onight, my friends, that I have no malice upon this
subject--not a particle; I simply wish to express my thoughts. The
world has grown better just in proportion as it is happier; the world
has grown better just in proportion as it has lost superstition; the
world has grown better just in the proportion that the sacerdotal class
has lost influence--just exactly; the world has grown better just in
proportion that secular ideas have taken possession of the world. The
world has grown better just in proportion that it has ceased talking
about the visions of the clouds, and talked about the realities of the
earth. The world has grown better just in the proportion that it has
grown free, and I want to do what little I can in my feeble way to add
another flame to the torch of progress. I do not know, of course, what
will come, but if I have said anything tonight that will make a husband
love his wife better, I am satisfied; if I have said anything, that
will make a wife love her husband better, I am satisfied; if I have
said anything that will add one more ray of joy to life, I am
satisfied; if I have said anything that will save the tender flesh of a
child from a blow, I am satisfied; if I have said anything that will
make us more willing to extend to others the right we claim for
ourselves, I am satisfied.

I do not know what inventions are in the brain of the future; I do not
know what garments of glory may be woven for the world in the loom of
the years to be; we are just on the edge of the great ocean of
discovery. I do not know what is to be discovered; I do not know what
science will do for us. I do know that science did just take a handful
of sand and make the telescope, and with it read all the starry leaves
of heaven; I know that science took the thunderbolts from the hands of
Jupiter, and now the electric spark, freighted with thought and love,
flashes under waves of the sea. I know that science stole a tear from
the cheek of unpaid labor, converted it into steam, and created a giant
that turns with tireless arms the countless wheels of toil; I know that
science broke the chains from human limbs and gave us instead the
forces of nature for our slaves; I know that we have made the
attraction of gravitation work for us; we have made the lightnings our
messengers; we have taken advantage of fire and flames and wind and
sea; these slaves have no backs to be whipped; they have no hearts to
be lacerated; they have no