ORATIONS AND SPEECHES. (~&C*^ts- ORATIONS AND SPEECHES VARIOUS OCCASIONS. VOL. I. TENTH EDITION. BOSTON: LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 1883. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1850, BY CHARLES C. LITTLE AND JAMES BHOWN, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. "I PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION THE following collection was made at the suggestion of the respectable association by whom it is published.* It was at first intended that it should consist of the materials of which this volume is composed, together with a selection of speeches in Congress, and articles in the North American Review, by the same author. It was found, on examination, that the addresses now submitted to the public would, of themselves, form a volume of ordinary size, and sufficient variety of matter. The collection has, accordingly, been confined to them, reserving for a future occasion, if deemed ^ expedient, the preparation of another volume, to com- jjo prehend the speeches, essays, and other miscellaneous compositions not contained in this. V^ The orations and speeches contained in this volume, with the exception of the address delivered before the Massachusetts Agricultural Society, were printed at the time of their delivery ; but advantage has been taken * American Stationers' Company. VOL. 6 (5) Vi PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. of the opportunity afforded by this republication, to revise and correct them, principally in matters of style. It will be found that some of the addresses, being on the same or similar occasions or subjects, exhibit a considerable similarity in the train of remark, and even in the illustrations. This is particularly the case with the orations delivered at Concord and Lexington, on the nineteenth of April, 1825, and 1835. Such a similarity was scarcely to be avoided. The general plan of the two addresses is different, but they necessarily required some description of the same memorable incidents ; and any attempt to avoid the repetition must have been at the sacrifice of topics consecrated to the occasion. The author, being desirous, in submitting this collection to the public, to make a contribution to the literature of the country which, however humble, might at least possess the negative merit of being inoffensive, the speeches deliv- ered by him on political occasions have been excluded, and nothing of a party character has been knowingly admitted. He is fully aware that, as the addresses which make up the volume were in their origin occasional, the collection of them cannot be expected to form a work of permanent interest and importance. It would be all he could hope, that they should be thought, at the time of their separate appearance, not to fall below the line of the indulgence usually extended to performances of 'this character. He has been induced, more by the encouragement of partial friends, than his own judgment of their value, to submit them again to the public in their present form. CHARLESTOWN, Mass,, July, 1836. PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION THE first of these volumes is a reimpression ot one which was published in 1836, and which has been for several years out of print. Its contents are the same, with the exception that a short speech on the Western Railroad has been transferred to the second volume, for the sake of equalizing the size of the two. The second volume consists principally of addresses delivered since 1836. In revising the earlier compositions in this collection for the present edition, I have applied the priming-knife freely to the style. This operation might have been carried still farther with advantage ; for I feel them to be still deficient in that simplicity which is the first merit in writings of this class. When I was at college, the English authors most read and admired, at least by me, and I believe generally by my contemporaries, were Johnson, Gibbon, and Burke. I yielded myself with boyish enthusiasm to their irresisti- ble fascination. But the stately antithesis, the unvarying magnificence, and the boundless wealth of diction of these great masters, amply sustained in them by their learning. (7) Vtii PREFACE TO THE PRESENT EDITION. their power of thought, and weight of authority, are ton apt, on the part of youthful imitators, to degenerate into ambitious wordiness. Some indulgence is perhaps due to these volumes for other reasons. With the exception of the lectures, the addresses contained in them were either written to be spoken, or having been spoken generally from heads pre- pared beforehand, were afterwards written out from the reporters' notes. The occasions, without exception, were of a popular character. It would be trying performances of this kind by a severe standard, to expect of them the terseness and condensation which belong to writings of a more serious cast, prepared for the graver business occa- sions of life. I hope, however, that those who may take the trouble to read the two volumes through will find some adaptation of manner to the varying nature of the occasion. An objection has been taken to some of the earlier patriotic orations contained in this collection as too strongly eulogistic of this country. On this point I can only plead that every thing said by me, to which this objection may be supposed to apply, has been said in good faith. The earlier orations were delivered not long after my return from a residence of four or five years in Europe, princi- pally on the continent. The last country visited by me was Greece, at that time subject to the Turkish yoke, but fermenting with the discontents which soon broke out in revolution. In Italy, France, and Germany, the restored bureaucracy of the old regime was every where in force, and felt with great impatience in the literary and social circles in which my acquaintance principally lay. In PREFACE TO THE PRESENT EDITION. IX England, the liberal ideas and principles embodied in the legislation of the last twenty-five years were still matters of doubtful debate. There was, at the same time, on the part of the literary and political journals of highest re- pute, (not excepting those whose general principles, it should seem, would have dictated a different course,) a tone of unfriendliness and disparagement towards the United States ; far less frequently manifested, I am happy to say, at the present day. Returning with deep impressions produced by this state of things, I was charged for four years with the editor- ship of the North American Review. This placed me, almost of necessity, in the position of a champion, and led me to contemplate some national questions very much in a polemical point of view. Traces of this may be found in some of the addresses contained in the present collec- tion. In reference to great principles, I do not find that the feelings under which I wrote, heightened as they were by the ardor of youth, led me to maintain opinions which, after the lapse of twenty-five eventful years, require to be qualified. But I am free to confess, that there is occa- sionally an exaggerated nationality in the tone with which principles, correct in themselves, are stated, which does not now appear to me in the best taste. It has also been objected to the manner in which some topics in American history are treated in these addresses, that it runs into overstrained sentiment. I am aware that there is danger of falling into this fault in orations for the fourth of July and other great popular festivals. But it ought not to be forgotten that a somewhat peculiar state of things existed among us twenty or thirty years X PREFACE TO THE PRESENT EDITION. ago, calculated to give the character in question to the fugitive literature of the day. The great rapidity with which the United States had grown up since the declara- tion of independence, had given that kind of importance to recent events, that hold upon the imagination, which, in a slower march of things, can usually be the result of nothing but a lapse of centuries. There were still linger- ing among us distinguished leaders of the revolutionary struggle. Our heroic age was historical, was prolonged even into the present time ; and the present and the his- torical consequently acquired something of the interest of the heroic past. Amidst all the hard realities of the present day, we beheld some of the bold barons of our Runnymede face to face. This tended to lift events from the level of dry matter of fact into the region of senti- ment. Other circumstances some of them incidents of this state of things exerted a powerful influence in the same direction. Such were the fusion of the old political parties that commenced soon after the peace of 1815; the expiration, in 1820, of the second century from the landing at Plymouth, and in 1830, the like event in ref- erence to Massachusetts; great eras these for the whole New England race ! the passage of several laws by Con- gress, pensioning the survivors of the revolutionary army; the visit of Lafayette in 1824; the commemoration, the following year, of the half century from the breaking out of the revolutionary war; the commencement of the Bun- ker Hill Monument in 1825 ; and the simultaneous death of Adams and Jefferson on the fourth of July, 1826. These, and some similar occurrences, were well adapted to excite the minds of youthful writers and speakers, and PREFACE TO THE PRESENT EDITION. XI to give a complexion to their thoughts and style. They produced, if I mistake not, in the community at large, a feeling of comprehensive patriotism, which I fear has, in a considerable degree, passed away. While it lasted, it prompted a strain of sentiment which does not now, as it seems to me, find a cordial response from the people in any part of the country. Awakened from the pleasing visions of former years by the fierce recriminations and dark forebodings of the present day, I experience the feelings of the ancient dreamer when cured of his harm- less delusions : -"me occidistis, amici, Non servastis, ait, cui sic extorta voluptas, Et demtus per vim mentis gratissimus error." A few words more of explanation will perhaps be pardoned me. Although the following addresses cover a considerable portion of my life, it would be unjust to regard them as its main business. They are all of them occasional, most of them hasty productions. It is still my purpose, should my health permit, to offer to the public indulgence a selection from a large number of articles contributed by me to the North American Review, and from the speeches, reports, and official correspondence prepared in the discharge of the duties of the several official stations, which I have had the honor to fill at home and abroad. Nor am I wholly without hope that I shall be able to execute the more arduous pro- ject to which I have devoted a good deal of time for many years, and towards which I have collected ample materials that of a systematic treatise on the modern Xll PREFACE TO THE PRESENT EDITION. law of nations, more especially in reference to those questions which have been discussed between the gov- ernments of the United States and Europe since the peace of 1783. EDWARD EVERETT. CAMBRIDGE, May, 1850. CONTENTS FIRST VOLUME. i. THE CIRCUMSTANCES FAVORABLE TO THE PROGRESS OF LITERATURE IN AMERICA, 9 An Oration delivered at Cambridge, before the Society of Phi Beta Kappa, on the 26th of August, 1824. II. THE FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND, 45 An Oration delivered at Plymouth, on the 22d of Decem- ber, 1824. III. THE FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR, ... 73 An Oration delivered at Concord, on the 19th of April, 1825. IV. THE PRINCIPLE OF THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS, . . . 103 An Oration delivered at Cambridge, on the 4th of July 1826. VOL. I. i 2 CONTENTS. V. ADAMS ADD JEFFERSON, 131 A Eulogy delivered at Charlestown, on t/ie 1st of August, 1826, in commemoration of John Adams and Thomas Jeffer- son, who died on the 4th of July preceding. VI. THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY, 150 An Oration delivered at Charlestown, on the 4th of July, 1828. vn. MONUMENT TO HARVARD, 173 An Address delivered on occasion of the erection of a monument to John Harvard in the graveyard at Charlestown. on the 26th of September, 182a VIII. SPEECH AT NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE, . 190 Delivered at a public dinner in that place, on the 2d of June, 1829. IX. SPEECH AT LEXINGTON, KENTUCKY, 198 Delivered at a public dinner in that place, on the 17th of June, 1829 CONTENTS. 3 X. SPEKCH AT THE YELLOW SPRINGS, IN OHIO, 207 Delivered at a Dublic dinner at that place, on the 29th of June, 1829. XL THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS, 215 An Address delivered before the Charlestown Lyceum, on the 28th of June, 1830; the two hundredth anniversary of the arrival of Governor Winthrop. XII. IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE TO PRACTICAL MEN, AND THE ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT, 246 The substance of addresses delivered by the author before several institutions for scientific improvement. XIII. THE WORKING MEN'S PARTY, 283 A Lecture delivered before the Charlestown Lyceum, on the 6th of October, 1830. XIV. ADVANTAGE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE TO WORKING MEN, . 307 Introduction to the Franklin Lectures in Boston, on the 14th of November, ia31. 4 CONTENTS. XV. COLONIZATION AND CIVILIZATION OF AFRICA, 329 A Speech before the American Colonization Society, in the Hall of the House of Representatives at Washington, on the 16th of January, 1832. XVI. EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES, 344 A Speech at a public meeting held at St Paul's Church, in Boston, on the 21st of May, 1833, on behalf of Kenyon College in Ohio. XVII. THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT, 354 A Speech made at Faneuil Hall, on the 28th of May, 1833, at a meeting called by the Massachusetts Charitable Me- chanic Association, to take measures for the completion of the Monument. XVIII. TEMPERANCE, 366 A Speech delivered at a temperance meeting in Salem, on the 14th of June, 1833. XIX. THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION, 377 An Oration delivered at Worcester, on the 4th of July, CONTENTS. 5 XX. THE EDUCATION OF MANKIND, 404 An Oration delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Yale College at New Haven, on the 20th of August, 1833. XXI. AGRICULTURE, 442 An Address delivered at Brighton, before the Massachusetts Agricultural Society, on the 16th of October, 1833. XXII. EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE, 459 Delivered in Faneuil Hall, at the request of the young men of Boston, on the 6th of September, 1834. XXIII. THE BATTLE OF LEXINGTON, 526 An Oration delivered at Lexington, by request of the citi- zens of that place, on the 19th (20th) of April, 1835. XXIV. THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON, 564 Oration delivered on the 4th of July, 1835, before the cit- izens of Beverly, Massachusetts, without distinction of party. b CONTENTS. XXV. EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO LIBERTY, MORALS, AND KNOWL- EDGE, 599 An Address delivered before the literary societies of Am- herst College, on the 25th of August, 1835. XXVI. THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK, 634 An Address delivered at Bloody Brook, in South Deerfield, on the 30th of September, 1835, in commemoration of the fall of the "Flower of Essex" at that spot, in King Philip's war, on the 18th of September, (O. S.,) 1675. ORATIONS AND SPEECHES. ORATIONS AND ADDRESSES. THE CIRCUMSTANCES FAVORABLE TO THE PROG- RESS OF LITERATURE IN AMERICA.* MR PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN : IN discharging the honorable trust which you have as- signed to me on this occasion, I am anxious that the hour which we pass together should be exclusively occupied with those reflections which belong to us as scholars. Our asso- ciation in this fraternity is academical ; we entered it before our Alma Mater dismissed us from her venerable roof; and we have now come together, in the holidays, from every variety of pursuit, and every part of the country, to meet on common ground, as the brethren of one literary household. The duties and cares of life, like the Grecian states, in time of war, have proclaimed to us a short armistice, that we may come up, in peace, to our Olympia. On this occasion, it has seemed proper to me that we should turn our thoughts, not merely to some topic of literary interest, but to one which concerns us as American scholars. I have accordingly selected, as the subject of our inquiry, the circumstances favorable to the progress of literature in the United States of America. In the discussion of this sub- ject, that curiosity, which every scholar naturally feels, in tracing and comparing the character of the higher civiliza- tion of different countries, is at once dignified and rendered * An oration, pronounced at Cambridge, before the Society of Phi Beta Kappa, 2Qth August, 1824. VOL. 1. 1 10 AMERICAN LITERATURE. practical by the connection of the inquiry with the condition and prospects of his native land. I am aware that such inquiries are apt to degenerate into fanciful speculations and doubtful refinements. Why Asia has, almost without exception, been the abode of some form of despotism, and Europe more propitious to liberty; why the civilization of the Egyptians was of a character so mel ancholy and perishable ; that of the Greeks so elegant, versa tile, and life-giving ; that of the Romans so stern and tardy, till they became the imitators of a people whom they con- quered and despised, but never equalled ; why tribes of barbarians, from the north and east, not known to differ, es- sentially, from each other, at the time of their settlement in Europe, should have laid the foundation of national charac- ters so dissimilar as those of the Spaniards, French, Germans, and English; are questions to which such answers, only, can be given, as will be just and safe, in proportion as they are general and comprehensive. It is difficult, even in the case of the individual man, to point out precisely the causes, under the operation of which, members of the same commu- nity, and even of the same family, grow up, with characters the most diverse. It must, of course, be much more difficult to perform the same analysis on a subject so vast as a nation, composed of communities and individuals, greatly differing from each other ; all subjected to innumerable external influences ; and working out the final result, often in the lapse of ages, not less by mutual counteraction, than cooperation. But as, in the formation of individual character, there are causes of undisputed and powerful operation, so, in national character, there are causes, equally certain, of rowth and ex- cellence on the one hand, and of degeneracy and ruin on the other. It belongs to the philosophy of history to investigate these causes ; and, if possible, to point out the circumstances, which, as furnishing the motives, and giving the direction, to intellectual effort in different nations, have had a chief agency in making them what they were, or are. Where it is done judiciously, it is in the highest degree curious thus to trace physical or political facts into moral and intellectual conse- AMERICAN LITEEATURE. 11 quences, and great historical results ; and to show how cli- mate, geographical position, local relations, institutions, single events, and the influence of individuals, have fixed the char- acters and decided the destiny of nations. In pursuing such inquiries, we may, for instance, be led to the conclusion, that it is the tendency of a tropical climate to enervate a people, and thus fit them to become the subjects of a despotism, though it may render them also, through the medium of a fervid temperament, formidable instruments of desolating but transitory conquest, under the lead of able and daring chiefs. We may find that a broad river, or a lofty chain of mountains, by stopping the inroads of war, or of immigra- tion, becomes the boundary, not merely of governments, but of languages and literature, of institutions and character. We may sometimes think we can trace extraordinary skill in the liberal arts to the existence of quarries of fine marble. We may see popular eloquence springing out of popular institutions, and, in its turn, greatly instrumental in affecting the fortunes of free states. We may behold the spirit of an individual law- giver or reformer perpetuated by codes and institutions, for ages. We may trace a peculiar law of progress in colonial settlements, insular states, tribes fortified within Alpine bat- tlements, or scattered over a smiling region of olive gardens and vineyards, and deduce the political and historical effects of these physical causes. These topics of rational curiosity and liberal speculation, as I have already intimated, acquire practical importance, when the land in which we ourselves live is the subject of in- vestigation. When we turn the inquiry to our own country ; when we survey its natural features, search its history, and examine its institutions, to see what are the circumstances which are to excite and guide the popular mind; it then becomes an inquiry of the highest interest, and worthy the attention of every patriotic scholar. We then dwell, not on a distant, uncertain, perhaps fabulous, past, but on an impend- ing future, teeming with individual and public fortune ; a future, toward which we are daily and rapidly swept forward, and with which we stand in the dearest connection that can 12 AMERICAN LITERATURE. bind the generations of men together ; a future, which oui own characters, actions, and principles, may influence, for good or evil, for lasting glory or shame. We then strive, as far as our poor philosophy can do it, to read the country's reverend auspices ; to cast its great horoscope in the national sky, where some stars are waning, and some have set. We endeavor to ascertain whether the soil, which we love as that where our fathers are laid, and we shall presently be laid with them, is likely to be trod, in times to come, by an en- lightened, virtuous, and free people. 1. The first circumstance, of which I shall speak, as influ- encing the progress of letters by furnishing the motives to intellectual effort among us, is the new form of political soci- ety established in the United States ; viz., a confederacy of republics, in which, however, within the limits of the Consti- tution, the central government acts upon the individual citi- zen. It is not my purpose to detain y.ou with so trite a topic as the praises of free political institutions ; but to ask your attention to the natural operation of a system like ours on the literary character of a people. I call this a new form of po- litical society. The ancient Grecian republics, indeed, were free enough, within the walls of the single cities, of which many of them were wholly or chiefly composed ; while, toward the confederate or tributary states, their governments generally assumed the form of a despotism, more capricious, and not less arbitrary, than that of a single tyrant. Rome was never the abode of well-regulated republican liberty. The remark just made of the Grecian republics, in reference to allied states, applies to the Roman, for the greater portion of its history ; while, within the walls of the city, the com- monwealth fluctuated between the evils of an oppressive aris- tocracy and a factious populace. Since the downfall of Rome, the rudiments of a representative legislature are to be found in the estates of some of the governments of continental Europe, and far more distinctly and effectually developed in the British Parliament ; but a uniform and complete representative system, organized by a written constitution of government, and unaccompanied by a powerful hereditary element, is AMERICAN LITERATURE. 13 original in this country. Here, for the first time, the whole direction and influence of affairs, and all the great organic functions of the body politic, are subjected, directly or indi- rectly, the executive and legislative functions directly, to free popular choice. Whatsoever quickening influence resides in public honors and trusts, and in the cheerful con- sciousness of individual participation in the most momentous political rights, is here, for the first time, exerted, directly, on the largest mass of men, with the smallest possible deductions ; and as a despotism, like that of Turkey or Persia, is, by all admis- sion, the form of government least favorable to the intellectual progress of a people, it would seem equally certain, that the farther you recede from such a despotism, in the establish- ment of a system of popular and constitutional liberty, the greater the assurance that the universal mind of the country will be powerfully and genially excited. I am aware that it is a common notion, that, under an elective government, of very limited powers, like that of the United States, we lose that powerful spring of action which exists in the patronage of strong hereditary governments, and must proceed from the crown. I believe it is a prevalent opinion, abroad, among those who entertain the most friendly sentiments toward the American system, that we must consent to dispense with something of the favorable influence of princely and royal patronage on letters and the arts, and find our consolation in the political benefits of a republican gov- ernment. It may be doubted, however, whether this view be not entirely fallacious. For, in the first place, it is by no means true that a popular government will be destitute either of the means or the disposition to exercise a liberal patronf-ge. No government, as a government, ever did more for the fine arts than that of Athens. In the next place, it is to be con- sidered, in this connection, that the evils of centralization are as evident, in reference to the encouragement of the general mind of the people, as they are in regard to a contented ac- quiescence in political administration. Whatever is gained, for those who enjoy it, by concentrating a powerful patronage in the capital, and in the central administration, is lost in the 14 AMERICAN LITERATURE. neglect and discouragement of the distant portions of the state, and its subordinate institutions. It must be recollected, that our representative system extends far beyond the election of the high officers of the national and state governments. It pervades our local and municipal organizations, and proba- bly exercises, in them, the most efficient and salutary part of its influence. In the healthful action of this system, whatever virtue there is in patronage is made to pervade the republic, like the air ; to reach the farthest, and descend to the lowest. It is made not only to cooperate with the successful, and decorate the prosperous, but " to remember the forgotten, to attend to the neglected, to visit the forsaken." Hitherto, for the most part, men in need of patronage have had but one weary pilgrimage to perform, to travel up to court. By an improvement on the Jewish polity, which enjoined a visit, thrice a year, to the Holy City, the theory of patronage in question requires a constant residence at the favored spot. Provincial has become another term for inferior and rude ; and unpolite, which once meant only rural, has been made to signify something little better than barbarous. As it is, in the nature of things, a small part, only, of the population of a large state, which can thus bring itself, or by happy chance can fall, into the sphere of metropolitan favor, it follows, that the mass of the people are cut off from the operation of those motives to exertion, which flow from the hope or the posses- sion of patronage. But the beneficial effect of patronage, properly so called, is probably much overrated. This effect is not, on any system of distribution, to be sought in its direct application to the support of men of genius and learning. Its best operation is in the cheerful effect of kindly notice and intelligent audi- ence. Talent, indeed, desires to earn a support, but not to receive a dole. It is rightfully urged, as the great advantage of our system, that the encouragements of society extend as widely as its burdens, and search out, and bring forward, whatsoever of ability and zeal for improvement are contained in any part of the land. I am persuaded, that, mainly, in this equal T *. diffusion of rights and privileges lies the secret of the AMERICAN LITERATURE. 15 astonishing development of intellectual energy in this country. Capacity and opportunity, the twin sisters, who can scarce subsist happily but with each other, are brought together. These little local republics are schools of character and nurseries of mind. The people, who are to choose, and from whose number are to be chosen, by their neighbors, all those who, either in higher or lower stations, are intrusted with the management of affairs, feel the strongest impulse to mental activity. They read, and think, and form judgments on important subjects. In an especial manner, they are moved to make provision for education. With all its deficiencies, our system of public schools founded, in the infancy of the country, by the colonial legislature, and transmitted to our own days is superior to any system of public instruction (with possibly a single exception) which has ever been es- tablished by the most enlightened states of the Old World. Hasty prejudices, as to the tendencies of representative re- publics, have been drawn from the disorders of the ill- organized democracies of the ancient world. Terrific exam- ples of license and anarchy, in Greece and Rome, are quoted, to prove that man requires to be protected from himself, forgetting the profound wisdom wrapped up in the well-known formidable inquiry, Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? But to reason, in cases like this, from the states of Greece to our constitutions of government, is to be deceived by schoolboy analogies. From the first settlement of New England, and from an early stage of their progress in many of the other states, one of the most prominent traits of the character of our population has been, to provide and to diffuse the means of education. The village school-house and the village church are the monuments of our republicanism ; to read, to write, and to discuss grave affairs, in their primary assemblies, are the licentious practices of our democracy. But, in this acknowledged result of our system of govern- ment, another objection is taken to its influence, as far as literary progress is concerned. It is urged, that, though it may be the effect of our system to excite the mind of the people, it excites it too much in a political direction ; that 16 AMERICAN LITERATURE. the division and subdivision of the country into states and districts, and the equal diffusion of political privileges ana powers among the whole population, with the constant re- currence of elections, however favorable to civil liberty, are unfriendly to learning; that they kindle only a political ambition ; and particularly, that they seduce the aspiring youth, from the patient and laborious vigils of the student, to plunge prematurely into the conflicts of the forum. I am inclined to think, that, as far as the alleged facts exist, they are the necessary result of the present stage of our national progress, and not an evil necessarily incident to representative government. Our system is certainly an economical one, both as to the number of persons employed and the compensation of public service. It cannot, therefore, draw more individuals from other pursuits into public life, than would be employed under any other form or system of government. It is obvious, that the administration of the government of a country, whether it be liberal, or absolute, or mixed, is the first thing to be provided for. Some persons must be employed in making and administering the laws, before any other human interest can be attended to. The Fathers of Plymouth organized themselves under a simple compact of government, before they left the Mayflower. This was both natural and wise. Had they, while yet on shipboard, talked of founding learned societies, or engaged in the discussion of philosophical problems, it would have been insipid pedantry. As the organization and administra- tion of the government are, in the order of time, the first of mere human concerns, they must ever retain a paramount importance. Every thing else must come in by opportunity ; this, of necessity, must be provided for : otherwise, life is not safe, property is not secure, and there is no permanence in the social institutions. The first efforts, therefore, of men, in building up a new state, are, of necessity, political. The peculiar relations of the colonies to the parent state, also, called into political action much of the talent of the country, for a century before the revolution. But where else in the world did the foundation of the college ever follow so closely AMERICAN LITERATURE. 17 /n that of the republic, as in Massachusetts ? In the early stages of society, when there is a scanty population, its entire force is required for administration and defence. We are receding from this stage, but have not yet reached, although we are rapidly approaching, that in which a crowded popula- tion produces a large amount of cultivated talent, not needed for the service of the state. As far, then, as the talent and activity of the country are at present called forth, in a political direction, it is fairly to be ascribed, not to any supposed incompatibility of popular institutions with the cultivation of letters, but to the precise point, in its social progress, which the country has reached. A change of government would produce no change in this respect. Can any man suppose, other things remaining the same, that the introduction of an hereditary sovereign, an order of nobility, a national church, a standing army, and a military police, would tend to a more general and more fruit- ful development of mental energy, or greater leisure, on the part of educated men, to engage in literary pursuits ? It is obviously as impossible that any such effect should be pro- duced, as that the supposed producing cause should be put in action, in this country. By the terms of the supposition, if such a change were made, the leading class of the commu- nity, the nobles, would be politicians, by birth ; as much talent would be required to administer the state ; .as much physical activity to defend it. If there were a class, as there probably would be, in the horizontal division of society, which exists under such governments, not taking an interest in politics, it would be that, which, under the name of the peasantry, fills, in most other countries, the place of, per- haps, the most substantial, uncorrupted, and intelligent popu- lation on earth, the American Yeomanry. We are not left to theory on this point. There are portions of the American continent, earlier settled than the United States, governed, from the first, by absolute power, and possessing all the ad- vantages which can flow from what is called a strong govern- ment. It may be safely left to the impartial judgment of mankind, to compare the progress, either of general intelli- VOL. i. 3 18 AMERICAN LITERATURE. gence, or of higher literature, in those portions of the conti- nent, and in the United States. Nor would any different conclusion be drawn from the contrast between the colonies and the United States, before and since the revolution. Again, it cannot be thought a matter of little moment, that, under a purely popular government, the cultivation of letters always has been, and unquestionably always will be, deemed as honorable a pursuit as any to which the attention can be devoted. Under other forms of government, a different standard of respectability exists. Hereditary rank, of neces- sity, takes precedence ; and all the institutions of society are made to regard the accidents of birth, as more important than personal merit. The choicest spirits of Europe, for ten centuries, have been trained up to the feeling, that govern- ment and war are the only callings worthy of noble blood. In those foreign countries, as England, where the political institutions have been most improved, and the iron yoke of feudalism most effectually broken, that is, in other words, where the people have been restored to their natural rights, we behold, as the invariable consequence, a proportionate intellectual progress. What could be more preposterous, than to attribute this progress to the operation of those remnants of the feudal system, which still remain, rather than to the free principles and popular institutions which have succeeded it ; and to deny to such institutions, in their more perfect organization, in this country, a tendency to produce the same happy effects, which their partial introduction has every where else produced? It cannot but be, that the permanent operation of a free system of constitutional and representative government should be favorable to the culture of mind, because it is in con- formity with that law of Nature by which mind itself is distributed. The mental energy of a people, which you propose to call out, the intellectual capacity, which is to be cultivated and improved, has been equally diffused, through- out the land, by a sterner leveller than ever marched in the van of a revolution, the impartial providence of God. He has planted the germs of intellect alike in the city and the AMERICAN LITERATURE. 