“Is this one part of the great reward, for which my brethren and myself endured lives of toil and of hardship?  We had faith and hope.  God granted us the spirit to look forward, and we did look forward.  But this scene we never anticipated.  Our hopes were on another life.  Of earthly gratifications we tasted little; for human honors we had little expectation.  Our bones lie on the hill in Plymouth churchyard, obscure, unmarked, secreted to preserve our graves from the knowledge of savage foes.  No stone tells where we lie.  And yet, let me say to you, who are our descendants, who possess this glorious country, and all it contains, who enjoy this hour of prosperity, and the thousand blessings showered upon it by the God of your fathers, we envy you not; we reproach you not.  Be rich, be prosperous, be enlightened.  Live in pleasure, if such be your allotment on earth; but live, also, always to God and to duty.  Spread yourselves and your children over the continent; accomplish the whole of your great destiny; and if so be, that through the whole you carry Puritan hearts with you; if you still cherish an undying love of civil and religious liberty, and mean to enjoy them yourselves, and are willing to shed your heart’s blood to transmit them to your posterity, then are you worthy descendants of Carver and Allerton and Bradford, and the rest of those who landed from stormy seas on the rock of Plymouth.” [Loud and prolonged cheers.]

Gentlemen, that little vessel, on December 22, 1620, made her safe landing on the shore of Plymouth.  She had been tossed on a tempestuous ocean; she approached the New England coast under circumstances of great distress and trouble; yet amidst all the disasters of her voyage, she accomplished her end, and she placed the feet of a hundred precious souls on the shore of the New World.

Gentlemen, let her be considered this night as an emblem of New England, as New England now is.  New England is a ship, stanch, strong, well-built, and particularly well-manned.  She may be occasionally thrown into the trough of the sea, by the violence of winds and waves, and may wallow there for a time; but, depend upon it, she will right herself.  She will, ere long, come round to the wind, and will obey her helm. [Cheers and applause.]

We have hardly begun, my brethren, to realize the vast importance, on human society, and on the history and happiness of the world, of the voyage of that little vessel which brought the love of civil and religious liberty hither, and the Bible, the Word of God, for the instruction of the future generations of men.  We have hardly begun to realize the consequences of that voyage.  Heretofore the extension of our race, following our New England ancestry, has crept along the shore.  But now the race has extended.  It has crossed the continent.  It has not only transcended the Alleghany, but has capped the Rocky Mountains.  It is now upon the shores of the Pacific; and on this day, or if not on this day, then this day twelvemonth, descendants of New England will there celebrate the landing—­[A Voice:  “To-day; they celebrate to-day.”]