«2 M26 
 
 Cop 
 
 y 1 
 
 ORATION, 
 
 POEM, 
 
 Speeclies, Clii»omcles, &c., ^ 
 
 
 Jftoioni}f%'^alkn Coluit Jail | 
 
 On Thursday ETening, October 29th, 1857 
 
 
 
 '^ 
 
 % 
 
 
 M AL D E N: 
 
 PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY CHARLES C P. MOODY. 
 185 7. 
 
ORATION, 
 
 POEM, 
 
 Speeches, Chronicles, «fec.. 
 
 AT THE 
 
 §t)iMm of i\t Ualben Mm lall, 
 
 On Thursday Erening, October 29th, 1857. 
 
 M ALD E N: 
 
 PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY CHARLES C. P. MOODY. 
 1857. 
 
fl4 
 
 PUBLISHEE'S ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 A desire having been expressed by many persons, 
 that the proceedings at the dedication of the new Town 
 Hall should be published, the undersigned has ventured 
 to issue a moderate pamphlet edition of the same, sup- 
 posed to be sufficient for the citizens of Maiden only. 
 The price is a little higher than would ordinarily 
 attach to a pamphlet of this size, when the edition 
 was a large one. The Oration and Poem are each 
 worthy of record, and our citizens may well feel proud 
 that they have those dwelling among them who are able 
 and willing thus to respond, without compensation, to a 
 hasty call for their literary services — rendered, too, in 
 a manner highly creditable to themselves, and to the 
 town. C. C. P M. 
 
 Maiden, Nov. 25, 185.7. 
 
DESCRIPTION OF THE NEW TOWN HOUSE 
 
 The building is a noble one, constructed in what may very properly 
 
 ■ be called an American style of architecture, differing somewhat from 
 
 ■i any of the foreign styles. The building is 86 feet long, by 55 feet wide, 
 
 J and constructed of face bricks, with free-stone trimmings, and a cast 
 
 iron front to the principal story. 
 
 The cellar is surrounded by thick granite walls, and divided by brick 
 partitions into apartments for fuel, &c. for the occupants of the several 
 parts of the building. The entrances to the cellar are by bulk heads 
 from the outside, and convenient stairways from the principal story. 
 
 The principal story is 12 feet high, and divided into two large and 
 spacious stores in front, with a ten feet passage way leading to three 
 large and convenient rooms for the town offices in the rear, and also 
 two circular stairways leading to the main hall above. 
 , In one of the rear rooms is constructed a fire-proof brick vault, for 
 
 the purpose of keeping the town records, &c. 
 
 In the second story is the well ventilated main hall, 52 by 67 feet, 
 and 24 feet in height, with two anti-rooms, one each side of the main 
 entrance, over which is a gallery projecting into the main hail about 19 
 feet, and properly secured with brackets, &c. . 
 
 In the space over the main hall, is finished another smaller hall 24 
 by 77 feet, and 10 feet in height, with convenient stairway leading from 
 the second story. 
 
 The building is lighted with gas throughout, and warmed by two of 
 Hanson & Hall's " challenge furnaces," placed in the principal story of 
 the building. 
 
 All parts of the building are constructed of the best materials, and in 
 the most thorough and substantial manner. The finish is plain, and 
 well adapted to the purpose. The mason work was performed by 
 Messrs Whittlesey & Ayer, of Chelsea ; the carpenter work by Messrs 
 Clark and Newhall of Maiden. The painting by Mr. T. C. Whitte- 
 more, also of tliis town. The gas fittings by Mr. Joseph H. Wait, of 
 Maiden. The design was furnished by Mr. John Stevens, of Boston. — 
 The whole cost of the building and land is $25,000. In the main hall 
 sittings are furnished for 750 persons, and they may be easily increased 
 to 1000 when occasion demands it. 
 
 The Building Committee, chosen by the town, consisted of the fol- 
 lowing gentlemen : Gilbert Haven, esq. (chairman), George Vannevar, 
 Gershom L. Fall, Elisha S. Convers, Caleb Wait, Hubbard Russell, 
 and Dnnirl V. Wi-e. 
 
ORDER OF EXERCISES, 
 
 AT THE DEDICATION OF THE 
 
 M A L D E N TOWN HOUSE, 
 
 Thursday Evening, October 22th, 1857. 
 GILBERT HAVEN, Esq., presided as as President of the occasion. 
 
 Potpourri, (II Trovatore)— on the Piano Forte, by Prof. H.G. CAREY. 
 
 Chorus — " Joy ! Joy ! Freedom to-day ! " 
 
 By the united Choirs of the Town, under the direction of 
 
 GEORGE P. COX, Esq. 
 
 Prayer — b}' the Chaplain, Rev. F. G. PRATT. 
 
 Dedicatory Hymn — written for the occasion by Rev. J. G. ADAMS. 
 
 Tune, North Bend, hj B. A. Burdilt. 
 
 For homes of Freedom in our land, 
 
 For rights to Freemen dear, 
 Great God we praise Thee, as we stand 
 
 This day assembled here. 
 
 For what our fathers here have known 
 
 Of Thy paternal care. 
 For seeds of strength which they have sown, 
 
 Whose fruits their children share ; 
 
 For all we praise Thee ! as we come 
 
 This house to dedicate 
 As Freedom's temple, Freedom's home, 
 
 In our good town and state. 
 
 Lord, make It such to us and ours, 
 
 A sacred altar, shrine, 
 Where Freemen consecrate their powers 
 
 To Truth and Right divine ! 
 
 Let strife of sect, and party hate, 
 
 Be banished from these walls ; 
 And MEN come here to serve the state 
 
 As holy duty calls. 
 
 And haste the day when through all lands 
 
 This manly work is done, 
 Which, in Truth's power, and Freedom's bands, 
 
 Shall make the nations one ! 
 
 Oration — by Rev. E. O. HAVEN, D. D. 
 
 Chorus — " Hale to thee, Liberty ! " 
 
 Poem — by JOHN L. SULLIVAN, M. D. 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 Short Speeches by Messrs Wm. H. Richardson, Jr., C. C. Coffin, 
 
 G. L. Fall, G. P. Cox, Wm. J. Eames, and C. C. P. Moody. 
 
 DoxoLOGY — " From all that dwell below the skies." 
 BENEDICTION. 
 
DE. HAVEN'S ORATION. 
 
 Fellow Citizens and Friends op the Town op Malden. 
 
 A work of great value to our town is just completed. This 
 convenient and creditable structure, the product of jour own 
 money, and of your own voluntary enterprise is erected, and we 
 now meet where hereafter your public power is to be exerted, 
 and your united voice shall be uttered, not only upon matters 
 of local interest, but upon the government of the Common- 
 wealth and of the Nation. We meet to-night to congratulate 
 each other ; and you have requested me to give utterance to 
 such reflections as shall comport with the occasion and make 
 it productive of good. We meet not as citizens to vote, not as 
 partisans to persuade, but as a body of the people to rejoice, to 
 exult in the possession of an edifice which by its very name is 
 significant of a fact that distinguishes us as a people, and exalts 
 us high among the nations of the earth. We meet as the peo- 
 ple of a Town. 
 
 Little political communities but one remove from the family, 
 like organized towns, must have been the first formed centres 
 of government, and in them we see the germ of nations and of 
 empires. And as the character of all subsequent growth de- 
 pends upon the seed, so the character of the nation and of the 
 empire to be formed depends upon its first centres of political 
 power. 
 
 You may take a mass of elementary unorganized matter and 
 subject it to the action of the great powers of nature ; let the 
 sun shine upon it, let water moisten it, and the air float about 
 it, and ere long you will perceive nature's chemistry begin to 
 operate. Particle will claim kindred with particle — antagonis- 
 tic elements will separate, and soon several centres of life will 
 be formed, and there will shoot up, from the seeds always mis- 
 
6 
 
 teriously furnished, organisms of beau+y and power, feeble at 
 first, but to extend through various mutations till they ripen 
 into exquisite vegetable growth or complicated animal bodies. 
 But the whole character of the future development always de- 
 pends upon the primary germ. Similar is the power of the 
 town. A large part of history is the history of towns. Towns, 
 which when large are termed cities, have stamped the character 
 of the world. Particularly in modern history, that of Europe 
 and America, have cities and towns been the foci of intelligence, 
 wealth, authority, enterprise, civilization, Ireedom, and art. I 
 propose therefore as a subject for our reflections, the Function 
 AND Value of the Town, in distinction from the State and all 
 other governmental organizations, large and small. 
 
 I have spoken of the beginnings of life, and of the fore-shad- 
 owings of all massive and advanced structures of nature in the 
 germs from which they spring. There are imperfect growths, 
 offensive, poisonous plants ; hideous, ravenous, and destructive 
 animals, suited only to a low order of development, and destin- 
 ed always in due season to pass away for higher grades. So 
 there have been and are national governments, like the Russian 
 and the Chinese, which are unfitted for the ripest civilization, 
 and which must disappear ; and in these cases the great govern- 
 ments are but the natural outgrowth of the first seeds. But as 
 our General Government is peculiar, and we may claim, in the- 
 ory at least, the best, so are the elements. The New England 
 town, now generally the American town, has no exact duplicate 
 in any other land, and is an original outgrowth of American 
 circumstance and of American mind. 
 
 In England, a town was originally a collection of houses on 
 contiguous territory, having some common centre of interest, 
 as a market. It was not a political organization, nor had the 
 inhabitants any specific municipal duties. A town-hall, like 
 this, would be with them an anomaly. In Europe, generally, 
 towns are unknown. There are settlements. There are tracts 
 of country marked out and named, but in the American sense, 
 towns do not exist. The free cities, so called, of Europe, were 
 the offspring of necessity. They were in fact collections of self- 
 emancipated slaves, who assumed the power of government, 
 
sometimes as despotisms, sometimes as republics ; and tliey be- 
 came the bulwarks and propagators of new political life, often 
 expanding into empires,and the first effectually and permanently 
 to resist and undermine that Feudal tyranny which once held all 
 Europe in chains. 
 
 But here the word town has a peculiar meaning. As we have 
 in America introduced many new terms into the English lan- 
 guage, so we have given to many old words an entirely new sig- 
 nificance, growing out of our new developments of life. One of 
 these changed terms is Town. When the first emigrants from 
 Europe landed on these shores, and grouped themselves into 
 settlements which they -called towns, it was necessary at once 
 that they should do for themselves what had been done for them 
 in the old country by the supreme power of the State. They 
 must make laws for order and protection. Criminals must be 
 punished. Internal improvements must be projected and exe- 
 cuted. The responsibilities of self government were thrown up- 
 on them. At home, order had been secured by some authority, 
 royal or parliamentary, or both, so that having no choice in the 
 matter, they were compelled to accept and obey. But in this 
 new land, royalty was represented by a feeble deputy governor, 
 and Parliement by a Colonial Legislature which was often anx- 
 ious to assume as little authority as possible, since all authority 
 thus exercised was particularly liable to interference from the 
 foreign government. The inhabitants of the several towns 
 were compelled tlierefore to govern themselves, or to live in an- 
 archy. Their primary organizations were much like the 'safety 
 committees' of our pioneer settlements, and other spontaneous 
 regulators of other years. They however sought legalization or 
 acknowledgment from tlie more open and concentrated author- 
 ity of the State or Province. Thus, gradually, with various 
 modifications, grew up the town, which has become an insepar- 
 able component part of all our free states, carried into all our 
 aiewly formed territories, and which exerts a more powerful and 
 salutary influence tlian any other one of our political insti- 
 tutions. 
 
 With a marked significance, may this tjontineut be denomi- 
 nated a new world. It was new, not merely in its animals, and 
 
plants, its mineral treasures, and in its exhaustless resources, 
 but especially as furnishing an arena where men, delivered from 
 the slavery of iron customs, and established usages, might clothe 
 themselves with a government growing out of their present ne- 
 cessities and desires. Theories here might blossom and ripen 
 into action. Our fathers were full grown civilized men, invested 
 at once with all the freedom of the savage. A general bank- 
 rupt law with reference to the past had been enacted, and here 
 in the forest they could organize society, not according to the 
 copies of antiquity, but according to the living mould of their 
 own souls. There is scarcely a foolis]^ custom among any peo- 
 ple that was not once useful and wise, but the necessity for it 
 having passed away, it is now an empty form or a tyrannical 
 habit. But old usages had no charm to those who in these for- 
 ests soon discarded not only their European clothes for garments 
 indigenous to the soil, and more fitted to their demands, but al- 
 so clothed themselves in social and civil institutions devised to 
 meet their present exigences. Among the best of these was the 
 American town. 
 
