THE DOMESTIC VIRTUES. 171 



virtues which have made the name of New England honored, 

 have had their root. And the maturity and vigor to which 

 these virtues have attained, has not been due to accidental 

 causes, but to causes as permanent in their action as tliose 

 which secure the equilibrium of the seasons amidst changeful 

 skies. The generations have changed ; yet, what gave charac- 

 ter and worth to them remains. Amidst the fluctuations of the 

 times in trade, in fashion, in politics, there is a substratum of 

 integrity, of loyalty to truth, of industry, of courage, of patient 

 endurance and perseverance, of decision, of enterprise and of 

 hopefulness for the future, based on a prevailing faith in the 

 power of goodness to vindicate itself, in the long run, against 

 whatever opposes and may for a time postpone its triumph. 

 What we have to say is, that from the beginning there have been 

 in New England, homes, and a great many of them, which have 

 turned out just such results, just such moral characteristics as 

 these ; and the natural inference, indeed the necessary inference 

 is, that there must have been at work in these homes some ap- 

 paratus adapted to the end actually reached ; just as a beautiful 

 piece of cloth from a mill, is an advertisement to the public of 

 the perfection of the machinery of which it is the product. 



Now, the elements above named are not physical ; they are 

 moral and religious. But they are elements of mighty weight, 

 in any just estimate, whether of a nation's greatness or of a 

 nation's strength. They do not, indeed, enter into our statistics, 

 which we collect with painstaking, 'and point to with pride, 

 which we flaunt in the face of our enemies, as a proof of our 

 strength, and a warning to them to keep hands off. The old 

 figure of the lion and the unicorn, with which Britain foolishly 

 thought to intimidate her feeble colonies, we are tempted to 

 borrow and use for a like end. But we all see and know, as 

 well as we know our alphabet, that external resources, however 

 high up they may be piled, constitute not the strength of a 

 nation. Beautiful France, with her great resources, her fertile 

 soil, her climate almost unrivalled, has proved herself not strong 

 of late ; and one secret of her weakness unquestionably is to 

 be found in tlie fact, that among the thirty millions of her 

 spirited, talented, chivalrous people, so few have known the 

 educating power of a Christian home ; so few have had instilled 

 into them around the hearth stone, those high qualities of the 