19 country ; by the beaten way-side, and in the secluded valley and solitary hamlet. Sterling native character, strength and quickness of mind, the capacity for brilliant attainment, are not among the distinctions which Nature has given, exclusive- ly, to the higher circles of life. Too often, in quiet times, and in most countries, they perish in the obscurity to which a false organization of society consigns them. And the reason why, in dangerous, convulsed, and trying times, there generally happens an extraordinary development of talent, unquestionably is, that, in such times, whatever be the nomi- nal form of the government, necessity, for the moment, proclaims an intellectual Republic. What happens in a crisis of national fortune, under all governments, is, in this respect, the steady and natural opera- tion of our political institutions. Their foundation, at last, is in dear Nature. They do not consign the greater part of the social system to torpidity and mortification. They send out a vital nerve to every member of the community, how- ever remote, by which it is brought into living conjunction and strong sympathy with the kindred intellect of the nation. They thus encourage Nature to perfect her work, on the broadest scale. By providing systems of universal and cheap education, they multiply, indefinitely, the numbers of those to whom the path is opened, for further progress ; and thus bring up remote, and otherwise unpatronized, talent into the cheerful field of competition. The practical operation of popular institutions of government provides, in innumerable ways, a demand for every species of intellectual effort, not merely within the circle of a capital, but throughout the land. In short, wherever man has been placed by Providence, endowed with rational capacities of improvement, there the genius of the republic visits him, with a voice of encourage- ment and hope. Every day he receives, from the working of the social system, some new assurance that he is not forgotten in the multitude of the people. He is called to do some act, to assert some right, and to enjoy some privilege ; and he is elevated, by this consciousness of his social importance, from the condition of the serf or the peasant, to that of the free- man and the citizen. 20 AMERICAN LITERATURE. In thus maintaining that the tendency of our popular institutions, at the present stage of our national progress, to excite a diffusive interest in politics, is in no degree unfriendly to the permanent intellectual improvement of the country, it is not intended to assert that the peculiar and original char- acter of these institutions will produce no corresponding modification of our literature. The reverse is, unquestion- ably, the fact. It may safely be supposed, that, with the growth of the people in wealth and population, as the various occasions of an enterprising and prosperous community, placed on the widest theatre of action ever opened to man, call into strong action and vigorous competition the cultivated talent of the country, some peculiar tone, form, and propor- tion will be given to its literature, by the nature of its political institutions, and the social habits founded on them. Literature is but a more perfect communication of man with man, and mind with mind. It is the judgment, the memory, the imagination ; discoursing, recording, or musing aloud, upon the materials drawn from the great storehouse of obser- vation, or fashioned out of them by the creative powers of the mind. It is the outward expression of the intellectual man ; or, if not this, it is poor imitation. What, therefore, affects the man, affects the literature ; and it may be assumed, as certain, that the peculiarity of our political institutions will be represented in the character of our intellectual pur- suits. Government, war, commerce, manners, and the stage of social progress, are reflected in the literature of a country. No precedent exists, to teach us what direction the mind will most decidedly take, under the strong excitements to action above described, unrestrained by the direct power of govern- ment, but greatly influenced by public sentiment, throughout a vastly-extensive and highly-prosperous country, into which the civilization of older states has been rapidly transfused. This condition of things is, evidently, substantially new, and renders it impossible to foresee what garments our native muses will weave to themselves. To foretell our literature would be to create it. There was a time, before an epic poem, a tragedy, an historical composition, or a forensic harangue, AMERICAN LITERATURE. 21 had ever been produced by the wit of man. It was a time of vast and powerful empires, and of populous and wealthy cities. We have no reason to think that any work, in either of those departments of literature, (with the exception, per- haps, of some meagre chronicle, which might be called his- tpry,) was produced by the early Ethiopians, the Egyptians, or the Assyrians. Greece herself had been settled a thousand years, before the golden age of her literature. At length, the new and beautiful forms, in which human thought and pas- sion expressed themselves in that favored region, sprang up, and under the excitement of free political institutions. Be- fore the epos, the drama, the oration, the history, appeared, it would, of course, have been idle for the philosopher to form conjectures as to the paths which would be struck out by the kindling genius of the age. He who could form such an anticipation could and would realize it, and it would be anticipation no longer. The critic is ages behind the poet. Epic poetry was first conceived of, when the gor- geous vision of the Iliad, not, indeed, in its full detail of cir- cumstances, but in the dim fancy of its leading scenes and bolder features, burst upon the soul of Homer. It would be equally impossible to mark out, beforehand, the probable direction in which the intellect of this country will move, under the influence of institutions as new and peculiar as those of Greece, and so organized as to secure the best blessings of popular government, without the evils of anarchy. But if, as no one will deny, our political system brings more minds into action, on equal terms, and extends the advantages of education, more equally, throughout the community ; if it provides a prompter and wider circulation of thought ; if, by raising the character of the masses, it swells to tens of thousands and millions those " sons of emulation, who crowd the narrow strait where honor travels," it would seem not too much to anticipate new varieties and peculiai power in the literature, which is but the voice and utterance of all this mental action. The instrument of communication may receive improvement ; the written and spoken language acquire new vigor ; possibly, forms of address wholly new 22 AMERICAN LITERATURE. will be devised. Where great interests are at stake, great concerns rapidly succeeding each other, depending on almost innumerable wills, and yet requiring to be apprehended in a glance, and explained in a word ; where movements are to be given to a vast population, not so much by transmitting orders as by diffusing opinions, exciting feelings, and touch- ing the electric chord of sympathy ; there language and ex- pression will become intense, and the old processes of com- munication must put on a vigor and a directness adapted to the condition of things. Our country is called, as it is, practical ; but this is the element for intellectual action. No strongly-marked and high- toned literature, poetry, eloquence, or philosophy, ever ap- peared, but under the pressure of great interests, great enter- prises, perilous risks, and dazzling rewards. Statesmen, and warriors, and poets, and orators, and artists, start up under one and the same excitement. They are all branches of one stock. They form, and cheer, and stimulate, and, what is worth all the rest, understand, each other ; and it is as truly the sentiment of the student, in the recesses of his cell, as of the soldier in the ranks, which breathes in the exclamation, " To all the sons of sense proclaim, One glorious hour of crowded life Is worth an age without a name ;" crowded with emotion, thought, utterance, and achievement. Let us now inquire how history and experience confirm the foregoing speculations. Here we shall be met again at the outset, and reminded of the splendid patronage which has been bestowed by strong governments on literature ; patron- age of a kind which necessarily implies the centralization of the resources of the state, and is consequently inconsistent with a representative system. We shall be told of the rich establishments, and liberal pensions ; of museums founded, libraries collected, and learned societies sustained ; by Ptole- mies, Augustuses, and Louises, of ancient and modern times. Then we shall be directed to observe the fruit of this noble patronage, in the wonders of antiquarian and scientific lore AMERICAN LITERATURE. 23 which it has ushered into the world; the Thesauruses and Corpuses, from which the emulous student, who would under- stand all things, recoils in horror, and in the contemplation of which, meek-eyed Patience folds her hands in despair. When we have reflected on these things, and turn our thoughts back to our poor republican land ; to our frugal state treasuries, and the caution with which they are dispensed ; to our modest private fortunes, arid the thrift with which they are, of necessity, hoarded; to our scanty public libraries, and proportionably limited private collections, we may be apt to form gloomy auguries of the influence of free political institutions on letters. Here, then, we may fairly scrutinize the real character of this vaunted patronage, and inquire what it has actually done for the pure original litera- ture of any people. How much was unfruitful pomp and display, and how much mere favoritism ; and of the expen- sive literary enterprises, to which I have alluded, how many may be compared to the Pyramids stupendous monuments of industry, labor, and power, of little value to the eye of taste, and of no benefit to man ? But let us examine, more carefully, the experience of for- mer ages, and see how far their political institutions, as they have been more or less popular, have been more or less pro- ductive of intellectual excellence. When we make this ex- amination, we shall be gratified to find, that the clear prece- dents are all in favor of liberty. The greatest efforts of human genius have been made where the nearest approach to free institutions has taken place. Not one ray of intellec- tual light shone forth, as far as we know, to cheer the long and gloomy ages of the Memphian and Babylonian despots. Not an historian, not an orator, not a poet, as has been already observed, is heard of in their annals. When we ask what was achieved by the generations of thinking beings, the millions of men, whose natural genius may have been as bright as that of the Greeks, nay, who forestalled the Greeks in the first invention of many of the arts, we are told that they built the pyramids of Memphis, the temples of Thebes, the tower of Babylon ; and carried Sesostris and Ninus upon 24 AMERICAN LITERATURE. their shoulders, from the west of Africa to the Indus. Mark the contrast in Greece. With the first emerging of that country into the light of political liberty, the poems of Ho- mer appear. Some centuries, alike of political confusion and literary darkness, follow, and then the great constellation of their geniuses seems to rise at once. The stormy eloquence and the deep philosophy, the impassioned drama and the grave history, were all produced for the entertainment of the "fierco democratic " of Athens. Here, then, the genial influence of liberty on letters is strongly put to the test. Athens was certainly a free state ; free to licentiousness, free to madness. The rich were arbi- trarily pillaged to defray the public expenses ; the great were banished to appease the envy of their rivals ; the wise sacri- ficed to the fury of the populace. It was a state, in short, where liberty existed, with most of the imperfections which have sometimes led the desponding to love and praise despot- ism. Still, however, it was for this lawless, merciless, but free people, that the most chaste and accomplished literature which the world has known, was produced. The philosophy of Plato was the attraction which drew the young men of this factious city to a morning's walk in the olive gardens of the academy. Those tumultuous assemblies of Athens, which rose in their wrath, and to a man, and clamored for the blood of Phocion, required to be addressed in the profoundly studied and exquisitely wrought orations of Demosthenes. No ! the noble and elegant arts of Greece grew up in no Augustan age. Unknown before in the world, strangers on the Nile, and on the Euphrates, they sprang at once into life, in a region not unlike our own New England, iron-bound, sterile, but free. The imperial astronomers of Chaldaea went up almost to the stars in their observatories; but it was a Greek who first foretold an eclipse, and measured the year. Some happy genius in the East invented the alphabet, but not a line has reached us of profane literature, in any of their languages ; and it is owing to the embalming power of Gre- cian genius, that the invention itself has been transmitted to the world. The Egyptian architects could erect structures, AMERICAN LITERATURE. 25 which, after three thousand years, are still standing in their Uncouth, original majesty ; but it was only on the barren soil of Attica, that the beautiful columns of the Parthenon and the Theseum could rest, which are standing also. With the decline of liberty in Greece began the decline of her letters and her arts, though her tumultuous democracies were succeeded by liberal and accomplished princes. Com- pare the literature of the Alexandrian with that of the Per- iclean age ; how cold, pedantic, and imitative ! Compare, I will not say the axes, the eggs, the altars, and the other frigid devices of the pensioned wits in the museum at Alexandria, in a far subsequent a.ge, but compare their best productions with those of independent Greece ; Callimachus with Pindar, Lycophron with Sophocles, Aristophanes of Byzantium with Aristotle, and Apollonius the Rhodian with Homer. When we descend to Rome, to the Augustan age, the proverbial era of Maecenas, we find one uniform work of imitation, often of translation. The choicest spirits seldom rise beyond a happy transfusion of the Grecian masters. Horace translates AlcEeus. Terence translates Menander, Lucretius translates Epicurus, Virgil translates Homer, and Cicero, I had almost said, trans- lates Demosthenes and Plato. But the soul of republican liberty did burst forth from the lips of Cicero ; her inspiration produced in him the best specimens of a purely original liter- ature, which the Romans have transmitted to us. After him, their literary history is written in one line of Tacitus : glis- cente adulatione, magna ingenia deterrcbantur. The fine arts revived a little, under the princes of the Flavian house, but never rose higher than a successful imitation of the waning excellence of Greece, executed by her fugitive artists. With the princes of this line, the arts of Rome expired, and Con- stantine the Great was obliged to tear down an arch of Trajan for sculptures, to adorn his own. Finally, a long period of military and barbarous despotism succeeded, which buried letters and arts in one grave with national independence. In modern times, the question as to the distinct effect of political institutions on learning, has become greatly compli- cated, in consequence of the large number of separate states, VOL. I. 26 AMERICAN LITERATURE. into which the civilized world is divided, and the easy and rapid communication between them. The consequence is. that a powerful impulse, given to mind in one country, under the influence of causes favorable to its progress, may be felt to some extent in other countries, where no such causes exist. Upon the whole, however, the modern history of literature furnishes many illustrious examples, which may well awaken a doubt whether much has been effected by direct patronage, whether of arbitrary or liberal governments, for the encour- agement of letters. Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio, "the all Etruscan three," were citizens of the Florentine republic, to which they owed nothing but exile, confiscation, and persecu- tion. The Medici rendered important services in promoting the revival of letters, but Machiavelli was pursued for resisting their tyrannical designs ; Guicciardini composed his history in exile ; and Galileo confessed, in the prisons of' the Inquisi- tion, that the earth did not move. Ariosto's princely patron, when presented with a copy of the Orlando, asked, " Where did you pick up this trumpery, Ludovico ? " and the " mag- nanimous Alfonso " confined Tasso in a madhouse, till he became a fitting inmate for it. Cervantes, after he had immortalized himself, in his great work, was obliged to write on, for bread. The whole French Academy was pensioned, to crush the great Corneille. Racine, after living to see his finest pieces derided as cold and worthless, died of a broken heart. The divine genius of Shakspeare found its best pat- ronage in popular favor. It gave him fortune, but it raised him to no higher rank than that of a subaltern actor in his own and Ben Jonson's plays. The immortal Bacon made disastrous wreck of his greatness, in a court, and is said (falsely, I trust) to have begged a cup of beer, in his old age, and begged it in vain. The most valuable of the pieces of Seldon were written in that famous resort of great minds, the Tower of London. Milton, surprised by want, in his infirm old age, sold one of the first productions of the human mind for five pounds. The great boast of English philosophy was expelled from his place in Oxford, and kept in banishment, " the king having been given to understand," to use the AMERICAN LITERATURE. 27 words of Lord Sunderland, who ordered the expulsion. " that one Locke has, upon several occasions, behaved himself very factiously against the government." Dryden presents his trans- lation to his patron, as " the wretched remainder of a sickly age worn out with study and oppressed with fortune, without other support than the constancy and patience of a Christian." Otway was choked with a morsel of bread, too ravenously swallowed after a long fast. Johnson, after the publication of his Dictionary, was released by Richardson from arrest for debt ; and Goldsmith, at one period of his career, took refuge from actual starvation among the beggars of London. When we consider these facts, and the innumerable others of which these are a specimen, we may probably be led to the conclu- sion that the appearance of eminent geniuses, under the forms of government subsisting in Europe, furnishes no decisive proof that they are the most friendly to intellectual progress. II. The next circumstance, worthy of mention, as pecu- liarly calculated to promote the progress of improvement, and to furnish motives to intellectual exertion, in this country, is the extension of one government, one language, and, sub- stantially, one character, over so vast a space as the United States of America. Hitherto, in the main,, the world has seen but two forms of political government free govern- ments in small states, and arbitrary governments in large ones. Though various shades of both have appeared, at different times, in the world, yet, on the whole, the political ingenuity of man has never before devised the method of extending purely popular institutions beyond small districts, or of gov- erning large states by any other means than military power. The consequence has been, that the favorable effect of free institutions on intellectual progress, has never been developed, on a very large scale. But, though favorable to the improve- ment of the mind, under any circumstances, it is evident, that, in order to their full effect, in bringing forth the highest attainable excellence, they must be permanently established, in an extensive region and over a numerous people. Such is the state of things existing in this country, and for the first time in the world, and for which we are indebted to the 28 AMERICAN LITERATURE. peculiar nature of our government, as a union of confeder- ated republics. Its effect upon literature must eventually be, to give elevation, dignity, and generous expansion to every species of mental effort. A nationality at once liberal and great is the parent of great thoughts. The extent, the resources, and the destiny of the country are imaged forth in the conception of its leading minds. They are but the organs of the race from which they are descended, the land in which they live, and the patriotic associations under which they have been educated. These prompt their language and elevate their thoughts. Under an impulse like the prophetic enthusiasm of old, they feel and utter the sentiments which are inspired by the system of which they are the members. As the mind goes forth to enter into communion or conflict with millions of kindred spirits, over a mighty realm, it dilates, with a noble consciousness of its vocation. It dis- dains mean conceptions, and strives to speak a noble word, which will touch the heart of a great people. This necessary connection between the extent of a country and its intellectual progress, was, it is true, of more impor- tance in antiquity than it is at the present day, because, at that period of the world, owing to political causes, on which we have not time to dwell, there was, upon the whole, but one civilized and cultivated people, at a time, upon the stage ; and the mind of one nation found no sympathy, and derived no aid, from the mind of another. Art and refinement fol- lowed in the train of political ascendency, from the East to Greece, and from Greece to Rome, declining in one region as they rose in another. In the modern world, a combination of political, intellectual, and even mechanical causes, (for the art of printing is among the most powerful of them,) has produced an extension of the highest civilization over a large family of states, existing contemporaneously in Europe and America. This circumstance might seem to mould the civil- ized portion of mankind into one republic of letters, and make it, comparatively, a matter of indifference to any indi- vidual mind, whether its lot was cast in a small or a large, a weak or a powerful, state. It must be freely admitted, that AMERICAN LITERATURE. 29 this is, to some extent, the case ; and it is one of the great advantages of the modern over the ancient civilization. And yet a singular fatality immediately presents itself, to neutral- ize, in a great degree, the beneficial effects of this enlarged and diffused civilization on the progress of letters in any sin- gle state. It is true, that, instead of one sole country, as in antiquity, where the arts and refinements find a home, there are, in modern Europe, seven or eight, equally entitled to the general name ,of cultivated nations, and in each of which some minds of the first order have appeared. And yet, by the multiplication of languages, the powerful effect of inter- national sympathy on the progress of letters has been greatly impaired. The muses of Shakspeare and Milton, of Camo- ens, of Lope de Vega and Calderon, of Corneille and Racine, of Dante and Tasso, of Goethe and Schiller, are comparative strangers to each other. Certainly it is not intended that these illustrious minds are unknown beyond the limits of the lands in which they were trained, and to which they spoke. But who is ignorant that not one of them finds a full and hearty response from any other people but his own, and that their writings must be, to some extent, a sealed book, except to those who read them in the mother tongue ? There are other languages besides those alluded to, in which the works of a great writer would be still more effectually locked up. How few, even of well-educated foreigners, know any thing of the literature of the Hungarian, Sclavonian, or Scandin- avian races ! to say nothing of the languages of the East. This evil is so great and obvious, that for nearly two centuries after the revival of letters, the Latin language was adopted, as a matter of course, by the scholars of Europe, in works intended for general circulation. We see men like Luther, Calvin, Erasmus, Bacon, Grotius, and Leibnitz, who could scarce have written a line without exciting the admiration of their countrymen, driven to the use of a tongue which none but the learned could understand. For the sake of addressing the scholars of other countries, these great men, and others like them, in many of their writings, were willing to cut themselves off from all sympathy with the 30 AMERICAN LITERATURE. mass of those whom, as patriots, they must have wished most to instruct. In works of pure science and learned crit- icism, this is of the less consequence ; for. being independent of sentiment, it matters less how remote from real life the symbols by which their ideas are conveyed. But, when we see a writer, like Milton, who, as much as any other that ever lived, was a master of the music of his native tongue ; who, besides all the beauty of conception and imagery, knew better than most other men how to breathe forth his thoughts and images, " In notes with many a winding bout Of linked sweetness long drawn out, With wanton heed and giddy cunning, The melting voice through mazes running, Untwisting all the chains that tie The hidden soul of harmony ; " when we see a master of English eloquence, thus gifted, choosing a dead language, the dialect of the closet, a tongue without an echo from the hearts of the people, as the vehicle of his defence of that people's rights ; asserting the cause of Englishmen in the language, as it may be truly called, of Cicero ; we can only measure the incongruity, by reflecting what Cicero would himself have thought and felt, if compelled to defend the cause of Roman freedom, not in the language of the Roman citizen, but in that of the Gre- cian rhetorician, or the Punic merchant. And yet, Milton could not choose but employ this language ; for he felt that in this, and this alone, he could speak the word " with which all Europe rang from side to side." There is little doubt that the prevalence of the Latin lan- guage, among modern scholars, was a great cause, not only of the slow progress of letters among the people at large, but of the stiffness and constraint of the vernacular style of most scholars themselves, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. That the reformation in religion advanced with such rapidity is, in no small degree, to be attributed to the translations of the Scriptures and the use of liturgies in the modern tongues. The preservation, in legal acts, in Eng- AMERICAN LITERATURE. 31 land, of a foreign language, I will not offend the majesty of Rome by calling it Latin, down to so late a period as 1730, may be one reason why reform in the law did not keep pace with the progress of reform in some other depart- ments. With the establishment of popular institutions under Cromwell, among various other legal improvements,* many of which were speedily adopted by our plain-dealing fore- fathers, the records of the law were ordered to be kept in English ; " a novelty," says the learned commentator on the English laws, "which, at the restoration, was no longer continued, practisers having found it very difficult to express themselves so concisely or significantly in any other language but Latin." f Nor are the other remedies for the evil of a multiplicity of tongues more efficacious. Something, of course, is done by translations, and something by the study of foreign lan- guages. But that no effectual transfusion of the higher litera- ture of a country can take place in the way of translation, need not be urged ; and it is a remark of one of the few who could have courage to make such a remark, Madame de Stael, that it is impossible fully to comprehend the literature of a foreign tongue. The general preference, given till lately, to Young's Night Thoughts and Ossian, over all the other Eng- lish poets, in many parts of the continent of Europe, confirms the justice of this observation. It is unnecessary, however, to repeat, that it is not intended to apply to works of exact science, or merely popular information. There is, indeed, an influence of exalted genius, coexten- sive with the earth. Something of its power will be felt, in spite of the obstacles of different languages, remote regions, and other times. The minds of Dante and of Shakspeare have, no doubt, by indirect influence, affected thousands who never read a line of either. But the true empire of genius, its sovereign sway, must be at home, and over the hearts of kindred men. A charm, which nothing can borrow, and for which there is no substitute, dwells in the simple sound of * See a number of them in Lord Somers's Tracts, VoL I. t Blackatone's Commentaries, Vol. III. p. 422. 32 AMERICAN LITERATURE. our mother tongue. Not analyzed, nor reasoned upon, it unites the simplest recollections of early life with the matur- est conceptions of the understanding. The heart is willing to open all its avenues to the language in which its infantile caprices were soothed ; and, by the curious efficacy of the principle of association, it is this echo from the faint dawn of intelligence, which gives to eloquence much of its manly power, and to poetry much of its divine charm. What a noble prospect presents itself, in this way, for the circulation of thought and sentiment in our country ! In- stead of that multiplicity of dialect, by which mental com- munication and sympathy between different nations are restrained in the Old World, a continually expanding realm is opened to American intellect, by the extension of one language over so large a portion of the Continent. The en- ginery of the press is here, for the first time, brought to bear, with all its mighty power, on the minds and hearts of men, in exchanging intelligence, and circulating opinions, un- checked by diversity of language, over an empire more extensive than the whole of Europe. And this community of language^all important as it is, is but a part of the manifold brotherhood, which already unites the growing millions of America, with a most powerful influ- ence on literary culture. In Europe, the work of interna- tional alienation, which begins in diversity of language, is consummated by diversity of race, institutions, and national prejudices. In crossing the principal rivers, channels, and mountains, in that quarter of the world, you are met, not only by new tongues, but by new forms of government, new associations of ancestry, new, and often hostile objects of national pride and attachment. While, on the other hand, throughout the vast regions included within the limits of our republic, not only the same language, but the same national government, the same laws and manners, and common ancestral associations prevail. Mankind will here exist and act in a kindred mass, such as was scarcely ever before con- gregated on the earth's surface. What would be the effect, on the intellectual state of Europe, at the present day, were AMERICAN LITERATURE. 33 all her nations and tribes amalgamated into one vast empire, speaking the same tongue, united into one political system, and that a free one, and opening one broad, unobstructed path- way, for .the interchange of thought and feeling, from Lisbon to Archangel ? If effects must bear a constant proportion to their causes ; if the energy of thought is to be commensurate with the masses which prompt it, and the masses it must penetrate ; if eloquence is to grow in fervor with the weight of the interests it is to plead, and the grandeur of the assem- blies it addresses ; in a word, if the faculties of the human mind are capable of tension and achievement altogether in- definite ; "Nil actum reputans, dum quid superesset agendum;" then it is not too much to say, that a new era will open on the intellectual world, in the fulfilment of our country's prospects. If it should be objected, that the permanent and prosperous existence of a commonwealth so extensive is not to be hoped for, I reply, that by the wise and happy partition of powers between the national and state governments, in virtue of which the national government is relieved from all the odium of internal administration, and the state governments are spared the conflicts of foreign politics, all bounds seem re- moved from the possible extension of our country, but the geographical limits of the continent. Instead of growing cumbrous, as it increases in size, there never was a moment, since the first settlement in Virginia, when the political sys- tem of America moved with so firm and bold a step, as at > the present day. Should our happy Union continue, this great continent, in no remote futurity, will be filled up with the mightiest kindred people known in history ; our lan- guage will acquire an extension which no other ever pos- sessed ; and the empire of the mind, with nothing to resist its sway, will attain an expansion, of which, as yet, we can but partly conceive. The vision is too magnificent to be fully borne ; a mass of two or three hundred millions, not chained to the oar, like the same number in China, by a VOL. I. 5 34 AMERICAN LITERATURE. stupefying despotism, but held in their several orbits of nation and state, by the grand representative attraction ; bringing to bear, on every point, the concentrated energy of such a host ; calling into competition so many minds ; uniting into one great national feeling the hearts of so many freemen, all to be guided, moved, and swayed, by the master spirits of the time ! III. Let me not be told that this is a chimerical imagina- tion of a future indefinitely removed ; let me not hear repeat- ed the poor jest of an anticipation of " two thousand years," of a vision that requires for its fulfilment a length of ages beyond the grasp of any reasonable computation. Tt is the last point of peculiarity in our condition, to which I invite your attention, as affecting the progress of intellect, that the country is growing with a rapidity hitherto without example in the world. For the two hundred years of our existence, the population has doubled itself in periods of less than a quarter of a century. In the infancy of the country, and while it remained within the limits of a youthful colony, a progress so rapid as this, however important in the principle of growth disclosed, was not yet a circumstance strongly to fix the attention. But, arrived at a population of ten millions, it is a fact of extreme interest, that, within less than twenty- five years, these ten millions will have swelled to twenty ; that the younger members of this audience will be citizens of the largest civilized state on earth ; that, in a few years more than one century, the American population will equal the fabulous numbers of the Chinese empire. This rate of increase has already produced the most striking phenomena. A few weeks after the opening of the revolutionary drama at Lexington, the momentous intelligence that the first blood was spilt reached a party of hunters beyond the Alleghanies, who had wandered far into the western wilderness. In pro- phetic commemoration of the glorious event, they gave the name of Lexington to the spot of their encampment in the woods. That spot is now the capital of a state as large as Massachusetts ; from which, in the language of one of her own citirens, one of the brightest ornaments of his country, AMERICAN LITERATURE, 35 the tide of emigration still farther westward is more fully pouring, than from any other in the Union.