"To our Pilgrim Fathers the Thanksgiving observance was primarily a religious one. The Puritan felt the omnipresence of Deity. His government was a theocracy, his life. an effort to appease the Almighty's wrath. The present age has come to think of him as one who lived in the fear of God rather than in the love of mao. But surely: the fear of God is preferable to that indifference—that practical atheism—which has come to characterize so many in the modern world. It is a sorry day for a nation when it forgets God. It is well to have one day in which the whole people formally acknowledges its obligation to the Supreme Ruler.
"For the whole tendency of our complex civilization is to lessen the sense of nearness to, and dependence upon, Deity and the consequent feeling of gratitude. The primitive man lived close to nature and sai in its operations a constant reminder of what he considered the supernatural. To eave man existence was precarious. Food, shelter, immunity from danger were obviously and painfully uncertain; and when each came it inspired gratitude to the mysterious Giver. Hence the thank offering, developing in time into the sacrifice, which is so marked a feature of all religious.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.