24
THE BATTALION.
DEBATE,
Resofved That the Present Course of our RepubFie Tends Toward
Dissofution.
By 0. T. FWcGarthy.
I sing of thee, 0 liberty most gracious Goddess at whose
sacred shrine the rich and poor alike may worship, whose
grace is grateful and ever shall oe, till the God of nature
shall have run his course.
Divinely favored, this great nation, that a sacrificing
genius assumed the guidance of her destiny in the dark revo
lutionary period of her struggle for liberty.
It was not a war of immoderate desire of preferment or
exaltatio i, in wnich monarchs contended for a crown or
acquisition of territory, it was a struggle for individual free
dom and civil rights descending in its principles to the
inviolable refuge of home and happiness and defining for
every man due proportion of accountability he should exercise
oyer his own condition, possessions and occupations.
The sight was imposing and sublime and may well be
pronounced the most brilliant in the history of man s social
progress.
The instructive lessons of history can no where be
studied with more profit and with better results than in the
present revolutionary period of discussions and dissentions
which shake this land of liberty to its very foundation and
threaten its destruction and especially by us who enjoy the
blessings of freedom purchased by the blood of our grandsires
and purified by their tears.
Little honor or reward is to us that we sing their heroic
deeds unless we imitate their example and unselfish devotion
to their country’s cause. Their hearts were animated by an
absorbing principle, love of country, lest love for government
be lost, their motto was “union forever” and undivided