* I need not say that this astonishing increase of numbers is by no means the best measure of the country's growth. Arts, letters, agriculture, all the great national interests, all the sources of national wealth, are growing in a ratio still more rapid. In our cities, the intensest activity is apparent ; in the country, every spring of prosperity, from the smallest improvement in husbandry, to the construction of canals and railroads across the continent, is in vigorous action. Abroad, our vessels are beating the pathways of the ocean white ; on the inland frontier, the nation is moving forward with a pace more like romance than reality. These facts and influences form one of those peculiarities in our country's condition, which will have the most power- ful effect on the minds of the people. The population of most of the states of Asia, and some of Europe, has appa- rently reached its term. In some it is declining, in some stationary ; and in the most prosperous, under the extraord - nary impulse of the last part of the eighteenth century, it doubles itself but about once in seventy-five years. In con- sequence of this, the process of social transmission is heavy * Mr Clay's Speech on internal Improvement Should the population continue to double in about twenty-two years, the following will be the result : 1862 34,126,706 1884 68,253,412 1906 136,506,824 1928 273,013,648 Many persons now in existence will then be alive. " II arrivera done," says M. de Tocqueville, " un terns ou 1'on pourra voir dans 1'Amerique du Nord 150,000,000 d'hommes, egaux entre eux, qui tous appartiendront a la meme famille, qui auront le meme point de depart, la meme civilisation, la meme langue, la meme religion, les memes habitudes, les memes moeurs, et a travers lesquels la pensee circulera sous la meme forme et se peindra des rnemes couleurs. Tout le reste est douteux, mais ceci est certain. Or, voici un fait entierement nouveau dans le monde, et dont 1'imagination elle-meme ne saurait saisir la port.ee." De Tocqueville, De la Democratic en Jlm6rique, Tom. II. p. 415, 5me ed. This work waa published in 1834. 36 AMERICAJN LITERATURE. and slow. Men not adventitiously favored come forward late in life, and the best years of existence are exhausted in lan- guishing competition. The man grows up, and, in the stern language of one of their most renowned economists,* finds no cover laid for him at Nature's table. The assurance of the most frugal subsistence commands the brightest talents arid the most laborious studies ; poor wages pay for the unremitted labor of the most curious hands; and it is a small part of the population only that is within the reach even of these humiliating springs of action. We need not labor to contrast this state of things with the teeming growth and rapid progress of our own country. In- stead of being shut up, as it were, in the prison of a station- ary, or a slowly progressive community, the emulation of our countrymen is drawn out and tempted on by an horizon constantly receding before them. New nations of kindred freemen are springing up, in successive periods, shorter even han the active portion of the life of man. " While we spend jr time," says Burke, on this topic, " in deliberating on the mode of governing two millions in America, we shall find we have millions more to manage." f Many individuals are in this house who were arrived at years of discretion when these words of Burke were uttered ; and the two mil- lions which Great Britain was then to manage have grown into ten, exceedingly unmanageable. The most affecting view of this subject is, that it puts it in the power of the wise and good to gather, while they live, the ripest fruits of their labors. Where, in human history, is to be found a contrast like that which the last fifty years have crowded into the lives of those favored men, who, raising their hands or their voices, when the feeble colonies engaged in a perilous conflict with one of the most powerful empires on earth, have lived to be crowned with the highest honors of the republic which they established ? Honor to their gray hairs, and peace and serenity to the evening of their eventful days! * Mr Malthus. f Speech on Conciliation 'with America, March 22, 1775. AMERICAN LITERATURE. 37 Though it may never again be the fortune of our country to bring within the compass of half a century a contrast so dazzling as this, yet, in its grand and steady progress, the career of duty and usefulness will be rim by all its chil- dren, under a constantly increasing excitement. The voice which, in the morning of life, shall awaken the patriotic sympathy of the land, will be echoed back by a community, vastly swelled in all its proportions, before that voice shall be hushed in death. The writer, by whom the noble features of our scenery shall be sketched with a glowing pencil, the traits of our romantic early history gathered up with filial zeal, and the peculiarities of our character delineated with delicate perception, cannot mount so rapidly to success, but that ten years will add new millions to the numbers of his readers. The American statesman, the orator, whose voice is already heard in its supremacy from Florida to Maine, whose intellectual empire already extends beyond the limits of Alexander's, has yet new states and new nations starting into being, the willing subjects of his sway. This rapid march of the population westward has been at- tended by circumstances in some degree novel in the history of the human mind. It is a fact, somewhat difficult of expla- nation, that the refinement of the ancient nations seemed com- paratively devoid of an elastic and expansive principle. With the exception of the colonies in Asia Minor, the arts of Greece were enchained to her islands and her coasts ; they did not penetrate far into the interior, at least not in every direction. The language and literature of Athens were as much unknown to the north of Pindus, at a distance of two hundred miles from the capital of Grecian refinement, as they were in Scythia. Thrace, whose mountain tops may almost be seen from the porch of the temple of Minerva, at Sunium, was the proverbial abode of barbarism. Though the colonies of Greece were scattered on the coasts of Asia, of Italy, of France, of Spain, and of Africa, no extension of their popu- lation far inward took place, and the arts did not penetrate beyond the walls of the cities where they were cultivated. How different is the picture of the diffusion of the arts and 38 AMERICAN LITERATURE. improvements of civilization, from the coast to the interior of America ! Population advances westward with a rapidity which numbers may describe, indeed, but cannot represent, with any vivacity, to the mind. The wilderness, which one year is impassable, is traversed, the next, by the caravans of industrious emigrants, carrying with them the language, the institutions, and the arts of civilized life. It is not the irruption of wild barbarians, sent to visit the wrath of God on a degenerate empire ; it is not the inroad of disciplined banditti, put in motion by reasons of state or court intrigue. It is the human family, led out by Providence to possess its broad patrimony. The states and nations which are springing up in the valley of the Missouri, are bound to us by the dearest ties of a common language, a common government, and a com- mon descent. Before New England can look with coldness on their rising myriads, she must forget that some of the best of her own blood is beating in their veins ; that her hardy children, with their axes on their shoulders, have been among the pioneers, in this march of humanity ; that, young as she is, she has become the mother of populous states. What generous mind would sacrifice to a selfish preservation of local preponderance the delight of beholding civilized nations rising up in the desert ; and the language, the manners, the principles in which he has been reared, carried, with his household gods, to the foot of the Rocky Mountains ? Who can forget, that this extension of our territorial limits is the extension of the empire of all we hold dear ; of our laws, of our character, of the memory of our ancestors, of the great achievements in our history ? Whithersoever the sons of the thirteen states shall wander, to southern or western climes, they will send back their hearts to the rocky shores, the battle- fields, the infant settlements of the Atlantic coast. These are placed beyond the reach of vicissitude. They have become already matter of history, of poetry, of eloquence. Divisions may spring up, ill blood may burn, parties be formed, and interests may seem to clash ; but the great bonds of the nation are linked to what is past. The deeds of the great men, to whom this country owes its origin and growth, AMERICAN LITERATURE. 39 are a patrimony, I know, of which its children will never deprive themselves. As long as the Mississippi and the Mis- souri shall flow, those men, and those deeds, will be remem- bered on their banks. The sceptre of government may go where it will ; but that of patriotic feeling can never depart from Judah. In all that mighty region which is drained by the Missouri and its tributary streams, the valley coexten- sive, in this country, with the temperate zone, will there be, as long as the name of America shall last, a father that will not take his children on his knee, and recount to them the events of the twenty-second of December, the nineteenth of April, the seventeenth of June, and the fourth of July ? This, then, is the theatre on which the intellect of America is to appear, and such the motives to its exertion ; such the mass to be influenced by its energies ; such the glory to crown its success. If I err in this happy vision of my country's fortunes, I thank Heaven for an error so animating. If this be false, may I never know the truth. Never may you, my friends, be under any other feeling, than that a great, a grow- ing, an immeasurably expanding country is calling upon you for your best services. The name and character of our Alma Mater have already been carried by some of our brethren hundreds of miles from her venerable walls ; and thousands of miles still farther westward, the communities of kindred men are fast gathering, whose minds and hearts will act in sympathy with yours. The most powerful motives call on us, as scholars, for those efforts which our common country demands of all her chil- dren. Most of us are of that class who owe whatever of knowledge has shone into our minds to the free and popular institutions of our native land. There are few of us who may not be permitted to boast, that we have been reared in an honest poverty, or a frugal competence, and owe every thing to those means of education which are equally open to all. We are summoned to new energy and zeal, by the high nature of the experiment we are appointed in providence to make, and the grandeur of the theatre on which it is to be performed. At a moment of deep and general agitation in 40 AMERICAN LITERATURE. the Old World, it pleased Heaven to open this last refuge of humanity. The attempt has begun, and is going on, far from foreign corruption, on the broadest scale, and under the most benignant prospects ; ' and it certainly rests with us to solve the great problem in human society ; to settle, and that forever, the momentous question, whether mankind can be trusted with a purely popular system of government. One might almost think, without extravagance, that the departed wise and good, of all places and times, are looking down from their happy seats to witness what shall now be done by us ; that they who lavished their treasures and their blood, of old, who spake and wrote, who labored, fought, and perished, in the one great cause of Freedom and Truth, are now hanging from theip orbs on high, over the last solemn experiment of humanity. As I have wandered over the spots once the scene of their labors, and mused among the prostrate columns of their senate houses and forums, I have seemed almost to hear a voice from the tombs of departed ages ; from the sepulchres of the nations which died before the sight. They exhort us, they adjure us, to be faithful to our trust. They implore us by the long trials of struggling humanity ; by the blessed memory of the departed ; by the dear faith which has been plighted, by pure hands, to the holy cause of truth and man ; by the awful secrets of the prison houses, where the sons of freedom have been immured ; by the noble heads which have been brought to the block ; by the wrecks of time, by the eloquent ruins of nations, they conjure us not to quench the light which is rising on the world. Greece cries to us by the convulsed lips of her poisoned, dying Demosthenes ; and Rome pleads with us in the mute persua- sion of her mangled Tully. They address us, each and all, in the glorious appeal which was made by Milton to one who might have canonized his memory in the hearts of the friends of liberty, but who did most shamefully betray the cause " Reverere tantam de te expectationem, spern patriae de te unicam. Reverere vultus et vulnera tot fortiurn virorum, quotquot pro libertate tarn strenue. decertamnt, manes etiam eorum qui in ipso certamine occubuerunt. Reverere extera- AMERICAN LITERATURE. 41 rum qtioque civitatum existimationem de te atque sermones ; quantas res de libertate nostra tarn fortiter parta, de nostra republica tarn gloriose exorta sibi polliceantur ; quae si tarn cito quasi aborta evanuerit, profecto nihil seque dedecorosum huic genti atque periculosum fuerit." * Yes, my friends, such is the exhortation which calls on us to exert our powers, to employ our time, and consecrate our labors, for the honor and service of our native land. When we engage in that solemn study, the history of our race ; surveying the progress of man, from his cradle in the East to these limits of his wandering ; when we behold him forever flying westward from civil and religious thraldom, over mountains and seas, seeking rest and finding none, but still pursuing the flying bow of promise to the glittering hills which it spans in Hesperian climes ; we cannot but exclaim, with Bishop Berkeley, the generous prelate, who bestowed his benelactions, as well as blessings, on our country, "Westward the course of Empire takes its way; The four first acts already past, A fifth shall close the drama with the day ; Time's noblest offspring is the last." This exclamation is but the embodiment of a vision, which the ancients, from the earliest period, cherished of some favored land beyond the mountains or the seas ; a land of equal laws and happy men. The primitive poets placed it in the Islands of the Blest ; the Doric bards dimly beheld it in the Hyperborean region ; the mystical sage of the Academy found it in his lost Atlantis ; and even the stern spirit of Seneca dreamed of the restoration of the golden age in dis- tant worlds, hereafter to be discovered. Can we look back upon these uninspired predictions, and not feel the weight of obligation which they imply ? Here must these bright fan- cies be turned into truth ; here must these high visions be realized, in which the seers and sages of the elder world took refuge from the calamities of the days in which they lived, * Milton, Defensio Secunda. VOL. I. 6 42 AMERICAN LITERATURE. There are no more continents to be revealed ; Atlantis hath arisen from the ocean ; the farthest Thule is reached ; there are no more retreats beyond the sea, no more discoveries, no more hopes.* Here, then, a mighty work is to be performed, or never, by mortals. The man who looks with tenderness oft the sufferings of good men in other times ; the descendant of the Pilgrims, who cherishes the memory of his fathers ; the patriot, who feels an honest glow at the majesty of the system of which he is a member ; the scholar, who beholds, with rapture, the long-sealed book of truth opened for all to read without prejudice ; these are they, by whom these auspices are to be accomplished. Yes, brethren, it is by the intellect of the country that the mighty mass is to be in- spired ; that its parts are to communicate and sympathize with each other ; its natural progress to be adorned with becoming refinements ; its principles asserted 'and its feel- ings interpreted to its own children, to other regions, and to after ages. Meantime, the years are rapidly passing away, and gathering importance in their course. With the present year [1824J will be completed the half century from that most important era in human history the commencement of our revolu- * " Now looking anxiously round the world for any new race, which may receive the seed (so to speak) of our present history into a kindly yet vig- orous soil, and may reproduce it, the same and yet new, for a future period, we know not where such are to be found. Some appear exhausted, others incapable; and yet the surface of the whole globe is known to us. The Roman colonies along the banks of the Rhine and Danube looked out on the country beyond those rivers, as we look up at the stars, and actually see with our eyes a world of which we know nothing. The Romans knew that there was a vast portion of the earth which they did not know ; how vast it might be, was a part of its mysteries. But to us, all is explored ; imagination can hope for no new Atlantic island to realize the vision of Plato's Critias ; no new continent, peopled by youthful races, the destined restorers of our worn-out generations. Every where the search has been made, and the report has been received ; we have the full amount of earth's resources before us, and they seem inadequate to supply life for a third period of human history." Dr Arnold, (Inaugural) Lecture on Modern History. (1840.) AMERICAN LITERATURE. 43 tionary war. The jubilee of our national existence is at hand. The space of time that has elapsed since that mo- mentous date has laid down in the dust, which the blood of many of them had already hallowed, most of the great men to whom, under Providence, we owe our national exist- ence and privileges. A few still survive among us, to reap the rich fruits of their labors and sufferings ; and ONE * has yielded himself to the united voice of a people, and returned in his age to receive the gratitude of the nation to whom he devoted his youth. It is recorded on the pages of American history, that when this friend of our country applied to our commissioners at Paris, in 1776, for a passage in the first ship they should despatch to America, they were obliged to answer him, (so low and abject was then our dear native land,) that they possessed not the means, nor the credit, sufficient for providing a single vessel, in all the ports of France. " Then," exclaimed the youthful hero, " I will provide my own." And it is a literal fact that, when all America was too poor to offer him so much as a passage to her shores, he left, in his tender youth, the bosom of home, of domestic happiness, of wealth, of rank, to plunge in the dust and blood of our inauspicious struggle ! Welcome, friend of our fathers, to our shores ! Happy are our eyes, that behold those venerable features ! Enjoy a triumph such as never conqueror nor monarch enjoyed the assurance that, throughout America, there is not a bosom which does not beat with joy and gratitude at the sound of your name ! You have already met and saluted, or will soon meet, the few that remain of the ardent patriots, prudent counsellors, and brave warriors, with whom you were asso- ciated in achieving our liberty. But you have looked round in vain for the faces of many, who would have lived years of pleasure, on a day like this, with their old companion in arms and brother in peril. Lincoln, and Greene, and Knox, and Hamilton, are gone ; the heroes of Saratoga and York- town have fallen before the enemy that conquers all. Above * General La Fayette was present at the delivery of this Address. 44 AMERICAN LITERATURE. all, the first of heroes and of men, the friend of your youth, the more than friend of his country, rests in the bosom of the soil he redeemed. On the banks of his Potomac he lies in glory and in peace. You will revisit the hospitable shades of Mount Vernon, but him, whom you venerated as we did, you will not meet at its door. His voice of consolation, which reached you in the dungeons of Olmiitz, cannot now break its silence to bid you welcome to his own roof. But the grateful children of America will bid you welcome in his name. Welcome ! thrice welcome to our shores ! and whithersoever your course shall take you, throughout the limits of the continent, the ear that hears you shall bless you, the eye that sees you shall give witness to you, and every tongue exclaim, with heartfelt joy, Welcome ! welcome, La Fayette ! FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND.* AMIDST all the proud and grateful feelings which the return of this anniversary must inspire in the bosom of every child of New England, a deep solicitude oppresses me, lest I should fail in doing justice to the men and to the events which we are met to commemorate. This solicitude, I would hope, is no mere personal feeling. I should be unworthy to address you on this occasion, could I, from the selfish desire of win- ning your applause, devote the moments of this consecrated day to any cold speculations, however ingenious or original. Gladly would I give utterance to the most familiar common- places, could I be so happy in doing it as to excite or strengthen the feelings which belong to the time and the place. Gladly would I repeat to you those sentiments which have been so often uttered and welcomed on this anniver- sary ; sentiments whose truth does not change in the change of circumstances ; whose power does not wear out with time. It is not by pompous epithets or lively antitheses that the exploits of the Pilgrims are to be set forth by their children. We can only do this worthily by repeating the plain tale of their sufferings, by dwelling on the circumstances under which their memorable enterprise was executed, and by catching that spirit which led them across the ocean, and guided them * Oration delivered at Plymouth on the 22d of December, 1824. The immediate reference in this discourse is to the settlement of New England, as commenced at Plymouth ; but some of the views contained in it are equally applicable to other portions of the United States. It was not thought necessary, in each particular case, to interrupt the train of remark for the purpose of guarding against an undue limitation or exten- sion. 46 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. to the spot where we stand. We need no voice of artificial rhetoric to celebrate their names. The bleak and deathlike desolation of Nature proclaims with touching eloquence the fortitude and patience of the meek adventurers. On the bare and wintry fields around us their exploits are written, in characters which will last, and tell their tale to posterity when brass and marble have crumbled into dust. The occasion which has called us together is certainly one to which few parallels exist in the history of the world. Other countries have their national festivals. They com- memorate the birthdays of their illustrious children; they celebrate the foundation of important institutions. Momen- tous events, victories, reformations, revolutions, have awakened in all countries, on their anniversaries, the grateful and patri- otic feelings of posterity. But we commemorate the birth- day of all New England ; the foundation, not of one institu- tion, but of all the institutions, the settlements, the societies, the improvements, here or elsewhere, which trace their descent to a New England origin. Were it only as an act of rare adventure, were it a trait in foreign or ancient history, we should fix upon the achieve- ment of our fathers as one of the noblest deeds in the annals of the world. Were we attracted to it by no other principle than that sympathy we feel in all the fortunes of our race, it could lose nothing, it must gain, in the contrast, with what- ever history or tradition has preserved to us of the wanderings and settlements of the tribes of man. A continent, for the first time, effectually explored ; a vast ocean, traversed by men, women, and children, voluntarily exiling themselves from the fairest portions of the Old World ; and a great nation grown up. in the space of two centuries, on the foundations so perilously laid by this feeble band point me to the rec- ord or to the tradition of any thing that can enter into com- petition with it ! It is the language, not of exaggeration, but of truth and soberness, to say that there is nothing in the accounts of Phoenician, of Grecian, or of Roman coloniza- tion, that can stand in the comparison. What new importance, then, does not the achievement FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 47 acquire for us, when we consider that it was the deed of our fathers ; that this grand undertaking was accomplished on the spot where we dwell ; that the mighty region they explored is our native land ; that the unrivalled enterprise they dis- played is not merely a fact proposed to our admiration, but is the source of our being ; that their cruel hardships are the spring of our prosperity ; that their weary banishment gave us a home ; that to their separation from every thing which is dear and pleasant in life we owe all the comforts, the blessings, the privileges, which make our lot the envy of mankind ! These are the well-known titles of our ancestors to our gratitude and veneration. But there seems to me this peculiarity in the nature of their enterprise, that its grand and beneficent consequences are, with the lapse of time, constantly unfolding themselves, in an extent, and to a magnitude, beyond the reach of the most sanguine promise. Successful, indeed, in its outset, it has been more and more successful, at every subsequent point, in the line of time. Accomplishing all they projected, what they projected was the least part of what has come to pass. Forming a design, in itself grand bold, and even appalling, for the risks and sacrifices it required, the fulfil- ment of that design is the least thing, which, in the steady progress of events, has flowed from their counsels and their efforts. Did they propose to themselves a refuge, beyond the sea, from the religious and political tyranny of Europe ? They achieved not that alone, but they have opened a wide asylum to all the victims of oppression throughout the world. We ourselves have seen the statesmen, the generals, the kings of the elder world flying for protection to our shores. Did they look for a retired spot, inoffensive for its obscurity, and safe in its remoteness, where the little church of Leyden might enjoy the freedom of conscience ? Behold the mighty regions, over which, in peaceful conquest, victoria sine clade, they have borne the banners of the cross ! Did they seek, under the common franchise of a trading charter, to pros- ecute a frugal commerce, in reimbursement of the expenses 48 FIKST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. of their humble establishment? The fleets and navies of their descendants are on the farthest ocean ; and the wealth of the Indies is now wafted, with every tide, to the coasts where, with hook and line, they painfully gathered up their frugal earnings. In short, did they, in their brightest and most sanguine moments, contemplate a thrifty, loyal, and prosperous colony, portioned off, like a younger son of the imperial household, to an humble and dutiful distance? Behold the spectacle of an independent and powerful republic, founded on the shores where some of those are but Lately deceased who saw the first-born of the Pilgrims ! And shall we stop here ? Is the tale now told ? Is the contrast now complete ? Are our destinies all fulfilled ? My friends, we are in the very morning of our days ; our num- bers are but a unit ; our national resources but a pittance ; our hopeful achievements in the political, the social, and the intellectual nature, are but the rudiments of what the children of the Pilgrims must yet attain. If there is any thing certain in the principles of human and social progress ; if there is any thing clear in the deductions from the history of the past ; if there is any, the least, reliance to be placed on the conclu- sions of reason, in regard to the nature of man, the existing spectacle of our country's growth, magnificent as it is, does not suggest even an idea of what it must be. I dare adventure the prediction, that he who, two centuries hence, shall stand where I stand, and look back on our present condition, wiF sketch a contrast far more astonishing ; and will speak of our times as the day of small things, in stronger and juster lan- guage than any in which we can depict the poverty and wants of our fathers. But we ought to consecrate this day to the memory of the Pilgrims. The twenty-second of December belongs to them ; and I shall hope to have contributed my mite towards our happy celebration, if I can succeed in pointing out a few of those circumstances of the first emigration to our country, and particularly of the first emigration to New England, from which, under a kind Providence, has flowed, not only the immediate success of the undertaking, but the astonishing FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 49 train of consequences auspicious to the cause of liberty, humanity, and truth. I. When the first settlements were made upon the coasts of America by Europeans, a voyage across the Atlantic must have been much more formidable, to all except seafaring people by profession, than it is at the present day. Persons, like most of those who composed the company of the May- flower, no doubt regarded with natural terror the passage of the mighty deep. Navigation, notwithstanding the great advances which it had made in the sixteenth century, was yet, comparatively speaking, in its infancy. The very fact that voyages of great length and hazard were successfully attempted in very small vessels, (a fact which, on first view, might seem to show a high degree of perfection in the art,) in reality proves that it was as yet but imperfectly understood. That the great Columbus should put to sea, for the discovery of a new passage across the Western Ocean to India, with two out of three vessels unprovided with decks, may, indeed, be considered the effect, not of ignorance of the art of naviga- tion, but of bitter necessity.* Sir Francis Drake, near a hundred years afterwards, the first naval commander who ever sailed round the earth, enjoying the advantage of the royal patronage, and of no little personal experience, embarked on his voyage of circumnavigation with five vessels, of which the largest was of one hundred, and the smallest , of fifteen tons.f This fact must be regarded as proof that the art of * " Ex regio fisco destinata sunt tria navigia ; unum onerarium caveatum, alia duo levia mercatoria sine caveis, quse ab Hispanis caravelse vocantnr." Peter Martyr de rebus oceanicis. p. 2. f The great extent to which the fishing business was very early carried, on the Banks of Newfoundland and the New England coasts, must have familiarized men with the idea of a passage across the Atlantic, and thus have been one cause of the readiness of so many persons to undertake the voyage. It appears that, as early as 1578, there were employed, in this fishery, of Spaniards, 100 sail, besides 20 or 30 in the whale fishery on the same coasts ; of Portuguese, 50 ; of French, 150 ; of English, from 30 to 50. Hakluyt, Vol. Ill, p. 132, cited in North American Review for July, 1824, p. 140. Captain Smith remarks that according to Whitbourne's " Dis- covery of Newfoundland," the banks and coasts of that region were visited by 250 sail of English fishermen annually. Vol. II. p. 246, Richmond edition. VOL. I. 7 50 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. navigation, in the generation preceding our ancestors, had not reached that point where the skilful adaptation of means to ends supersedes the necessity of extraordinary intrepidity, aided by not less extraordinary good fortune. It was, there- fore, the first obstacle which presented itself to the project of the Pilgrims, that it was to be carried into execution across the ocean which separates our continent from the rest of the world. Notwithstanding, however, this circumstance, and the natural effect it must have had on their minds, there is no doubt that it is one of those features in our natural situation, 10 which America is indebted, not merely for the immediate success of the enterprise of settlement, but for much of its subsequent prosperity. The rest of the world, though nominally divided into three continents, in reality consists of but one. Europe, Asia, and Africa are separated by no natural barriers which it has not been easy, in every age, for an ambitious invader to pass. The consequence has been, on the whole, unfavor- able to social progress. The extent of country inhabited, or rather infested, by barbarous tribes, has always far outweighed the civilized portions. More than once, in the history of the world, refinement, learning, arts, laws, and religion, with the wealth and prosperity they have created, have been utterly swept away, and the hands moved back on the dial-plate of time, in consequence of the irruption of savage hordes into civilized regions. Were the early annals of the East as amply preserved as those of the Roman empire, they would, probably, furnish us with accounts of revolutions on the Nile and the Euphrates as disastrous as those, by which the civil- ized world was shaken in the first centuries of the Christian era. Till an ocean interposes its mighty barrier, no region is secure from foreign violence. The magnificent temples of Egypt were demolished, in the sixth century before our Savior, by the hordes which Cambyses had collected from The information contained in this treatise must have been very widely dif- fused, for by an order of council of 12th April, 1622, it was ordered to be distributed to every parish in the kingdom. Ancient, Right of the English Nation to the American Fisheries, &c. London, (1764.) FIRST SETTLEMENT OF MEW ENGLAND. 