Centennial records of the women of Wisconsin

              .158 CENTENNIAL   EECOEDS.
Oh grand old Pilgrim heroes.
Oh souls that were tried and true. With aU of our proud possessions
We are humbled at thought of you. Men of such might and muscle.
Women so brave and strong. Whose faith was fixed as the mountains.
Through a night so dark and long.
We know of your grim, grave errors.
As husbands and as wives; Of the rigid bleak ideas
That starved your dafly Uves; Of pent-up, curbed emotions,
Of feeUngs crushed, suppressed. That God Avith the heart created
In every human breast.
We know of that Uttle remnant
Of British tyranny. When you hunted Quakers and witehes,
And swung them from a tree; Yet back to a holy motive.
To Uve in the fear of God, To a purpose high, exalted.
To walk where martyrs trod.
We can trace your gravest errors.
Your aim was fixed and sure; And e'en if your acts were fanatic.
We know your hearts were pure. You Uved so near to heaven,
You overreached your trust. And deemed yourselves creators.
Forgetting you were but dust.
But we with our broader visions. With our wider realm of thought,
I often think would be better If we Uved as our fathers taught.