One can fancy a patriotic Englishman taking his son to Westminster Abbey, and there telling him the story of liberty, in the history of the renowned dead who sleep about him, until the youth is inspired with a patriotism deeper than the love of kindred, and second only to the love of God.

So an American father who desires his children to assume their proper place among the great force of American youth who are to perpetuate American institutions, might well bring them to the Capitol of the nation, and there in glowing words, and amid reminders of every decade of the nineteenth century and the latter part of the eighteenth, tell the story of liberty as shown in republican institutions.

He could also take his children to Mount Vernon for a day; there they might read together the history of that serene, majestic character whose eminence has carried him beyond national lines and made him belong to the world as well as to us—a citizen of all lands and of all ages.

History is best told by biography. Around Washington would be grouped John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Alexander Hamilton. These men, without a precedent to follow, launched a new government, establishing all the departments of its great machinery with such wisdom, justice, and patriotism that what they did, what they thought and planned, but were not able to complete, is to-day the standard of patriotism and national achievement.

Then would follow that man whose life grows radiant in the strong search-light of history—John Quincy Adams; that Adams, who could truthfully say at the close of a long, brilliant, and useful life, in the words of an old Roman: "I have rendered to my country all the great service she was willing to receive at my hand, and I have never harbored a thought concerning her which was not divine." With him would be his compeers, Madison, Monroe, Burr, Clay, Webster, Jackson, John Randolph, the elder Bayard, and Calhoun.

That father would not fail to make plain the stern patriotism of Andrew Jackson and Daniel Webster against the insidious treason of Calhoun and his coterie.

During the early days of President Jackson's administration he gave a state dinner in honor of Jefferson's birthday. On his right sat Calhoun, Vice-President of the United States, and up to this time the intimate friend and confidential adviser of the Executive. On Jackson's left sat Webster, with the black brows of Jove.

The toasts of the evening had been ambiguous. Mr. Calhoun gave this toast: "Our union, next to our liberties the most dear; it can only be preserved by respecting the rights of States, and by distributing its burdens and its benefits equally."

Webster nudged the President. Old Hickory sprang to his feet and gave the toast: "Our federal union; it must be preserved." Every man drank it standing, Calhoun among the rest.

How near our country came to open rebellion is shown in the last hours of Jackson. A friend at his bedside said: "What would you have done with Calhoun and his friends had they persisted in nullification?" "Hanged them, sir, as high as Haman. They should have been a terror to traitors for all time," said the dying statesman.

That father could tell part of the story of liberty in the life of the younger Adams. At the age of eleven Adams decided that he would be a Christian. He said: "Of this one thing I must make sure: I shall humbly serve God. If He makes me a great man, I shall rejoice; but this He surely will do: if I trust Him, He will make me a useful man."

God took Adams at his word. He sought the Kingdom first. God added place. Adams was diplomat, Senator, Secretary of State, President, Congressman. He might well say with his dying breath, as he was carried from his place in the old House of Representatives to the Rotunda, "This is the last of earth, but I am content."

Well he might be content. He had been a faithful, honest, upright Christian man, who had received at the hands of his fellow citizens the highest honors they could confer, and in his death he passed to a home among the redeemed, there with enlarged intelligence and clearer vision to continue his work for God in the beyond.

In this day, when writers are striving to make black appear white, the father who would mingle Christianity with patriotism would not fail to sketch the life of Aaron Burr in contrast with the young Adams.

Burr tells us that at the age of eighteen the Spirit of God came upon him with such power that he fled to the woods to settle that great question which faces every human being—"Shall I be a Christian?" He said to himself: "I purpose as a lawyer to succeed by the tricks of the trade. There is many a short cut in business which a Christian could not take, therefore I shall not be a Christian."

He tells us that the Spirit of God never again troubled him. He sinned against the Spirit, that unpardonable sin. Left to himself, his destiny led him to a high place only to make his fall more terrible. Socially he was the most charming man of his day, but he entered no home which he did not defile. No woman loved him but to her sorrow.

Burr was holding the position of Vice-President as a Republican when he was nominated by the Federalists for Governor of New York. Some of the leading men of that party refused to support him, among them Hamilton. This led to the duel in which Hamilton was killed, July 11, 1804.

Burr was disfranchised and banished by the laws of New York, and was indicted for murder by the authorities of New Jersey for having killed Hamilton on the soil of that State. He could not enter either New York or New Jersey to settle his business. He was bankrupted, and more than $5,000 in debt when all his property had been sold and the results paid over.

The day before the duel Burr had a right to suppose himself a more important man than Hamilton. Was he not Vice-President? Had he not just received a majority of the votes of the City of New York for Governor of that State, in spite of Hamilton's greatest exertions? Yet the day after the duel the dying Hamilton had the sympathy of every human being, and Burr was a fugitive from justice, not knowing friend from foe. Never was there a greater revulsion of feeling.

Southern men tried to console him by their more courteous demeanor. Between the time of the duel and the convening of Congress, Burr had kept himself south of Mason and Dixon's line, for in any Northern State he would have been arrested on a requisition on the Governor.

He went back to Washington and again presided over the Senate, but was simply scorched by the open, daily manifestations of the scorn of Northern Senators. The Southern men were more courteous in their demeanor. On Saturday, March 2d, he took leave of the Senate. That body was in executive session, therefore no spectators were present. Mr. Burr, one of the most eloquent as well as one of the handsomest men of his day, rose in his place after the galleries had been cleared. He began his address by saying that he had intended to remain during his constitutional time, but he felt an indisposition coming upon him and he now desired to take leave of them.

The silence could be felt. There was no shorthand reporter present, and exactly what he said is not now known—perhaps nothing very different from what other retiring Vice-Presidents have said. No reference was made to the duel, none to the scorn he had merited, unless it were in his words, "For injuries received, thank God, I have no memory."

He thanked the Senators for kindness and courtesy. He prophesied that if ever political liberty in this country died its expiring agonies would be witnessed on the floor of the United States Senate. As he walked out no man rose, no man shook hands with him; when the door closed on him it shut him out forever from position, usefulness, home, country, the love of women, and the friendship of men.

At the President's reception on the following Morning two Senators were relating the circumstances to a group which had gathered round them. On being asked, "How long did Mr. Burr speak?" one of them answered, "I can form no idea; it may have been a moment and it may have been an hour; when I came to my senses I seemed to have awakened from a kind of trance."

Burr, hurled from power and honor, wandered a fugitive from justice, and at last would have been laid in a pauper's grave but for the care of a woman who had loved him in his better days.

Surely the Psalmist was right when, speaking of the righteous and the unrighteous, he said: "And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away."