Commonwealth of Massachusetts

BY HIS EXCELLENCY

CURTIS GUILD, JR.
GOVERNOR

A PROCLAMATION FOR A DAY OF PUBLIC
THANKSGIVING AND PRAISE

At the springtide and at the ebbing of the year, two American holidays are dedicated to gratitude. On Memorial Day we gather to commemorate the sacrifices made by man: on Thanksgiving Day we reverently acknowledge our debt to the mercy and providence of Almighty God.
In accordance with a custom at once reverent and inspiring, I, therefore, with the advice and consent of the Council, appoint Thursday, November Twenty-eighth, as a day of Thanksgiving Prayer and Praise.

May the scattered children of the Commonwealth return to the ancient hearthstone, that the successful may rejoice with those who have known them as brothers, that the afflicted may feel the consoling touch of a mother’s hand.

Material prosperity has been ours beyond the fortune of any other people, and with prosperity has come almost measureless power at the Council Board of the Nations. May it be granted to us to use that power for good. May we remember that the venerable charter of the colony from which our Commonwealth arose cites that the purpose to which Massachusetts was dedicated is reverence for religion and the spread of civilization and happiness among those less favored than ourselves.
Confident that even hardship and misfortune would, under Divine Providence, be converted for good, the Pilgrim Founders of the Feast gathered together in hope and even in joy, and faced their trials with a song.

Let us in our flood-tide of success desert not the duties of religion. In the liberality of faith, respecting every honest conviction, let us remember that no nation of atheists has ever been allowed to live. In returning thanks for the ever broadening Brotherhood of Man, let us the more gratefully acknowledge the beneficent Fatherhood of God.

Given at the Council Chamber, this thirtieth day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and seven, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and thirty-second.

CURTIS GUILD, Jr.

By His Excellency the Governor, with the advice and consent of the Council.

WILLIAM M. OLIN
SECRETERY

God save the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.