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Dedication Address by Colonel Walter Scott – Quincy Massachusetts
I would be lacking in gratitude if I did not thank your committee and association at this time for the high honour and privilege of participating in the ceremonies of this day. Marking, as it has, the birth of one more member of the Burns family of statues in the United States. I do thank you with all my heart, for with you I feel there cannot be too many Burns memorials. The number is now large and it is increasing yearly. Today California, New York, Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Illinois, Pennsylvania and many other States bid the new baby a hearty welcome. We know from history that the memory of what has been done here today will go with us as we travel forward, and that from the seed we scatter here and there, numberless other statues will arise, for the soul of him in whose honour this great granite figure has been raised goes marching on. In the preface of the Kilmarnock edition of his poems, Robert Burns begs his readers, particularly the learned and the polite, who may honour him with a perusal , that they will make every allowance for education and circumstance of life; but if after a fair, candid and impartial criticism he shall stand convicted of dullness and nonsense let him be done by as he should in that case do by others – let him be condemned without mercy, to contempt and oblivion. You people of this great little city 139 years after these words were written, join the rest of the world in answering them. By the artistic, lifelike statue of the world’s greatest poet that has been dedicated in your midst this day, you will tell this generation, its children and posterity what YOU thought of the one known the world over as the poet of mankind. This day you will become the youngest member of a world-encircling band of Burns monuments. And citizens of Quincy are still making history. Today you have honoured yourselves and mankind by your high tribute to our beloved poet, once more proclaiming to the world that Burns never died. Truer lines never were written than those oft-quoted ones of Campbell: “To live in the breast of those we leave behind is not to die.” One hundred and sixty-five years after his earthly birth by this statue that you have erected you testify to the undying fame of the poet ushered into the world in that wee “but an’ ben” at Ayr, now a shrine visited by all peoples of the earth; and all nations join in thanks to the Lord of Hosts that Robert Burns was given to live on the earth for a short time, that he might proclaim his doctrine that all men are born equal and should have the same opportunity for life and liberty. The democracy of the man who derived his inspiration from the people has stood the test of time and who shall deny that he was the forerunner of the gospel which has changed the history of the world – the gospel we can glimpse in those prophetic lines: “Its comin’ yet for a’ that That man tae man the warld o’er Shall brithers be for a’ that” We know, as did Burns, that liberty in thought, spirit or deed if it does not interfere with duty to God, is for all mankind. We like to think of Burns as one among the multitude. Dr Robert I Collyer; a staunch admirer of his, once referred to him as “The poet of freedom and of the common human life, the man of the people who in the ‘Cotters Saturday Night,’ painted a picture of a poor man’s home such as even Shakespeare never dreamt of, and see it in a light sweeter and fairer than ever rested in a palace.” For all time, the world over, Robert Burns will be known as the friend of the people, regardless of race or creed. It has been said that Scotsmen have a good conceit of themselves. Be this true or otherwise, it is fitting that the ‘land of the heather’ should be represented in our societies and that a statue of her favourite son should gaze out over this beautiful ‘Granite City’, the birthplace, as before referred to, of Presidents and many others who played such an important role in our national independence. For no other country up to 1775 ever demonstrated as Scotland did, her great love for national independence. At Bannockburn she spoke to the world in no uncertain tone, just as did this country at Lexington, Concord and Bunker Hill. Scotland has played a modest part in the acts of the great drama of the United States. We find Scottish names among the signers of the Declaration of Independence and, a third of our Presidents were of Scottish descent, as were many of our Vice Presidents, cabinet members and those in all walks of life such as artists, inventors, financiers, engineers – not forgetting the army and navy. In connection with the latter, we think at once of Paul Jones, who was first to carry the American flag into British waters. Even before our Declaration of Independence, Burns wrote in unmistakable language on the subject of freedom and held aloft the ideals for which America has always stood. In his stirring Ode for General Washington’s Birthday we find the words: “Columbia’s offspring, brave and free In danger’s hour still flaming in the van Ye know and dare maintain the Royalty of Man” Yes, America may well claim Robert Burns – the Burns who watched the progress of the American Revolution, who had a high admiration for the first President of the United States and who gave that memorable toast, “A better man than Pitt – Washington.” Once more, then by the proceedings of this day, we have rekindled a flood of tender memories of the people’s poet, whose sublime song has enriched and bettered the whole world. We cannot do too much honour to the great genius whose name will live through the ages.
Address by Alex J Cowe – Second surviving charter member of the Quincy Burns Memorial Association On behalf of the Burns Memorial Association of Quincy I have much pleasure in presenting, through you to the city of Quincy this splendid tribute to the memory of one who not only gave to the world songs of endless beauty and poems depicting nature with a warmth and grandeur unexcelled in the history of literature, but also of one who, when the fathers of this great nation were in the throes of righteous rebellion spoke out and unflinchingly stood for the liberty and democracy being fought for on the Revolutionary battlefields. Robert Burns, Scotland’s most famous poet, visioned, perhaps more clearly than most other men of his time, the day when the rule of kings and class privilege would give way to government of the people, by the people for the people. His dictum ‘A man’s a man for a’ that’ gave hope and courage to the poor and oppressed, they lifted their faces from the ground and beheld in words afire with truth and purpose a new proclamation: “Princes and Lords are but the breath of Kings An honest man is the noblest work of God” His was the spirit of Patrick Henry - “Who would be a traitor knave Who would fill a coward’s grave Who so base as be a slave Let him turn and flee” The Burns Memorial Association of Quincy makes no apologies for the setting in this historic city of the image of him who, in the face of exile or death dared espouse the cause of the embattled colonists. Carved in indelible characters on the face of these ever lasting stones are the lines he addressed to the immortal General George Washington’s birthday:- “No Spartan tube no Attic shell No lyre Aeolian I awake: Thy harp Columbia, let me take, We dare maintain the royalty of Man” Robert Burns uncompromisingly stood for human rights. In spirit he fought side by side with the embattled farmers of these far-stretching valleys and hillsides. He held with them until the realisation of his dream – establishment of “government of the people, by the people, for the people.” Those who peruse his immortal pages will be fired by the same spirit of sturdy independence that animates the hearts of the sons and daughters of this land of hope and constitutional justice. They will feel the stimulus which rouses and sends men into the fight for supremacy in the varied fields of human endeavour. They will find that:- “Rank is but the guinea stamp: The man’s the gold for a’ that” This splendid memorial of Quincy’s peerless granite designed and so massively executed by Quincy artists and artisans represents all that is manly, genuine and enduring. I therefore, in the name of Burns, present it, through you, mayor of Quincy to the city of Quincy for ever.
Acceptance Speech by Mayor Barbour of Quincy I consider it one of the great honours that has come to me that I am having the privilege of accepting for the people of this city the beautiful monument of Burns. The unceasing untiring labours of the Association, extending over a period of 24 years, has made possible this great gift to our city. I sincerely congratulate the members of the Association; I commend the artisans who lack conceived and built and constructed this beautiful monument. It is not my purpose to sing an appraisement of the worth of Robert Burns, which has been done, but I do believe that commemorating as Quincy does this year, the 300th anniversary of her settlement, it is fitting a monument should be erected to the poet of liberty and democracy. When we consider that in these 300 years there left from this town men and women who laid the very foundation of the greatest democracy on the face of the earth – our own United States. It gives me great pleasure to accept for and on behalf of the people of Quincy this beautiful memorial and I promise it will forever be a sacred possession of a thankful and grateful people in whose name I now give grateful thanks.
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