 . Behold a primitive pioneer town-meeting, such as might have 
 been seen not far from this very spot in the ancient and worthy 
 town of Maiden, more than two hundred years ago. These hills 
 were then clad with the primitive forest. The Deer, and the 
 Wolf, and the Bear, claimed residences by pre-emption, within 
 the limits of the township. Occasionally a lone Indian, or a 
 small band of these aboriginal natives called at the settler's cab- 
 in. A single road, laid out, I suppose, on an Indian trail, con- 
 nected this new settlement by a large circuitous route, " over the 
 neck " with Boston, which, itself was a village of less than a thous- 
 and souls, and a full day's journey distant, except as reached by a 
 boat or two, owned by the richest inhabitants. The houses 
 were illy constructed of logs, and thatched with the product of 
 our extended ocean meadows, which first attracted the settlers 
 this way. Near the centre of the town were two conspicuous 
 buildings of the same family, though one is larger than the oth. 
 er, and one is adorned with humble belfry ; these are the meet- 
 ing-house, and the school-house. I need not add that the meet- 
 ing-house is never warmed by a fire, though opened and well- 
 
9 
 
 filled, even in the coldest Sabbaths of the year, nor were the 
 prayers very short, or the sermons much clipped ; though how 
 our Puritan fathers, and mothers, could have endured the Bo- 
 rean blasts of winter is a mystery to their colder-blooded sons 
 and daughters. Their theology and eloquence must have been 
 of a hot nature, and we can but imagine that they had an extra- 
 ordinary quantity of home-spun garments and bear-skin over- 
 coats, and other native furs, while the hot bricks and primitive 
 foot-stoves were quite abundant. While we sit here in this ele- 
 gant edifice, how easy it is for us to imagine — far more comfort- 
 able perhaps to imagine it than it would be to endure it — that 
 we sit in that building erected just one hundred and ninety-nine 
 years ago, near this spot, in which the early town-meetings were 
 held. It is the first frame meeting-house built in Maiden, the 
 contract for building which was made the 11 th of September, 
 1658. It was a " good strong. Artificial Meeting-house, of thir- 
 ty-three foot Square," for which the enormous sum was paid of 
 " one hundred and fifty pounds, in corne, cord-wood, and provi- 
 sions, sound and merchantable at price-current, and fatt cattle." 
 Here Maiden's town-meetings were held, but whether or not 
 when it was completed the inhabitants held a joyous dedication, 
 tradition does not inform us. Yet we can but fancy that though 
 the first meeting in it was in mid winter, early in 1669, yet the 
 Rev. Marmaduke Matthews preached from his pul})it, under- 
 neath the huge-sounding board, a fervent and long discourse ; 
 and the old hardy, pioneer Puritans, who had seen the massive 
 cathedrals of their native land, rejoiced with tears, that in this 
 wilderness home, they had a meeting-house of their own, in 
 which with their children to worship God. In this rustic meet- 
 ing-house the people are gathered to hold a town-meeting. But 
 though the building is rustic — though that' thirty-three foot 
 square house has no pretensions to architectural splendor, yet 
 the idea shadowed forth to the eye of philosophy in thai assem- 
 blage, called a town-meeting, is destined to clothe this whole 
 world in political beauty. It is one of the master thoughts, 
 which combined, shall go forth to battle with tyranny, with 
 darkness, and with wrong, till the whole earth shall be re- 
 deemed. 
 
10 
 
 Beliold the assemblage. The venerable pastoi' is with them. 
 There are no severe conflicts of politics, divorced from morals^ 
 that make it indecorous for a religious teacher to discharge 
 openly the duties of an intelligent citizen. Grave deacons are 
 there, and receive proper respect Captains, corporals, ser- 
 geants and other military officers are in the company, for these 
 Puritans were compelled to fight, and right nobly did they do 
 it. Nay, even now, a stock of muskets is piled by the pulpit, 
 and a few stand on guard lost they may be suddenly- surprized. 
 
 The Select men sit in their places, and the chosen one,pre* 
 sides ; and these hardy settlers on the edge of a new continent, 
 only one grotip of a dozen, or more, similar towns already or- 
 ganized, not having yet began to dream that their settlements 
 would ever extend beyond these hills that skirt our Northern 
 and Western horizon, outnumbered many times by the savages 
 around them, and with nought to depend upon for protection 
 but their fire arms, their superiority, their integrity, and their 
 trust in Almighty God, proceed openly to discuss matters of 
 grave interest to the newly organized township of Maiden. I 
 know not what questions occupied the attention of the town- 
 meetings held in that noble thirty-three feet square meeting* 
 house. No quaint record of their proceedings remains. It waa 
 not then an age of Newspapers. Reporters were wholly un- 
 known. The Boston News Letter, the first Newspaper publish- 
 ed in Boston, and the first in America, was not yet established. 
 News passed only from Up to Up, and on the Sabbath, at noon 
 time, as they stood about the door in Summer, or gathered in 
 the public house in Whiter, all the latest intelligence was duly 
 retailed, and the wise men among them interspersed sagacious 
 unwritten editorial comments. This communicated to the Sab* 
 bath almost as much interest as the sermon. What then may 
 have been discussed in those early meetings we know not ; but 
 of this we are sure, that whatever was the question, whether to 
 lay out the road tiiis side of the mountain, or the other ; wheth- 
 er to pay the arrearages of the minister's salary in money, or in 
 corn, and pumpkins ; whether to employ a school-master four 
 months, or three ; whether to erect a pillory opposite the meet- 
 ing-house door J whether to punish theft by whipping, or by 
 
11 
 
 placing in the stocks ; how to resist the growing luxuries of the 
 age-^whatever the questions may have been, the simple fact that 
 they discussed questions of general interest in open town-meet- 
 ing, and decided them by a majority of votes, is what claims our 
 admiration ; and I doubt not, that in addition to this they dis- 
 cussed them with a high moral purpose, and witli a manly de- 
 termination, while they should secure as far as possible their 
 own convenience to make Maiden a decided power with the 
 other towns around, to plant freedom, intelligence, and Christ- 
 ianity, in these Western wilds. 
 
 Fellow citizens, that town-meeting and similar assemblages in 
 the sister towns were the first pulsations of an energy destined 
 to make this wliole continent vital. There were the germs of 
 glory, 'i'here the politics of the nineteenth century had their 
 birth. There was a little cellule of life, like tho^e in matter, of 
 which I have spoken ; and whether tliis continent is to become 
 a vast mass of ossification, a kind of coral mountain, in which 
 life is exhibited only at the extremiiicb, nil individuality being 
 destroyed, or whether it is to be a confederacy of independent 
 souls is to depend upon the continued vitality of thet-e same lit- 
 tle independent centres of political life. I plead then for the 
 continuance of our vital institution, the town ; nor let it be 
 imagined that it is simply because of the appropriateness of the 
 theme to the present occasion that I urge, perhaps extravagant- 
 ly, its claims. It is vital. It is primal in its value, as it is 
 primal in its origin. It existed before the StatCp and before any 
 union or body of States, and it is the mother of them both. But 
 for it neither the State nor the United States could endure as 
 genuine republics, nor could they secure that end, for which 
 they are designed, individual liberty. 
 
 And would you see clearly why it is that many other nations, 
 amazed at the prosperity of these United States, at their won_ 
 derful combination of liberty and strength, and striving to imi- 
 itate them, have faile . ? Why France, in spite of her spasmodic 
 efforts to clothe herself in freedom, has failed ? Why Mexico 
 and the South American States, though like us in a new world? 
 and driving their foes from them, have failed ? It was because 
 that in neither instance they had the town. And, Fellow Cit- 
 
12 
 
 izens, you may receive it as a political axiom, which reason af- 
 firms, and history verifies, that there can be no free country 
 without this element. Reforms, like all true strength and ma- 
 jesty, proceed from the small to the great. A ship, to be safe, 
 must be built from the keel upwards, of solid material. If the 
 joints, aud planks be imperfect, it will be imperfect. It may be 
 beautiful otherwise for a season, but it cannot buffet the storm. 
 God'rf grand works are glorious because he lavishes his skill 
 on the LITTLE, more if possible, than on the great. The Missis- 
 sippi finds its sources in the mountain springs ; the ocean could 
 have no tides, no majesty, no power, but for the shape and pol- 
 ish of every single drop. 
 
 There is a charm about this universal law in its application 
 to States. The science of government is preeminently attrac- 
 tive to an American mind, as it has received a new develop- 
 ment from American history. It has come to be understood 
 that the great object to be sought in government is the preser- 
 vation of individual freedom, and the securing to every man his 
 individual natural rights. The rights of conscience, the rights 
 of opinion, and of expressing opinion, the rights of choice of oc- 
 cupation, all limited, not for the good of a few but simply by 
 the principle not to infringe upon others' rights and safety — 
 this is the American idea. While an elasticity of administra- 
 tion is allowed, nothing being so fixed as to be incapable of 
 change, beneath all, as a foundation, rests this claim of individ- 
 ual rights and regard to them in others. But this is compara- 
 tively a new idea. It was known formerly, but it was only a 
 theory, not a fact. 
 
 This, I repeat, is the American idea. It is in fact the Occi- 
 dental idea in opposition to the Oriental, the idea of the West- 
 ern continent in opposition to the Eastern. 
 
 The idea of individual rights is not recognized or even enter- 
 tained in Asia. Men are treated like chaff, or if as grain, spok- 
 en of in the mass and estimated in the mass. In all the an- 
 cient great universal empires, man as man was never thought 
 of So is it to-day in Russia ; so is it in France. So is it mea- 
 surably in all Europe. In England, a marked contrast with the 
 East is exhibited, but in our own country alone is the value of 
 
18 
 
 man as man thoroughly appreciated and felt. There are por- 
 tions of this country where this idea is not understood, but they 
 have not the town, and are free only from a connection with the 
 rest. Would you see the origin of this grand thought, that is 
 yet working Eastward, or proceeding onward till it reaches 
 again its birth-place, to revolutionize the world ? It was in the 
 cabin of the May Flower, anchored off Cape Cod, two hundred 
 and thirty-seven years ago, that an act was consummated, 
 which from the character and subsequent influence of those per- 
 forming it proved a mountain spring, whence gushed out the 
 pure streams of liberty, destined yet to water the earth. Forty 
 one men, all there were in the Pilgrim band, including those 
 whose common appellation was Goodman as well as those call- 
 ed Mister, the servants as well as the gentlemen, signed their 
 own names, for they could all write, to the following paper. 
 
 " In the name of God, Amen. We whose names are under- 
 written, the loyal subjects of our dread Sovereign King James, 
 by the grace of God, &c., having undertaken, for the Glory of 
 God, and advancement of the Christian faith, and honor of our 
 King and Country, a voyage to plant the first Colony in the 
 Northern parts of Virginia, do by these presents solemnly and 
 mutually, in the presence of God, and one to another, covenant 
 and combine ourselves together into a Civil body politic, for our 
 better ordering and preservation, and furthermore of the ends 
 aforesaid ; by virtue hereof, to enact, constitute, and form such 
 just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, 
 from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and conven- 
 ient for the general good of the colony, unto which we promise 
 all due submission and obedience. 
 
 'In witness whereof we have hereunder subscribed our names, 
 at Cape Cod, the 11th of November, in the year of the reign of 
 our sovereign lord. King James of England, France, and Ire- 
 land, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, Anno 
 Domini, 1620.' 
 
 That Paper begot the Declaration of Independence, which 
 was passed by the Continental Congress, July 4th, 1776. That 
 paper, from the situation and forming power given to its sign- 
 ers, the first founders of a colony to stamp the character of 
 
14 
 
 coming states, was the initiative of a new outgrowth in history, 
 unlike and in advance of all that the world had ever before seen. 
 
 That Paper was founded on a higher estimate of manhood 
 than the famous Magna Charta, which is the basis of the Eng- 
 lish Constitution ; for the Magna Charta merely wrings out of 
 a reluctant sovereign a few privileges for a special class, thus 
 conceding that what is not granted may rightly be retained. 
 But the May Flower Paper assumes all to be equal both in ob- 
 ligation to the law and in power to make it. Beautifully pro- 
 phetic name was that. Some angel must have suggested the 
 word when that little one hundred and eighty ton craft was to 
 receive its title. For in that little boat sprung up after a long 
 and tedious winter of centuries a delicate heaven-tinted blossom, 
 which proved to be no feeble plant, but hardy and reproductive, 
 destined to clothe America with beauty and ere long to perfume 
 the world. 
 
