Though this was little foreseen in their day, it is plain now
how it has come to pass. The highest greatness surviving time and storm
is that which proceeds from the soul of man. [Applause.] Monarchs and
cabinets, generals and admirals, with the pomp of courts and the
circumstance of war, in the gradual lapse of time disappear from sight;
but the pioneers of truth, though poor and lowly, especially those whose
example elevates human nature and teaches the rights of man, so that
government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not
perish from the earth [great applause], such harbingers can never be
forgotten, and their renown spreads coextensive with the cause they
served.
I know not if any whom I now have the honor of addressing have thought
to recall the great in rank and power filling the gaze of the world as
the Mayflower with her company fared forth on their adventurous voyage.
The foolish James was yet on the English throne, glorying that he had
"peppered the Puritans." The morose Louis XIII, through whom Richelieu
ruled, was King of France. The imbecile Philip III swayed Spain and the
Indies. The persecuting Ferdinand the Second, tormentor of Protestants,
was Emperor of Germany. Paul V, of the House of Borghese, was Pope of
Rome. In the same princely company and all contemporaries were Christian
IV, King of Denmark, and his son Christian, Prince of Norway; Gustavus
Adolphus, King of Sweden; Sigismund the Third, King of Poland;
Frederick, King of Bohemia, with his wife, the unhappy Elizabeth of
England, progenitor of the house of Hanover; George William, Margrave of
Brandenburg, and ancestor of the Prussian house that has given an
emperor to Germany; Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria; Maurice, landgrave of
Hesse; Christian, Duke of Brunswick and Lunenburg; John Frederick, Duke
of Wuertemberg and Teck; John, Count of Nassau; Henry, Duke of Lorraine;
Isabella, Infanta of Spain and ruler of the Low Countries; Maurice,
fourth Prince of Orange; Charles Emanuel, Duke of Savoy and ancestor of
the King of United Italy; Cosmo de' Medici, third Grand Duke of
Florence; Antonio Priuli, ninety-third Doge of Venice, just after the
terrible tragedy commemorated on the English stage as "Venice
Preserved"; Bethlehem Gabor, Prince of Unitarian Transylvania, and
elected King of Hungary, with the countenance of an African; and the
Sultan Mustapha, of Constantinople, twentieth ruler of the Turks.
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