5] the steppes of Central Asia. The vineyards of Burgundy were wasted, in the third century of our era, by roving savages from beyond Caucasus. In the eleventh century, Gengis Khan and his Tartars swept Europe and Asia, from the Baltic to the China Sea. And Ionia and Attica, the gardens of Greece, are still, under the eyes of the leading Christian powers of Europe, beset by remorseless barbarians, whose fathers issued, a few centuries ago, from the Altai Mountains. Nor is it the barbarians alone who have been tempted, by this facility of communication, to a career of conquest and plunder. The Alexanders and the Caesars, the Charlemagnes and the Napoleons, the founders of great empires, the aspirers to universal monarchy, have been enabled in no small degree, by the same circumstance, to turn the annals of mankind into a tale of war and misery. When we descend to the scrutiny of single events, we find that the nations who have most frequently and most immediately suffered have been those most easily approached and overrun ; and that those who have longest and most uniformly maintained their independ- ence have done it by virtue of lofty mountains, wide rivers, or the surrounding sea. In this state of things, the three united continents of the Old World do not contain a single spot where any grand scheme of human improvement could be attempted, with a prospect of fair experiment and full success, because there is no spot safe from foreign interference ; and no member of the general system so insignificant, that his motions are not watched with jealousy by all the rest. The welfare and progress of man, in the most favored region, instead of pro- ceeding in a free and natural course, dependent on the organ- ization and condition of that region alone, can only reach the point which may be practicable in the general result of an immensely complicated system, made up of a thousand jarring members. The continent of America accordingly opened, at the time of its first settlement, and still opens, a new theatre of human development. Notwithstanding the prodigious extent of 52 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. commercial intercourse, and the wide grasp of naval power, among modern states, and their partial effect in bringing us into the political system of Europe, we are yet essentially strangers to it ; placed at a distance which retards, and for every injurious purpose neutralizes, all peaceful communica- tion, and defies all hostile approach. To this it was owing that so little was here felt of the convulsions of the civil wars which followed in England, soon after the emigration of our fathers. To this, in a more general view, we are indebted for our steady colonial growth, our establishment of independence, and our escape amidst the political storms which, during the last thirty years, have shaken the empires of the earth. To this we shall still be indebted, and more and more with the progress of our country, for the originality and stability of national character. Hitherto, the political effects of our seclusion behind the mighty veil of waters have been the most important. Now that our political foundations are firmly laid ; that the work of settlement, of colonization, of independence, and of union, is all done, and happily done ; we shall reap in other forms the salutary fruits of our remote- ness from the centres of foreign opinion and feeling. I say not this in disparagement of foreign states : their institutions are doubtless as good, in many cases, as the con- dition of things now admits ; or, when at the worst, could not be remedied by any one generation of men. But, with- out disparaging foreign governments, we may be allowed to prefer our own ; to assert their excellence, to seek to main- tain them on their original foundations and on their true principles. That great word Independence, which, if first uttered in 1776, was most auspiciously anticipated in 1620, comprehends much more than a mere absence of foreign jurisdiction. I could almost say, that, if it rested there, it would scarcely be worth asserting. In every noble, in every true acceptation, it implies, not merely an American govern- ment, but an American character and an American feeling. To the formation of these, nothing will more powerfully contribute than our geographical separation from other parts of the world. FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 53 111 these views, there is nothing unsocial ; nothing hostile to a friendly and improving connection of distant regions with each other, or to the profitable interchange of the com- modities which a bountiful Providence has variously scattered over the earth. For these and all other desirable ends, the perfection to which the art of navigation is brought affords abundant means of conquering the obstacles of distance. At this moment, the trade of America has penetrated to the interior of Asia Minor, the plains of Tartary, the centre of Hindostan and China, and the remotest islands of the Indian Ocean. While ambition and policy, by intrigue and blood- shed, are contesting the possession of a few square miles of territory, our peaceful commerce has silently extended its jurisdiction from sea to sea, from continent to continent, till it holds the giooe in its grasp. But, while no one can doubt the mutual advantages of a judiciously conducted commerce, or be insensible of the good which has resulted to the cause of humanity from the culti- vation of a peaceful and friendly intercourse with other lands, it is yet beyond question, that the true principle of American policy, to which the whole spirit of our system, not less than the geographical features of the country, invites us, is separation from Europe. Next to UNION AT HOME, which ought to be called, not so much the essential condition of our national existence as our existence itself, separation from all other countries is the great principle by which we are to prosper. It is toward this that our efforts, public and private, ought to tend ; and we shall rise or decline in strength, improvement, and prosperity, as we obey or violate this principle. This is the voice of Nature, which did not in vain disjoin our continent from the Old World : nor reserve it beyond the ocean, for fifty centuries, only that it might become a common receptacle for the exploded principles, the degenerate examples, and the remediless corruptions of older states. This is the voice of our history, which traces every thing excellent in our character and prosperous in our for- tunes to dissent, non-conformity, departure, resistance, and independence. 54 FIKST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. And it is a matter of sincere congratulation, that, under the healthy operation of natural causes, very partially accelerated by legislation, the current of our pursuits and industry, with- out deserting its former channels, is throwing a broad and swelling branch into the interior. Foreign commerce, the natural employment of an enterprising people, whose popula- tion is accumulated on the sea-coast, and whose neutral services were invited by a world in arms, is daily reverting to a condition of more equal participation among the various maritime states, and is, in consequence, becoming less produc- tive to any one. While America remains, and will always remain, among the foremost commercial and naval states, an ample portion of our resources has already taken a new direction. We profited of the dissensions of Europe, which threw her carrying-trade into our hands. We are now profit- ing of the pacification of Europe, in the application to our own soil, our own mineral and vegetable products, our water- courses, and our general internal resources, of a part of the capital thus accumulated. This circumstance is, in a general view, most gratifying, inasmuch as it creates a new bond of mutual dependence in the variety of our natural gifts, and in the mutual benefits rendered each other by the several sectional interests of the country. The progress is likely to be permanent and sure, because it has been mainly brought about in the natural order of things, and with little legislative interference. Within a few years, what a happy change has taken place ! The substantial clothing of our industrious classes is now the growth of the American soil, and the texture of the American loom ; the music of the water-wheel is heard on the banks of our thousand rural streams ; and enterprise and skill, with wealth, refinement, and prosperity in their train, having studded the sea-shore with populous cities, are making their great " progress " of improvement through the interior, and sowing towns and villages, as it were, broadcast through the country ! II. If OUT remote position be so important among the circumstances which favored the enterprise of our fathers, FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND 55 and have favored the growth of the settlements founded by them, scarcely less so was the point of time at which those settlements were commenced. When we cast our eyes over the annals of our race, we find them to be filled with a tale of various fortunes the rise and fall of nations ; periods of light and darkness ; of great illumination and of utter obscurity ; and of all inter- mediate degrees of intelligence, cultivation, and liberty. But in the seeming confusion of the narrative, our attention is arrested by three more conspicuous eras, at unequal distances in the lapse of ages. In Egypt we still behold, on the banks of the Nile, the monuments of an improved age a period, no doubt, of high cultivation and of great promise. Beneath the influ- ence of causes which are lost in the depth of antiquity, but which are doubtless connected with the debasing supersti- tions and political despotism which prevailed in that country, this period passed away, and left scarce a trace of its exist- ence, beyond the stupendous and mysterious structures the temples, the obelisks, and the pyramids which yet bear witness to an age of great power and cultivated art, and mock the curiosity of mankind by the records inscrutably carved on their surfaces.* Passing over an interval of about one thousand years, we reach the second epoch of light and promise. With the progress of freedom in Greece, that of the mind kept pace ; and an age of achievement in almost every branch of human art succeeded, of which the influence is still felt in the world. But the greater part of mankind were too barbarous to improve by the example of this favored corner ; and though the influence of its arts, letters, and civilization was wonder- fully extensive and durable ; though it seemed to revive at the court of the Roman Caesars, and still later at that of the Arabian caliphs ; yet, not resting on those popular institutions and popular principles which can alone be permanent, because * This remark was made before the successful attempts of Dr. Young and M. Champollion to decipher the Egyptian hieroglyphics. 56 FIKST SETTLEMENT 0* NEW ENGLAND. alone natural, it slowly died away, and Europe and the world relapsed into barbarity. The third great era of our race is the close of the fifteenth century. The use of the mariner's compass and the inven- tion of the art of printing had furnished the modern world with two engines of improvement and civilization, either of which was far more efficacious than all, united, known to antiquity. The Reformation, also, about this time, disen- gaged Christianity, itself one of the most powerful instru- ments of civilization, from those abuses which had hitherto greatly impaired its beneficent influence on temporal affairs ; and at this most chosen moment in the annals of the world, America was discovered. It would not be difficult, by pursuing this analysis, to show that the precise period, when the settlement of our coasts began, was peculiarly auspicious to the foundation of a new and hopeful system. Religious reformation was the original principle which kindled the zeal of our Pilgrim fathers; as it has been so often acknowledged to be the master principle of the greatest movements in the modern world.* The religions of Greece and Rome were portions of the political systems of these countries. The Scipios, the Crassuses, and Julius Caesar himself, were high priests. It was, doubtless, owing in part to this example, that, at an early period after the first intro- duction of Christianity, the heads of the church so entirely mistook the spirit of this religion, that, in imitation of the splendid idolatry which was passing away, they aimed at a new combination of church and state, which received but too much countenance from the policy of Constantine. This abuse, with ever multiplying and aggravated calamitous con- * " From the commencement of the religious war in Germany to the peace of Westphalia, scarce any thing great or memorable occurred in the European political world, with which the Reformation was not essentially connected. Every event in the history of the world, in this interval, if not directly occasioned, was nearly affected by this religious revolution ; and every state, great or small, remotely or immediately felt its influence." - Schiller, Geschichte des Dreissigjdhrigen Krieges, Vol. I. p. 1. FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 5? sequences, endured without any effectual check till the first blow was aimed at the supremacy of the papal power by Philip the Fair of France, in the fourteenth century, who laid the foundation of the liberties of the French Church by what may be called the Gallican Reformation. After an interval of two hundred years, this example was followed and improved upon by the princes in Germany who espoused the Protestant Reformation of Luther, and in a still more decisive manner by Henry the Eighth in England ; at which period we may accordingly date the second great step in the march of religious liberty. Much more, however, was yet to be effected toward the dissolution of the political bond between church and state. Hitherto, a domestic was substituted for a foreign yoke, and the rights of private conscience had, perhaps, gained but little in the exchange. In the middle of the sixteenth century, and among the exiles whom the tyranny of Q,ueen Mary had driven to the free cities on the Rhine, the ever- memorable sect of Puritans arose. On their return to Eng- land, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, their dislike to the ceremonial of the Church of England gained strength and intensity by the compulsory means employed to establish conformity. Nearly as we have now reached, both in simplicity of principle and point of time, to our Pilgrim forefathers, there is one more purifying process to go through, and one more generation to pass away. The major part of the non-con- formists themselves, while they rejected the ceremonies and disliked the organization of the Church of England, approved, in substance, the constitution of the Genevan Church, and their descendants were willing, a century later, to accept of a legal establishment in Scotland. It remained, therefore, to take the last step in the progress of reform, by asserting the independence of each single church. This principle may be considered as firmly established from the time of John Robinson, who may be called the father of the Independent Churches. His own, at Leyden, was the chief of these ; and fidelity to their principles was the motive VOL, i. 8 58 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. of their departure from Holland, and the occasion of their settlement at Plymouth.* On these, as on most questions of religious opinion, the judgments of men differ, for the most part, according to the associations in which they have been educated. Few, how- ever, will dissent from the proposition, that the early part of the seventeenth century was a great era of movement and progress in every thing that concerns civil and religious liberty. It was the age when the discoveries of the Spanish, Portuguese, and English navigators had begun to exert a stimulating influence on the world at large ; and the old continent and the new, like the magnetic poles, commenced those momentous processes of attraction and repulsion, from which so much of the activity of both has since proceeded. It was the period when the circulation of knowledge had become general ; and books, in all languages, were in the hands of a very large class, in every country. The history of Europe, in all its states, shows the extent and vehemence of the consequent fermentation. With their new engines of improvement and new principles of right, the communities of men rushed forward in the course of reform ; some with firmness and vigor, proportioned to the greatness of the object in view ; most with tumult and desperation, propor- tioned to the duration and magnitude of their injuries ; and none with entire success. The most that was effected, in the most fortunate states, was a compromise between the new claims and the old abuses. Absolute kings stipulated to be no longer absolute ; and free citizens preferred what they called petitions of right. In this way, and after infinite struggles, a tolerable foundation for practical liberty was laid on two principles, in the abstract false, as principles of gov- * In 1619, Robinson published, at Leyden, his "Apologia pro exulibus Anglis qui Brownistae vulgo appellantur." It has been conjectured, that the name of Independents may have grown out of a word in the following sentence, in which the leading principle of their religious peculiarities is expressed : " Ccetum quemlibet particularem esse totam, integram, et perfectam ecclesiam, ex suis partibus constantem, immediate et inde- vendenter (quoad alias ecclesias) sub ipso Christo." Apologia, Cap. V. p. 22, cited in Mosheim's Ecclesiast Hist Vol. V. p. 388. FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 59 ernment that of acquiescence on the part of the sovereign, and prescription in favor of the people. So firmly established are these principles, by consent of the statesmen of the freest country in Europe, as the best and only foundation of civil rights, that, so late as the last years of the eighteenth cen- tury, a work of great ingenuity and eloquence was written by Mr Burke, to prove that the people of England have not a right to appoint and to remove their rulers ; and that, if they ever had the right, they deliberately renounced it, at the glorious revolution of 1688. for themselves and their posterity forever. The work of reform is, of course, rendered exceedingly difficult, in Europe, by the length of time for which great abuses have existed, and the extent to which these abuses are interwoven with the whole system. We cannot but regard it as the plain interposition of Providence, that, at the critical period when the most powerful springs of improvement were in operation, a chosen company of Pilgrims, who were actuated by these springs of improvement, in all their strength, who had purchased the privilege of dissent at the high price of banishment from the civilized world, and who, with the dust of their feet, had shaken off many of the abuses and errors which had been accumulating for hundreds of years, came over to these distant and unoccupied shores. I know not that the work of thorough reform could be safely trusted to any different hands. I can credit their disinterestedness, when they maintain the equality of ranks ; for no rich for- feitures of attainted lords await them in the wilderness. I need not question the sincerity with which they assert the rights of conscience ; for the plundered treasures of an ancient hierarchy are not to seal their doctrine. They rested the edifice of their civil and religious liberties on a foundation as pure as the snows around them. Blessed be the spot, the only one on earth, where man has been able, in the organiza- tion of a commonwealth, to establish the good, without beginning with the sad, the odious, the often suspicious task of pulling down the bad ! III. Under these auspices, the Pilgrims landed on the coast 60 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. of New England. They found it a region of moderate fer- tility, offering an unsubdued wilderness to the hand of labor, with a climate temperate, indeed, but, compared with that which they had left, verging somewhat near to either ex- treme ; and a soil which promised neither gold nor diamonds, nor any thing but what should be gained from it by patient industry. This was but a poor reality for that dream of Oriental luxury with which America had filled the imagina- tions of men. The visions of Indian wealth, of mines of silver and gold, and fisheries of pearl, with which the Spanish adventurers in Mexico and Peru had astonished the ears of Europe, were but poorly fulfilled on the bleak and sterile plains of New England. No doubt, in the beginning of the settlement, these circumstances operated unfavorably on the growth of the colony. In the nature of things, it is mostl) adventurers who incline to leave their homes and native land, and risk the uncertainty of another hemisphere ; and a climate and soil like ours furnished but little attraction to the adventuring class. Captain Smith, in his zeal to promote the growth of New England, is at no little pains to show that the want of mineral treasures was amply compensated by the abundant fishery of the coast ; and having sketched, in strong colors, the prosperity and wealth of the states of Holland, he adds, " Divers, I know, may allege many other assistances, but this is the chiefest mine, and the sea the source of those silver streams of their virtue, which hath made them now the very miracle of industry, the only pattern of perfection for these affairs ; and the benefit of fishing is that primum mobile that turns all their spheres to this height of plenty, strength, honor, and exceeding great admiration." * While we smile at this overwrought panegyric on the primitive resource of the first settlers of New England, we .cannot but acknowledge that it has foundation in truth. It is, doubtless, to the untempting qualities of our climate and soil, and the conditions of industry and frugality, on which alone the prosperity of the colony could be secured, that * Smith's Generall Historic, Vol. II. p. 185, Richmond edit FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 61 we are to look for a full share of the final success of the enterprise. To this it is to be ascribed, that the country itself was riot preoccupied by a crowded population of savages, like the West India Islands and Mexico, who, placed upon a soil yielding almost spontaneously a superabundance of food, had multiplied into populous empires, and made a progress in the arts which served no other purpose than to give strength and duration to some of the most frightful systems of despotism that ever afflicted humanity ; systems uniting all that is most horrible in depraved civilization and wild barbarity. The problem, indeed, is hard to be solved, in what way, and by what steps, a continent possessed by savage tribes is to be lawfully occupied and colonized by civilized man. But this question was divested of much of its practical difficulty by the scantiness of the native population which our fathers found in New England, and the migratory life to which the necessity of the chase reduced them. It is owing to this that the annals of New England exhibit no scenes like those which were acted in Hispaniola, in Mexico, and Peru ; no tragedies like those of Anacaona, of Guatimozin, and of Ata- hualpa ; no statesmen like Bobadilla ; no heroes like Pizarro and Cortes ; " No dark Ovando, no religious Boyle." The qualities of our climate and soil enter largely, in other ways, into that natural basis on which our prosperity and our freedom have been reared. It is these which distinguish the smiling aspect of our busy, thriving villages from the lucra- tive desolation of the sugar islands, and all the wide-spread miseries of the colonial system of modern Europe, as it has existed, beyond the barrier of these mighty oceans, in the unvisited, unprotected, and unavenged recesses of either India. We have had abundant reason to be contented with this austere sky, this hard, unyielding soil. Poor as it is, it has left us no cause to sigh for the luxuries of the tropics, noi to covet the mines of the southern regions of our hemisphere. Our rough and hardly subdued hill-sides, and barren plains, 62 FIJtlST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. have produced us that which neither ores, nor spices, nor sweets could purchase ; which would not spring in the richest gardens of the despotic East. The compact numbers and the strength, the general intelligence and the aptitude for the arts of high civilization, which, since the world began, were never exhibited beneath the sultry line, have been the precious product of this iron-bound coast. The rocks and the sands, which would yield us neither the cane nor the coffee-tree, have yielded us, not only an abundance and a steadiness in resources, rarely enjoyed amidst the treacherous profusion of tropical colonies, but the habits, the manners, the industrious population, the schools and the churches, precious beyond all the wealth of all the Indies. "Man is the nobler growth our soil supplies, And souls are ripened in our northern skies." Describe to me a country rich in veins of the precious metals that is traversed by good roads. Inform me of the convenience of bridges, where 'he rivers roll over golden sands. Tell me of a thrifty, prosperous village of freemen in the miserable districts where every clod of the earth is kneaded up for diamonds, beneath the lash of the task-master. No, never ! while the constitution, not of states, but of human nature, remains the same ; never, while the laws, not of civil society, but of God, are unrepealed, will there be a hardy, virtuous, independent yeomanry in regions where two acres of untilled banana will feed a hundred men.* It is idle to call that food, which can never feed a free, intelligent, indus- trious population. It is not food ; it is chaff ; it is ashes ; there is no nourishment in it, if it be not carefully sown, and painfully reaped, by laborious freemen, and the better if on their own fee-simple acres. IV. Nor ought we to omit to say, that if our forefathers found, in the nature of the region to which they emigrated, the most favorable spot for the growth of a free and happy state, they themselves sprang from the country and the stock, * Humboldt, Essai Politique sur le Royaume de la Nouvelle Espagne, Tom. III. 28, 35. FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 63 the best adapted to furnish the habits and principles essential to the great undertaking. In an age that speculates, arid speculates to important purpose, on the races of fossil animals, of which no living specimen has existed since the deluge, and which compares, with curious criticism, the dialects of languages which ceased to be spoken a thousand years ago, it cannot be called idle, to inquire, which of the different countries of modern Europe possesses the qualities that best adapt it to become the parent nation of a new and free state. I know not, in fact, what more momentous question in human affairs could be asked, than that which regards the most hopeful lineage of a collective empire. But without engaging in so extensive a discussion, I may presume that there is not one who hears me, that does not regard it as a matter of con- gratr.*ation and joy, that our fathers were Englishmen. No character is perfect among nations, more than among men; but it must needs be conceded that, of all the states of Europe, England has been, from an early period, the most favored abode of liberty ; the only part of Europe, where, for any length of time, constitutional liberty can be said to have a stable existence. We can scarcely con- template, with patience, the idea that we might have been a Spanish colony, a Portuguese colony, or a Dutch col- ony. We can scarcely compare, with coolness, the inherit- ance which was transmitted to us by our fathers, with that which we must have received from almost any other country ; absolute government, military despotism, and the " holy inqui- sition." What would have been the condition of this flour- ishing and happy land, had these been the institutions on which its settlement was founded ? There are, unfortunately, too many materials for answering this question, in the history of the Spanish and Portuguese settlements on the American continent, from the first moment of unrelenting waste and desolation, to the distractions and conflicts of which we our- selves are the witnesses. What hope can there be for the colonies of nations which possess themselves no spring of improvement, and tolerate none in the regions over which they rule ; whose administration sets no bright examples of 64 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. parliamentary independence ; whose languages send out no reviving lessons of sound and practical science, (afraid of nothing that is true,) of manly literature, of sound philosophy ; but repeat, with every ship that crosses the Atlantic, the same debasing voice of despotism, bigotry, and antiquated super- stition ? What citizen of our republic is not grateful, in the contrast which our history presents ? Who does not feel, what reflect- ing American does not acknowledge, the incalculable advan- tages derived to this land, out of the deep fountains of civil, intellectual, and moral truth, from which we have drawn in England ? What American does not feel proud that his fathers were the countrymen of Bacon, of Newton, and of Locke ? Who does not know that, while every pulse of civil liberty in the heart of the British empire beat warm and full in the bosom of our ancestors, the sobriety, the firmness, and the dignity, with which the cause of free principles struggled into existence here, constantly found encouragement and countenance from the friends of liberty there ? Who does not remember that, when the Pilgrims went over the sea, the prayers of the faithful British confessors, in all the quarters of their dispersion, went over with them, while their aching eyes were strained, till the star of hope should go up in the western skies ? And who will ever forget that, in that eventful struggle which severed these youthful republics from the British crown, there was not heard, throughout our continent in arms, a voice which spoke louder for the rights of America, than that of Burke, or of Chatham, within the walls of the British parliament, and at the foot of the British throne ? No : for myself I can truly say that, after my native land, I feel a tenderness and a reverence for that of my fathers. The pride I take in my own country makes me respect that from which we are sprung. In touching the soil of England, I seem to return, like a descendant, to the old family seat ; to come back to the abode of an aged and venerable parent. I acknowledge this great consanguinity of nations. The sound of my native language, beyond the sea, is a music to my ear, beyond the richest strains of Tuscan softness or Castilian majesty. I am FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 65 not yet in a land of strangers, while surrounded by the man- ners, the habits, and the institutions under which I have been brought up. I wander, delighted, through a thousand scenes, which the historians and the poets have made familiar to us; of which the names are interwoven with our earliest associ- ations. I tread with reverence the spots where I can retrace the footsteps of our suffering fathers; the pleasant land of their birth has a claim on my heart. It seems to me a classic, yea, a holy land ; rich in the memory of the great and good, the champions and the martyrs of liberty, the exiled heralds of truth ; and richer, as the parent of this land of promise in the west. I am not I need not say I am not the panegyrist of England. I am not dazzled by her riches, nor awed by her power. The sceptre, the mitre, and the coronet stars, garters, and blue ribbons seem to me poor things for great men to contend for. Nor is my admiration awakened by her armies, mustered for the battles of Europe ; her navies, over- shadowing the ocean ; nor her empire, grasping the farthest East. It is these, and the price of guilt and blood by which they are too often maintained, which are the cause why no friend of liberty can salute her with undivided affections. But it is the cradle and the refuge of free principles, though often persecuted ; the school of religious liberty, the more precious for the struggles through which it has passed ; the tombs of those who have reflected honor on all who speak the English tongue ; it is the birthplace of our fathers, the home of the Pilgrims ; it is these which I love- and venerate in England. I should feel ashamed of an enthusiasm for Italy and Greece, did I not also feel it for a land like this. In an American, it would seem to me degenerate and ungrate- fu . to hang with passion upon the traces of Homer and Virgil, and follow without emotion the nearer and plainer footsteps of Shakspeare and Milton. 