 Is it not fitting then that we now, sitting for the first time 
 within these walls, should rejoice in the vital principle that they 
 represent ? Happy is that people that can comprehend a prin- 
 ciple ! Our fathers comprehended one, and for its triumph 
 fought long and well. 
 
 These walls body forth a principle ; and were they far less 
 attractive than they are, were this building like that of our fath- 
 ers, thirty-three feet square, and rough and unsightly, still 
 would we exult in it as a town-house, because it asserts a vital 
 law, the very heart and centre of all genuine political freedom. 
 
 I need not describe to you the workings of those principles in 
 all our institutions. I need not portray to you the backward 
 fermenting influence of these primal laws in the structures of 
 European society, by which the joints of despotic fabrics are 
 loosening, and all kinds of temporary expedients are tried to 
 support them, and every school of medicine puts forth its skill 
 to keep the ' sick men ' alive — all of which will fail till they re- 
 turn to the simplicity of nature and work from within outward, 
 from the elements upward, from the individual, and the fam- 
 ily through some political organization corresponding to our 
 town. 
 
 A momentous question is it now with some whether the foun- 
 
15 
 
 dation we have is capable of bearing the immense weight that 
 society on this continent must soon assume. It is a pleasing 
 and favorite practice to cast the horoscope of American destiny. 
 Nor is it by astrologic dreams, but by mathematical calculations 
 based upon solid facts, and in strict accordance with known 
 laws, that we by prophetic glass see North America peopled 
 with its hundreds of millions of civilized men. We expect here, 
 even as we believe in continued progress, to see every useful art 
 carried to a higher perfection than has yet been reached ; to 
 see marks of utility and beauty unparalleled, to see agriculture 
 and all kindred productive labor perfected ; to see every educa- 
 tional and reformative and preservative agency fully developed, 
 upon a scale of grandeur and in a degree of advancement never 
 before witnessed. 
 
 But there are those whose visions of American prophecy are 
 sombre and forbidding. History to them reveals no law of pro- 
 gress but constant repetition. The ages are to rush on in their 
 treadmill cycles of destiny, never to rise above the ignorance, 
 superstition, and degradation of the past. Liberty, and knowl- 
 edge, and cultivation, and independence, are for the aristocracy ; 
 the great multitude must ever be a kind of semi-animate basis 
 on which the fortunate surface few shall rest and rejoice, the 
 mass below forming material for census reports, for the rank 
 and file in war, for productive service in peace, but wholly de- 
 prived of independent thought and action. These atrabiliary 
 interpreters of history do not attribute American freedom and 
 energy to its political institutions, nor to its schools and reli- 
 gion ; but to the thinness of its population, to its millions of 
 unappropriated acres, and to the fancied ease with which in a 
 new land the necessaries of life may be procured. And these 
 same dark-visaged prophets assure us, that when the United 
 States shall have its two or three hundred millions of human 
 beings it will be impossible to preserve a republican form of 
 government ; the bulk will be too massive for self control, the 
 people will be too ignorant, prejudiced, mutually hostile ; pas- 
 sion will be too strong, conflicting interests too violent, dema- 
 gogues too shrewd, and a sovereign will be needed with his ar- 
 my and nobility to preserve the form of order in the immense 
 
16 
 
 mass. Then individualism shall die — for individualism in the 
 multitude and despotism cannot co-exist. The two facts are 
 contradictory and the one or the other must yield. The popu- 
 lation must be degraded into a mass to be counted or measured 
 by the foot or the cord, like wood, or mud, instead of being esti- 
 mated as so many individual intellects and souls to be trained 
 for thought and action here, and forever. 
 
 Let us allow no such vaticination to trouble our vision. We 
 repel it, not only because it conflicts with the promises of Christ- 
 ianity, the deductions of philosophy, and the rightly interpreted 
 teachings of history, but because we see in present American 
 institutions, if they are perfected and preserved, power to sus- 
 tain and vitalize a nation of any conceivable extent and number. 
 Yes, we do firmly believe that the fundamental idea of individ- 
 ual independent right and responsibility — the fact so well ex- 
 pressed in our noble Declaration — " all men are created 'free 
 and equal " — will yet with the force of an axiom find its way to 
 the universal mind, and like the Sun melt away all despotism, 
 and cause to spring up everywhere political institutions vital 
 and beautiful like that embodied in the American town. 
 
 For, be it observed, that there is this difference between na- 
 tions based on despotism and those based on freedom ; the for- 
 mer become unwieldy and unmanageable by growth, while the 
 latter will and must become by the same process more perma- 
 nent and mighty. Every additional State, in which the primal 
 conditions of safety are observed, strengthens the ties that bind 
 this union together. Any dangers that threaten our grand con- 
 federacy of States, do not arise from extent or numbers, but 
 from a want in some of the parts of individual cultivation in 
 the population, and also of the primary political institutions out 
 of which the great free State grows. The most essential of 
 these prime institutions is the true democratic town. Were all 
 of the United States, exclusive of the Territories as thickly pop- 
 ulated as Massachusetts, we should have a grand population of 
 about 190 millions, which is nearly equal to the whole of Europe 
 exclusive of Russia. And were the whole United States ex- 
 cluding its Territories as thickly inhabited as the Eastern half 
 of Massachusetts, it would contain a population equal to the 
 
17 
 
 whole of Europe, including Russia. And yet nowhere does the 
 Republican system of government work moie perfectly and sat- 
 islactorily than in dense and enlightened Massachusetts. No- 
 where else is the theory better understood ; nowhere else is 
 there quite so perfect and harmonious and complete development 
 of it, in all its appendages and demands ; and nowhere else on 
 the round earth do all the people enjoy so high educational ad- 
 vantages. 
 
 It is not bulk that gives weakness — bulk makes strength. 
 But it must not be forgotten that in order that bulk may con- 
 stitute strength it is necessary that the ultimate or prime ele- 
 ments, out of which the bulk grows, should be properly consti- 
 tuted and arranged, and should in fact have each of the essen- 
 tial properties desirable in the final structure. This fact, con- 
 stituting the very pith and substance of my discourse, is of so 
 much value that I must illustrate it still farther. 
 
 The pyramids of Egypt are the most massive structures of 
 man's building. They are monuments of the earliest post-dilu- 
 vian history. If you inquire into the cause of this permanency 
 you will find it to consist partly in the solidity of the material, 
 and particularly in the regular mathematical forms of the con- 
 stituent blocks, and the nice adjustment of the joints, leaving 
 no fissures for the admission of destructive elements. Had they 
 been built of irregular stones, though piled together, with the 
 greatest care, they could not have withstood the silent wear of 
 thousands of years. But far more forcible illustrations of this 
 may be found in the works of God. Nature's works are always 
 symmetrical ; and when God seeks durability he always begins 
 the preparation for it in the primal element. Take for instance 
 the diamond, perhaps the hardest structure in nature's laboratory. 
 It is only by the most violent and skilful efforts that it can be 
 broken and reduced to powder ; and when so reduced, the mi- 
 croscope reveals the fact that the ultimate particles, the very 
 finest diamond dust, consist of perfect diamonds, each particle 
 as symmetrical as the original gem ; and it is a plausible con- 
 jecture that the very smallest primitive atoms of carbon, of 
 which it is composed, those, particles too minute to be detected 
 even by the microscope, many of which we are now breathing, 
 
18 
 
 are little diamonds, and tliat the strength and beauty of this val- 
 nal)le gem consists in the fact that the original property of the 
 atoms is preserved throughout. 
 
 This law must also prevail in the most permanent productions 
 of man. A despotism to be strong must be a despotism through. 
 out. It should begin with the serf, or slave, and end with the 
 unli ' ited sovereign. The Emperor of Russia, by abohshing 
 .''erfdom, is undermining his own throne. And, too, he is be- 
 ginning precisely at the right spot. It will require generations, 
 perhaps centuries, to perfect the work, and there shall be many re- 
 actions, but Russia will yet be a republic. The entering wedge 
 is 'he abolishment of serfdom. And the only leaven that can 
 tio the work is that which must be applied not to the top, not 
 to the surface, but to the particles, the people. So too, a Re- 
 public, to be permanent, to be able to breast all storms, to de- 
 feat all foes, and to withstand all defections, must be symme- 
 trical throughout. And the symmetry must begin, not end, 
 wif/iin. All reforms work upward — from the small to the 
 great: they ever have, they ever must. Jesus begins with the 
 C'Ximnion people. Perhaps the majority of the first Christians 
 were slaves. It is a law old as nature, old as fact. Abolish 
 our National Constitution and our Confederated Government 
 to-day, and it would be no great evil provided that the primary 
 ultimate organizations remain ; for out of them, if we deserve it, 
 soon another general organization would arise. Abolish our State 
 governments in like manner, and they would inevitably in some 
 form be replaced. But let the general organizations remain in- 
 tact, and abolish our school districts, and our towns, and you 
 make a vacuum within, leaving the whole structure like a hol- 
 low tree, beautiful without, but unsound and feeble, and ready 
 in any violent storm to collapse and perish ! This, Fellow Cit- 
 izens, is sound philosophy, and truth not sufficiently understood 
 by the American people. Let us then cherish a proper estimate 
 of the value of the town. 
 
 To preserve the primal integrity of our nation, we have two 
 grand agencies which ought not to be overlooked, and which ad- 
 ded to the ballot and town governments, constitute the pillars 
 on which the whole glory of the United States stands. The 
 
19 
 
 first of these is Public Scliools. There are in t'lis :tate, their 
 birth place, the pruduct of the Town. In town meetings they 
 had their origin. From town nn-elings they receive their diiec- 
 tion and support. 
 
 There is a sense in which they are pre-eniinenlly American. 
 Our public schools, though proceeded by ^omc others in Europe 
 of a similar character, have some peculiarities giving them espe- 
 cial value, and had here an independent origin. They have 
 preserved the civilization of their e United ^tates. They aie in- 
 deed in this respect more elementary, more primal than the 
 Town, of which in fact they constitute a part. That they have 
 preserved the civilization of the continent is evident 
 
 Let us look at this sulgect carefully. It is written in the 
 history of the world, that the great preservers of civilization in 
 ancient times have been vast cities. What was the civilization 
 of former ages ? It was the civilization of Egypt — a compact 
 nation of cities. The whole extent of Egypt in its palmiest days 
 was about 4,600 square miles — smaller than the State of Mas- 
 sachusetts ; and yet, that little hive contained seven millions of 
 human beings. Is it a wonder that by constant contact and 
 motion they polished each other into civilization ? Such also 
 was the civilization of Nineveh, and Babylon, and Jcrusal m, 
 and Thebes, Damascus, and Athens, and finally of Rome. It is 
 not denied that for the want of true religion, in many of these 
 cities, the morals were grossly corrupt ; but it is a fact that 
 they were civilized. But what was the character of all rural 
 and scattered populations in ancient times ? Uniformly they 
 rapidly degenerated into barbarism, in all instances except 
 where some grand remedial agency existed to prevent it. The 
 Israelites having left Egypt gradually degenerated, and for the 
 space of five hundred years, descended in the scale of refine- 
 ment and strength, till the grand remedial agency devised by 
 Omniscience, was brought into perfect action, and all the males 
 were compelled annually to resort to Jerusalem, and engage in 
 one common worship ; and but for the wonderful preservative 
 power of the true religion, sustained even by inspired prophets 
 and miracles, their ruralization in the land of Canaan would 
 have made ihem savages. This is confirmed by the fact that 
 
20 
 
 when tliG twelve tribes divided into two nations, the two tribes 
 or Jews, retaining Jerusalem and their centralization, retained 
 also after stern conflict, the true religion and civilization, and 
 were a compact and educated people ; while the ten tribes, out- 
 numliering them, loosing their centralization, sunk down into 
 barbarism, mingled with other pagan hordes, and, like the lost 
 Pleiad, are forever blotted out of human vision. 
 
