Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 3.djvu/1048

Rh the citizen can seize and hold for his own protection and hie country's welfare. A direct power over one's own person and property, an individual opinion to be counted on all questions of public interest, is better than indirect influence, be it ever so far-reaching.

Though influence, like the pure white light, is all-pervading, yet it is oft-times obscured with passing clouds and nights of darkness; like the sun's rays, it may be healthy, genial, inspiring, though sometimes too direct for comfort, too oblique for warmth, too scattered for any given purpose. But as the prism by dividing the rays of light reveals to us the brilliant coloring of the atmosphere, and as the burning-glass by concentrating them in a focus intensifies their heat, so does the right of suffrage reveal the beauty and power of individual sovereignty in the great drama of national life, while on a vital measure of public interest it combines the many voices of the people in a grand.chorus of protest or applause.

After an unusually calm, pleasant voyage, for November, we sailed up our beautiful New York harbor just as the sun was rising in all his glory, gilding every hill-top and distant spire in the landscape, and with grateful hearts we celebrated the national Thanksgiving-day once more with loving friends in the great Republic.