Who could have thought that these fugitives from the tyrant's power would, in little more than a century, grow like the tribes of Israel into a people able to withstand the onslaughts of the oppressor, and to abolish forever within their borders despotic rule? Who could have had faith that men of different creeds, speaking various tongues, bred in unlike social conditions, would here coalesce and co-operate for the general purposes of free government? Above all, who could have believed that a form of government rarely tried, even in small States, and when tried found practicable only for brief periods, would here become so stable, so strong, that every hamlet, every village, is self-poised and manages its own affairs? The achievement is greater than we are able to know; nor does it lie chiefly in the millions who coming from many lands have here made homes and found themselves free; nor in the building of cities, the clearing of forests, the draining of swamps, the binding of two oceans, and the opening of lines of rapid communication in every direction. Not to numbers or wealth do we owe our significance among the nations; but to the fact that we have shown that respect for law is compatible with civil and religious liberty; that a free people can become prosperous and strong, and preserve order without king or standing army; that the State and the Church can move in separate orbits and still co-operate for the common welfare; that men of different races and beliefs may live together in peace; that in spite of an abnormally rapid increase of population and of wealth, and of the many evils thence resulting, the prevailing tendency is to sanity of thought and sentiment, thus plainly manifesting the vigor of our life and institutions; that the government of the majority, where men put their trust in God and in knowledge, is in the end the government of the good and the wise. We have thus helped to establish confidence in human nature; to prove that man's instincts, like the laws of Nature, are conservative; to show that the enthusiasts who would overturn everything, destroy everything, have no abiding place or influence in the affairs of a free people, as volcanic and cyclonic forces are but transitory and superficial in their action upon the earth. We have shown in a word that under a popular government, where men are faithful and intelligent, it is as impossible that society should become chaotic as that the planets should dissolve into star dust.