 The grand preservative agency among the ancient Greeks, to 
 hold up the rural population, was their Olympic games, held 
 quadrennially, at which tliey assembled by tens, perhaps hun- 
 dre s of thousands, not only to witness the combats of wrest- 
 lers, chariot-drivers, and foot-racers, developing the body, but 
 also to listen to the speeches of orators, the recitations of poems, 
 the reading of histories, and to gaze upon statuary and paint- 
 ings, and hear the charms of music, in those noble ' world fairs.' 
 Thus did the Greeks preserve their civilization. 
 
 Now come down to Roman times. Rome was for many cen- 
 turies the heart of the world. Her great basaltic road, the Ap- 
 pian Way, may almost have been called the great aorta of the 
 earth. Over its lava pavement rolled the wheels of every kind 
 of vehicle from every part of the woi'ld. It was trodden by the 
 foot of the Parthian horse, the Indian elephant, and the Arabi- 
 an camel. Thousands of pedestrians, like flowing and ebbing 
 water, wore its pavement smooth. Rome was the fountain of 
 civilization and the mistress of the world. She sent forth her 
 armies and her arts, her governors and her pedagogues, into 
 distant parts of the then known three grand divisions of the 
 earth. She partially conquered, and partially civilized, Spain 
 and Germany, and Britain, and her influence was not unfelt in 
 France. But she attempted too much. Her empire broke 
 down by its own weight. The heart of the world became clog- 
 ged with b:id blood. And there came down on Europe, after 
 Cnristianity became corrupt for the want of .some great civiliz- 
 ing power, a night of a thousand years ; a night in which near- 
 ly all that was good and noble, was buried and forgotten ; a 
 night of barbarism, from which Europe and the world would 
 never have emerged, had there not been buried in the ruins an 
 unseen element — Chiisti.auitij^ which, like a living seed in a 
 
21 
 
 pile of fermenting rubbish, retained its vitality, and after long 
 struggles burst forth, a crimped, twisted, sickly shrub, which 
 from that day to this, has been putting forth its limbs, stretch- 
 ing toward the sunlight, and striving, in spite of the cruel in- 
 termeddling of state-supported churches, to show itself as it is — 
 the tree of life for the healing of the nations, transplanted from 
 the paradise of God. In all this history we may trace the ten- 
 dency of thinly-settled communities to neglect the cultivation of 
 the mind. 
 
 Indeed it would not be difficult to show that all the savagism 
 of the world has originated in this way. God never made man 
 a savage — he became so by wandering off into the woods. 
 
 Why, then, it may be asked, is not America degenerate ? — 
 This applies no more to the west than to the east, for the pro- 
 cess of- population has been the same throughout. About two 
 centuries ago the primitive forests kissed the Atlantic shore. 
 The deer bounded where now is Broadway, and the Indians 
 pitched their wigmam, or smoked the pipe of peace, on the site 
 of Faneuil Hall. There had come to this vast expanse previous 
 colonists from Europe, many years before ; the Northmen, who, 
 after vain struggles for a home, left it, with scarcely a trace be- 
 hind ; afterwards, a company of Welchmen, who actually de- 
 generated into savages, and mingled with the aboriginal tribes ; 
 and afterwards, other English colonists, all of whom perished or 
 returned. But now there came men of sterner material— the 
 Pilgrims of New England, and the Cavaliers of Virginia ; the 
 former, rugged and strong as the rocks on which they landed ; 
 and the latter, bringing with them the polish of classical educa- 
 tion, and the refinement of courts. It was the Pilgrims who 
 gave character and stability to this country. Early they were 
 the tower of its strength ; and their principles and peculiari- 
 ties, like their descendants, can be traced in every part of Amer- 
 ica's domain.* 
 
 The common school^ next to Christianity, was the sheet-an- 
 chor of their hope. Ere yet their log-houses were complete, 
 the church was built and dedicated to God, and the humble 
 
 * The early Duch settlers of New York also established common schools. 
 
 4 
 
22 
 
 school-house rose as if by magic, for a hundred hands combined 
 to throw the logs together ; and on the rough seat running all 
 around the inside of the house, were ranged the coarse-clad ur- 
 chins and damsels, some with their backs towards the centre 
 and their faces towards the wall, and some listening to the 
 teachings of the master, who paced through the centre, proud as 
 the ruler of an empire, though his wages were perhaps a pound 
 sterling a month, and he " boarded round." But founder of an 
 empire he was. And but for that same unpretending class, 
 common school teachers, America would not have been a proud 
 republic as to-day ; but if peopled by white inhabitants at all, 
 they would have been like the serf of Russia, or the peasant of 
 Brazil. Long ago the people of these colonies were by far the 
 best educated people in the world ; and long before any nation 
 of Europe had begun to think of educating the masses, you 
 might have walked up and down the whole length and breadth 
 of New England — and though every man was obliged to carry 
 a loaded musket — though they went armed to church — though 
 every outward influence was toward barbarism — yet you could 
 not find one single native of the soil that could not read and 
 write. Such was the effect of common schools. And not the 
 smallest honor have most of our great men esteemed it (inclu- 
 ding some who have sat in the presidential chair,) that in their 
 boyhood they attended, and some of them in their youth taught 
 common schools. 
 
 Could such a nation become barbarian ? No ! The fire of in- 
 tellect was kindled in every soul, and many waters could not 
 quench it. 
 
 I have said that public schools are one of the elements which 
 with the town form the support of national freedom. The oth- 
 er element, and I bespeak your hearty interest when I mention 
 it, is the pulpit. The pulpit, too modest to urge its own claims 
 in this regard, must not be slighted. I must forget now that I 
 have ever stood within it, and here on this social and political 
 platform, maintain its power. Let the peculiarities of sect dis- 
 appear, too insignificant to be noticed in this grand survey. By 
 the pulpit, I understand the regular presentation and enforce- 
 ment of those central moral truths, around which the whole 
 
23 
 
 universe centres, and on which it rests, on every seventh day of 
 time, sacredly devoted to this high aim. What historian can 
 faithfully depict its influence ? What poet shall clothe its do- 
 ings in fitting heroic verse ? Is there a man so blind as not to 
 see it ? Is there a man so prejudiced as not to acknowledge it? 
 There are those whom reason cannot convince, but are there 
 any who can resist the omnipotence of fact ? You see the 
 streams imprisoned by winter, leaping and laughing at the re- 
 turn of Spring, and the pent up vegetable powers, budding into 
 beauty, and can you doubt that it is the effect of the smile of 
 the sun ? You see the tides following regularly the track of 
 the orb of night, and can you doubt that they are caused by the 
 moon ? It were certainly idle to argue that fire does warm. 
 Now observe that where the pulpit is unknown, or if known, is 
 degenerate, and has not its proper ammunition, the bible, and 
 that too read and studied by the people, there constitutional 
 liberty is always unprized and unknown; while within the 
 range of its light, and always in proportion to the purity cf its 
 beams the people arise into the majesty of independence and 
 manhood. 0, it were inexcusable folly to deny the fact that the 
 greatest system of individualizer on earth is Christianity, and 
 the greatest individualism that ever appeared among men, was 
 he whom we call the Savior of the world. To him, and in the 
 light of his doctrine, every human being is more valuable than 
 all worlds, and the beggar is as truly a man as the prince. It 
 was because our fathers were enlightened by the pulpit, that 
 they, unconscious of its full power, and moved by a sublime im- 
 pulse, signed that glorious paper in the cabin of the May Flow- 
 er, anchored off Cape Cod. 
 
 And was it not almost prophetic that afterwards the town 
 house and the meeting house were one, and the people met to 
 discuss and vote in the very familiar and sacred spot where 
 their understandings were enlightened and their hearts stirred 
 by immortal truth ? And if in the advance of society, it is de-- 
 manded that the buildings should be separate, never let the mu- 
 tual dependence of the two be denied or forgotten. 
 
 Thus have I endeavored to discharge, though it be unwortlii- 
 iy, the duty you have imposed upon me. There are itoany 
 
24 
 
 branches of thought appropriate, but none seemed to me so na- 
 turally to grow out of the occasion as the value of that Ameri- 
 can institution, the Town. Our fathers were not led to its es- 
 tablishment by any marked sagacity which distinguished them 
 above all other people. It was partly the resiilt of their circum- 
 stances, partly of their education, partly of their religion, and 
 wholly of the good Providence of the Supreme One. They were 
 not curious of w^hat they did. Those who accomplish great 
 acts, seldom are. They were not accustomed to draw beautiful 
 fancy pictures of the future, they had enough to do to live in 
 the stern present. They often violated their own principles, 
 but it was unintentionally and from a good purpose ; and there 
 is this wonderful power about truth that if acknowledged from 
 the heart, it will contend with all error and conquer it, and in 
 time crush it out. They were plain, practical, strong, earnest 
 men. They are often ridiculed, and so all positive characters 
 can be. It is only smooth, polished, negative persons that pre- 
 sent no angles on which you can fasten a joke. That face must 
 be totally void of expression that cannot be caricatured. Lord 
 Brougham is a positive man, and therefore suffers much in the 
 pages of Punch. Ichabod Crane was an absolute power, and 
 left his image on the mind of Washington Irving, and was 
 therefore fit to become the standing national picture for a ludi- 
 crous Yankee school-master. Socrates, patient and good, was 
 ridiculed by Aristophanes, on the Grecian stage. 
 
 Our fathers were rough and earnest, and our mothers were 
 their fitting companions. Would that we could see them, those 
 bearded and moustached ministers, erect and grave, walking 
 among the people as princes and oracles, and yet fearlessly crit- 
 icised, and boldly contradicted by any parishioner who fancied 
 that he or she had found some new light ; the men, grave, and 
 sometimes gay, ready to wrestle, pitch quoits, discuss texts, or 
 fight the Indians, looking forward with joy to Thanksgiving- 
 days when they devoured vast quantities of turkeys and pump- 
 kin pies, both native American dishes, and the women too, as 
 earnest, as brave, as independent, and as self-reliant as the men. 
 What if they did have their faults — who has not ? They be- 
 lieved in witches, did they ? Yes, and they determined too, to 
 
25 
 
 rid themselves of such abominations. Even in this they show- 
 ed their genuine and brave sincerity, Other people believed in 
 witches long afterwards, and trembled at the word, but relied 
 chiefly on old rusty horse-shoes nailed over the door-ways for 
 defense— our fathers needed stronger weapons and used them 
 till they learned better. 
 
 They persecuted the Quakers, did they ? Yes, and a great 
 outcry is raised over it — though even then they were far in ad- 
 vance of the rest of the world on this very subject, and they had 
 strong temptations to this wrong, and in some cases the perse- 
 cuted deserved punishment for actual civil offences ; and they 
 saw this error and abandoned it without any instruction from 
 abroad. But they need no defense. They have -opened up a 
 new and glorious chapter in history ; and you may select any 
 other people that ever lived on this round earth, and seek in 
 vain for a more glorious career. 
 
 Are we proud of our origin ? It is an unworthy pride unless 
 we tread in their footsteps and honor their name. Let us then 
 deserve political freedom, and by deserving, secure it. Govern- 
 ments do not make, they are made. They are not the trunk, 
 they are the foliage and the flower. 
 
 How then shall we dedicate this house ? Behold it. Materi- 
 ally it is but a trifling work. All the brick and stone and wood, 
 would scarcely make a single block of an old Egyptian pyramid, 
 or raise the superstructure a single inch. Yes ! but in soul, in 
 association, in the thoughts that cluster about it, in the beauty 
 that plays within it, how vastly siiperior is this house ! "Forty 
 centuries look down upon you. Frenchmen," exclaimed Napole- 
 on as his fierce conquering army met on the sands of Egypt the 
 foes they had unrighteously attacked ! It was a sublime ex- 
 pression, a thunder-bolt of thought. — But were we called upon 
 to defend our liberties in the sight of a humble New England 
 Town-house, with what more than human eloquence would 
 these silent walls plead for liberty and right ! And that mag- 
 nificent structure of ancient Rome of which the poet has so 
 beautifully sung : 
 
 But when the rising moon begins to climb 
 Its topmost arch, and gently pauses there ; 
 
26 
 
 When the stars twinkle through the loops of time, 
 
 And the low night-breeze waves along the air 
 
 The garland-forest, which the gray walls wear, 
 
 Like laurels on the first bald Caesar's head ; 
 
 When the light shines serene but doth not glare, 
 
 Then in this magic circle raise the dead ; 
 
 Heroes have trod this spot— 'tis on their dust ye tread 
 
 AVhile stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand ; 
 
 When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ; 
 
 And when Rome falls, the world. 
 And yet could you stand before these majestic rains witliout 
 thinking of the thousands of Jewish slaves that toiled to build it? 
 And of the groans and sighs and screams and agony of the gladi- 
 ators that fought there, aye, and of the early Christians, men, 
 women and children, torn to pieces by wild beasts in the pres- 
 ence of tens of thousands of spectators, while the Roman ladies 
 looked on with delight, and by turning their pretty thumbs 
 downward forbade all hope of mercy to the dying martyrs ! And 
 even that largest structure of modern times, St. Peter's — does it 
 not speak to us of superstition, when men thought to pur- 
 chase pardon for sin by dying devotions, and the ignorant popu- 
 lace poured out their money to pay for safety against the Turk, 
 the comet, and the devil? No such associations martins build- 
 ing. It is the free will offering of the people. It is the temple 
 of Liberty, the plain, unadorned enclosure, where man meets 
 man on common grounds and mind meets mind, and out of the 
 union wisdom is born. 
 
