features in the administration of God’s moral government, that he prepares for all events and contingencies, and furnishes things just when they are needed; thus doing for man, ever since the creation of the world, what he did for man in its creation: that is, providing for the necessities of man, as in the course of time and in the progress of things necessities may arise. ”

“ Human responsibility, my young friends, is a high and a sacred thing, and grows out of the nature and necessities of man, and is always determined by the condition of his nature and necessities. And as man changes, or as his condition and circumstances change, there will and must be a change in his responsibilities, his rights and his duties ”

“ Do man’s increasing wants and expanding necessities demand new and additional means of supply? In the providence of Him who suffers no sparrow to fall unnoticed, those wants are supplied. And when advancing science, art and commerce require new inventions and improvements, to increase the comfort, convenience and welfare of nations, God sends into the world the qualified minds to furnish the requisite means. ”

“ Thus has it ever been; every age or period of ages has had its leading and prominent nation. And though a rivalship has often existed between two distinguished nations, each striving for the supremacy; yet, in the end, the one has had always to yield to the power of the other.
Another fact equally interesting and important to us is, that this march of empires has ever been westward, or rather that supremacy of which we have been speaking, and which has always internalized itself in one particular nation for a period of time, has ever successively tended westward ”

“ But there is one circumstance connected with the doctrine of responsibility which we must not fail to notice, which is this:—that men are much more desirous of securing their rights than of meeting and discharging the responsibilities which those rights impose upon them; upon the same principle that most men would rather receive a debt justly due them, than discharge a pecuniary obligation equally just. ”

“ Incomprehensible nonsense, like that embraced in German transcendentalism, which many in our country profess to admire, and which they desire to engraft upon our literature, morals and religion, is taken for sublimity and profundity of knowledge—just as a muddy and very shallow pool is often mistaken for one of great depth. ”

“ But you will always find this conservatism, as it calls itself—discover it where you may and under whatever name or association it lies—posted and trenched against every species of reform, improvement and progression; standing still like a mile-stone, and sneering at and ridiculing every thing that passes by in its flying career. ”

“ Have the people no divine rights, as well as the priest and the king? A most eventful day it was and still is to the world when this idea was first suggested; for it is the great moral Archimidean lever that is steadily moving, revolutionizing and transforming the world in its social, political and religious aspects. ”

“ But almost every evil in our world has its antidote, at least it was so in the case before us; for by hard kicks and heavy blows, redoubled in quantity and increased in quality, sufficient to make even a donkey think, the idea of divine rights was at least, after many centuries, beaten into the heads of the people ”

“ Not the power of man, and certainly not the power of God, for it is his work and his purpose. Man cannot stop it, and God will not. Call it what you may—aggression, annexation, usurpation, everything known in the vocabulary of monarchists and conservatists—the same things—Liberty heeds them not, stops not to answer them or argue with them. She has a vocabulary of her own, containing her own terms, her own ideas, and her own principles of action. She is aggressive; all truth is so, Christianity is so ”

“ All things are tending to the fulfilment of that promise which gives the kingdoms of this world to the Son of God, and to which the Redeemer evidently alludes in that sublime prayer of his, the night of his betrayal, when he prays for the unity and oneness of all his believers and followers. ”

“ There are moral causes now at work—causes emanating from ourselves—sufficient, in the lapse of a few centuries, to effect this. The voice of prophecy in the oracles of truth, the mission of Christ into the world, and the nature and tendency of Christianity, intimate, we think, very clearly the truth of the idea we have advanced ”

“ It becomes a giant, even when young, and before its club of truth no hydra-headed monster can stand. And soon it was so in this case. The divine rights of the people soon became too strong for the assumed divine rights of kings and priests. ”

“ In one way or another, his life and conduct, however humble and obscure they may be, do exercise an influence, we cannot tell to what an extent, on the lives, fortunes and conduct of others; giving them a tendency and character which ultimately may result in consequences the most momentous, for good or evil, to society and the world. God rules over the nations of the earth ”

“ The first essential for the preservation and extension of liberty is universal and increasing intelligence, in perfect freedom of mind and conscience. But the most essential requisite for the preservation of these is the universal diffusion of virtue. ”

“ Not that they should desire less the possession of all their rights, but the discharge of all their responsibilities more: because that in receiving our rights and our dues, the blessing or the benefit is confined to ourselves; but in discharging our responsibilities and duties, we benefit and bless others;—and how fay that benefit and blessing are extended, depends upon the nature and character of those responsibilities. ”

“ It is a knowledge of things themselves as they are, a knowledge of the signs and tendencies of the times, a profound and accurate knowledge of the character and wants of the age. And all this requires time, long and laborious study, close, honest and independent investigation—an investigation carried on irrespective of the fear, or favor, or dogmas of men. ”

“ These are no idle nor unimportant questions; but when considered in relation to the purposes of God in reference to the interest of humanity, lead us to the contemplation of the wisdom and goodness of Him who alone is wise in council and excellent in knowledge. ”

“ The class of facts to which we call your minds is, that since nations and empires began their march on the field of time, the van of that march, for a certain period, has been led by some one nations pre-eminent and distinguished above all others, until it had finished its mission and completed the work assigned it by Him who employs nations as well as men to do his will ”

“ And when the peculiar condition of society and the general necessities of the world require a new or an additional continent, then that which was created from the beginning and kept in reserve for this very emergency, is in due time disclosed to the rest of the world. ”

“ This results from the fact that it is more pleasant to receive than to give; though it is much more blessed to give than to receive; and this is the law or consideration that should influence all men in the discharge of their duties and responsibilities. ”