"Why is it that, next to the birthday of the saviour of the world, your most joyous and venerated festival returns on this day? Is it not that, in the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the saviour? That it forms a leading event in the progress of the gospel dispensation? Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the redeemer's mission on earth? That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity?"