1 should think him cold in his love for his native land, who felt no melting in his heart for that other native country, which holds the ashes of his forefathers. V. But it was not enough that our fathers were of Eng- VOL. i. 9 66 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. land : the masters of Ireland and the lords of Hindostan are of England too. But our fathers were Englishmen, aggrieved, persecuted, and banished. It is a principle amply borne out by the history of the great and powerful nations of the earth, and by that of none more than the country of which we speak, that the best fruits and choicest action of the com- mendable qualities of the national character are to be found on the side of the oppressed few, and not of the triumphant many. As, in private character, adversity is often requisite to give a proper direction and temper to strong qualities, so the noblest traits of national character in all countries, our own not excepted, will often be found in times of trial and disaster, in the ranks of a protesting minority or of a dissenting sect. Never was this truth more clearly illustrated than in the set- tlement of New England. Could a common calculation of policy have dictated the terms of that settlement, no doubt our foundations would have been laid beneath the royal smile. Convoys and navies would have been solicited to waft our fathers to the coast ; armies, to defend the infant communities ; and the patronage of princes and great men, to defend their interests in the councils of the mother country. Happy, that our fathers enjoyed no such patronage ; happy, that they fell into no such protecting hands ; happy, that our foundations were silently and deeply cast in quiet insignificance, beneath a charter of banishment, persecution, and contempt ; so that, when the royal arm was at length outstretched against us, instead of a submissive child, tied down by former graces, it found a youthful giant in the land, born amidst hardships, and nourished on the rocks, indebted for no favors, and owing no duty. From the dark portals of the Star Chamber, and in the stern text of the acts of uniformity, the Pilgrims received a commission more efficient than any that ever bore the royal seal. Their banish- ment to Holland was fortunate ; the decline of their little company in the strange land was fortunate ; the difficulties which they experienced in getting the royal consent to banish themselves to this wilderness were fortunate ; all the tears and heart-breakings of that ever-memorable parting at Delft- FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. G7 haven had the happiest influence on the rising destinies of New England. All this purified the ranks of the settlers. These rough touches of fortune brushed off the light, uncer- tain, selfish spirits. They made it a grave, solemn, self- denying expedition. They cast a broad shadow of thought and seriousness over the cause, and if this sometimes deep- ened into severity and bitterness, can we find no apology for such a human weakness ? It is sad, indeed, to reflect on the disasters which this little band of Pilgrims encountered ; sad to see a portion of them, the prey of unrelenting cupidity, treacherously embarked in an unseaworthy ship, which they are soon obliged to abandon, and crowd themselves into one vessel one hundred persons, besides the ship's company, in a vessel of one hundred and sixty tons. One is touched at the story of the long, cold, and dangerous autumnal passage ; of the landing on the inhos- pitable rocks at this dismal season ; where they are deserted before long by the ship which had brought them, and which seemed their only hold upon the world of fellow-men a prey to the elements and to want, and fearfully ignorant of the power and the temper of the savage tribes that filled the unexplored continent upon whose verge they had ventured. But all this wrought together for good. These trials of wandering and exile, of the ocean, the winter, the wilder- ness, and the savage foe, were the final assurance of success. They kept far away from the enterprise all patrician soft- ness, all hereditary claims to preeminence. No effeminate nobility crowded into the dark and austere ranks of the Pil- grims. No Carr nor Villiers desired to conduct the ill-provided band of despised Puritans. No well-endowed clergy were desirous to quit their cathedrals, and set up a splendid hie- rarchy in the frozen wilderness. No craving governors were anxious to be sent over to our cheerless El Dorados of ice and of snow. No, they could not say they had encouraged, patronized, or helped the Pilgrims. They could not after- wards fairly pretend to reap where they had not strown ; and as our fathers reared this broad and solid fabric with pains and watchfulness, unaided, barely tolerated, it did not 68 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND fall when the arm which had never supported was raised to destroy. Methinks I see it now, that one solitary, adventurous vessel, the Mayflower of a forlorn hope, freighted with the prospects of a future state, and bound across the unknown sea. I behold it pursuing, with a thousand misgivings, the uncer- tain, the tedious voyage. Suns rise and set, and weeks and months pass, and winter surprises them on the deep, but. brings them not the sight of the wished-for shore. I see them now, scantily supplied with provisions, crowded almost to suffocation in their ill-stored prison, delayed by calms, pursuing a circuitous route ; and now, driven in fury before the raging tempest, in their scarcely seaworthy vessel. The awful voice of the storm howls through the rigging. The laboring masts seem straining from their base; the dismal sound of the pumps is heard; the ship leaps, as it were, madly from billow to billow ; the ocean breaks, and settles with ingulfing floods over the floating deck, and beats with deadening weight against the staggered vessel. I see them, escaped from these perils, pursuing their all but desperate undertaking, and landed at last, after a five months' passage, on the ice-clad rocks of Plymouth, weak and exhausted from the voyage, poorly armed, scantily provisioned, depending on the charity of their shipmaster for a draught of beer on board, drinking nothing but water on shore, without shelter, without means, surrounded by hostile tribes. Shut now the volume of history, and tell me, on any principle of human probability, what shall be the fate of this handful of adventurers. Tell me, man of military science, in how many months were they all swept off by the thirty savage tribes enumerated within the boundaries of New England ? Tell me, politician, how long did this shadow of a colony, on which your conventions and treaties had not smiled, languish on the distant coast ? Stu- dent of history, compare for me the baffled projects, tho deserted settlements, the abandoned adventures of other times, and find the parallel of this. Was it the winter's storm, beating upon the houseless heads of women and chil- dren ? was it hard labor and spare meals ? was it disease f FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 69 was it the tomahawk ? was it the deep malady of a blighted hope, a ruined enterprise, and a broken heart, aching in its last moments at the recollection of the loved and left, beyond the sea ? was it some or all of these united that hurried this forsaken company to their melancholy fate ? And is it possible that neither of these causes, that not all combined, were able to blast this bud of hope ? Is it possible that from a beginning so feeble, so frail, so worthy, not so much of admiration as of pity, there have gone forth a progress so steady, a growth so wonderful, a reality so important, a prom- ise yet to be fulfilled so glorious ? Such, in a very inadequate statement, are some of the cir- cumstances under which the settlement of our country began. The historian of Massachusetts, after having given a brief notice of Carver, of Bradford, of Winslow, of Brewster, of Standish, and others, adds, " These were the founders of the colony of Plymouth. The settlement of this colony occa- sioned the settlement of Massachusetts Bay, which was the source of all the other colonies of New England. Virginia was in a dying state, and seemed to revive and flourish from the example of New England. I am not preserving from oblivion," continues he, " the names of heroes, whose chief merit is the overthrow of cities, provinces, and empires ; but the names of the founders of a flourishing town and colony, if not of the whole British empire in America."* This was the judicious reflection of Hutchinson, sixty years ago, when the greatest tribute to be paid to the Fathers of Plymouth was, that they took the lead in colonizing the British possessions in America. What, then, ought to be our emotions, as we meet, on this anniversary, upon the spot where the first successful foundations of the great American republic were laid ? Within a short period, an incident has occurred, which, of itself, connects, in the most gratifying association, the early settlement of New England with the present growth and * Hutchinson's History of Massachusetts Bay, Vol. II. Appendix, p. 463. 70 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. prosperity of our wide-extended republic. Within the past year, the ^iberal hand of this great confederacy of states has been extended for the restoration and security of the harbor, where, on the day we celebrate, the germ of the future growth of America was comprehended within one weather- beaten vessel, tossing upon the tide, on board of which, in the words of Hutchinson, the Fathers of New England, by a sol- emn instrument, "formed themselves into a proper democracy." Two centuries only have elapsed, and we behold a great American representation convened, from twenty-four inde- pendent and flourishing republics, taking under their patron- age the local interests of the spot where our fathers landed, and providing, in the same act of appropriation, for the removal of obstacles in the Mississippi and the repair of Plymouth Beach. I know not in what words a more beautiful commen- tary could be written on our early infancy or our happy growth. There were members of the national Congress which made that appropriation, I will not say from distant states, but from different climates ; from regions which the sun in the heavens does not reach in the same hour that he rises on us. JNor is it even our mighty territory to which the influence of the principles and example of the Fathers of New England is confined. While I utter the words, a constitution of repub- lican government, closely imitated from ours, is going into operation in the states of the Mexican confederation, a region more extensive than all our territories east of the Mississippi. Farther south, one of the provinces of Central America, the republic of San Salvador, has sent its envoys to solicit a union with us. Will posterity believe that such an offer was made and refused, in the age that saw England and Spain rushing into war for the possession of a few uninhabited islets on the coast of Patagonia? Pass the Isthmus of Darien, and we behold the sister republic of Colombia, a realm two thirds as large as Europe, ratifying her first solemn treaty of amity and commerce with the United States ; while still onward to the south, in the valleys of the Chilian Andes, and on the banks of La Plata, in states not less vast than those already FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. 71 named, constitutions of republican government are in pros- perous operation, founded on our principles, and modelled on our forms. When our commissioners visited those countries, in 1817, they found the books most universally read among the people were the constitutions of the United States and of the several states, translated into the language of the country ; while the public journals were filled with extracts from the celebrated " Defence " of these constitutions, written by that venerable descendant of the Pilgrims, (John Adams,) still living in our neighborhood, to witness the prosperous opera- tion of the governments which he did so much to establish.* I do not fear that we shall be accused of extravagance in the enthusiasm we feel at a train of events, of such astonish- ing magnitude, novelty, and consequence, connected by asso- ciations so intimate with the day we now hail ; with the events we now celebrate ; with the Pilgrim Fathers of New England. Victims of persecution ! how wide an empire acknowledges the sway of your principles ! Apostles of liberty ! what millions attest the authenticity of your mission ! The great continents of America have become, at length, the theatre of your achievements ; the Atlantic and the Pacific, the highways of communication, on which your prin- ciples and your example are borne. From the oldest abodes of civilization, the venerable plains of Greece, to the scarcely explored range of the Cordilleras, the impulse you gave at length is felt. While other regions revere you as the leaders of this great march of humanity, we are met, on this joyful day, to offer to your memory our tribute of filial affection. The sons and daughters of the Pilgrims, we have assembled on the spot where you, our suffering fathers, set foot on this happy shore. Happy, indeed, it has been for us ! O that * This oration dates in 1824. The interval between that period and the present has furnished many other instances of the influence of Amer- ican precedents in the political reforms of the age. Perhaps the most astonishing is the fact, that within the current year (1849) a constitution of representative government has been proclaimed in the Austrian empire, of which it was said in the British House of Lords, that it was modelled on that of the United States, rather than on that of England 72 FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND. you could have enjoyed those blessings which you prepared for your children ! Could our comfortable homes have shielded you from the wintry air ! could our abundant harvests have supplied you in time of famine ! could the broad shield of our beloved country have sheltered you from the visitations of arbitrary power ! We come, in our prosperity, to remem- ber your trials ; and here, on the spot where New England began to be, we come to learn of you, our Pilgrim Fathers, an abiding lesson of virtue, enterprise, patience, zeal, and faith ! THE FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR.* FELLOW-CITIZENS : THE subject which the present occasion presents to our consideration, is of the highest interest. The appearance of a new state in the great family of nations, is one of the most important topics of reflection that can ever be addressed to us. In the case of America, the magnitude and the difficulty of the subject are greatly increased by peculiar circumstances. Our progress has been so rapid ; the interval has been so short between the first plantations in the wilderness and the full development of our political system ; there has been such a visible agency of single characters in affecting the condition of the country ; such an almost instantaneous expansion of single events into consequences of incalculable importance, that we find ourselves deserted by the principles and prece- dents drawn from the analogy of other states. Men have here seen, felt, and acted themselves, what in most other countries has been the growth of centuries. Take your station, for instance, on Connecticut River. Every thing about you, whatsoever you behold or approach, bears witness that you belong to a powerful and prosperous state. But it is only seventy years since the towns which you now contemplate with admiration, as the abodes of a numer- ous, refined, enterprising population, safe in the enjoyment of life's best blessings, were wasted and burned by the savages * Oration delivered at Concord, 19th April, 1825 VOL. I. 10 (73) 74 FIEST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. of the wilderness ; and their inhabitants, in large numbers, the old and the young, the minister of the gospel, and the mother with her new-born babe, were wakened at midnight by the war-whoop, dragged from their beds, and marched with bleeding feet across the snow-clad mountains, to be sold, as slaves, to the French in Canada. Go back eighty years farther, and the same barbarous foe is on the skirts of your oldest settlements, at your own doors. As late as 1676. ten or twelve citizens of Concord were slain or carried into captivity, who had gone to meet the Indians in their attack on Sudbury, in which the brave Captain Wadsworth and his companions fell. These contrasts regard the political strength of our coun- try ; the growth in national resources presents a case of increase still more astonishing, though less adapted to move the feelings. By the last valuation, the aggregate property of Massachusetts is estimated at something less than three hundred millions of dollars. By the valuation made in 1780, the property of Massachusetts and Maine was estimated at only eleven millions. That astonishing incident in human affairs, the revolution of America, as seen on the day of its portentous, or rather, let me say, of its auspicious commencement, is the theme of our present consideration. To what shall we direct our thoughts ? On the one hand, we behold a connection of events ; the time and circumstances of the original discovery ; the settlements of the Pilgrims, and their peculiar principles and character ; their singular political relations with the mother country ; their long and doubtful struggle with the savage tribes ; their collisions with the royal governors ; their cooperation in the British wars ; with all the influences of their geographical and physical condition ; uniting to constitute what I may call the national education of America. When we take this sur- vey, we feel, as far as Massachusetts is concerned, that we ought to divide the honors of the revolution with the great men of the colony in every generation ; with the Windows and the Pepperells, the Cookes, the Dummers, and the Math- ers, the Winthrops and the Bradfords, and all who labored and FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 75 acted in the cabinet, the desk, or the field, for the one great cause. On the other hand, when we dwell upon the day itself, every thing else seems lost in the comparison. Had our fathers failed, on that day of trial which we now cele- brate ; had their votes and their resolves (as was tauntingly predicted on both sides of the Atlantic) ended in the breath in which they began ; had the rebels laid down their arms, as they were commanded ; and the military stores, which had been frugally treasured up for this crisis, been, without resist- ance, destroyed ; then the revolution would have been at an end, or rather never had been begun ; the heads of Han- cock and Adams and their brave colleagues would have been exposed in ghastly triumph on Temple Bar ; a military des- potism would have been firmly fixed in the colonies ; the patriots of Massachusetts would have been doubly despised, the scorn of their enemies, the scorn of their deluded country- men ; and the heart of this great people, then beating and almost bursting for freedom, would have been struck cold and dead, perhaps forever. It may be objected to such a celebration as this, that it tends to keep up a hostile sentiment towards England. But I do not acknowledge the justice of this scruple. In the first place, it was not England, but the English ministerial party of the day, and even a small circle in that party, which pro- jected the measures that resulted in our revolution. The rights of America found steady and powerful assertors in England. Lord Chatham declared to the House of Peers that ' he was glad America had resisted ; and, alluding to the fact that he had a son in the British army, he added, that " none of his blood should serve in this detested cause." Nay, even a portion of the ministry that imposed the stamp duty, the measure which hastened the spirit of America to a crisis which it might not have reached in a generation, Lord Mansfield, the Duke of Giafton, the Earl of Shelburne, and Lord Camden, rose, one after another, and asserted in the House of Lords, that they had no share in some of the measures which were proposed by the verv cabinet of which they were leading members 76 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. But I must go farther. Did faithful history compel us to cast on all England, united, the reproach of those measures which drove our fathers to arms ; and were it, in consequence, the unavoidable effect of these celebrations, to revive the feelings of revolutionary times in the bosoms of the aged ; to kindle those feelings anew in the susceptible hearts of the young ; it would still be our duty, on every becoming occa- sion, in the strongest colors, and in the boldest lines we can command, to retrace the picture of the times that tried men's souls. We owe it to our fathers, we owe it to our children. A pacific and friendly feeling towards England is the duty of this nation ; but it is not our only nor our first duty. Amer- ica owes an earlier and a higher duty to the great and good men who caused her to be a nation, at an expense of treasure, a contempt of peril, a prodigality of blood, as pure and noble as ever flowed. I cannot consent, out of tenderness to the memory of the Gages, the Hutchinsons, the Grenvilles and Norths, the Dartmouths and Hillsboroughs, to cast a veil over the labors and the sacrifices of the Quincys, the Adamses, the Hancocks, and the Warrens. There is not a people on earth so abject as to think that national courtesy requires them to hush up the tale of the glorious exploits of their fathers and countrymen. France is at peace with Austria and Prussia ; but she does not demolish her beautiful bridges, which perpetuate the names of the battle-fields where Napoleon annihilated their armies, nor tear down the columns molten out of their captured artillery. England is at peace with France and Spain; but does she suppress the names of Trafalgar and Waterloo ? does she overthrow the towers of Blenheim Castle, eternal monuments of the disasters of France ? No ; she is wiser. Wiser, did 1 say ? She is truer, juster to the memory of her fathers and the spirit of her children. The national character, in some of its most important elements, must be formed, elevated, and strengthened from the materials which history presents. Are we to be eternally ringing the changes upon Marathon and Thermopyla3 ; and going back to find in obscure texts of Greek and Latin the great exemplars of patriotic virtue ? I FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 77 rejoice that we can find them nearer home, in our own coun- try, on our own soil ; that strains of the noblest feeling that ,ver swelled in the breast of man, are breathing to us, out of every page of our country's history, in the native elo- quence of our mother tongue ; that the colonial and the provincial councils of America exhibit to us models of the spirit and character which gave Greece and Rome their name and their praise among the nations. Here we ought to go for our instruction ; the lesson is plain, and easily applied. When we go to ancient history, we are bewildered with the difference of manners and institutions. We are willing to pay our tribute of applause to the memory of Leonidas, who fell nobly for his country, in the face of the foe. But when we trace him to his home, we are confounded at the reflec- tion, that the same Spartan heroism to which he sacrificed himself at Thermopylae, would have led him to tear his only child, if it happened to be a sickly babe, the object for which all that is kind and good in man most strongly pleads, from the bosom of its mother, and carry it out to be eaten by the wolves of Taygetus. We feel a glow of admiration at the heroism displayed at Marathon, by the ten thousand champions of invaded Greece ; but we cannot forget that the tenth part of the number were slaves, unchained from the workshops and doorposts of their masters, to go and fight the battles of freedom. I do not mean that these examples are to destroy the interest with which we read the history of ancient times ; they possibly increase that interest, by the singular contrasts they exhibit. But they do warn us, if we need the warning, to seek our great practical lessons of patriotism at home ; out of the exploits and sacrifices, of which our own country is the theatre ; out of the characters of our own fathers. Them we know, the natural, unaffected, the citizen heroes. We know what happy firesides they left for the cheerless camp. We know with what pacific habits they dared the perils of the field. There is no mystery, no romance, no madness, under the name of chiv- alry, about them. It is all resolute, manly resistance, for the sake of conscience and principle, not merely of an 78 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. overwhelming power, but of all the force of long-rooted habits, and the native love of order and peace. Above all, their blood calls to us from the soil which we tread ; it beats in our veins ; it cries to us, not merely in the thrilling words of one of the first victims in the cause, " My sons, scorn to be slaves," but it cries with a still more moving eloquence, "My sons, forget not your fathers." Fast, O, too fast, with all our efforts to prevent it, their precious memories are dying away. Notwithstanding our numerous written memorials, much of what is known of those eventful times dwells but in the recollection of a few revered sur- vivors, and is rapidly perishing with them. How many prudent counsels, conceived in perplexed times ; how many heart-stirring words, uttered when liberty was treason ; how many brave and heroic deeds performed when the halter, not the laurel, was the promised meed of patriotic daring, are already lost and forgotten in the graves of their authors ! How little do we, * although we have been permitted to hold converse with the venerable remnants of that day, how little do we know of their dark and anxious hours ; of their secret meditations ; of the hurried and perilous events of the momentous struggle ! And while they are dropping round us like the leaves of autumn, and scarce a week passes that does not call away some member of the veteran ranks, already so sadly thinned, shall we make no effort to hand down the traditions of their day to our children ; to pass the torch of liberty unquenched to those who stand next us in the line ? Let us then faithfully go back to those all-important days. Let us recall the events with which the momentous revolu- tionary crisis was brought on ; let us gather up the traditions which still exist ; let us show the world, that if we are not called to follow the example of our fathers, we are at least not insensible to the worth of their characters, nor indifferent to the sacrifices and trials by which they purchased our prosperity. Time would fail us to recount the measures by which the way was prepared for the revolution ; the stamp act ; its FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 79 repeal, with the declaration of the right to tax America ; the landing of troops in Boston, beneath the batteries of fourteen 'vessels of war, lying broadside to the town, with springs on their cables, their guns loaded, and matches smoking; the repeated insults, and finally the massacre of the fifth of March, resulting from this military occupation ; and the Boston Port Bill, by which the final catastrophe was hurried on. Nor can we dwell upon the appointment at Salem, on the seventeenth of June, 1774, of the delegates to the Conti- nental Congress ; of the formation at Salem, in the following October, of the Provincial Congress ; of the decided measures which were taken by that noble assembly at Concord and at Cambridge ; of the preparations they made against the worst, by organizing the militia, providing stores, and appointing commanders. All this was done by the close of the year 1774. At length the memorable year of 1775 arrived. The plunder of the provincial stores at Medford, and the attempt to seize the cannon at Salem, had produced a highly irritated state of the public mind. The friends of our rights in England made a vigorous effort, in the month of March, to avert the crisis that impended. On the twenty-second of that month, Mr Burke spoke the last word of conciliation and peace. He spoke it in a tone and with a power befitting the occasion and the man ; but he spoke it to the north-west wind. Eight days after, at that season of the year when the prudent New England husbandman repairs the enclosures of his field, as the first preparation for the labors of the season, General Gage sent out a party of eleven hundred men to overthrow the stone walls in the neighborhood of Boston, by way of opening and levelling the arena for the approaching contest. With the same view, in the months of February and March, his officers were sent in disguise to traverse the country, to make military surveys of its roads and passes, to obtain accounts of the stores at Concord and Worcester, and to communicate with the disaffected. These disguised offi- cers were here at Concord, on the twentieth of March, and received treacherous or unsuspecting information of the 80 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. places where the provincial stores were concealed. I mention this only to show that our fathers, in their arduous contest, had every thing to contend with ; secret as well as open foes ; treachery as well as power. But I need not add that they pos- sessed not only the courage and the resolution, but the vigi- lance and care demanded for the crisis. In November, 1774, a society had been formed at Boston, principally of the me- chanics of that town, a class of men to whom the revolu- tionary cause was as deeply indebted as to any other in America, for the express purpose of closely watching the movements of the open and secret foes of the country. In the long and dreary nights of a New England winter, they patrolled the streets ; and not a movement which concerned the cause escaped their vigilance. Not a measure of the royal governor but was in their possession, in a few hours after it was communicated to his confidential officers. Nor was manly patriotism alone aroused in the cause. The daughters of America were inspired with the same noble temper that animated their fathers, their husbands, and their brothers. The historian tells us, that the first intimation communicated to the patriots, of the impending commence- ment of hostilities, came from a " daughter of liberty, un- equally yoked with an enemy of her country's rights." With all these warnings, and all the vigilance with which the royal troops were watched, none supposed the fatal mo- ment was so near. On Saturday, April fifteenth, the Provin- cial Congress adjourned their session in this place, to meet on the tenth of May. On the very same day, Saturday, the fifteenth of April, the companies of grenadiers and light infantry in Boston the flower not merely of the royal garrison, but of the British army were taken off their regular duty, under the pretence of learning a new military exercise. At the midnight following, the boats of the trans- port ships, which had been previously repaired, were launched, and moored for safety under the sterns of the vessels of war. Not one of these movements least of all, that which took place under cover of midnight was unobserved by the vigilant "sons of liberty." The next morning, Colonel Paul FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 81 Revere, a very active member of the patriotic society just mentioned, was despatched, by Dr Joseph Warren, to John Hancock and Samuel Adams, then at Lexington, whose seizure was threatened by the royal governor. So early did these distinguished patriots receive the intelligence, that preparations for an important movement were on foot ! Just- ly considering, however, that some object besides the seizure of two individuals was probably designed in the movement of so large a force, they advised the Committee of Safety to order the distribution, into the neighboring towns, of the stores c Elected at Concord. Colonel Revere, on his return from this excursion on the sixteenth of April, in order to guard against any accident which might make it impossible at the last moment to give information from Boston of the departure of the troops, concerted with his friends in Charles- town, that, whenever the British forces should embark in their boats to cross into the country, two lanterns should be lighted in the North Church steeple ; and one, should they march out by Roxbury. Thus was the meditated blow prepared for. before it was struck ; and the caution of the British commander was rendered unavailing, who, on Tuesday, the eighteenth of April, despatched ten sergeants, with orders to dine at Cam- bridge, and at nightfall to scatter themselves on the roads from Boston to Concord, to prevent notice of the projected expedition from reaching the country. At length the momentous hour arrives, as big with conse- quences to man as any that ever struck in his history. The darkness of night still shrouds the rash and fatal measures with which the liberty of America is hastened on. The highest officers in the British army are as yet ignorant of the nature of the meditated blow. At nine o'clock in the even- ing of the eighteenth. Lord Percy is sent for by the governor, to receive the information of the design. On his way back to his lodgings, he finds the very movements, which had been just communicated to him in confidence by the commander- in-chief, a subject of conversation in a group of patriotic citizens in the street. He hastens back to General Gage, VOL. I. 11 82 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. and tells him he is betrayed ; and orders are instantly given to permit no American to leave the town. But the order is five minutes too late. Dr Warren, the president of the Committee of Safety, though he had returned only at night- fall from the meeting at West Cambridge, was already in possession of the whole design ; and instantly despatched two messengers to Lexington Mr William Dawes, who went out through Roxbury, and Colonel Paul Revere, who crossed to Charlestown. The latter received this summons at ten o'clock, on Tuesday night ; the lanterns were imme- diately lighted up in North Church steeple ; and in this way, before a man of the soldiery was embarked in the boats, the news of their coming was travelling with the rapidity of light through the country.