366
WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1859
of the people secure,-if I can see the end of sectional strife and harmony restored, I shall be content. I am to leave a numerous progeny to share with yours the good and evil that is to come. For myself, I have no aspirations beyond the present. My path through life has been stormy. I would have sunshine and peace at its close. For posterity I have many anxious thoughts. As men who may either entail blessing or misery upon their children, let us be faithful to the trust imposed upon us. The feelings of a father actuate me, when I implore you to preserve the liberties entrusted to your keeping. If the country prospers they will be benefited if disaster comes they must suffer. The same results will accrue to yours. Let me exhort you, then, to stand by the Constitution and the Union. Confide in one an- other in the hour of danger. Rely upon yourselves when dema- gogues would mislead you. Maintain those reserved powers which are essential to preserve your liberties against centraliza- tion, and they will withstand the shock of centuries. Ladies, I know that politics are always uninteresting to you, yet I believe you have in their general result an abiding interest. It is always a gratification to me to behold my fair country women in assemblages like these. It is a guarantee that their husbands and fathers and brothers are men of intelligence and refinement, who appreciate their mental capacities and desire their counte- nance in their undertakings. Your presence exercises a calming influence upon those antagonisms, which are too often engendered in the heat of political contests. All parties desire your approv- ing smile, and therefore all are encouraged by your presence. I know that in the direct administration of political affairs, you have no share; but yet, reigning as you do, supreme in the realm of love, your influence often controls the destiny of nations. Woman's love is the great lever which rouses man to action. The General, as he plans the strategic combinations which are to ensure victory, looks forward to a recompense dearer than the laurels upon his brow; the soldier, as he trudges along on the weary march or mingles in the scenes of the battle field, even with death around him, forgets, a while the carnage and turns his thoughts to the fond girl he left behind him; the mariner, tempest tossed, driven by rude waves, sings merrily aloft as he thinks of the little cottage by the shore, where his wife and dear ones await him -the statesman as he devises amid deep and painful thought, ' . plans of government, which are to tell upon his own a~d ~is country's fame, never loses sight of the joys which await him
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