 We dedicate this house then to Freedom of Speech, to Wis- 
 dom and Justice. Here let right assert her own authority. 
 Here let Humanity reign. Here let the oppressed always have 
 their advocates, and tyranny never find a friend. Here let the 
 voice of Maiden be uttered, ringing and loud, for truth and for 
 God, and men never be wanting, able to prize, worthy to enjoy, 
 and willing to defend the noble birthright bequeathed to us by 
 our patriot sires. 
 
DR. SULLIVAN'S POEM. 
 
 Unarched, unpillared, plain, substantial, square, 
 Though here no cloud-capped turrets pierce the air, 
 No dome swells proudly to the eye of day, 
 From walls whose massive grandeur mocks decay; 
 His desert, tomb no haughty Pharaoh rears, 
 The task of nations, and the toil of years ; 
 Though here no deathless triumph art has won, 
 Breathing the life of Poesy to stone ; 
 Though through yon stream no white-limbed Nereid roves, 
 No stately Dryads haunt the unclassic groves ; 
 Though ne'er yon hill, by bright immortals trod. 
 Has bowed beneath the footsteps of a God ; 
 Though here, half-crazed with love of antique lore. 
 No foot-worn pilgrim comes from many a shore. 
 By mouldering arch, by nodding tower and wall. 
 And ivied columns toppling to their fall. 
 By tombs long vacant, temples long o'erthrown, j 
 
 On Times' sad wrecks to muse and mourn alone; 
 Though as he points you reverent to the page 
 
 Whence Learning's radiance streams through every age, ^ 
 
 Like Horeb's fires which burn but ne'er consume, ; 
 
 As turns the Moslem's face to Mecca's tomb, j 
 
 Here turns nor scholar's eye, nor poet's heart, I 
 
 As to the cradle land of song and art ; i 
 
 Though to these shores Antiquity bequeathes . | 
 
 Nor hero's bays, nor minstrels fadeless wreaths, | 
 
 To our brief Past no. golden Age belongs 
 
28 
 
 Of arts, and arms, and eloquence, and songs ; 
 Not ours the Arcadian lute, the Orphean lyre, 
 Nor blind old Homer's harp of deathless fire ; 
 Not ours the halos of undying fame. 
 Which round a Scipio's burn, a Caesar's name ; 
 
 Yet even these walls, where scarce the echoing din 
 Of labor hushes, ere these rights begin, 
 This spot, redeemed as 't were but yesterday 
 From savage beasts, and men more brutes than they, 
 Though mute for ages, finds to-night a tongue. 
 Whose voice of triumph joins the choral song 
 Of the world's freedom, chanting in the ear 
 Of its slaved millions their deliverance near. 
 Yes, from this spot, each kindred spot and dome 
 Fair Freedom hallows, her peculiar home, 
 From Maine's rude coast, Francisco's glassy bay, 
 From capes that glisten in the gulf's warm spray, 
 To the green prairies where the exile bears 
 The patriot's valor, and the pilgrim's prayers 
 All lifting up their voices like the sound 
 Of many waters, heard the world around, 
 Borne echoing back from every shore and sea, 
 Swells the high pgean, " Earth shall yet be free." 
 
 Such the proud boast, whose trumpet tones sublime 
 Swept from these shores and rang through every clime, 
 So to the Old world called the New aloud. 
 What time our sires those sacred truths avowed, 
 Whose triumph opened in the boundless West 
 Earth's last asylum for the World's oppressed. 
 Which blaze to-night and burn these walls around, 
 Hallow this spot and make it holy ground ; 
 That men born equals, none have leave to bind, 
 Nor hold in bonds of ignorance the mind ; 
 That in all lands, which throw the impartial door 
 
29 
 
 Of learning open or to rich or poor, 
 Where meek-eyed Tolerance breaks the bigot's rod, 
 And leaves the conscience free to worship God, 
 There nations flourish, there the State shall be 
 Safe though self-governed, firmly ruled though free. 
 
 So pled for truth those true, strong hearted men, 
 And oft repulsed, pled patiently again ; 
 For hearts still loyal loved their father land, 
 And in the tyrant's owned a sovereign's hand, 
 Till by long outrage forced to look on those 
 Once loved as brothers with the hate of foes. 
 The indignant farmers, fortune, honor, life, 
 Pledged to the chances of the unequal strife, 
 In few and simple, but immortal words 
 To heaven appealing, beat their scythes to swords ; 
 On yon green slope, whose shaft shall proudly tell 
 "While Time endures, the tale we know so well. 
 Silent though fearless, through the moonless night 
 Dug their rude trenches for the morrow's fight, 
 "When huge and spectral loomed the ships that lay 
 Moored in the stream through morning's twilight gray, 
 Their wakeful watch the fort's low line alarms. 
 And his shrill signal roused the foe to arms, 
 From each black frigate through the war-clouds dun 
 Roared the hoarse thunders of the deep-toned gun, 
 While our brave fathers, strengthening for the fray 
 Their frail redoubts with fence and new-mown hay, 
 Their homespun flag to June's soft breeze unfurled, 
 And fired the shot still echoing round the world. 
 
 Seven long years' travailing at the nation's birth, 
 The groans of freedom filled the shuddering earth ; 
 Then, while he raised his lettered hands and blessed 
 The young Alcides cradled in the West, 
 5 
 
30 
 
 New hope each captives's kindling heart inspires, 
 As up the Heaven, resplendent with strange fires. 
 He sees the nation's natal planets rise. 
 The new Orion of the sunset skies. 
 Then Europe witnessed with pretended scorn, 
 But inward tremors, a Eepublic born ; 
 While tyrants, pointing to the fates of all 
 Past commonwealths, stood prophets of its fall. 
 
 Thank God ! not yet their vulture's beaks have torn 
 The eye, which looks undazzled on the morn, 
 Above their hate the fearless eagle springs, 
 Hope in his eye, and victory on his wings. 
 
 But hark ! the solemn voices of the past 
 Eepeat, republics are not born to last. 
 Ill-bom prosperity too soon creates 
 The lusts that weaken, strifes that sever states ; 
 Too soon the virtues of their youth decay. 
 Sloth saps, and vices waste their strength away. 
 'Twas thus with Athens, freedom's early home. 
 With crushed, now Papal, once republic Rome. 
 Through the same streets, which witnessd long ago 
 Of the world's victors each triumphant show, 
 As rich with tribute, every nation brings 
 EoU their red chariots drawn by captive kings. 
 Move the mock pageants of a faith that binds 
 In hopeless bondage hands and hearts and minds. 
 The sports of Carnival usurp the place 
 Of warlike games, which rear a martial race ; 
 The sons of Romulus their lives employ 
 In vacant pastime, or voluptuous joy. 
 On Rome's sad ruin gazing undismayed, 
 Shake the babe's rattle for the hero's blade, 
 Or murmur, basking idly in the noon, 
 
31 
 
 ** Hail, ' sweet do-nothing,' fortune's happiest boon." 
 
 No more forever, or in hope or fear, 
 
 Their palsied arms shall poise the shattered spear, 
 
 No blow for freedom dare their hands again 
 
 As, Slavery's self-grown sweet, they hug their chain. 
 
 God of our fathers, from our hearths and homes 
 Avert the terror of a fall like Rome's ! 
 Let faith look up, and still behold thy hand, 
 Outstreached to save, even while it smites the land. 
 
 Nor mourn that princely opulence denied, 
 Which loves to mimic unrepublic pride, 
 For lands soon look on Freedom's setting sun 
 When wealth rolls in, by honest toil unwon ; 
 When banks their aid to lawless usury lend, 
 To strip the merchants, whom they should befriend ; 
 When the street Shylock with a heart like stone, 
 Sticks the meek victim with his cut-throat loan. 
 
 Through Time's far vistas with prophetic eye 
 Piercing the shadows of Futurity, 
 Behold, still safe through every hostile storm. 
 The star-crowned Union lifts her glorious form 
 With thrice the orbs, which bound her youthful brow, 
 That starred tiara burns and blazes now. 
 Still westward winds the emigrant's long train. 
 Their white-topped wagons gleaming o'er the plain. 
 There go the children whom your love pursues 
 With prayers and blessings, wander where they choose,- 
 There bring the dauntless spirit of their sires, 
 The heart that faints not, hand that never tires. 
 The restless, quenchless energies of mind 
 And mould, which stamps them foremost of mankind, 
 There win from spendthrift nature's living gold 
 
Unmined, the wealth these barren glebes withhold, 
 There plant, where seaward blue Columbia foams 
 Each shore an Eden, new JMew England homes, 
 There teach their little ones the prayers they tried 
 To lisp in childhood, kneeling at your side. 
 
 There, as New Empires to quick being start. 
 Each claimed and welcomed proudly to her heart, 
 Shall the loved Union see star after star, 
 As yet unborn, rise flaming from afar ; 
 There like the apocalyptic angel stand 
 One foot on sea, and one upon the land ; 
 Her face a glory like the sun shall shed. 
 As mid the heavens she lifts her towering head, 
 One grasp the sword which won the world's release. 
 One radiant palm the olive branch of peace, 
 As the glad nations lavish at her feet 
 Honor and gifts unsought, and thus more sweet. 
 Exclaim, " not mine the eagle, but the dove 
 For Earth is conquered — not with arms but love,'* 
 
SPEECH OF WILLIAM H. HICHARDSON, Jr. 
 
 At the conclusion of the Poem, the President remarked that 
 as the hour was yet early, and as there were several of our 
 citizens who would favor the audience with remarks on this in- 
 teresting occasion, he would first call upon Mr. Wm. H. Richard- 
 son, Secretary of the Committee of Arrangements. Mr. Rich- 
 ardson responded to the call, and spoke as follows ; 
 
 Mr. President, and Ladies and Gentlemen, 
 
 In attempting to make a few remarks in response to the call, 
 I feel that what I shall offer will be like the song after the feast, 
 or the whirl of a tiny wheel after a brilliant pyrotechnic display. 
 Were I to select a sentiment most appropriate to the occasion, 
 and in accordance with my own feelings, as expressive of our 
 position — it would be " our town, and our duties." To that 
 sentiment I will endeavor briefly to address myself. 
 
 I am fully conscious that the few moments allotted to me are 
 totally inadequate to a fair presentation of the ideas suggested 
 by so fruitful a theme. When Maiden was yet in her infancy, 
 and Boston was a far off City, — when her streets echoed only 
 to the tap of the lapstone, or the ring of the Anvil — when 
 the raising of a barn was an event in history, when the tything 
 man was vested with supreme authority, and when black-strap 
 — for the laborers, and wine for the ministers, was the common 
 beverage. Then — in those days of arcadian simplicity, it were 
 no difficult task to speak of " our town, and our duties." But, 
 when with the march of time, improvement and progress, have 
 taken the place of rural simpHcity, and the City with its din and 
 smoke, and ceaseless whirl, has become linked by bands of 
 iron, to our once quiet village, and our town has become the 
 mother of a fair and blooming daughter. Miss Melrose, who is 
 striving to out rival her somewhat aged parent — in view of all 
 
84 
 
 these changes to attempt to do justice to the suggestions of the 
 sentiment, in the brief time now given mo, were to attempt] to 
 build a Town-House, in a night. Our Town-House, is no long- 
 er a remote contingency, but a palpable reality. We stand here 
 this night within its walls, not without, I trust, feelings of local 
 pride. Some one has said, that, in all creation and in all com- 
 position, the first step towards the realization of a thought, and 
 the closing step which lifts that thought into a material embodi- 
 ment, are the motives of a mental pause, flush with hope and 
 promise, and brimming with exultation. Such are the impulses 
 which have drawn us together this evening. 
 
 We have assembled to dedicate this beautiful Hall. We have 
 come with the earnest prayer — the stirring Anthem, the eloquent 
 oration, the classic poem, the sentiment and responsive speech, 
 — all combining to make this a joyous occasion. Maiden has 
 witnessed but few jubilees, like the one we this night celebrate. 
 In '49 we celebrated her natal year. Then she was adorned, and 
 decked with streaming flag, and emblazoned banner. Then her 
 sons and her daughters, came " from all the region round about." 
 Those whose infant years had first heard the lullaby upon the 
 bosom of a Maiden mother, — those who had in early manhood, 
 walked from her gates to seek a fortune, — or a name, then hast- 
 ened hither, to join with her native sons and daughters, to sing 
 Lang Syne, and gather new and fresher inspiration for life's du- 
 ties, and life's joys. These festal greetings — these dedicatory 
 services have a higher significance than is expressed in the sol- 
 emn prayer, — the oration, — the poem, or speech. These pass 
 with the hour, remembered for a day, soon to be swallowed 
 up by the returning waves of business, or house-hold cares. 
 This edifice should mark a step onward, and upward. It is the 
 exponent of our times, and the tastes of our people. The com- 
 pletion of this building, is the striking of another hour upon the 
 clock of time, telling us that we have accomplished one more 
 duty, and henceforward new agencies are placed in our hands, 
 with which to labor. Towns have their infancy, youth and ma- 
 turity, no less than individuals or nations, and it is every man's 
 duty to do what he can to make that town better and more at- 
 tractive for his having lived in it. What though we have been 
 
85 
 
 taxed within an inch of our lives to rear this beautiful structure. 
 Here it stands, and the time for grumbling has past. Let us 
 see to it that now it has become our property, that we rightly 
 improve its possible benefits. It may point a moral, as well as 
 adorn our village. If we have been extravagant, and I should 
 judge from the doleful groanings which the tax-bills extort, that 
 we had, let us in future count the cost, and appropriate accord- 
 ingly. But I would speak of our duties as citizens to each oth- 
 er. We need more social life in our midst, and our Hall is the 
 common ground upon which all should meet. This Hall 
 should be made the fraternizer of opposing interests and clash- 
 ing sentiments. This Hall opens a new field where rich and 
 poor, learned and unlearned — politician — fireman — mechanic 
 — merchant — minister and layman, all can meet and learn to 
 respect and love one another. We are too exclusive. We live 
 as though each of us inhabited an inaccessible island, and the 
 draw bridge was constantly up. 
 
 We meet together only upon Town-meeting days, each por- 
 tion of the town anxious to get her part of the public money. 
 That divided or " used up," we repair to our homes caring only 
 for what individually concerns us. " Lands intersected by a nar- 
 row frith abhor each other." If we can only get at each other, 
 we shall find that there are mines of gold, which we can coin 
 into blessings, richer far than California's glittering dust. Here 
 we stand hedged about by our own little jealousies and foolish 
 idiocyncrasies — each suspiciously eyeing the other, with cat-like 
 keenness, ready to jump upon every little fault we see, but don't 
 understand, allowing differences of opinion, which alone ennoble 
 dignify and elevate us, to become so many impassable barriers to 
 each other's hearts and affections. I was pleased with a remark 
 made by an orthodox brother the other evening at their festival, 
 which although there had been a good deal of pipe-laying prev- 
 ious to the levee, and much gas was permitted to escape, yet was 
 a genial, high toned and truly social occasion — on enquiring 
 whether enough would be realized to pay the outlay, he replied 
 " I don't care whether we make a cent or not — this social gath- 
 ering is worth all our trouble." So long as we withdraw our- 
 selves from these social communions, just so long will jealousies 
 
36 
 
 and divisions exist. " A community strictly defined, ceases to 
 exist, when it ceases to have common pursuits, — common in- 
 terests and common objects of affection and pride." God speed 
 the day, when instead of coldness and stiffening formality — when 
 instead of separating into factions, and laying an embargo upon 
 the kindliest affections of the heart, we shall cause gleams of 
 sun-shijie to radiate from soul to soul, and commence that inter- 
 change of courteous communication, which should always exist 
 between those bound together by the same municipal ties, and 
 the same local interests. 
 
 The fact is, there are those whom we pass every day, and only 
 know by a nod of recognition, or perhaps, pass without saluta- 
 tion, and whom we ignorantly suppose have no elements of 
 character congenial with our own : when, could wc but lift the 
 mask which conceals their views and thoughts, we should, be 
 surprised and delighted with their companionship. Now we 
 owe it to ourselves as citizens of one town, which is, rightly con- 
 sidered, but one great family, to throw off our exclusiveness, 
 and introduce ourselves to each other. Emerson says that 
 « Politeness is the ritual of society, as prayers are of the Church." 
 Socialism, my friends, is a sub-rehgion, and I verily believe, we 
 shall advance the cause of practical religion, by striving to know, 
 and benefit each other in the manner pointed out, ten thousand 
 times more than by practising a formal asceticism, or a vain and 
 narrow exclusiveness, which is the sure indication of a weak 
 head, and an experience which is bounded North by our " sect " 
 — East, by our church, — West, by our family, and South by 
 any snob that may perchance be introduced, into the family. 
 
 Some one has said that it is a popular delusion to suppose 
 that a man belongs to himself. No man does. He belongs to 
 his wife, or his children, or his relations, or his creditors, — 
 (there is no mistake about the latter remark in these days, it is a 
 most uncomfortable nearness,) or to society in some form or 
 other. It is for their especial good and behalf that he lives and 
 works, and they kindly allow him to retain a certain per cent- 
 age of his gains to administer to his own pleasures, or wants. 
 In short, society is the master, and man is the servant ; and it 
 is entirely according as societv nrovns a ffood, or bad master, 
 
37 
 
 Our duties then are simple but yet imperative. This incrus- 
 tation of self is all wrong. Let us make this occasion the key- 
 note to a broader public spirit and a more enlightened individu- 
 alism, so that we may all fall into line and keep step to the mu- 
 sic of this new Union. 
 
 A few words concerning the adornment of our town. I was 
 pleased with some portions of an address delivered by the Hon. 
 N. P. Banks, at the late Domestic Festival, at "Waltham. In 
 speaking of the attractions which gave a town its true glory, he 
 referred to the grand old trees, whicli^ deck her brow and adorn 
 her streets. 
 
 These, he contended, were the wreaths which made her so at- 
 tractive to residents and strangers. He spoke also of her beau- 
 tiful gardens, and the importance of horticulture, thereby prov- 
 ing himself not only a good Bank's man, but a good Gardner 
 man. We, Mr. President, need to pay more attention to the 
 adornment of our streets — the regularity of buildings — so that 
 instead of bald and unattractive thoroughfares — lines of houses 
 which look as though an earthquake had jostled them out of 
 place — and the owners were either too poor to replace, or in- 
 different concerning their positions, we may see wide streets and 
 richly shaded avenues ; and residences with a depth of front that 
 shall protect them from the sweepings of every wind that blows. 
 Let any one stand here in the square, which is about as near 
 square as a crooked-neck squash, and see what an utter lack of 
 all symmetry and regularity strikes the eye. It is positively 
 painful to see the angles and corners and sides, all mingled into 
 one confused mass. The public square, which should be the pride 
 of every town, is any thing but our boast. We once had a charm- 
 ing lake, whose waters the soul could drink, and which served as 
 a relief to the eye of the weary one, and which was indeed a dia- 
 mond of the first water, sparkling like a gem upon the bosom of 
 rustic beauty. That was sold, yes, sold to the highest bidder, and 
 its waters with the land upon its borders, which it was vainly 
 hoped the town would preserve from profanation, was allowed to 
 be sacrificed to the spirit of the almighty dollar. Now we have 
 no public square, we have no retreat of beauty, where childhood 
 and lovers and old age can congregate. If, instead of expending 
 G 
 
88 
 
 our public money upon streets that are never travelled, and upon 
 others laid over marshes with broken backs, that cannot sustain 
 them — If instead of trying foolish experiments, we would beau- 
 tify our streets with trees, improve our side-walks — widen and 
 straighten our lanes and squirrel tracks, lay out a public square 
 or two — we should diminish our taxes — enhance the value of 
 every man's estate in our midst, and what is of far greater im- 
 portance, it would broaden the path for a larger public spirit in 
 the right direction. It would dissipate purely selfish interests 
 — our town would become a source of an honorable local pride 
 and attraction, and Maiden would no longer drag her slow- 
 length along, in the march of improvement with her sister towns, 
 receiving only the dust which their more rapid strides throw 
 back upon us, but we could proudly point the stranger to our 
 public institutions, rich in architectural beauty — our cemetery, 
 whose attractions and sweet repose shall rest upon the soul like 
 a benediction — our rural walks, and public squares, all of which 
 shall be ours to admire, ours to enjoy, — ours to elevate, and 
 ennoble. All this, Mr, President, we can do — the possibilities 
 lie all about us. Thus shall we truly honor our town, and dis- 
 charge our duties. 
 
 SPEECH OF C. C. COFFIN. 
 
 C. C. Coffin, Esq. chairman of the school committee, was 
 then called upon. He said, 
 
 Mr. President : — The orator of the evening has most felici- 
 tously alluded to the habits, the customs, and the condition of 
 society in this town as they were in ancient times ; permit me 
 then, sir, to take up the subject again — going back over the 
 path of years, not so far as he has been, — but a quarter of a 
 century, that I may notice a few of the changes made in mat- 
 ters of education. 
 
 My appearance upon this platform in response to your call, 
 reminds me of my school-boy-days, and the system of education 
 then in use. I distinctly recollect my first attempts at oratory 
 in the old school house of my native town, amid the granite 
 
39 
 
 hills. The circumstances of the occasion will never be forgot- 
 ten ; for my heart by some unaccountable anatomical proces8, 
 jumped into my throat. You, sir, can undoubtedly say by 
 heart, the eloquent words I uttered upon that occasion, com- 
 mencing : 
 
 *' You'd scarce expect one of my age." 
 I remember that I was taught to thrust out my arm, so — to let 
 the audience know I was that high, — about four feet in statue, 
 and then at the passage : 
 
 " And if I chance to fall below 
 
 Demosthenes or Cicero," 
 I was instructed to make a similar gesture about eighteen inch- 
 es from the floor, to let the audience know, that that was the 
 possible oritorial difference between Cicero and myself. 
 
 And then at the lines: — [ Laughter. 
 
 " Don't view me with a critic's eye, 
 
 But pass my imperfections by," 
 I swept all criticism behind me with a magnificent motion. I 
 recollect that, because it was suggestive of my first attempt at 
 learning to swim. [ Renewed laughter,] 
 And then at — 
 
 " Tall oaks from little acorns grow," 
 I pictured the brave old monarch of the forest, throwing out its 
 giant arms, by pointing to the zenith. O, sir, that was rare ora- 
 tory. It would have been no violation of the ten command- 
 ments, if the audience had worshipped it, for the likeness of it 
 never was seen or heard of in heaven above, or the earth be- 
 neath, or in the waters under the earth. [Great laughter.] 
 
 Education in those days was conducted differently from what 
 it is now. The principle then was, that a free use of the ferule 
 made boys smart, and the principle as carried out certainly ac- 
 complished the object, as I remember to my sorrow. [Cheers.] 
 I remember the school books of that day. My first was "the 
 New England Primer, or an Easy Guide to the Art of Read- 
 ing," a book two and one half inches long, one and a half 
 broad, and a sixteenth of an inch thick — which in the space of 
 four pages, put us through from A to abomination. [Laugh- 
 ter.] Then there were the illustrations with marginal read- 
 
40 
 
 ings — one where Adam stood beneath an apple-tree, and in the 
 margin the couplet : 
 
 '« In Adam's fall 
 We sinned all." 
 
 The idea uppermost in my mind, was that Adam had been 
 up in the tree stealing apples, and had a tumble. [Renewed 
 laughter.] 
 
 Then there was the Moon — a jolly faced old fellow laughing 
 at the stars, with the information that 
 " The moon gives light 
 In time of night." 
 
