What We Obtain Too Cheap, We Esteem Too Lightly

Last autumn, I came across the worn headstone of an American soldier killed at the Battle of Brandywine. I don't know his name, where he was from, or how old he was when he died. He could have been a ten-year-old fifer making $8 dollars a month, or a sixty-year-old local farmer barely able to raise his musket. All I know is that he heard the call of liberty and answered.

Do you hear it? It's easy to ignore, at least at first. You can drown it out in the din of everyday distractions and comforts. After all, things aren't that bad. Stop polluting everyone's YouTweetFace with this political crap and fire up the BBQ! You can still speak freely in the properly allocated zones. You can still live per the callings of your conscience, except when compulsory healthcare is involved. You can still purchase a firearm in many municipalities, so long as it's state-approved. No American Citizen who didn't really deserve it has ever been extrajudicially assassinated, and if you're not a criminal, who cares what the NSA sees and hears?

Aye, there's the rub. That American soldier who's blanketed in clover above didn't semi-sorta-die for some quasi-half-freedom. It was, is and always will be liberty or death, period.

I touched his gravestone and thanked him, marveling at his courage to stand up in the face of such terrifying odds. Whoever he was, he wasn't lost and his efforts weren't in vain. He's remembered, and he's inspiring me 236 years later.

In a way, all of the men and women from our founding are whispering to us - it's just a matter of tuning in your hearts to that subtle, unmistakable frequency. But let me tell you, once you finally do find it amidst all the static, no other message or promise will do. Liberty is the biggest, kindest, most welcoming, peaceful and accepting light there is, and no amount of separatist stain can blot it out.

The Third Lantern remembers all the men and women who've fallen protecting that celestial spark, and humbly reminds those carrying it onward:

"The battle," Patrick Henry said, "is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave."