Religious Liberty Department by S. B. Horton

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jun 4, 1914

Religious Liberty Department

By S. B. Horton

C. S. LONGACRE — — — — — — — — — — N. Am. Div. Secretary

President Wilson on Patriotism

REFERRING to President Wilson's address at the unveiling of the Barry statue in Washington recently, the Washington Herald comments editorially, in part: —

"Every American should read the address of President Wilson at the unveiling of the Barry statue yesterday. A great many will be better Americans if they give it careful study. The address ought to and probably will take its place as the best and clearest definition in American literature of genuine patriotism. First of all, it should be printed in the schoolbooks, that the principles which it proclaims may be learned early by those who later in life must be depended upon to maintain the nation's honor and traditions."

The President's address, excerpts of which we present below, proves a timely utterance. The Barry statue had its inception in 1902 when, at a meeting of the Robert Emmet Club of Georgetown, a resolution was indorsed to take steps to induce the national government to erect a statue in the nation's capital in honor of Capt. John Barry. As a result of that resolution, the necessary legislation was passed to honor the first commissioned officer in the American navy. The circumstance of his being an Irishman and a communicant of the Roman Catholic Church was seized upon by the Roman hierarchy to bring that church

and its influence into prominence. A military mass was devised to round off the unveiling ceremonies, to which the President and other national officials were invited.

Whether intended or not, the President's address was quite significant in its bearing upon the principles of patriotism as exemplified in such cases as that of Captain Barry. He said: —

"Patriotism is, in my mind, not merely a sentiment. There is a certain effervescence, I suppose, which ought to be permitted to those who allow their hearts to speak in the celebration of the glory and majesty of their country, but the country can have no glory or no majesty unless there be a deep principle and conviction back of the enthusiasm. Patriotism is a principle, not a mere sentiment. No man can be a true patriot who does not feel himself shot through and through with a deep ardor for what his country stands for, what its existence means, what its purpose is declared to be in its history and in its policy. I recall those solemn lines of the poet Tennyson in which he tries to give voice to his conception of what it is that stirs within a nation: 'Some sense of duty, something of a faith, some reverence for the laws ourselves have made, some patient force to change them when we will, some civil manhood firm against the crowd; steadfastness, clearness of purpose, courage, persistency, and that uprightness which comes from the clear thinking of men who wish to serve not themselves but their fellow men.'"

"What does the United States stand for, then, that our hearts should be stirred by the memory of the men who set up her Constitution? John Barry fought, like every other man in the Revolution, in order that America might be free to make her own life without interruption or disturbance from any other quarter. You can sum the whole thing up in that, that America had a right to her own self-determined life; and what are our corollaries from that?"

"There are just as vital things stirring now that concern the existence of the nation as were stirring then, and every man who worthily stands in this presence should examine himself and see whether he has the full conception of what it means that America shall live her own life. Washington saw it when he wrote his farewell address. It was not merely because of passing and transient circumstances that Washington said that we must keep free from entangling alliances. It was because he saw that no country had yet set its face in the same direction in which America had set her face. We cannot form alliances with those who are not going our way; and in our might and majesty and in the certainty of our own purpose we need not, and we should not, form alliances with any nation in the world. Those who are right, those who study their consciences in determining their policies, those who hold their honor higher than their advantage, do not need alliances. You need alliances when you are not strong, and you are weak only when you are not true to yourself. You are weak only when you are in the wrong; you are weak only when you are afraid to do the right; you are weak only when you doubt your cause and the majesty of a nation's might asserted."

"There is another corollary. John Barry was an Irishman, but his heart crossed the Atlantic with him. He did not leave it in Ireland. And the test of all of us—for all of us had our origins on the other side of the sea—is whether we will assist in enabling America to live her separate and independent life, retaining our ancient affections, but determining everything that we do by the interests that exist on this side of the sea. Some Americans need hyphens in their names, because only part of them have come over. But when the whole man has come over, heart and thought and all, the hyphen drops of its own weight out of his name. This man was not an Irish-American; he was an Irishman who became an American. I venture to say if he voted he voted with regard to the questions as they looked on this side of the water, and not on the other side; and that is my infallible test of a genuine American, that when he votes, or when he acts, or when he fights, his heart and his thought are nowhere but in the center of the emotions and the purposes and the policies of the United States."

"This man illustrates for me all the splendid strength which we brought into this country by the magnet of freedom. Men have been drawn to this country by the same things that have made them love this country—by the opportunity to live their own lives and to think their own thoughts and to let their whole natures expand with the expansion of this free and mighty nation. We have brought out of the stocks of all the world all the best impulses, and have appropriated them and Americanized them and translated them into the glory and majesty of this great country."

"When we go out from this presence, we ought to take this idea with us—that we, too, are devoted to the purpose of enabling America to live her own life, to be the justest, the most progressive, the most honorable, the most enlightened nation in the world. Any man that touches our honor is our enemy. Any man who stands in the way of that kind of progress which makes for human freedom cannot call himself our friend. Any man who does not feel behind him the whole push and rush and compulsion that filled men's hearts in the time of the Revolution, is no American. No man who thinks first of himself and afterward of this country, can call himself an American. America must be enriched by us. We must not live upon her; she must live by means of us."

It may be said to the credit of the President's good taste and judgment that he did not attend the mass held on the Monument grounds on the day following the ceremonies. If these principles so suggestively presented by the President were to govern our legislators and executives, and were heeded by those who would use the government for propagating religious doctrines and observances, there would be no need of fear as to the future course of the United States government.

S. B. HORTON.