 A remarkable piece of information I 
 
 Then there was John Rogers, going home to glory, in a 
 flame of fire — leaving " nine small children and one at the 
 breast," to mourn his fate. Then came the Catechism — dry, 
 hard, theologic food. Strange sir, that the book-makers should 
 have given knotty subjects, which have set the world by the 
 ears for eighteen hundred years, and which even now are in dis- 
 pute, to children just out of the alphabet I But that was the 
 system then. 
 
 After this came the wonderful American Spelling Book, by 
 Noah Webster, Junior, Esquire, with a picture of the author 
 on the frontispiece. I never shall forget its delightful fables, 
 of the young sauce-box in the apple tree, who would not come 
 down when the old man in a cocked hat, wanted him to, 
 but who was brought to his senses by the stoney arguments of 
 the gentleman. 
 
 I am aware sir, in this I am talking to the recollection of the 
 older portion of the audience ; but I trust I shall be pardoned 
 by the other portion, in dwelling a moment longer upon that 
 charming book of which I knew every word almost by heart. 
 Especially do I remember the Milk Maid, who counted her 
 chickens before they were hatched ; who determined to have a 
 new dress — in which respect she was not so very different from 
 the ladies of these days — [Laughter ] who declared that as 
 *' green became her complexion best, geeen it should be — that 
 she would wear it to the fair, where all the beaus the country 
 round would aspire for her hand in the dance ; and who with a 
 
41 
 
 self-complacent toss of the head spilled the milk, and lost her 
 chickens, and new green dress. [ Laughter.] A warning to 
 ladies for all time, not to count chickens before they are hatch- 
 ed — at least I suppose it was intended for them, for I never 
 saw the man who supposed that he was to draw an inference 
 from the fable. [Cheers.] 
 
 In Arithmetic we had that wonderful problem : 
 
 " As I was going to St. Ives, 
 
 I met seven wives ; 
 
 Every wife had seven sacks, 
 
 Every sack had seven cats, 
 
 Every cat had seven kits, 
 
 Kits, cats, sacks and wives, 
 
 How many were going to St. Ives." 
 I never could get that through my head. [Great laughter.] 
 Lindley Murray was our grammarian. We had great times 
 in passing, and the only object was to pass over it as fast as we 
 could. [Merriment] 
 
 It is said, .though I cannot vouch for the truth of it, that one 
 young lady in a declension of nouns, declared that kiss was 
 both common and proper, and that it was not common to de- 
 cline a proper one ! [Renewed mirth.] 
 
 Mr. Chairman, I could dwell upon those old time themes 
 with pleasure; but I have adverted to them merely to contrast 
 them with the present. And yet, sir, it is not necessary that I 
 should speak of the present, as it speaks for itselt. The common 
 school system of Massachusetts to-day ,is her crowning glory. To 
 her, it is richer than the diadem upon a monarch's brow. The 
 poorest child in our midst, who feels the sacred flame warming 
 his soul into a desire to attain knowledge, may, in common 
 with the rich man's son, ascend from the A, B, C, of the prima- 
 ry department, up through the elementary course, till he stands 
 a candidate for admission to the classic halls of Harvard. This 
 is more to the Commonwealth, than hoarded gold or marble 
 palaces. This it is which makes Massachusetts, to-day, the 
 brightest star in this glittering constellation of States, and which 
 in proportion as it is prized and cherished, will make her glori- 
 ous through coming years. 
 
SPEECH OF HON. WILLIAM J. EAMES. 
 
 The President next called upon Hon. Wm. J. Eames, of the 
 Governor's Council. Mr. Eames then responded as follows : 
 
 Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen, 
 
 After the able oration, the eloquent poem, and excellent mu- 
 sic from our own village choirs, to which we have just listened, 
 the inspiring words, and smooth cadence of which still linger on 
 the ear, I fear that anything I may say will come like the 
 " Benediction which follows after prayer ;" or perhaps, like the 
 " Finally bretheren," after a long discourse. 
 
 But I should be doing injustice to my own feelings did I no* 
 thank my fellow citizens for this cordial reception, and respond 
 in a few words to the call you have made upon me. 
 
 I do not rise to make a speech — in the ten minutes you have 
 allotted me, that would be impossible — but rather to congrat- 
 ulate the inhabitants of Maiden, and you Sir, as the Chairman 
 of our building committee on the completion of this beautiful 
 and substantial structure. I need not tell this assembly how 
 much I have desired, and how ardently I have labored for the 
 erection of a building like this. A few years ago, and we were 
 behind other towns in the number and character of our public 
 buildings, but now as we look upon our elegant churches, large 
 and convenient school-houses, and add to them this edifice : I 
 think we have reason to be proud of the public spirit that caus- 
 ed them to be erected, and to rejoice that " our lines have fallen 
 to us in such pleasant places, and that we have so goodly a her- 
 itage." We have come up here to participate in these dedicato- 
 ry exercises not as political, or sectarian partisans, but as mem- 
 bers of one family with a common object and a common destiny. 
 "We meet to encourage a free and social intercourse among all 
 our people, to bind ourselves more strongly together in bonds 
 of fraternal love, and to destroy if possible the spirit of local and 
 personal jealousy wliich is the bane of any community. Let no 
 
43 
 
 party bitterness intrude upon these festivities. Here, if no- 
 where else, let party strife be hushed. And here to-night let us 
 inaugurate an era of good will and brotherly love. I trust that 
 this occasion will tend to increase our love and veneration for 
 our native and adopted town, so that in the future, each of us 
 may be able to say of it, as of our State, and our country, 
 
 " Where 'er I roam, what other realms to see, 
 My heart untrammelled fondly turns to thee." 
 
 I am glad to be here to-night because in these days of ship- 
 wrecks on the sea, and financial wrecks on the land, it is re- 
 freshing to turn our thoughts to other and more pleasing themes. 
 Standing among familiar faces, listening to familiar voices, 
 it is natural, and seems appropriate to the occasion to inquire, 
 what will be said and done here in coming years. For one, I hope 
 to hear these walls echo to tlie classic eloquence of an Everett, 
 and a Sumner, to listen to the flowing periods of a Chapin, and 
 a Beecher, and to be made happier and better by the inspiring 
 music of Handel and Beethoven. And here, perhaps, on the 
 Sabbath day, 
 
 " The best, of all the seven," 
 some minister of our holy religion may stand upon this plat- 
 form to proclaim that gospel " which maketh wise unto salva- 
 tion." Here also will come the grumbling tax payer, and the 
 liberal' citizen, to exercise the noblest rights of freemen. But I 
 am reminded by the allusion in your call that I am expected to 
 say something of the State, in which we live, the primal institu- 
 tions of which have been so ably discussed by the orator of the 
 evening. I can only say, that I am proud to be a native of old 
 Massachusetts. It has been my fortune to travel somewhat in 
 other lands, and to reside some years in the youngest State of 
 this republic, whose rivers run over golden sands, yet I never 
 found a son of Massachusetts who did not love the State that 
 gave him birth, and who, if he was fortunate enough to obtain 
 a competency there, would not hasten home to enjoy it, and this 
 may, I think, be considered among the better feelings of our na- 
 tures, for who is there that does not sympathize with the spirit 
 of those words which say 
 
 " Lives there a man beneath the sun, 
 Who never to himself hath said, 
 This is my own, my native land 1 
 
SPEECH OF GEKSHOM L. FALL. 
 
 Mr. W. H. Richardson, Jr., offered the following sentiment : 
 
 The Buildinsr Covimittee — They have nobly discharged the trust 
 assigned them, and richly deserve the plaudit, "Well done, 
 good and and faithful servants." 
 
 After the reading of the sentiment, Mr. R. then called on Mr. 
 G. L. Fall, to respond. Mr. Fall answered to the call, and 
 spoke in words nearly as follows : — 
 
 Mr. President, and Ladies and Gentlemen : Nothing could 
 exceed my surprise in having my name called to respond to the 
 sentiment offered by my friend Mr. Richardson, for he knows 
 very well, sir, that I make no pretentions to public speaking— r 
 no, not before a small gathering, much less before this large 
 audience of my fellow citizens, who have had the pleasure of 
 listening to the eloquent and instructive oration, the poem, and 
 the several gentlemen who have interested them this evening. 
 A proper response to the sentiment would require some statis- 
 tics, which I cannot give at this time, correctly ; and if I could, 
 I should be doing injustice to my associates on the committee, 
 not having exchanged a word with either of them upon the 
 gubject. But they will justify me in saying, that the duties 
 of the committee have been very arduous. Soon after the com- 
 mencement of our labors, the committee found many embarrass- 
 ments in their way. By vote of the town, our public square 
 was the nucleus around which the inhabitants had drawn a line, 
 and in the location of the building, we could not go beyond it. 
 Within that circle, we found a fe^v desirable lots, but the 
 price asked for them was double what we had reason to suppose 
 it would be. To determine the location of the building, the 
 material of which it should be constructed, and the plans, and 
 and general arrangements for the present and future interest of 
 the whole town, caused much anxious solicitude with the com- 
 mittee. Our own meetings have been many, for aught I know, 
 " three score and ten." If any have complained, I am sure 
 
45 
 
 none has had more cause of complamt than the seven ladies 
 most intimately connected with the committee. Arduous, and 
 at times perplexing, has been our duty, yet the committee have 
 been united; every vote has been unanimous, as the records 
 will show. In a few weeks we shall resign the trust committed 
 to our care, and shall give you this spacious building, which 
 will stand for ages, unless destroyed by the elements, or the 
 convulsions of nature. 
 
 SPEECH OF GEORGE P. COX. 
 
 At the call of the President, Mr. George P. Cox made the 
 following remarks. Mr. Cox was in the gallery, and had charge 
 of the singing, which was performed to the admiration of all 
 present. 
 
 Mr. President — I came here to listen and not to speak, and 
 I need not tell you how well I have been paid for coming, in 
 listening to the able Oration, and fine Poem, which have been 
 pronounced this evening. I am not a speech maker, and were 
 1 one it would be the height of presumption in me to offer one 
 after the eloquent Oration of the evening. 
 
 But, Mr. President, I cannot refrain from offering to you, 
 and to the citizens of Maiden, my congratulations on the suc- 
 cess which has attended the efforts and labors of the Committee 
 chosen by the town to erect this Town House — success in its 
 LOCATION — success iu erecting these substantial walls without 
 harm or accident to any, and success in being able to present 
 to the citizens of Maiden so beautiful and inviting a room as 
 this, which is not equalled in this county, — a room where our 
 wives and daughters may assemble for social enjoyment, or lit- 
 erary entertainment ; and above all, where the citizens of Mai- 
 den may meet to do and perform those acts which none but 
 freemen can do — choose the officers of the town, the state, and 
 the nation. 
 
 With these few remarks, Mr. President, I will resume my 
 seat and give place to others. 
 7 
 
REMARKS AND CHRONICLES BY C. C. P. MOODY. 
 
 The President then said that there was one more ' chapter ' 
 to be given in these dedicatory services. He would therefore 
 call upon Mr. C. C. P. Moody, who was wont to chronicle the 
 passing events of the town. 
 
 Mr. Moody then said — 
 
 Mr. President, — Ladies and Gentlemen : It is important 
 that a speech, as well as a book, should have an introduction, 
 and I have oftentimes been amused to see what a funny intro- 
 duction some orators offer. One will very modestly tell you, 
 that he cannot make a speech, that he has really nothing to say; 
 and before you are aware of it, he has pulled from his pocket a 
 roll of manuscript, and he goes into a labored argument to prove, 
 what is patent to every one, that he has in truth nothing to say. 
 Another, when he has nothing else that he can offer, will say 
 that somebody who has preceded him " has stolen his thunder,'' 
 or, "that he has taken the wind out of his sails." Now sir, no 
 one ever steals mt/ thunder any more than he steals my tobacco, 
 for I never have any of either ; but sometimes when occasion 
 calls for it, I have a little bottled lightning, and if any body 
 can get hold of that, they are at liberty to hold on to it as long 
 as it will do them good. But speaking of electricity, may I not 
 compare this numerous audience to one great electrical ma- 
 chine, highly charged with both negative and positive forces — 
 the speakers who have preceded me have given a tremendous 
 momentum to the great wheel of thought, and all it now needs 
 is a little friction that we may have some genuine heat light- 
 ning, and that you know never hurts any body. Allow me to 
 say, sir, that if you are not able to see fire, I am sure that the 
 keen optics of the ladies will see " sparks" in every part of the 
 house. (Sensation.) 
 