* Having accomplished this precautionary measure, Colonel Revere repaired to the north part of the town, where he constantly kept a boat in readiness, in which he was now rowed by tAvo friends across the river, a little to the eastward of the spot where the Somerset man-of-war was moored, between Boston and Charlestown. It was then young flood, the ship was swinging round upon the tide, and the moon was just rising upon this midnight scene of solemn anticipa- tion. Colonel Revere was safely landed in Charlestown, where his signals had already been observed. He procured a horse from Deacon Larkin, for the further pursuit of his errand. That he would not be permitted to accomplish it, without risk of interruption, was evident from the informa- tion which he received from Mr Richard Devens, a member of the Committee of Safety, that on his way from West Cambridge, where the committee sat, he had encountered several British officers, well armed and mounted, going up the road. At eleven o'clock, Colonel Revere started upon his errand. After passing Charlestown Neck, he saw two men on horse- back under a tree. On approaching them, he perceived them by the light of the moon to be British officers. One of them * See note A. FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION 83 immediately tried to intercept, and the other to seize him. The colonel instantly turned back towards Charlestown, and then struck into the Medford road. The officer in pursuit of him, endeavoring to cut him off, plunged into a clay pond, in the corner between the two roads, and the colonel escaped. He pursued his way to Medford, awoke the captain of the minute men there, and giving the alarm at every house on the road, passed on through West Cambridge to Lexing- ton. There he delivered his message to Messrs Hancock and Adams, and there also he was shortly after joined by Mr William Dawes, the messenger who had gone out by Roxbury. After staying a short time at Lexington, Messrs Revere and Dawes, at about one o'clock of the morning of the nineteenth of April, started for Concord, to communicate the intelligence there. They were soon overtaken on the way by Dr Samuel Prescott, of Concord, who joined them in giving the alarm at every house on the road. About half way from Lexington to Concord, while Dawes and Prescott were alarming a house on the road, Revere, being about one hundred rods in advance, saw two officers in the road of the same appearance as those he had escaped in Charlestown. He called to his companions to assist him in forcing his way through them, but was instantly surrounded by four officers. These officers had pre- viously thrown down the wall of an adjoining field, and the Americans, prevented from forcing their way onward, passed into the field. Dr Prescott, although the reins of his horse had been cut in the struggle with the officers, succeeded, by leaping a stone wall, in making his escape from the field, and reaching Concord. Revere aimed at a wood, but was there encountered by six more officers, and was, with his compan- ion, made prisoner. The British officers, who had already seized three other Americans, having learned from their pris- oners that the whole country was alarmed, thought it best for their own safety to hasten back, taking their prisoners with them. Near Lexington meeting-house, on their return, the British officers heard the militia, who were on parade, firing a volley of guns. Alarmed at this, they compelled Revere to 84 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. give up his horse, and then, pushing forward at a full gallop, escaped down the road. The morning was now advanced to about four o'clock ; nor was it then known at Lexington that the British troops were so near at hand. Colonel Revere again sought Messrs Hancock and Adams at the house of the Reverend Mr Clark ; and it was thought expedient by their friends, who had kept watch there during the night, that these eminent patriots should remove towards Woburn. Having accompanied them to a house on the Woburn road, where they proposed to stop, Colonel Revere returned to Lexington to watch the progress of events. He soon met a person at full gallop, who informed him that the British forces were coming up the road. Hastening now to the public house, to secure some papers of Messrs Han- cock and Adams, Colonel Revere saw the advancing troops in full array. It was now seven hours since these troops were put in motion. They were mustered, at ten o'clock of the night preceding, on the Common, in Boston, and embarked, to the number of eight hundred grenadiers and light infantry, in the boats of the British squadron. They landed at Phipps's Farm, a little to the south of Lechmere's Point, East Cambridge, and on disembarking, a day's provision was dealt out to them. Pursuing the path across the marshes, they emerged into the old Charlestown and West Cambridge road. And here let us pause a moment in the narration, to ask, who are the men, and what is the cause ? Is it an army of Frenchmen and Canadians, who in earlier days had often run the line between them and us, with havoc and fire, and who have now come to pay back the debt of recent defeat and subjugation ? Or is it their ancient ally of the woods, the stealthy savage, borne in his light canoe, with muffled oars, over the midnight waters, creeping like the felon wolf through our villages, that he may start up at dawn, to wage a war of surprise, of plunder, and of death, against the slum- bering cradle and the defenceless fireside ? O, no ! It is the disciplined armies of a brave, a Christian, a kindred people ; led by gallant officers, the choice sons of England ; and they FIRoT BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 85 are going to seize, and secure for the halter, men whose crime is, that they have dared to utter, in the English tongue, on this side of the ocean, the principles which gave and give England her standing among the nations ; they are going to plunge their swords in the breasts of men who, fifteen years before, on the Plains of Abraham, fought and conquered by their side. But they go not unobserved ; the tidings of their approach are travelling before them ; the faithful messengers have aroused the citizens from their slumbers ; alarm guns aro answering to each other, and spreading the news from village to village ; the tocsin is heard, at this unnatural hour, from steeples that never before rung with any other summons than that of the gospel "of peace ; tne sacred tranquillity of the hour is startled with all the mingled sounds of preparation of resolute though unorganized resistance. The Committee of Safety, as has been observed, had met the preceding day at West Cambridge : and three of its respected members, Gerry, Lee, and Orne, had retired to sleep in the public house, where the session of the committee was held. So difficult was it, notwithstanding all that had passed, to believe that a state of things could exist, between England and America, in which American citizens should be liable to be torn from their beds by an armed force at midnight, that the members of the Committee of Safety, though forewarned of the approach .of the British troops, did not even think it necessary to retire from their lodgings. On the contrary, they rose from their beds and went to their windows to gaze on the unwonted sight the midnight march of armies through the peaceful hamlets of New England. Half the column had already passed, when a flank guard was suddenly detached to search the public house, no doubt in the design of arresting the members of the Committee of Safety, who might be there. It was only at this last critical moment, that Mr Gerry and his friends bethought themselves of flight, and, without time even to clothe themselves, escaped into the fields. By this time, Colonel Smith, who commanded the expedi- tion, appears to have been alarmed at the indications of a general rising throughout the country. The light infantry 86 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. companies were now detached and placed under the command of Major Pitcairn, for the purpose of hastening forward to secure the bridges at Concord, and thus cut off the commu- nication between this place and the towns north and west of it. Before these companies could reach Lexington, the offi- cers already mentioned, who had arrested Colonel Revere, joined their advancing countrymen, and reported that five hundred men were drawn up in Lexington, to resist the king's troops. On receiving this highly exaggerated account, the British light infantry was halted, to give time for the grena- diers to come up. The company assembled on Lexington Green, which the British officers, in their report, had swelled to five hundred, consited of sixty or seventy of the militia of the place. Information had been received about nightfall, both by private means and by communications from the Committee of Safety, that a strong party of officers had been seen on the road, directing their course towards Lexington. In consequence of this intelligence, a body of about thirty of the militia, well armedi assembled early in the evening ; a guard of eight men under Colonel William Munroe, then a sergeant in the com- pany, was stationed at the house of the Rev. Mr. Clark ; and three men were sent off to give the alarm at Concord. These three messengers were, however, stopped on their way, as has been mentioned, by the British officers, who had already passed onward. One of their number, Elijah Sanderson, has lately died at Salem, at an advanced age. A little after midnight, as has been stated, Messrs. Revere and Dawes arrived with the certain information that a very large body of the royal troops was in motion. The alarm was now gener- ally given to the inhabitants of Lexington, messengers were sent down the road to ascertain the movements of the troops, and the militia company under Captain John Parker appeared on the green to the number of one hundred and thirty. The roll was duly called at this perilous midnight muster, and some answered to their names for the last time on earth. The company was now ordered to load with powder and ball, and awaited in anxious expectation the return of those who had FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 87 been sent to reconnoitre the enemy. One of them, in conse- quence of some misinformation, returned and reported that there was no appearance of troops on the road from Boston. Under this harassing uncertainty and contradiction, the militia were dismissed, to await the return of the other expresses, and with orders to be in readiness at the beat of the drum. One of these messengers was made prisoner by the British, whose march was so cautious, that they remained undiscov- ered till within a mile and a half of Lexington meeting- house, and time was scarce left for the last messenger to return with the tidings of their approach. The new alarm was now given ; the bell rings, alarm guns are fired, the drum beats to arms. Some of the militia had gone home, when dismissed ; but the greater part were in the neighboring houses, and instantly obeyed the summons. Sixty or seventy appeared on the green, and were drawn up in double ranks. At this moment, the British column of eight hundred bayonets appears, headed by their mounted com- manders, their banners flying and drums beating a charge. To engage them with a handful of militia of course was madness, to fly at the sight of them they disdained. The British troops rush furiously on ; their commander, with mingled threats and oaths, bids the Americans lay down their arms and disperse, and his own troops to fire. A mo- ment's delay, as of compunction, follows. The order, with vehement imprecations, is repeated, and they fire. No one falls, and the band of self-devoted heroes, most of whom prob- ably had never seen a body of troops before, stand firm in the front of an army outnumbering them ten to one. Another vol- ley succeeds ; the killed and wounded drop, and it was not till they had returned the fire of the overwhelming force that the militia were driven from the field. A scattered fire now succeeded on both sides, while the Americans remained in sight ; and the British troops were then drawn up on the green, to fire a volley and give a shout in honor of the victory.* While these incidents were taking place, and every moment * See note B. 88 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. then came charged with events which were to give a charac- ter to centuries, Hancock and Adams, though removed by their friends from the immediate vicinity of the force sent to apprehend them, were apprised, too faithfully, that the work of death was begun. The heavy and quick-repeated volleys told them a tale that needed no exposition, which pro- claimed that Great Britain had severed that strong tie which bound the descendants of England to the land of their fathers, and had appealed to the right of the strongest. The inevi- table train of consequences burst in prophetic fulness upon their minds ; and the patriot Adams, forgetting the scenes of tribulation through which America must pass to realize the prospect, and heedless that the ministers of vengeance were in close pursuit of his own life, uttered that memorable ex- clamation, equal to any thing that can be found in the records of Grecian or Roman heroism " O, what a glorious morn- ing is this ! " Elated with its success, the British ctrmy took up its march towards Concord. The intelligence of the projected expedi- tion had been cpmmunicated to this town by Dr Samuel Prescott, in the manner already described , and from Concord had travelled onward in every direction. The interval was employed in removing a portion of the public stores to the neighboring towns, while the aged and infirm, the women and children, sought refuge in the surrounding woods. About seven o'clock in the morning, the glittering arms of the hostile column were seen advancing on the Lincoln road. A body of militia, from one hundred and fifty to two hundred men, who had taken post for observation on the heights above the entrance to the town, retire at the approach of the army of the enemy, first to the hill a little farther north, and then beyond the bridge. The British troops press forward into the town, and are drawn up in front of the court house. Parties are then ordered out to the various spots where the public stores and arms were supposed to be deposited. Much had been removed to places of safety, and something was saved by the prompt and innocent artifices of individuals. The destruction of property and of arms was hasty and FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 89 incomplete, and, considered as the object of an enterprise of such fatal consequences, it stands in shocking contrast with the waste of blood by which it was effected. I am relating events whicft, though they can never be repeated more frequently than they deserve, are yet familiar to most who hear me. I need not therefore attempt, nor would it be practicable did I attempt it, to recall the numer- ous interesting occurrences of that ever-memorable day. The reasonable limits of a public discourse must confine us to a selection of the more prominent incidents. It was the first care of the British commander to cut off the approach of the Americans from the neighboring towns by destroying or occupying the bridges. A party was imme- diately sent to the south bridge, and tore it up. A force of six companies, under Captains Parsons and Lowrie, was sent to the north bridge. Three companies under Captain Lowrie were left to guard it, and three under Captain Parsons pro- ceeded to Colonel Barrett's house in search of provincial stores. While they were engaged on that errand, the militia of Concord, joined by their brave brethren from the neigh- boring towns, gathered on the hill opposite the north bridge, under the command of Colonel Robinson and Major Buttrick. The British companies at the bridge were now apparently bewildered with the perils of their situation, and began to tear up the planks of the bridge ; not remembering that this would expose their own party, then at Colonel Barrett's, to certain destruction. The Americans, on the other hand, resolved to keep open the communication with the town, and perceiving the attempt which was made to destroy the bridge, were immediately put in motion, with orders not to give the first fire. They drew near to the bridge, the Acton company in front, led on by the gallant Davis. Three alarm guns were fired into the water, by the British, without arresting the march of our citizens. The signal for a general dis- charge is then made a British soldier steps from the ranks, and fires at Major Buttrick. The ball passed between his arm and his side, and slightly wounded Mr Luther Blanchard, who stood near him. A volley instantly followed, and Cap- VOL. I. 12 90 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. tain Davis was shot through the heart, gallantly marching at the head of the Acton militia against the choice troops of the British line. A private of his company, Hosrher, of Acton, also fell at his side. A general action now ensued, which, after the loss of several killed and wounded, terminated in the retreat of the British party towards the centre of the town, followed by the brave band who had driven them from their post. The advance party at Colonel Barrett's was thus left to its fate ; and nothing would have been more easy than to effect its entire destruction. But the idea of a declared war had not yet forced itself, with all its consequences, into the minds of our countrymen ; and these advanced companies were allowed to return unmolested to the main band. It was now twelve hours since the first alarm had been given, the evening before, of the meditated expedition. The swift watches of that eventful night had scattered the tidings far and wide ; and, widely as they spread, the people rose in their strength. The indignant yeomanry of the land, armed with the weapons which had done service in their fathers' hands, poured to the spot where this new and strange tragedy was acting. The old New England drums, that had beat at Louisburg, at Quebec, at Martinique, at the Havana, were now sounding on all the roads to Concord. There were officers in the British line that knew the sound ; they had heard it in the deadly breach, beneath the black, deep-throated engines of the French and Spanish castles, and they knew what followed, where that sound went before. With the British, it was a question no longer of protracted contest, nor even of halting long enough to rest their ex- hausted troops, after a weary night's march, and all the labor, confusion, and distress of the day's efforts. Their dead were hastily buried in the public square ; their wounded placed in the vehicles which the town afforded ; and a flight com- menced, to which the annals of warfare will hardly afford a parallel. On all the neighboring hills were multitudes, from the surrounding country, of the unarmed and infirm, of women and children, who had fled from the terrors and the perils of the plunder and conflagration of their homes ; or FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 91 were collected, with fearful curiosity, to mark the progress of this storm of war. The panic fears of a calamitous flight, on the part of the British, transformed this inoffensive, timid throng into a threatening array of armed men ; and there was too much reason for the misconception. Every height of ground, within reach of the line of march, was covered with the indignant avengers of their slaughtered brethren. The British light companies were se'nt out to great distances,, as flanking parties ; but who was to flank the flankers ? Every patch of trees, every rock, every stream of water, every building, every stone wall, was lined (I use the words of a British officer in the battle) with an unintermitted fire. Every cross road opened a new avenue to the assailants. Through one of these, the gallant Brooks led up the minute men of Reading. At another defile, they were encountered by the Lexington militia, under" Captain Parker, who, undis- mayed at the loss of more than a tenth of their number in killed and wounded in the morning, had returned to the con- flict. At first, the contest was kept up by the British with all the skill and valor of veteran troops. To a military eye. it was not an unequal contest. The commander was not, or ought not to have been, taken by surprise. Eight hundred picked men, grenadiers and light infantry, from the English army, were no doubt considered by General Gage an ample detachment to march eighteen or twenty miles through an open country, and a very fair match for all the resistance which could be made by unprepared husbandmen, without concert, discipline, or leaders. A British historian, to paint the terrific aspect of things that presented itself to his coun- trymen, declares that the rebels swarmed upon the hills, as if they dropped from the clouds. Before the flying troops had reached Lexington, their rout was entire. Some of the offi- cers had been made prisoners, some had been killed, and several wounded, and among them the Commander-in-chief, Colonel Smith. The ordinary means of preserving discipline failed ; the wounded, in chaises and wagons, pressed to the front, and obstructed the road ; wherever the flanking parties, from the nature of the ground, were forced to come in, the 92 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. line of march was crowded and broken ; the ammunition began to fail ; and at length the entire body was on a full run. " We attempted," says a British officer already quoted, " to stop the men, and form them two deep, but to no pur- pose ; the confusion rather increased than lessened." An English historian says, the British soldiers were driven before the Americans like sheep ; till, by a last desperate effort, the officers succeeded in forcing their way to the front, " when they presented their swords and bayonets against the breasts of their own men, and told them, if they advanced, they should die." Upon this, they began to form, under what the same British officer pronounces " a very heavy fire," which must soon have led to the destruction or capture of the whole corps. At this critical moment, a reenforcement arrived. Colonel Smith had sent back a messenger from Lexington, to apprise General Gage of the check he had there received, and of the alarm which was running through the country. Three regi- ments of infantry and two divisions of marines, with two field-pieces, under the command of Brigadier-General Lord Percy, were accordingly detached. They marched out of Boston, through Roxbury and Cambridge,* and came up with the flying party in the hour of their extreme peril. While their field-pieces kept the Americans at bay, the reenforcement drew up in a hollow square, into which, says the British historian, they received the exhausted fugitives, "who lay down on the ground, with their tongues hanging from their mouths, like dogs after a chase." A half hour was given to rest ; the march was then re- sumed ; and, under cover of the field-pieces, every house in Lexington, and on the road downwards, was plundered and set on fire. Though the flames, in most cases, were speedily extinguished, several houses were destroyed. Notwithstand- ing the attention of a great part of the Americans was thus drawn off, and although the British force was now more than doubled, their retreat still wore the aspect of a flight. The * See note C. FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 93 Americans filled the heights that overhung the road, and at every defile the struggle was sharp and bloody. At West Cambridge, the gallant Warren, never distant when danger was to be braved, appeared in the field, and a musket ball soon cut off a lock of hair from his temple. General Heath was with him ; nor does there appear, till this moment, to have been any effective command among the American forces. Below West Cambridge, the militia from Dorchester, Rox- bury, and Brookline came up. The British field-pieces began to lose their terror. A sharp, skirmish followed, and many fell on both sides. Indignation and outraged humanity struggled on the one hand, veteran discipline and desperation on the other j and the contest, in more than one instance, was man to man, and bayonet to bayonet. The British officers had been compelled to dismount from their horses, to escape the certain destruction which attended their exposed situation. The wounded, to the number of two hundred, now presented the most distressing and con- stantly increasing obstruction to the progress of the march. Near one hundred brave men had fallen in this disastrous flight ; a considerable number had been made prisoners ; a round or two of ammunition only remained ; and it was not till late in the evening, nearly twenty-four hours from the time when the first detachment was put in motion, that the exhausted remnant reached the heights of Charlestowri. The boats of the vessels of war were immediately employed to transport the wounded ; the remaining British troops in Boston came over to Charlestown, to protect their weary countrymen during the night ; and, before the close of the next day, the royal army was formally besieged in Boston. Such, fellow-citizens, imperfectly sketched in their outline, were the events of the day we celebrate ; a day as important as any recorded in the history of man. It is a proud anni- versary for our neighborhood. We have cause for honest complacency, that when the distant citizen of our own repub- lic, when the stranger from foreign lands, inquires for the spots where the noble blood of the revolution began to flow, 94 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. where the first battle of that great and glorious contest was fought, he is guided through the villages of Middlesex, to the plains of Lexington and Concord. It is a commemoration of our soil, to which ages, as they pass, will add dignity and interest ; till the names of Lexington and Concord, in the annals of freedom, will stand by the side of the most honor- able names in Roman or Grecian story. It was one of those great days, one of those elemental occasions in the world's affairs, when the people rise and act for themselves. Some organization and preparation had been made ; but from the nature of the case, with scarce any effect on the events of that day. It may be doubted whether there was an efficient order given, the whole day, to any body of men as large as a regiment. It was the people, in their first capacity, as citizens and as freemen, starting from their beds at midnight, from their firesides, and from their fields, to take their own cause into their own hands. Such a spectacle is the height of the moral sublime ; when the want of every thing is fully made up by the spirit of the cause, and the soul within stands in place of discipline, organization, and resources. In the prodigious efforts of a veteran army, beneath the dazzling splendor of their array, there is some- thing revolting to the reflective mind. The ranks are filled with the desperate, the mercenary, the depraved; an iron slavery, by the name of subordination, merges the free will of one hundred thousand men in the unqualified despotism of one ; the humanity, mercy, and remorse, which scarce ever desert the individual bosom, are sounds without a meaning to that fearful, ravenous, irrational monster of prey, a mercenary army. It is hard to say who are most to be commiserated, the wretched people on whom it is let loose, or the still more wretched people whose substance has been sucked out to nourish it into strength and fury. But in the efforts of the people, of the people struggling for their rights, moving, not in organized, disciplined masses, but in their spontaneous action, man for man, and heart for heart, there is something glorious. They can then move forward without orders, act together without combination, and brave the flaming lines of FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 95 battle, without intrenchments to cover or walls to shield them. No dissolute camp has worn off from the feelings of the youthful soldier the freshness of that home, where his mother and his sisters sit waiting, with tearful eyes and aching hearts, to hear good news from the wars ; no long service in the ranks of a conqueror has turned the veteran's heart into marble ; their valor springs not from recklessness, from habit, from indifference to the preservation of a life knit by no pledges to the life of others. But in the strength and spirit of the cause alone they act, they contend, they bleed. In this they conquer. The people always conquer. They always must conquer. Armies may be defeated, kings may be overthrown, and new dynasties imposed, by foreign arms, on an ignorant and slavish race, that care not in what lan- guage the covenant of their subjection runs, nor in whose name the deed of their baiter and sale is made out. But the people never invade ; and, when they rise against the inva- der, are never subdued. If they are driven from the plains, they fly to the mountains. Steep rocks and everlasting hills are their castles ; the tangled, pathless thicket their palisado, and nature, God, is their ally. Now he overwhelms the hosts of their enemies beneath his drifting mountains of sand : now he buries them beneath a falling atmosphere of polar snows ; he lets loose his tempests on their fleets ; he puts a folly into their counsels, a madness into the hearts of their leaders ; and never gave, and never will give, a final triumph over a virtuous and gallant people, resolved to be free. There is another reflection which deserves to be made, while we dwell on the events of the nineteenth of April. It was the work of the country. The cities of America, partic- ularly the metropolis of our own state, bore their part nobly in the revolutionary contest. It is not unjust to say, that much of the spirit which animated America, particularly before the great appeal to arms, grew out of the comparison of opinions and concert of feeling, which might not have existed, without the convenience of assembling which our large towns afford. But if we must look to the city for a part of the impulse, we must look to the country at large for the 96 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. heart to be moved for the strength and vigor to persevere in the motion. It was the great happiness of America, that her cities were no larger, no more numerous, no nearer to each other ; that the strength, the intelligence, the spirit of the people were diffused over the country. In most of the old and powerful states of Europe, the nation is identified with the capital, and the capital with the court. France must fall with the city of Paris, and the city of Paris with a few courtiers, cabinet ministers, and princes. No doubt the English ministry thought that by holding Bos- ton, they held New England : that the country was conquered in advance by the military occupation of the great towns. They did not know that every town and village in America had discussed the great questions at issue for itself ; and in its town meetings, and committees of correspondence and safety, had come to the resolution that America must not be taxed by England. The English government did not understand we hardly understood ourselves, till we saw it in action the operation of a state of society where every man is, or may be, a freeholder, a voter for every elective office, a candidate for every one ; where the means of a good education are uni- versally accessible ; where the artificial distinctions of society are known but in a slight degree ; where glaring contrasts of condition are rarely met with ; where few are raised by the extreme of wealth above the mass, and fewer sunk by the extreme of poverty beneath it. The English ministry had not reasoned upon the natural growth of such a soil ; that it could not permanently bear either a colonial or a monarchical government ; that the only true and native growth of such a soil was independence and republicanism ; independence, because such a country must disdain to go over the water to find another to protect it ; republicanism, because the people of such a country must disdain to look up for protection to any one class among themselves. The entire action of these principles was unfolded to the world on the nineteenth of April, 1775. Without waiting to take an impulse from any thing but their own breasts, and in defiance of the whole exerted powers of the British empire, the yeomanry of the FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 97 country rose almost as a man, and set their lives on this dear stake of liberty. When we look back on the condition in which America stood on the nineteenth of April, 1775, and compare it with that in which it 'stands this day, we can fin.d no language of gratitude with which to do justice to those who took the lead in the revolutionary cause. The best gratitude will be an imitation of their example. It would be an exceedingly narrow view of the part assigned to this country on the stage of the nations, to consider the erection of an independent and representative government as the only political object at which the revolu- tion aimed, and the only political improvement which our duty requires. These are two all-important steps, indeed, in the work of meliorating the state of society. The first gives the people of America the sovereign power of carrying its will into execution ; the second furnishes an equitable and convenient mode of ascertaining what the will of the people is. But shall we stop here ? Shall we make no use of these two engines, by whose combined action every individual mind enjoys a share in the sovereign power of the state ? Most of the civil and social institutions which still exist in the country, were brought by our fathers from the Old World, and are strongly impressed with the character of the state of society which there prevails. Under the influence of neces- sity, these institutions have been partially reformed, and ren- dered, to a certain degree, harmonious with the nature of a popular government. But much remains to be done, to make the work of revolution complete. No pains should be spared to secure its practical benefits to the whole people ; to lessen, if it be not possible wholly to remove, the sad inequalities of condition ; to place the advantages of a good education within the reach of every individual ; and to add the blessings of social refinement, high civilization, and moral and religious culture, to those of national independence and political equal- ity. In proportion as we attain these ends, we shall be true to the spirit of the great maxim of constitutional govern- ments, that the voice of the people is the voice of God. But it is time to relieve your patience. I need not labor VOL. i. 13 98 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVLUTION to impress you with a sense of the duty which devolves on those whose sires achieved the ever-memorable exploits of this day. The lesson, I know, has not been lost upon you. Nowhere have the spirit and principles of the revolution preserved themselves in greater purity. The toils and suffer- ings of that day were shared by a glorious band of patriots, whose name was your boast while living, whose memory you will never cease to chevisli. The day we commemorate called the noble farmer of Middlesex the heroic Prescott to the field, and impelled him not to accept, but to solicit, the post of honor and danger on the seventeenth of June ; noble I call him ; for when did coronet or diadem ever confer distinc- tion like the glory which rests on that man's name ? In the perils of this day the venerable Gerry bore his part. This was the day which called the lamented Brooks and Eustis to their country's service ; which enlisted them, blooming in the freshness and beauty of youth, in that sacred cause to which their manhood and their age were devoted. The soil which holds their honored dust shall never be unworthy of them. What pride did you not justly feel in that soil, when you lately welcomed the nation's guest the venerable champion of America to the spot where that first note of struggling freedom was uttered, which sounded across the Atlantic, and drew him from all the delights of life to enlist in our cause ! Here, you could tell him, our fathers fought and fell, before they knew whether another arm would be raised to second them. No Washington had appeared to lead, no La Fayette had hastened to assist, no charter of independence had yet breathed the breath of life into the cause, when the nine- teenth of April called our fathers to the field. What remains, then, but to guard the precious birthright of our liberties ; to draw from the soil which we inhabit a consistency in the principles so nobly vindicated and sa- credly sealed thereon ? It shall never be said, while distant regions, wheresoever the temples of freedom are reared, are sending back their thoughts to the plains of Lexington and Concord, for their brightest and purest examples of patriotic FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. 