INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION. 255 
nave made up this long, dark panorama? And yet they are 
the races and nationalities, in the midst of which we have been 
placed, by God; ourselves a new race, with a new and sub¬ 
lime work to do, and endowed with unparalelled powers and 
instrumentalities for its accomplishment. 
To my mind, nothing is plainer than that it is the destiny 
of America to lead in the civilization of the world—that it is 
her sublime mission to teach and maintain the right of every 
human being to himself, and to the highest development of 
which he is capable, and to he herself an example of that true 
and sublime elevation of government and people which should 
be the aim of every nation. 
I cannot believe that Providence hid away in the bosom of 
old ocean this vast continent for ages, keeping it, as it were, 
a precious gem for the adornment and use of a chosen people, 
without the intent to make it and the people Avho should come 
to possess it, a mighty instrumentality for the redemption of 
the race from the old reign of error and its enslavement to 
the material world. This planet of ours, framed with such 
wisdom and skill, so beautifully fashioned and wonderfully 
furnished—a w'ork so glorious, that, when it was complete, 
“the morning stars sang together, and the sons of God shouted 
for joy’—the Creator did not design it as a stage, whereon 
the tragedy of human life as it has been, should be played 
and repeated forever. 
Gradual development is the law of man, as well as of Nature 
and the Universe, and he could probably only attain to the 
highest excellence by enduring the pangs of successive births. 
First an animal, then a man; this was the law. 
Ever since the race began its struggles, individual men 
have been born who were representatives of the race that was 
to be—heralds of the “good time coming;” but the great ma¬ 
jority of mankind have lived and died like the beasts of the 
field. As did the Children of Israel, after wandering for forty 
years in the wilderness, die at last without the sight of Canaan, 
so have the whole human race been wandering we know not 
how long, without even an approximate realization of the true 
