Anecdotes of public men; by John W. Forney.

130 ANECDOTES OF PUBLIC MEN.
institutions throughout the world. This, therefore, is a day in
which all humanity may unite with us in the hymn of praise,
and the toiling millions of the earth join with us in fervent
thanksgiving to Almighty God for the approaching redemption
of our race from slavery and oppression. [Loud and long-continued cheering and applause.]"
Mr. Walker was not a member of the Republican party, although he supported Mr. Lincoln in 1864, but he was a patriot
in the largest sense, and, like many of his school, after giving
half a century of his time to his country, he died poor. A generous government ought to seize an early occasion to prove, at
least in this case, that "Republics are not ungrateful."
July 23, I87I.]
XXIX.
WE are all the unconscious actors and spectators in the
world's theatre. The parts we play, and the scenes we applaud,
are the double substance of the current attraction. In I844 we
had the drama of the Native American riots in Philadelphia;
in I854 the sensation of Know-Nothingism; and seven years
later the tragedy of the rebellion. And now, at the end of another decade, the curtain rises before the New York outbreak
of the I2th of July, I87I. This last is too fresh for the historian, and so we refer it to the tribunal of time, content to let its
seeds work their way among the minds of men, and sure of the
harvest for the right. For as the riots of 1844, and the frenzy
of 1854, and the tragedy of I861-65 were each followed by
good results, so will the last sad evidence of bad passions attain
its ultimate compensation. In our happy country our better
nature secures the final mastery. Evil men and evil measures
dominate for a while, but they are finally crushed, inevitably,
and without exception.