99 daring, that we, whose lives are cast on these favored spote, can become indifferent to the exhortation, which breathes to us from every sod of the valley. Those principles, which others may adopt on the colder ground of reason and truth, we are bound to support by the dearest and deepest feelings. Wheresoever the torch of liberty shall expire, wheresoever the manly simplicity of our land shall perish beneath the poison of luxury, wheresoever the cause which called our fathers this day to arms, and the principles which sustained their hearts in that stern encounter, may be deserted or be- trayed, it shall not, fellow-citizens, it shall not be on the soil which was moistened with their blood. The names of Marathon and Thermopylae, after ages of subjection, still nerve the arm of the Grecian patriot ; and should the foot of a tyrant, or of a slave, approach these venerated spots, the noble hearts that bled at Lexington and Concord, " all dust as they are," would beat beneath the sod with indignation. Honor, this day, to the venerable survivors of that mo- mentous day which tried men's souls. Great is the happi- ness they are permitted to enjoy, in uniting, within the compass of their own experience, the doubtful struggles and the full-blown prosperity of our happy land. May they share the welfare they witness around them ; it is the work of their hands, the fruit of their toils, the price of their lives freely hazarded, that their children might live free. Bravely they dared ; patiently ay, more than patiently heroically, piously, they suffered; largely, richly may they enjoy. Most of their companions are already departed ; let us renew our tribute of respect this day to their honored memory. Numbers present will recollect the affecting solemnities with which you accompanied to his last home the brave and lamented Buttrick. With trailing banners, and mournful music, and all the touching ensigns of military sorrow, you followed the bier of the fallen soldier over the ground where he led the determined band of patriots on the morning of the revolution. But chiefly to those who fell ; to those who stood in the breach, at the breaking of that day of blood at Lexington : 100 FIRST BATTLES OF THE REVOLUTION. to those who joined in battle, and died honorably, facing the foe at Concord ; to those who fell in the gallant pursuit of the flying enemy, let us this day pay a tribute of grateful admiration. The old and the young ; the gray-haired vet- eran, the stripling* in the flower of youth ; husbands, fathers, brethren, sons, they stood side by side, arid fell together, like the beauty of Israel, on their high places. We have founded this day a monument to their memory. When the hands that rear it are motionless, when the feeble Yoice is silent, which now speaks our fathers' praise, the graven stone shall bear witness to other ages of our gratitude and their worth. And ages still farther on, when the monu- ment itself, like those who build it, shall have crumbled to dust, the happy aspect of the land which our fathers re- deemed shall remain, one common, eternal monument to their memory. NOTES. NOTE A, p. 82. THAT the lanterns were observed in Charlestown, we are informed by Colonel Revere, in the interesting communication in the Collections of the Historical Society, from which this part of the narrative is chiefly taken. A tradition by private channels has descended, that these lanterns in the North Church were quickly noticed by the officers of the British anny on duty on the evening of the 18th, who, to prevent the alarm being commu- nicated by these signals into the country, hastened to the church to extin- guish them. Their steps were heard on the stairs in the tower of the church, by the sexton, who had lighted the lanterns. To escape discovery, he himself extinguished the lanterns, and passing by the officers on the stairs, concealed himself in the vaults of the church. He was, a day or two after, arrested, while discharging the duties of his office at a funeral, tried, and condemned to death ; but respited, on a threat of retaliation from General Washington, and finally exchanged. This anecdote was related to me, with many circumstances of particularity, by one who had often heard it from the sexton himself. NOTE B, p. 87. It will be perceived, that, in drawing up the account of the transactions at Lexington, reference has been had to the testimony contained in the pamphlet lately published, entitled, " History of the Battle at Lexington, on the morning of the 19th of April, 1775. By Elias Phinney." While in this pamphlet several interesting facts are added, on the strength of the depositions of surviving actors in the scene to the accounts previously ex- isting, there is nothing, perhaps, in them which may not be reconciled with those previously existing accounts, if due allowance be made for the sole object for which the latter were originally published, (to show that the British were the aggressors ;) for the hurry and confusion of the moment ; and for the different aspect of the scene, as witnessed by different persons, from different points of view. It has, however, been my aim, not to pro- nounce on questions in controversy, but to state the impression left on my own mind, after an attentive examination of all the evidence. (101) 102 NOTES. NOTE C, p. 92. An interesting anecdote relative to this march of Lord Percy has been communicated to me by a veteran of the revolution, who bore his part in the events of the day. Intelligence having been promptly received of Lord Percy's being detached, the selectmen of Cambridge, by order of the Com- mittee of Safety, caused the planks of the Old Brighton Bridge to be taken up. Had this been effectually done, it would have arrested the progress of Lord Percy. But the planks, though all taken up, instead of being thrown into the river or removed to a distance, were piled up on the causeway, at the Cambridge end of the bridge. But little time was therefore lost by Lord Percy in sending over men upon the string-pieces of the bridge, who replaced the planks, so as to admit the passage of the troops. This was, however, so hastily and insecurely done, that when a convoy of provision wagons, with a sergeant's guard, which had followed in the rear of the reenforcement, reached the bridge, the planks were found to be too loosely laid to admit a safe passage ; and a good deal of time was consumed in adjusting them. The convoy at length passed ; but after such a delay, that Lord Percy's army was out of sight The officer who commanded the convoy was unacquainted with the roads, and was misdirected by the in- habitants at Cambridge. Having, at last, after much lost time, been put into the right road, the body of troops under Lord Percy was so far ad- vanced, as to afford the convoy no protection. A plan was accordingly laid and executed by the citizens of West Cambridge (then Menotomy) to arrest this convoy. The alarum-list, or body of exempts, under Captain Frost, by whom this exploit was effected, acted under the direction of a negro, who had served in the French war, and who, on this occasion, displayed the utmost skill and spirit The history of Gordon, and the other accounts which follow him, attribute the capture of the convoy to the Rev. Dr Payson, of Chelsea. Those who have further information alone can judge between the two accounts. The Rev. Mr Thaxter, of Edgartown, in a letter lately (1825) published in the " United States Literary Gazette," has ascribed the same exploit to the Rev. Edward Brooks, of Medford. Mr Brooks early hastened to the field, as a volunteer, that day ; and is said to have preserved the life of Lieutenant Gould, of the 18th regiment, who was made prisoner at Concord Bridge ; but there is, I believe, no ground foi ascribing to him the conduct of the affair in question. PRINCIPLE OF THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS." FELLOW-CITIZENS : IT belongs to us, with strong propriety, to celebrate this day. The town of Cambridge and the county of Middlesex are filled with the vestiges of the revolution : whithersoever we turn our eyes, we behold some memento of its opening scenes. The first Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, after its adjournment at Concord, met in the building in which we are now assembled. The rural magazine at Medford reminds* us of one of the earliest acts of British aggression. The march of both divisions of the royal army, on the memorable nineteenth of April, 1775, was through the limits of Cam- bridge ; in the neighboring towns of Lexington and Concord, the first blood of the revolution was shed ; in West Cam- bridge, the royal convoy of provisions was, the same day, gallantly surprised by the aged citizens, who staid to protect their homes, while their sons pursued the foe. Here the first American army was formed ; from this place, on the seventeenth of June, was detached the Spartan band that immortalized the heights of Charlestown consecrated that day, with blood and fire, to the cause of American liberty. Beneath the venerable elm which still shades the south- western corner of the common, General Washington first unsheathed his sword at the head of an American army ; and to that seat f he was wont every Sunday to repair, to join in the supplications which were made for the welfare of his country. How changed is now the scene ! The din and the desola- * An Oration delivered at Cambridge, on the 4th of July, 182(i f The first wall pew on the right hand of the pulpit (103) 104 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. tion of war are past ; Science has long since resumed her station within the shades of our ancient University, no longer glittering with arms. The anxious war-council is no longer in session, to offer a reward for the discovery of the best mode of making saltpetre an unpromising step to be taken, when an army of twenty thousand men is in the field. The grass is growing in the trampled sallyports of some of the rural redoubts that form a part of the simple lines of circumvalla- tion, within which a half-armed American militia held the flower of the British army blockaded ; the plough has done what the English batteries could not do, and levelled others of them with the earth ; and the MEN, the great and good men, their warfare is over, and -they have gone quietly down to the dust they redeemed from oppression ! At the close of a half century since the declaration of our independence, we are assembled to commemorate that great *and happy event. We do not meet each other and exchange- our felicitations because we should otherwise fall into forget- fulness of this auspicious era, but because we owe it to our fathers and to our children to mark its return with grateful festivities. The major part of this assembly is composed of those who had not yet engaged in the active scenes of life when the revolution commenced. We come not to applaud our own work, but to pay a filial tribute to the deeds of our fathers. It was for their children that the heroes and sages of the revolution labored and bled. They were too wise not to know that it was not personally their own cause in which they were embarked ; they felt that they were en- gaging in an enterprise which an entire generation must be too short to bring to its mature and perfect issue. The most they could promise themselves was, that, having cast forth the seed of liberty, having watered it with the tears of waiting eyes and the blood of brave hearts, their children might gather the fruit of its branches, while those who planted it should moulder in peace beneath its shade. Nor was it only in this that we discern their disinterested- ness, and their heroic forgetfulness of self. Not only was the independence for which they struggled a great and arduous THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 105 adventure, of which they were to encounter the risk, and others to enjoy the benefits; but the oppressions which roused them had assumed, in their day, no worse form than that of a pernicious principle. No intolerable acts of oppres- sion had ground them to the dust. They were not slaves, rising in desperation from beneath the agonies of the lash, but free men, snuffing from afar "the tainted gale of tyranny." The worst encroachments on which the British ministry had ventured, might have been borne, consistently with the prac- tical enjoyment of many of the advantages resulting from good government. On the score of interest alone, it would have been better for that generation to pay the duties on glass, painters' colors, stamped paper, and tea, than to plunge into the expenses of the revolutionary war. But they thought not of shuffling off upon posterity the burden ol resistance. They well understood the part which Providence had assigned to them. They perceived that they were called to discharge a high and perilous office to the cause of civil liberty ; that their hands were elected to strike the blow, for which near two centuries of preparation never remitted, though often unconscious had been making, on one side or the other of the Atlantic. They felt that the colonies had now reached that stage in their growth, when the difficult problem of colonial government must be solved. Difficult, 1 3all it, for such it is to the statesman, whose mind is not suf- ficiently enlarged for the idea, that a wise colonial govern- ment must naturally and rightfully end in independence : that even a mild and prudent sway, on the part of the mother country, furnishes no reason for not severing the bands of the colonial subjection ; and that when the rising state has passed the period of adolescence, the only alternative which remains is that of a peaceable or violent separation. The British ministry, at that time weaker, perhaps, than it had ever been since the reign of James II., had no knowledge of political science, but that which they derived from the text of official records. They drew their maxims, as it was happily said of one of them that he did his measures, from the file. They hear that a distant province has resisted the execution VOL. I. 14 106 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. of an act of parliament. Indeed, and what is the specific, in cases of resistance ? A military force ; and two more regiments are ordered to Boston. Again they hear that the General Court of Massachusetts Bay has adopted measures subversive of the allegiance due to the crown. A case of a refractory corporation. What is to be done ? First try a mandamus ; and if that fails, seize the franchises into his majesty's hands. They never asked the great question, whether Providence has assigned no laws to regulate the changes in the condition of that most astonishing of human things, a nation of kindred men. They did not inquire, I will not say whether it were rightful and expedient, but whether it were practicable, to give law across the Atlantic, to a people who possessed within themselves every imagina- ble element of self-government. But though the rulers of Britain appear not to have caught a glimpse of the great principles involved in these questions, there were those on this side of the Atlantic who had asked and answered them. They perceived that the hour of sepa- ration had come, because a principle was assumed by the British government which put an instantaneous check to the further growth of liberty. Either the race of civilized man happily planted on our shores, at first slowly and painfully reared, but at length auspiciously multiplying in America, is destined never to constitute a free and independent state ; or these measures must be resisted, which go to bind it in a mild but abject colonial vassalage. Either the hope must be forever abandoned, that a new centre of civilization was to be established on the new continent, at which the social and political institutions of the world might be brought to the standard of reason and truth, after thousands of years of de- generacy, or the battle was now to be fought, first in the political assemblies, and then, if need be, in the field. It can scarcely be said that the battle was fought in the halls of legislation. A spectacle indeed seemed to be prom- ised to the civilized world, of breathless interest and uncal- culated consequence. "You are placed," said the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, in their address to the inhabitants, THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 107 of December 4th, 1774, promulgated at the close of a session held in the house where we are now convened, "you are placed by Providence in a post of honor, because it is a post of danger ; and while struggling for the noblest objects, the liberties of our country, the happiness of posterity, and the rights of human nature, the eyes not only of North America and the whole British empire, but of all Europe, are upon you." * A mighty question of political right was at issue between the two hemispheres. Europe and America, in the face 01 mankind, are going to plead the great cause on which the fate of popular government forever is suspended. One circumstance, and one alone, exists, to diminish the interest of the contention, the perilous inequality of the parties, an inequality far exceeding that which gives animation to a con- test ; and so great as to destroy the hope of an ably waged encounter. On the one side were arrayed the two houses of the British Parliament, the modern school of political elo- quence, the arena where great minds had for a century and a half strenuously wrestled themselves into strength and power, and in better days, the common and upright chancery of an empire on which the sun never set. Upon the other side appeared the Colonial Assemblies of Massachusetts and Vir- ginia, and the Continental Congress of Philadelphia, composed of men trained within a small provincial circuit ; wanting till now the strength which the consciousness of a station before the world imparts; who brought no power into the contest, but that which they drew from their cause and their bosoms. It is by champions like these, that the great principles of rep- resentative government, of chartered rights, and constitutional liberty, are to be discussed ; and surely never, in the annals of national controversy, was exhibited a triumph so complete of the seemingly weaker party, a rout so disastrous of the stronger. Often as it has been repeated, it will bear another repeti- tion ; it never ought to be omitted in the history of constitu- tional liberty; it ought especially to be repeated this day; * Massachusetts State Papers, p. 416. 108 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. the various addresses, petitions, and appeals, the correspond- ence, the resolutions, the legislative and popular debates, from 1764 to the declaration of independence, present a maturity of political wisdom, a strength of argument, a gravity of style, a manly eloquence, and a moral courage, of which unquestionably the modern world affords no other example. This meed of praise, substantially accorded at the time by Lori Chatham, in the British Parliament, may well be repeated by us. For most of the venerated men to whom it is paid, it is but a pious tribute to departed worth. The Lees and the Henrys, Otis, Gtuincy, Warren, and Samuel Adams, the men who spoke those words of thrilling power, which raised and directed the storm of resistance, arid rang like the voice of fate across the Atlantic, are beyond the reach of our praise. To most of them it was granted to witness some of the fruits of their labors such fruits as revolutions do not often bear. Others departed at an untimely hour, or nobly fell in the onset ; too soon for their country, too soon, for every thing but their own undying fame. But all are not gone ; some still survive among us, to hail the jubilee of the independence they declared. Go back, fellow-citizens, to that day, when Jefferson and Adams composed the sub-committee who reported the Declaration of Independence. Think of the mingled sensations of that proud but anxious day, compared to the joy of this. What reward, what crown, what treasure, could the world and all its kingdoms afford, compared with the honor and happiness of having been united in that com- mission, and living to see its most wavering hopes turned into glorious reality ! Venerable men, you have outlived the dark days which followed your more than heroic deed ; you have outlived your own strenuous contention, who should stand first among the people whose liberty you had vindicated ! i^ou have lived to bear to each other the respect which the nation bears to you both ; and each has been so happy as to exchange the honorable name of the leader of a party, for that more honorable one, the. Father of his Country. While this our tribute of respect, on the jubilee of our independence, is paid to the gray hairs of the venerable survivor in our neigh- THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 109 borhood, (Adams,) let it not less heartily be sped to him, (Jef- ferson,) whose hand traced the lines of that sacred charter, which, to the end of time, has made this day illustrious. And is an empty profession of respect all that we owe to the man who can show the original draught of the Declaration of the Independence of the United States of America, in his own handwriting ? Ought not a title-deed like this to become the acquisition of the nation ? Ought it not to be laid up in the public archives ? Ought not the price at which it is bought to be a provision for the ease arid comfort of the old age of him who drew it ? Ought not he who, at the age of thirty, declared the independence of his country, at the age of eighty, to be secured by his country in the enjoyment of his own ? * Nor would we, on the return of this eventful day, forget the men who, when the conflict of council was over, stood forward in that of arms. Yet let me not, by faintly endeav- oring to sketch, do deep injustice to the story of their exploits. The efforts of a life would scarce suffice to draw this pic- ture, in all its astonishing incidents, in all its mingled colors of sublimity and woe, of agon/ and triumph. But the age of commemoration is at hand. The voice of our fathers' blood begins to cry to us from beneath the soil which it moistened. Time is bringing forward, in their proper relief, the men and the deeds of that high-souled day. The gen- eration of contemporary worthies is gone ; the crowd of the unsignalized great and good disappears; and the leaders in war, as well as the cabinet, are seen, in fancy's eye. to take their stations on the mount of remembrance. They come from the embattled cliffs of Abraham ; they start from the heaving sods of Bunker's Hill ; they gather from the blazing lines of Saratoga and Yorktown, from the blood-dyed waters of the Brandywine, from the dreary snows of Valley Forge, and all the hard-fought fields of the war! With all their wounds and all their honors, they rise and plead with us for their * About the time these words were spoken, Thomas Jefferson breathed his last, and towards the close of the afternoon of the same day, (4th July 1826,) John Adams also expired. See the following address. 110 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. brethren who survive ; and command us, if indeed we cherish the memory of those who bled in our cause, to show our gratitude, not by sounding words, but by stretching out the strong arm of the country's prosperity, to help the veteran survrv ors gently down to their graves ! But it is time to turn from sentiments like these, however appropriate, to the more direct business of the present occa- sion. The fiftieth return of this all-important day appears to enjoin on us to reassert the principles of the Declaration of Independence. Have we met, fellow-citizens, to commemo- rate merely the successful termination of a war ? Certainly not. The war of 1756 was in its duration nearly equal, and signalized in America by the most brilliant achievements of the provincial arms. But no one attempts to prevent that war, with all its glorious incidents, from gradually sinking into the shadows which time throws back on the deeds of men. Do we celebrate the anniversary of our independence merely because a vast region was severed from a European empire, and established a government for itself? Scarcely even this. The acquisition of Louisiana a region larger than the old United States the immediate conversion of a vast Spanish colonial waste into free and prosperous members of our republican federation the whole effected by a single happy exercise of the treaty-making power this is an event ill nature not wholly unlike, in importance not altogether beneath the separation of the colonies from England, regarded merely as an historical transaction. But no one thinks of commemorating with festivals the anniversary of this cession ; probably not ten who hear me recollect the date of the treaty by which it was effected ; although it is perhaps the most important occurrence in our history, since the adoption of the constitution, and will no doubt be regarded by posterity as by far the most important measure of Mr. Jefferson's adminis- tration. But it is not merely nor chiefly the military success, nor the political event, which we commemorate on these patriotic anniversaries. We mistake the principle of our celebration, when we speak of its object either as a trite theme, or as one THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. Ill among other important and astonishing incidents of the same kind in the world. The declaration of the independence of the United States of America, considered on the one hand as the consummation of a long train of measures and counsels preparatory, even though unconsciously, of this event and, on the other hand, as the foundation of our constitutional systems, deserves commemoration, as forming the era from which the establishment of government on a rightful basis will hereafter date. Looking upon the declaration of inde- pendence as the one prominent event which is to represent the American system, (and history will so look upon it,) I deem it right in itself and seasonable this day to express the opinion, that, while all other political revolutions, reforms, and improvements have been, in various ways, of the nature of palliatives and alleviations of systems vicious in principle, this alone is the great discovery in political science ; the practical fulfilment of all the theories of political reform which had amused the speculations and eluded the grasp of statesmen and philosophers of every former period. Although this festive hour affords but little scope for dry disquisition, yet I shall not think I wander from the duties of the day in dwelling briefly on the chain of ideas by which we reach this great conclusion. The political organization of a people is, of all matters of temporal concernment, the most important. Drawn together into that great assemblage which we call a Nation, by the social principle, some mode of organization must exist among men ; and on that organization depends more directly, more extensively, more permanently than on any thing else, the condition of the individual members that make up the com- munity. On the political organization in which a people shall for generations have been reared, it mainly depends, whether we shall behold in our fellow-man the New Holland- er, making a nauseous meal from the worms which he ex- tracts from a piece of rotten wood ; * the African, cutting out the under jaw of his captive to be strung on a wire, as a * Malthus's Essay on Population, Vol. I. p. 33, Amer. ed. 112 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS trophy of victory, while the mangled wretch is left to bleed to death on the field of battle ; * or whether we shall behold him social, civilized, and Christian, scarcely faded from the image of that perfection in which he was created. Such is the infinite importance to the nations of men of the political organization under which they live. The most momentous practical question, therefore, of course, is, in what way a people shall determine their political organiza- tion ; or, in still broader terms, what is a right foundation of government. Till the establishment of the American con- stitutions, this question had received but one answer in the world ; I mean but one which obtained for any length of time, and among any numerous people ; and that answer was, Force. The right of the strongest was the only footing on which the governments of the ancient and modern nations were in fact placed ; and the only effort of the theorists was, to disguise the simple and startling doctrine of the right of the strongest, by various mystical or popular fictions, which in no degree altered its real nature. Of these, the only two worthy to detain us, on the present occasion, are those of the two great English political parties, the whigs and the tories, as they are called, by names not unlike, in dignity and sig- nificance, to the doctrines which they designate. The tories taught, that the only foundation of government was " divine right ; " and this is substantially the same notion which is still inculcated on the continent of Europe ; though the delicate ears of the age are flattered by the milder term legitimacy. The whigs maintained that the foundation of government was an " original contract ; " but of this con- tract, the existing organization was the record and the evi- dence, and the obligation was perpetually binding. It may deserve the passing remark, therefore, that, in reality, the doctrine of the whigs in England is a little less liberal than that of the tories. To say that the will of God is the war- rant by which the king and his hereditary counsellors govern the land, is, to be sure, in a practical sense, what the illus * Edwards's History of the West Indies, Vol. II. p. 68, 3d ed. THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 113 trious sage of the revolution, surviving in our neighborhood, dared, as early as 1765, to pronounce it, " dark ribaldry." But, in a merely speculative sense, it may, without offence, be said that government, like every thing else, subsists by the divine will ; and, in this acceptation, there is a certain eleva- tion and grandeur in the sentiment. But to say that the form of government is matter of original compact with the people ; that my ancestors, ages ago, agreed that they and their posterity, to the end of time, should give up to a certain line of princes the rule of the state ; that nothing but ex- treme necessity, a necessity which it is treasonable even to attempt to define beforehand, justifies a departure from this compact, in which no provision is made that the will of the majority should prevail, but the contrary ; seems to me to be a use of language not in itself more rational, while it affects a liberality which it does not possess. And now, fellow-citizens, I think I speak the words of truth, without exaggeration, when I say, that before the establishment of our American constitutions, this tory doc- trine of the divine right was the most common, and this whig doctrine of the original compact was professedly the most liberal, doctrine ever maintained by any political party in any powerful state. I do not mean that in some of the little Grecian republics, during their short-lived noon of liberty and glory, no broader basis was laid ; nor that, in other times and places, speculative politicians had not in their closets dreamed of a better foundation of government. But I do mean that, whereas the whigs in England are the party of politicians who have enjoyed, by general consent, the credit of inculcat- ing a more liberal system, this notion of the compact is the extent to which their liberality went. It is plain, whichever of these phrases "divine right,'' or " original compact " we may prefer to use, that the right of the strongest lies at the foundation of both, in the same way, and to the same degree. The doctrine of the divine right gives to the ruler authority to sustain himself against the people, not merely because resistance is unlawful, but because it is sacrilegious. The doctrine of the compact VOL. i. 15 114 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. denounces every attempted change in the reigning line as a breach of faith, and as such also not only treasonable, but immoral. When a conflict ensues, force alone, of course, decides which party shall prevail ; and when force has so decided, all the sanctions of the divine will and of the social compact revive in favor of the successful party. Even the statute legislation of England allows the successful usurper to claim the allegiance of the subject in as full a manner as it could be done by a lawful sovereign.* Nothing is wanting to fill up this sketch of other govern- ments, but to consider what is the form in which force is ex- ercised to sustain them ; and this is that of a standing army, at this moment, the chief support of every government on earth except our own. As popular violence the unrestrained and irresistible force of the mass of men long oppressed and late awakened, and bursting in its wrath all barriers of law and humanity is unhappily the usual instrument by which the intolerable abuses of a corrupt government are removed, so the same blind force of the same fearful multitude, sys- tematically kept in ignorance both of their duty and of their privileges as citizens, employed in a form somewhat different indeed, but far more dreadful, that of a mercenary standing army, is the instrument by which corrupt governments are sustained. The deplorable scenes which marked the earlier stages of the French revolution have called the attention of this age to the fearful effects of popular violence ; and the minds of men have recoiled from the horrors which mark the progress of an infuriated mob. They are not easily to be exaggerated. But the power of the mob is transient ; the rising sun most commonly scatters its mistrustful ranks ; the difficulty of subsistence drives its members asunder ; and it is only while it exists in mass that it is terrible. But there is a form in which the mob is indeed portentous ; when to all its native terrors it adds the force of a frightful permanence ; when, by a regular organization, its strength is so curiously divided, and by a strict discipline its parts are so easily com- * Blackstone, IV., p. 77 and the authorities there cited. THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 115 bined, that each and every portion of it carries in its presence the strength and terror of the whole ; and when, instead of that want of concert which renders the common mob inca- pable of arduous enterprises, it is despotically swayed by a single master mind, and may be moved in array across the globe. I remember if, on such a subject, I may be pardoned an illustration approaching the ludicrous to have seen the two kinds of force brought into direct comparison. I was present at the second great meeting of the populace of London in 1819, in the midst of a crowd of I know not how many thousands, but assuredly a vast multitude, assembled in Smithfield market. The universal distress was extreme ; it was a short time affer the scenes at Manchester, at which the public mind was exasperated ; deaths by starvation were said not to be rare ; ruin by the stagnation of business was general ; and some were already brooding over the dark project of assassinating the ministers, which was, not long after, matured by Thistlewood and his associates, some of whom, on the day to which I allude, harangued this excited, desperate, starving assemblage. When I considered the state of feeling prevailing in the multitude around me ; when I looked in their lowering faces, heard their deep, indignant exclamations, reflected on the physical force concentrated, probably that of thirty or forty thousand able-bodied men, and added to all this, that they were .assembled to exercise what is in theory an undoubted privilege of British citizens ; I supposed that any small number of troops, who should attempt to interrupt them, would be immolated on the spot. While I was musing on these things, and turning in my mind the commonplaces on the terrors of a mob, a trumpet was heard to sound an uncertain, but a harsh and clamorous blast. I looked that the surrounding stalls in the market should have furnished the unarmed multitude at least with that weapon with which Virginius sacrificed his daughter to the liberty of Rome ; I looked that the flying pavement should begin to darken the air. Another blast is heard a cry of " The horse-guards ! " ran through the assembled 116 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. thousands ; the orators on the platform were struck mute ; and the whole ,of that mighty host of starving, desperate men incontinently took to their heels ; in which, I must confess, feeling no call on that occasion to be faithful found among the faithless, I did myself join them. We had run through the Old Bailey and reached Lndgate Hill, before we found out that we had been put to flight by a single mischievous tool of power, who had come triumphing down the opposite street on horseback, blowing a stage-coachman's horn. We have heard of those midnight scenes of desolation, when the populace of some overgrown capital, exhausted by the extremity of political oppression, or famishing at the gates of luxurious palaces, or kindled by some transport of fanatical zeal, rushes out to find the victims of its fury ; the lurid glare of torches, casting their gleams on faces dark with rage ; the ominous din of the alarm bell, striking with affright on the broken visions of the sleepers ; the multitudinous roar of the living storm, as it sweeps onward to its objects, but O, the disciplined, the paid, the honored mob ; not moving in rags and starvation to some act of blood or plunder ; but inarching, in all the pomp and circumstance of war, to lay waste a feebler state ; or cantoned at home among an over- awed and broken-spirited people ! We have read of granaries plundered, of castles sacked, and their inmates cruelly mur- dered, by the ruthless hands of the mob. We have read of friendly states ravaged, governments overturned, tyrannies founded and upheld, proscriptions executed, fruitful regions turned into trampled deserts, and the tide of civilization thrown back, by a well-organized system of military force.