1776.

JULY 2.

1876.

On the morning of Saturday, July 1st, there assembled at Independence Hall, in the room occupied by the National Museum, those persons who had been invited to contribute biographical sketches of the men of the Revolutionary period, where they were received by the ladies of the Board of Management, and by the Committee on the National Centennial Commemoration.

At 11.30 A. M. the doors of Independence Chamber were thrown open, and the American authors and antiquaries of 1876, passed into the shrine of liberty as a chorus of fifty voices rendered Whittier's great Centennial Hymn.

The Committee on the Restoration of Independence Hall, accompanied by the Mayor of the city, who occupied seats on either side of the President's chair and table, leaving the former significantly vacant, immediately arose, and Colonel Frank M. Etting, Chairman of the Committees on the Restoration of Independence Hall and of the National Centennial Commemoration, addressed the assemblage.

ADDRESS OF COL. ETTING.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:

On behalf of the city of Philadelphia, as well as of the Committees on Restoration of Independence Hall, and of the National Centennial Commemoration, I bid you welcome to this As the result of four years' labor we seek to present

room.

to you no mere spectacle of physical sight, but to afford you the means of a spiritual vision that will enable you to see through a century. Yonder parchment brought back by us, scarce bears trace of the signatures, the execution of which made fifty-six names imperishable. This table is no longer surrounded, in the flesh, by Hancock, Franklin, Jefferson, Richard Henry Lee, the Adamses, and the host of patriots who clustered here in June and July, 1776. These chairs that once were theirs are now vacant. Everything that was perishable has passed away, and what is left to us we may truly say has put on immortality. The "rising sun" of liberty and of perfect union, which Franklin pointed out to Jefferson as depicted upon the back of this very chair, when occupied by Washington in 1787, as President of the Convention for framing the Constitution of the United States, now shines undimmed by the shadow of any subsequent event, since we have permitted no trace of any memorial to remain in this chamber that can recall any sectional differences. All the associations that here present themselves to you are intended to enable each individual for himself to exercise the miraculous touch, to once more "set upon their feet" the Founders of the Republic. The actual lineaments of their faces are shown upon these walls, and every material adjunct in the adoption of our Magna Charta has now been returned to its former place of use. You, ladies and gentlemen, have done the rest. You have shown us in prose and in verse how these men lived, and how they moved, and what they struggled for. Thus, in the whole category of events of our Centennial epoch, there is no commemoration of greater significance than the very act of your assembling in this chamber.

It was here just one hundred years ago to-day that the Founders of the Republic met together, predetermined to call into being a new power upon the earth. At the instance of one of their number the final vote was put off until the

morrow.

Thus it was on the SECOND of July, 1776, that the final act was done-the United States became a Nation.

You, of all the citizens of the United States, come here today to build up a CENOTAPH of letters to the memory of those men the like of which is not afforded in the history of the world—no rain, no sun can ever reach it, and it must endure as long as Liberty and the English language survive.

If it be permitted to departed spirits again to visit the scenes of their earthly work, may we not invoke the shade of Washington again to occupy the President's chair, and to summon around him that host whose memories we hold so dear? In consonance at least with what we know to be their wishes, I shall now request the Rev. William White Bronson to ask the blessing of God upon our proceedings.

PRAYER.

O God, whose name is excellent in all the earth, and Thy glory above the heavens; who a century ago didst inspire and direct the hearts of the delegates in Congress to lay the perpetual foundations of peace, liberty, and safety; we bless and adore Thy Glorious Majesty for this Thy loving kindness and providence. And do Thou, who hast instructed us in Thy holy word to render honor to whom it is due, pour down Thy blessing upon these Thy servants, here assembled to perpetuate the sacred memory of the Fathers of our Republic. May this tribute of a Nation's gratitude be as extended and as abiding as the honored names which it is designed to commemorate. May the inhabitants of this land, while with hearts and voices they proclaim the praises of the assertors of their rights, the defenders of their liberties, and the vindicators of their laws, b perpetuating a call to great and virtuous achievements. And may all who, like our worthy departed of blessed memory, shall be eminent benefactors of mankind, like them, also, find