 Thus much for my introduction. I come now to the Chron- 
 icles OF THE Acts of the Seven Wise Men of Malden. 
 
47 
 
 1 Now after much strife, the people said we will build a 
 house ; then they looked out seven wise men, and they said 
 these shall have the oversight of the same. 
 
 2 Now these are the names of the wise men : Gilbert, Eli- 
 sha, Gershom, Caleb, Daniel, Hubbard, and George. 
 
 3 Gilbert was not only an ancient and discreet man, but a 
 doctor of the law, and he walked in all the commandments of 
 the Methodists blameless. 
 
 4 Elisha was a meek and quiet man, and the people made 
 him president over all the money — moreover he had banded 
 himself with certain other men, and they had great buildings 
 at a city called Edgeworth, and men servants and maid ser- 
 vants, who labored much, because they made sandalls for the 
 multitude ; moreover he walked in the ordinances of the Bap- 
 tists, and was deacon among his brethren. 
 
 5 Gershom was one of the chief men of the town, and it 
 was so, that on a certain time the Democrats laid hold on him> 
 and said, because thou art a wise and faithful man, we will 
 make thee counsellor to the Governor, then shall no damage 
 come to us. Now when he went up to worship, he walked 
 with the sect of the Orthodox. 
 
 6 Now Daniel had been a wiiE man for forty years, and he 
 was cunning in all matters of lands and houses, so that he was 
 full of wisdom and knowledge, and no man could stand before 
 him. 
 
 7 Caleb and Hubbard had long been of the chief fathers of 
 the town, and they were learned in all matters pertaining to 
 the wants of the people. Moreover, their knowledge was great 
 in stone, and mortar and timber. Now Caleb walked with his 
 brethren the Baptists, but Hubbard was of the sect of the Uni- 
 versalists. 
 
 8 George, sir-named Vanevar, dwelt in the south country ; 
 the same was aforetime a mighty builder, but now he tilleth the 
 land, and hath great stores of money, and much goods in the 
 fruits of the earth, besides horses and cattle in abundance. 
 
 9 Now when the wise men had come together, and had 
 consulted long about the matter, they said, who will give us the 
 land that we may build the house, as the people hath com- 
 manded us ? 
 
10 Then every man who had land, said, be it known unto 
 you, O ye wise men, that we will not give the land for nought, 
 as our fathers have done aforetime. Thou shalt give us a price 
 for it, yea so much, even a shekel a span, for so much as thou 
 mayest want. 
 
 11 Then the wise men were at their wits' end to know what 
 to do. They said, if we pay so much for the land^ then there 
 will be nought left for the building. Howbeit, they bought the 
 land of a certain Benjaminite and his sister, and it was a 
 goodly piece ; and after the people had considered the thing, 
 they said the wise men had done well. 
 
 12 Now not many days hence, when the people had all as- 
 sembled in one place, the moderator said, the wise men, whom 
 we have commanded to build the house, have sent in a writing 
 saying, give us twenty thousand shekels more of money, that we 
 may build the house. 
 
 13 Then there was a great confusion, some said one thing, 
 and some another ; and these are the names of some of the 
 men that gave their voice upon the matter : Andrew, sir-nam- 
 ed Lunt, an aged man whose eye was not dimmed, neither 
 was his natural force abated ; George, the carpenter, who liveth 
 over against the iron road that lieth to the west; Benjamin, sir- 
 named Hill, renowned as a 'squire, poet and philosopher, (and 
 the contest waxed warm between him and George); Daniel, sir- 
 named Perkins, one of the Anakims of the town ; Henry, sir- 
 named Hyde, a Democrat of the siraitest sect; Hubbard, the 
 money changer ; Gershom, a notable carpenter, and many 
 others. 
 
 14 Now after much talk, the people said, " we are in for it, 
 let us give the money. " Then they made a vote, and Thomas 
 the scribe wrote it down in a book, that Phineas the Treasurer 
 should give the money from time to time, as it might seem fit 
 and convenient for the wise men. 
 
 15 Then when the time drew nigh that the foundations of 
 the house should laid, the wise men called upon the carpenters, 
 and the masons, and all the mighty builders in the land of Mai- 
 den and said, let every man say the sum that will suffice him 
 
 work — for the nether and upper stories, for the 
 
49 
 
 foundations, the stones, and bricks, and mortar, and timbers, 
 and boards, and chambers, and courts, and windows, and fur- 
 niture, and lights, and ornaments, and roofs, and all things 
 pertaining thereto. 
 
 16 Then the carpenters, and masons, and builders, each 
 one considered the matter, and said within himself I should 
 like this job right well, and who knoweth but the lot may fall 
 to me. Then they took pen and ink and wrote down the sum 
 and handed it to the wise men — and so thus did they cast lots, 
 and the lot fell upon Jonathan, sir-named Clark. Then was 
 Jonathan glad, for he said I can make a good revenue from it. 
 Then said the wise men to Jonathan, go thou and do all this 
 work, and we will pay thee. Then Jonathan called to him one 
 Nathan^ and he said to him thou shalt help me in this work. 
 
 17 Now on the 4th month, on the 1st day of the month, in 
 the year when the women did greatly enlarge the borders of 
 their garments, and all barrels blushed because they were denu- 
 ded of their hoops, did men come with oxen and horses, and 
 they brought stone and bricks and timber. And others took 
 plough, and scraper, and spade, and pick axe, and wrought day 
 by day until the foundations were laid, Then the mason lif- 
 ted up his tool upon it, and with bricks and mortar did he rear 
 the walls thereof. 
 
 18 Then Jonathan, the carpenter, put in the beams thereof, 
 he also laid the floors thereof, and put on its roof and its orna- 
 ments. He also made the chambers, and courts, and stairs, 
 until he had made a full end of all the work. Then Joseph, a 
 noted " pipe-layer" of the sect of the Methodists, did come and 
 put up his beautiful ornaments for the lights. 
 
 19 Howbeit, when the people learned that the foundations 
 of the house were laid, and the corner stone thereof had been 
 put in his place, and no emblem, mark or sign had been put 
 under the same, then they cried out with a bitter cry, and they 
 said the wise men had done foolishly, — for it shall be when this 
 great house shall be razed to the ground after many generations, 
 and our children's children shall look diligently for some record 
 of their fathers, and find none, then will they be ashamed when 
 there is no remedy. Moreover did William, \yho had recently 
 
50 
 
 come from the land of Pennsylvania, write against the wise 
 men in this thing, and printed it in the book of the chronicles 
 of Moody, and the same was a swift and faithful Messenger to 
 reprove them. 
 
 20 Now it came to pass vs^hen the time drew nigh that the 
 carpenter should no longer lift up his tool upon the house, that 
 the wise men said one to another, let us call the people togeth- 
 er, that they may choose [them out certain men to dedicate the 
 house, lest we be blamed. 
 
 21 Then they issued a writing and signed it — Gilbert for 
 the wise men, and Hubbard for the chief fathers of the town. — 
 Now on a set time the people came together to consider what 
 they should do ; and they put one George, a notable singer, son 
 of Samuel, an ancient last maker, in the high seat, to be presi- 
 dent over all the meeting. Then they chose a certain young 
 man named William, son of William the elder, sir-named Rich- 
 ardson, to be scribe. Now William was not only a man of a 
 nimble tongue, but he held the pen of a ready writer, and he 
 wrought in a very curious art, even that of making beautiful 
 legs both for men and for women. 
 
 22 Then a man said, let George, the son of the last maker, 
 give his mind of what should be done to dedicate the house. — 
 Then George opened his mouth and said — one saith that there 
 should be an oration, another saith give us a supper, and music, 
 and dancing. He would therefore call upon Gershom to speak 
 his thoughts. Then Gershom lifted up his voice in the audience 
 of all the people, and said, let there be speeches, and music 
 and eating, and if any have a mind to dance, let them dance 
 even until break of day. 
 
 23 Now after Gershom had done speaking, a man cried out 
 " chronicles," and then another said " Moody," and still anoth- 
 er cried the same. Then one Charles, a printer, sir named 
 Moody, arose, and holding his hat in his hand, said, 
 
 24 Most noble president, and men and brethren, ye all know 
 that I greatly desire a " good time." But the thing is too great 
 to be done in one night ; my voice is for the speeches and mu- 
 sic, and supper, and then let the people take rest ; and after 
 that, when the house is swept and n-arnished, then may they 
 
51 
 
 dance. But to this the multitude would not listen ; they would 
 make haste for the dance, for they loved it well. Then many 
 others spoke on the same matter, but they said let it be done at 
 once — let us not wait until the second day. 
 
 25 Then they appointed twenty-six good and true men, who 
 should do all matters and things necessary for the satisfaction 
 of the people. 
 
 26 After this every man went to his own home, well pleas- 
 ed at what he had heard and seen. 
 
 27 Now on a set day the " twenty-six" came together to 
 decide upon the manner of dedicating the house — then they 
 talked a long while, and when they could by no means agree 
 what to do, (and it was now far in the night,) one said — "Ho I 
 every man to his bed, and when he hath taken rest and victuals, 
 and talked with his wife, let him come again to this place, and 
 then we will determine the whole matter. So every man went 
 to his home, and rested that night and all the next day. 
 
 28 And it came to pass when the evening again drew nigh, 
 the men assembled as aforetime. And when they began to 
 talk one with another, they said we are divided betwixt two 
 bands of music. Now the one band were all Yankees, and spoke 
 in a plain speech, and they were all shaven men, and dwelt 
 among the inhabitants of the land, with their wives and their 
 little ones — and they could play on all manner of instruments. 
 
 29 The other band came from a far country, and every man 
 had a crook in his tongue, so that he could not speak plain, 
 and he wore a great wisp of hair under his nostrils ; but never- 
 theless their music did greatly charm the lovers of pleasure. 
 
 30 Now some said give us the music of the Yankees, why 
 should we pay our money to the foreigners ? But others said 
 nay, give us the Germans, for the Yankees are not able to give 
 us the music we love. 
 
 31 Then every man whispered to his neighbor, and when 
 that was done, George, son of Samuel, stood upon his feet, 
 and said, Mr. President, hear my voice— let there be no supper 
 — but let every man eat at home with his wife and little ones, 
 as he hath need ! Then all the people bowed their heads and 
 said, Amen. 
 
52 
 
 32 After that they appointed one Erastus to make an ora- 
 tion. Now Erastus was a man mighty in the scriptures, and 
 he was learned in Latin, and in Greek, and in Hebrew, and in 
 all science and knowledge which is hard to be attained. They 
 also appointed John, the physician, to write a song of jubilee, 
 in which he should put the great thoughts that filled his heart. 
 
 33 Now after this, the men who had a mind to dance, said 
 we will have a supper, and the men with the crook in their 
 tongues shall play skilfully upon all manner of instruments — 
 and when men have eaten until their be no more desire in them, 
 then all who are Hght of foot shall dance, both men and wo- 
 men. 
 
 34 Howbeit, when they had counted the cost, many shook 
 their heads, and said, the money is gone, wherefore should we 
 distress ourselves, for it is an old proverb, " that he who will 
 dance must pay the fiddler." 
 
 35 Then they said, — the dance, the Germans, and the sup- 
 per, shall no longer come into our minds. After that they all 
 with one accord went to the dedication of the house, and there 
 they saw Gilbert, with all the chief men of the town seated 
 upon a high seat, and before them were gathered all the people, 
 even the women and children, and there was a great oration, 
 and all the people were happy. 
 
LIBRftRY OF CONGRESS 
 
 HIlNi 
 
 -<^ 014 069 872 6 
 
 wm 
 
 C. C. p. MOODY embraces the present opportu- 
 () nity to respectfully say to the citizens of Maiden, 
 ') that he will be happy to receive their orders for 
 all kinds of 
 
 f Iffll All) liSCI im MI! IM, 
 
 for which they may have occasion. His office is 
 thoroughly supplied with the most approved print- 
 ing materials, and his skill and judgment in arrang- 
 ing and combining tiiem for a neat and tasty job, 
 he constantly holds in readiness for his numerous 
 customers. 
 
 In one word, his work shall be expeditiously and 
 faithfully executed, at prices as low as can be afforded. 
 
 Office, 52, Washington St., Boston. 
 
 Residence in Maiden, near Boston & Maine Depot. 
 
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