350 
WISCONSIN STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY, 
whose years we count to-day, the greatest lesson of all is the pre¬ 
ponderance of public over private, of social over selfish tendencies 
and purposes in the whole body of the people, and the persistent 
fidelity to the genius and spirit of popular institutions, of the edu¬ 
cated classes, the liberal professions, and the great men of the 
country. These qualities transfuse and blend the hues and virtues 
of the manifold rays of advanced civilization into a sunlight of pub¬ 
lic spirit and fervid patriotism, which warms and irradiates the life 
of the nation. Excess of publicity as the animating spirit and stim¬ 
ulus of society more probably than its lack will excite our solici¬ 
tudes in the future. Even the public discontents take on this 
color, and the mind and heart of the whole people ache with anxie¬ 
ties and throb with griefs which have no meaner scope than the 
honor and safety of the nation. 
Our estimate of the condition of this people at the close of a cen¬ 
tury— as bearing on the value and efficiency of the principles on 
which the government was founded, in maintaining and securing 
the permanent well-being of a nation — would, indeed, be incom¬ 
plete if we failed to measure the power and purity of the religious 
elements which pervade and elevate our society. One might as 
well expect our land to keep its climate, its fertility, its salubrity, 
and its beauty, were the globe loosened from the law which holds 
it in an orbit, where we feel the tempered radiance of the sun, as 
to count upon the preservation of the delights and glories of liberty 
for a people cast loose from religion, whereby man is bound in har¬ 
mony with the moral government of the world. 
It is quite certain that the present day shows no such solemn ab¬ 
sorption in the exalted themes of contemplative piety, as marked 
the prevalent thought of the people a hundred years ago; nor so 
hopeful an enthusiasm for the speedy renovation of the world, as 
burst upon us in the marvelous and wide system of vehement, re¬ 
ligious zeal and practical good works in the early part of the nine¬ 
teenth century. But these fires are less splendid only because 
they are more potent, and diffuse their heat in well formed habits 
and manifold agencies of beneficent activity. They traverse and 
permeate society in every direction. They travel with the outposts 
of civilization, and outrun the caucus, the convention, and the suf¬ 
frage . 
The church, throughout this land, upheld by no political establish- 
