Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. III.djvu/463

Rh soil. When the little community trod the shores of the New World it had already perfected its essential, its formative principle. Within themselves were governors, priests and magistrates, such as every human community would require, but they must all be chosen by the popular voice. Neither rank nor wealth availed anything; nothing in that new community was of higher avail than those qualifications which made the fisherman Peter and Paul the tent-makers apostles in the kingdom of Christ. The human being made free through Christ holds the highest rank on earth; there can be none higher. Such rank and dignity are absolute; and the labour of this elevated and ennobled humanity becomes thereby of the highest value. Sanctity of life, and the honour of labour, are laws in the community of the Pilgrims, and the occupation of their lives during the earlier portion of their settlement in the New World was divine worship and labour.

Such was the little colony of the Mayflower. That was the seed. It fell in good soil, and bore fruit a hundred-fold. There was a creative power in that grain of corn; and we recognise the same to this day in all the social institutions and spiritual life of the United States, even where this is still cramped by accidental fetters, or darkened by the shades of the old night.

The humanity which became the lawgiver of this hemisphere stood forth there with a full consciousness of herself as the servant of God, and a member of the social State. These two in her are one. This is her peculiarity, or her peculiar perfection.

Many of our countrymen regard the United States merely as an aggregate of inharmonious parts, brought together by chance, and adhering together by chance, without any organised centre.

But no one who has lived for any length of time in the