"O America, guard well thyself!"
The following is an excerpt from an essay written in 1905 by John Ireland (1838-1918), then Archbishop of St. Paul, Minnesota, that appeared in The Church and Modern Society (Pioneer Press, 1905).
I have called America the providential nation. Even as I believe that God rules over men and nations, so do I believe that divine mission has been assigned to the Republic of the United States.
That mission is to prepare the world, by example and moral influence, for the universal reign of human liberty. America does not live for herself; the destines of humanity are in her keeping. No Monroe Doctrine confines her democracy within Atlantic and Pacific shores. American citizenship sustains the liberties of humanity.
[Democracies have been established elsewhere] but towering amid them all, America rises before the whole world, in the power and majesty of personified democracy, the hope of liberty’s friends, the despair of liberty’s foes.
O America, guard well thyself! For if thou fail, the hopes of humanity fail with thee.
The Irish-born Ireland was a staunch patriot and veteran of the Civil War. In 1862, one year after ordination, the twenty-four-year-old was granted permission to join the Fifth Minnesota Volunteer Infantry, joining the regiment days after the battle of Shiloh, and serving until the spring of 1863 when he was mustered out due to ill health. 1
John Ireland’s Civil War service will be the subject of my next post.
Father John Ireland and the Fifth Minnesota – The American Catholic (the-american-catholic.com)