* Such was the foundation in theory and in practice of all the governments which can be considered as having had a permanent existence in the world before the revolution in this country. There are certainly great differences between * "It was the apprehension of Montesquieu, that the spirit of increasing armies would terminate in converting Europe into an immense camp, in changing our artisans and cultivators into military savages, and reviving the age of Attila and Genghis." Sir J. Mackintosh, ViniUdaK, Galliccz, III. 28. THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 117 the Oriental despotisms, ancient and modern the military empire of Rome the feudal sovereignties of the middle ages and the legitimate monarchies of the present day. Some were and are more, and some less susceptible of melio- ration in practice ; and of all of them it might perhaps be said, being all defective in principle, " That which is best administered is best." In no one of these governments, nor in any government, was the truth admitted, that the only just foundation of all government is the will of the people. If it ever occurred to the practical or theoretical politician that such an idea deserved examination, the experiment was thought to have been made in the republics of Greece, and to have failed ; as fail it certainly did, from the physical impossibility of con- ducting the business of the state by the actual intervention of every citizen. Such a plan of government must of course fail ; if for no other reason, at least for this that it would prevent the citizen from pursuing his own business, which it is the object of all government to enable him to do. It was considered then as settled, that the citizens, each and all, could not be the government ; some one or more must dis- charge its duties for them. Who shall do this ? how shall they be designated ? The first king was a fortunate soldier, and the first noble- man was one of his generals ; and government has passed by descent to their posterity, with no other interruption than has taken place when some new soldier of fortune has broken in upon this line of succession, in favor of himself and of his generals. The people have passed for nothing in the plan ; and whenever it has occurred to a busy genius to put the question, By what right is government thus exercised and transmitted ? the common answer, as we have seen, has been, By divine right; while, as the great improvement on this doctrine, men have been consoled with the assurance, that such was the original contract. But a brighter day was in reserve. The founders of the feudal system, barbarous, arbitrary, and despotic as they were 118 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. and profoundly ignorant of political science, were animated by a spirit of personal liberty, out of which, after ages of conflict, grew up a species of popular representation. In the eye of the feudal system, the king was the first baron ; and standing within his own sphere, each other baron was as good as the first. From this important relation, in which the feu- dal lords of England claimed to stand to their prince, arose the practice of their being consulted by him in great and dif- ficult conjunctures of affairs ; and hence the cooperation of a grand council (subsequently convened in two houses, under the name of Parliament] in making the laws and administer- ing the government. The formation of this body has proved a great step in the progress of popular rights ; its influence has been decisive in breaking the charm of absolute monarchy, and giving to a body partially eligible by the people a large share in the government. It has also operated most auspi- ciously on liberty, by exhibiting to the world, on the theatre of a conspicuous nation, a living example, that in proportion as the rights and interests of a people are represented in a gov- ernment, in that degree the state becomes strong and prosper ous. Thus far the science and the practice of government had gone in England, and here it had come to a stand. An equal representation, even in the House of Commons, was unthought of; or thought of only as one of the exploded abominations of Cromwell. It is asserted by Mr Hume, writing about the middle of the last century, and weighing this subject with equal moderation and temper, that " the tide has run long, and with some rapidity, to the side of popular government, and is just beginning to turn towards monarchy." And he maintains that the British constitution is, though slowly, yet gradually verging towards an absolute government. Such was the state of political science, when the independ- ence of the United States of America was declared, and the constitution organized on the basis of that declaration. The precedents in favor of a popular system were such as we have seen. What lights these precedents gave them, our fathers had ; beyond this, they owed every thing to their own wis- dom and courage, in daring to carry out and apply to the THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 119 executive branch of 'the government that system of delegat- ed power of which the elements had always existed in the colonial assemblies. Within the limits of the several states, this principle was applied for the most part without qualifica- tion ; or where qualifications were attempted, they have, in most cases, been removed by subsequent amendments. In framing a government for the Union, consisting of sovereign states, independent of each other, a happy compromise was resorted to. An equal representation in the Senate was given to each state. The other house of Congress was established on the principle of proportionate numbers. On the same principle it was provided that the Executive should -be chosen according to a plan in which regard is had both to the equality of the states and to numerical majority ; and the powers and functions of each branch of the government are defined by a written constitution. Thus was organized a family of states, associated in a confederate Union, which, if any thing human is entitled to that name, may be called a perfect form of gov- ernment. And what, fellow-citizens, are to be the fruits to us and to the world of the establishment of such a system ? I might partly answer the inquiry, by reminding you what have been the fruits to us and to the world ; by inviting you to compare our beloved country, as it is, in extent of settlement, in numbers and resources, in the useful and ornamental arts, in the abundance of the common blessings of life, in the general standard of character, in the means of education, in the insti- tutions for social and philanthropic objects, in the various great industrial interests, in public strength and national respectability, with what it was hi all these respects fifty years ago. But the limits of this occasion will not allow us to engage in such an enumeration ; and it will be amply sufficient for us to contemplate in its principle the beneficial operation on society of the form of government bequeathed to us by our fathers. This principle is Equality ; the equal enjoyment by every citizen of the rights and privileges of the social union. The principle of all other governments is monopoly, exclu- 120 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. sion, favor. They secure great privileges to a small number, and necessarily at the expense of all the rest of the com- munity. In the keen conflict of minds which preceded and accom- panied the political convulsions of the last generation, the first principles of society were canvassed with a boldness and power before unknown in Europe ; and from the great prin- ciple, that all men are equal, it was for the first time triumph- antly inferred, as a necessary consequence, that the will of a majority of the people is the rule of government. To meet these doctrines, so alarming in their tendency to the existing governments of Europe, new ground was also taken by the champions of those governments, and particularly by a man whose genius, eloquence, and integrity gave a currency, which nothing else could have given, to his splendid para- doxes. In one of his stupendous efibrts to resist the torrent of the French revolution,* this great man, for great, almost beyond rivalry, most assuredly he was, in order to meet the inference drawn from the equality of man, that the will of the majority must be the rule of government, has under- taken, as he says. " to fix, with some degree of distinctness, an idea of what it is we mean when we say, the PEOPLE ; " and in fulfilment of this design, he lays it down, " that, in a state of rude nature, there is no such thing as a people. A number of men, in themselves, can have no collective ca- pacity. The idea of a people is the idea of a corporation ; it is wholly artificial, and made, like all other legal fictions. by common agreement." Mr Burke has himself, in near connection with this passage, justly affirmed, that "a state of civil society, much more truly than a savage and incoherent mode of life, is a state of na- ture ; " but I know not in what corner of the earth men are found assembled in large numbers, however barbarous, who do not form a people more or less improved It is but a truism to say that nowhere, and under no circumstances, have the individuals of our race been placed by nature, each * The Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs. THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 121 standing alone, and not united by those natural ties of consanguinity which form the first bonds of a collective capacity. The idea of a people is so far from being that of a corporation, wholly artificial, and, like all other legal fic- tions, made by common agreement, that it is, by the appoint- ment of Providence, the direct and necessary consequence and development of the social nature in which we are created. It begins in family, expands into race, and descends to remote ages, through a long line of kindred generations. Nor does it rest on physical relations alone. The myste- rious power of speech, which enables man to impart his thoughts and feelings to man, contributes largely to its for- mation. All the social sympathies and sentiments of our nature give it strength. Are all the relations of ancestry, pos- terity, and fellow-citizenship ; all the veneration and love bound up in the name of Country ; the delight, the enthusiasm, with which we seek out, after the lapse of generations and ages, the traces of our fathers' bravery or wisdom ; are these all " a legal fiction " ? Is it a legal fiction that moistens the eye of the solitary traveller, when he meets a countryman in a foreign land ? Is it a " common agreement " that gives its meaning to my mother tongue, and enables me to speak to the hearts of my kindred men beyond the rivers and beyond the mountains ? Yes, it is a common agreement ; but it is the same which marshals the winged nations, that, " In common, ranged in figure, wedge their way, Intelligent of seasons ; and set forth Their aery caravan, high over seas Flying, and over lands, with mutual wing Easing their flight" The mutual dependence upon each other in their severe,, interests and pursuits, of the individuals, families, and com- munities, of which a nation is composed, is a chapter in the great law, not of corporations, but of nature. The law by which commerce, manufactures, and agriculture support each other is the same law in virtue of which the earth owes its fertility to the rivers and the rains ; and the clouds derive VOL. i. 16 122 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. their high-travelling waters from the rising vapors ; and the ocean is fed from the secret springs of the mountains ; and the plant that grows derives its increase from the plant that decays ; and all subsist and thrive, not by themselves, but by others, in the great political economy of nature. The neces- sary cohesion of the parts of the political system is no more artificial than the gravity of the natural system, in which planet is bound to planet, and all to the sun, and the sun to all. And yet the great political, intellectual, moral system, which we call a People, is a legal fiction ! " O that mine enemy had said it ! " the admirers of Mr Burke may well exclaim. O that some scoffing Voltaire, some impious Rous- seau had uttered it ! Had uttered it ? Rousseau did utter the same thing ; and more rebuked than any other error of this misguided genius, is his doctrine of the Social Contract, which Burke has substantially reasserted in the sentences I have quoted. But no, fellow-citizens ; political society exists by the law of nature. Man is formed for it ; every man is formed for it ; every man has an equal right to its privileges ; and to be deprived of them, under whatever pretence, is so far to be reduced to slavery. The authors of the Declaration of Inde- pendence saw this, and taught that all men are born free and equal. On this principle our constitutions rest ; and no con- stitution can bind a people on any other principle. By the introduction of this principle of equality, the Declaration of Independence has at once effected a before unimagined exten- sion of social privileges. Grant that no new benefit (which, however, can by no means with truth be granted) be intro- duced into the world on this plan of equality, still it will have discharged the inestimable office of communicating, in equal proportion, to all the citizens, those privileges of the social union which were before partitioned in an invidious giada- tion, profusely among the privileged orders, and parsimoniously or not at all among the rest. Let me instance in the right of suffrage. The enjoyment of this right enters largely into the happiness of the social condition. I do not mean that it is necessary to our happiness actually to exercise this right at THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 123 every election ; but the right itself to give our voice in the choice of public servants and the management of public affairs is so precious, that there is not a citizen who hears me that would not lay down his life to assert it. This is a right unknown in every country but ours ; I say unknown, because in England, whose institutions make the nearest approach to a popular character, the elective suffrage is not only incredi- bly unequal and capricious in its distribution, but extends, after all, only to the choice of a minority of one house of the legislature.* Thus, then, the people of this country are, by their constitutions of government, endowed with a new source of enjoyment, elsewhere almost unknown ; a great and substantial happiness. Most of the desirable things of life bear a high price in the world's market. Every thing usually deemed a great good, must, for its attainment, be weighed down, in the opposite scale, with what is as usually deemed a great evil labor, care, danger. It is only the unbought, spontaneous, essential circumstances of our nature and condition, that yield a liberal enjoyment. Our religious hopes, intellectual meditations, social sentiments, family affec- tions, political privileges these are springs of unpurchased happiness ; and to condemn men to live under an arbitrary government is to cut them off from nearly all the satisfaction which nature designed should flow from those principles within us, by which a tribe of kindred men is constituted a people. But it is not merely an extension to all the members of society of those blessings which, under other systems, are monopolized by a few ; great and positive improvements, I feel sure, are destined to flow from the introduction of the republican system. The first of these will be to make wars less frequent, and finally to cause them to cease altogether. It was not a republican, but the subject of a monarchy, and no patron of novelties, who said, "War is a game, which, were their subjects wise, Kings would not play at" * These remarks, it will be observed from the date of the address, were made several years before the reform of the House of Commons. 124 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. A great majority of the wars which have desolated man- kind have been caused by the disputed titles and rival claims of sovereigns, or by their personal characters, particularly their ambition, or the character of their favorites, or by some other circumstance evidently incident to a form of govern- ment which withholds from the people the ultimate control of affairs. The more civilized men grow, strange as it may seem, the more universally is this the case. In the barbarous ages, the people pursued war as an occupation ; its plunder was more profitable than their labor at home, in the state of general insecurity. In modern times, princes raise their sol- diers by conscription, their sailors by impressment, and drive them, at the point of the bayonet and dirk, into the battles which they fight for reasons of state. But in a republic, where the people, by their representatives, must vote the dec- laration of war, and afterwards raise the means of its support, none but wars of just and necessary defence can be easily waged. Republics, we are told, indeed, are ambitious a seemingly wise remark, devoid of meaning. Man man is ambitious ; and the question is, Where will his ambition be most likely to drive his country into war ; in a monarchy, where the ruler has but to " cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war," or in a republic, where he must get a vote of a strong majority of the nation? Let history furnish the answer. The book which promised you, in its title, a history of the progress of the human family, or of some great branch of it turns out to be a record, not of the human family, but of the Macedonian family, the Julian family, the families of York and Lancaster, of Lorraine and Bourbon. We nesd not go to the ancient annals to confirm this remark. We need not speak of those who reduced Asia and Africa, in the morning of the world, to a vassalage from which they have never recovered. We need not dwell on the more notorious exploits of the Alexanders and the Csesars, the men who wept for other worlds to visit with the pestilence of their arms. We need net run down the bloody line of the dark ages, when the barbarous North disgorged her ambitious savages on Europe, or when, at a later period, barbarous Europe poured back her holy ruf- THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 125 fians on Asia ; we need but look at the dates of modern his- tory the history of civilized, balanced Europe. We here behold the ambition of Charles V. involving the continent of Europe in war for the first half of the sixteenth century, and the fiend-like malignity of Catharine de' Medici and her kin- dred, distracting it the other half. We see the haughty and cheerless bigotry of Philip, persevering in a conflict of exter- mination for one whole age in the Netherlands, and darkening the English Channel with his armada ; while France prolongs her civil dissensions, because Henry IV. was the twenty-sec- ond cousin of Henry III. We enter the seventeenth century, and again find the pride and bigotry of the house of Austria wasting Germany and the neighboring powers with the Thirty Years' war ; and before the peace of Westphalia is concluded, England is plunged by the Stuarts into the fiery trial of her militant liberties. At the same time, the civil wars are revived in France, and the kingdom is blighted by the craft and ava- rice of Mazarin. The civil wars are healed, and the atrocious career of Louis XIV. begins ; a half century of bloodshed and woe, that stands in revolting contrast with the paltry pre- tences of his wars.* At length the peace of Ryswic is made in 1697, and bleeding Europe throws off the harness, and lies down like an exhausted giant to repose. In three years, the testament of a doting Spanish king gives the signal for the Succession war ; till a cup of tea spilt on Mrs Masham's apron restores peace to the afflicted kingdoms. Meantime the mad- man of the north had broken loose upon the world, and was running his frantic round. Peace at length is restored, and with one or two short wars, it remains unbroken till, in 1740, the will of Charles VI. occasions another testamentary con- test ; and in the gallant words of the stern but relenting moralist, "The queen, the beauty, sets the world in arms." * " The reign of Louis XIV., a reign which has been so often celebrated as the zenith of warlike and military splendor, has always appeared to me to be the consummation of whatever is afflicting and degrading in the annals of the human race." - - Sir James Mackintosh, Vlndidet Gallica, Works, III. 11. 126 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. Eight years are this time sufficient to exhaust the com- batants, and the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle is concluded ; but, in 1755, the old French war is kindled in our own wilder- ness, and through the united operation of the feuds in England, which sprang from the disputed succession to the crown, the corruption of the French court and the ambition of Frederic, spreads throughout Europe. The wars of the last generation I need not name, nor dwell on that signal retribution by which the corruption of the old governments, both in France and the rest of continental Europe, conjured up at length the terrific genius of the French revolution, and in its progress awoke the military ambition of the astonishing individual, who seems, in our day, to have risen from the ranks of the people, to chastise the privi- leged orders with that iron scourge with which they had so long afflicted mankind. It may well be doubted, whether, under a government like ours, one of all these contests would have taken place. Those that had their origin in disputed titles and bequests of thrones could not, of course, have existed ; and, making every allowance for the effect of popular delusion, it seems to me not possible that a representative government would have embarked in any of the wars of ambition and aggrandizement which fill up the catalogue.* Who, then, are these families and individuals these royal lanistcB by whom the nations are kept in training for a long gladiatorial combat ? Are they better, wiser than the rest of mankind ? Look at them in life ; what are they ? " Kings are fond," says Mr Burke, no scoffer at thrones " kings are fond of low company, "f What are they when gone ? Expende Hannibalem. Enter the great cathedrals of Europe, and contemplate the sepulchres of the men whose interests and passions decided the fate of each successive generation. Question your feelings, as you behold where * I am sorry to say that the events of the last few years in this country have done much to discredit this opinion, t Speech on Economical Reform. THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 127 the Plantagenets and Tudors, the Stuarts and those of Brunswick, lie mournfully huddled up in the chapels of Westminster Abbey ; and compare those feelings with the homage you pay to Heaven's aristocracy the untitled learning, genius, and wit that moulder by their side. Count over the sixty-six emperors and princes of the Austrian house, that lie gathered in the dreary pomp of monumental marble, in the vaults of the Capuchins at Vienna ; and weigh the worth of their dust against the calamities of their Peasants' war, their Thirty Years' war, their Succession war, their wars to enforce the Pragmatic Sanction, and of all their other uncouth pretences for destroying mankind. But the cessation of wars, to which we look forward as the result of the gradual diffusion of republican government, is but the commencement of the social improvements which cannot but flow from the same source. It has been justly said, that he was a great benefactor of mankind who could make two blades of grass grow where one grew before. But our fathers were the great benefactors of mankind, who have brought into action such a vast increase of physical, political, and moral energy ; who have made not two citizens to live only, but vast multitudes to live and to prosper in regions which, but for them, would have remained for ages unsettled, and to enjoy those political rights of men, which, but for the principles of government established by them, would have continued to be arrogated, as the exclusive inheritance of a few. I may appeal to any sober judge of political proba- bility, whether more has not been done to extend the domain of civilization, in fifty years, since the declaration of inde- pendence, than would have been done in five centuries of continued colonial subjection. It is not even a matter of probability ; the king in council had adopted it, as a maxim of American policy, that no settlements in this country should be made beyond the Alleghanies ; in other words, that the design of Providence, in spreading out the fertile valley of the Mississippi, should not be fulfilled. The influence of our forms and principles of government on foreign nations is, next to their effect on our own condi 128 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. tion, the most interesting question we can consider. With an example of successful popular government before their eyes, the nations of the earth will not eventually be satisfied with any other. With the French revolution as a beacon to guide them, they will learn, we may hope, not to embark too rashly on the stormy waves of reform. The cause, however, of popular government is rapidly gaining in the world. In England, education is carrying it wide and deep into society. On the continent, written constitutions of governments nominally representative though as yet, it must be owned, nominally so alone are adopted in eight or ten late abso- lute monarchies ; and it is not without good grounds that we may trust that the indifference with which the great European powers contemplate the sacrifice of Greece, and their crusade against the constitutions of Spain, Piedmont, and Naples, will satisfy the mass of thinking men in Europe that it is time to put an end to these cruel delusions, and take their own jovernment into their own hands. But the great triumphs of constitutional freedom, to which our independence has furnished the example, have been wit- nessed in the southern portion of our hemisphere. Sunk to the last point of colonial degradation, they have risen at once into the organization of free republics. Their struggle has been arduous ; and eighteen years of checkered fortune have not yet brought it to a close. But we must not infer, from their prolonged agitations, that their independence is uncer- tain ; that they have prematurely put on the toga virilis of freedom. They have not begun too soon ; they have more to do. Our war of independence was shorter ; happily, we were contending with a government that could not, like that of Spain, pursue an interminable and hopeless contest, in defiance of the people's will. Our transition to a mature and well-adjusted constitution was more prompt than that of our sister republics ; for the foundations had been deeply settled, and the preparation long made. When we consider that it is our example which has aroused the spirit of independence from California to Cape Horn ; that the experiment of liberty, if it had failed with us, most surely would not have been THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. 129 attempted by them ; that even now our counsels and acts will operate as powerful precedents in this great family of republics ; we learn the importance of the post which Provi- dence has assigned us in the world. A wise and harmonious administration of the public affairs a faithful, liberal, and patriotic exercise of the private duties of the citizen while they secure our happiness at home, will diffuse a healthful influence through the channels of national communication, and serve the cause of liberty beyond the equator and the Andes. When we show a united, conciliatory, and imposing front to their rising states, we show them, better than sound- ing eulogies can do, the true aspect of an independent repub- lic. We give them a living example that the fireside policy of a people is like that of the individual man. As the one. commencing in the prudence, order, and industry of the pri- vate circle, extends itself to all the duties of social life, of the family, the neighborhood, the country, so the true domestic policy of the republic, beginning in the wise organ- zation of its own government, pervades its territories with a vigilant, prudent, temperate administration, and extends the hand of cordial interest to all the friendly nations, especially to those which are of the household of liberty. It is in this way that we are to fulfil our destiny in the world. The greatest engine of moral power known to human affairs, is an organized, prosperous state. All that man, in his individual capacity, can do all that he can effect by his pri- vate fraternities, by his ingenious discoveries and wonders of art, or by his influence over others is as nothing, compared with the collective, perpetuated influence on human affairs and human happiness, of a well-constituted, powerful com- monwealth. It blesses generations with its sweet influence ; even the barren earth seems to pour out its fruits under a system where rights and property are secure, while her fairest gardens are blighted by despotism. Nature enters into a beautiful accord, a better, purer asiento, with man, and guides an industrious citizen to every rood of her smiling wastes. We see, at length, that what has been called a state of nature, has been most falsely, calumniously so denominated ; VOL. i. 17 130 THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTIONS. that man is in his nature neither a savage, a hermit, nor a slave, but a member of a well-ordered family, a good neigh- bor, a free citizen, a well-informed, good man, acting with others like him. This is the lesson which is taught in the charter of our independence ; this is the lesson which our example ought to teach the world. EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON.* FRIENDS AND FELLOW-CITIZENS : WE are assembled, beneath the canopy of the weeping heavens, under the influence of feelings in which the whole family of Americans unites with us. We meet to pay a tribute of respect to the revered memory of those to whom the whole country looks up as to its benefactors ; to whom it ascribes the merit of unnumbered public services, and especially of the inestimable service of having led in the councils of the revolution. It is natural that these feelings, which pervade the whole American people, should rise into peculiar strength and earnestness in your hearts. In medi- tating upon these great men, your minds are unavoidably carried back to those scenes of suffering and of sacrifice into which, at the opening of their arduous and honored career, this town and its citizens were so deeply plunged. You cannot but remember that your fathers offered their bosoms to the sword, and their dwellings to the flames, from the same spirit which animated the venerable patriarchs whom we now deplore. The cause they espoused was the same which strewed your streets with ashes, and drenched your hill-tops with blood. And while Providence, in the aston- ishing circumstances of their departure, seems to have appointed that the revolutionary age of America should be closed up by a scene as illustriously affecting as its com- mencement was disastrous and terrific, you have justly felt it your duty it has been the prompt dictate of your feelings * Delivered at Charlestown, 1st of August, 1826, in commemoration of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, who died on the 4th of July preceding. (131) 132 EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. to pay, within these hallowed precincts, a well-deserved tribute to the great and good men to whose counsels, under God, it is in no small degree owing, that your dwellings have risen from their ashes, and that the sacred dust of those who fell rests in the bosom of a free and happy land. It was the custom of the primitive Romans to preserve in the halls of their houses the images of all the illustrious men whom their families had produced. These images are sup- posed to have consisted of a mask exactly representing the countenance of each deceased individual, accompanied with habiliments of like fashion with those worn in his time, and with the armor, badges, and insignia of his offices and exploits ; ail so disposed around the sides of the hall as to present, in the attitude of living men, the long succession of the departed ; and thus to set before the Roman citizen, whenever he entered or left his house, the venerable array of his ancestors revived in this imposing similitude. Whenever, by a death in the family, another distinguished member of it was gathered to his fathers, a strange and awful procession was formed. The ancestral masks, including that of the newly deceased, were fitted upon the servants of the family, selected of the size and appearance of those whom they were intended to repre- sent, and drawn up in solemn array to follow the funeral train of the living mourners, first to the market-place, where the public eulogium was pronounced, and then to the tomb. As he thus moved along, with all the great fathers of his name quickening, as it were, from their urns, to enkindle his emu- lation, the virtuous Roman renewed his vows of respect to their memory, and his resolution to imitate their fortitude, frugality and patriotism.* Fellow-citizens, the great heads of the American family are fast passing away ; of the last, of the most honored, two are now no more. We are assembled, not to gaze with awe on the artificial and theatric images of their features, but to contemplate their venerated characters, to call to mind their invaluable services, and to lay up the image of their virtues * Polyb. Historian Lib. VL pp. 495, 496, ed. Casaubon. EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. 133 in our hearts. The two men who stood in a relation in which no others now stand to the whole Union, have fallen. The men whom Providence marked out among the first of the favored instruments to lead this chosen people into the holy land of liberty, have discharged their high office, and are no more. The men whose ardent minds prompted them to take up their country's cause, when there was nothing else to prompt, and every thing to deter them ; the men who afterwards, when the ranks were filled with the brave and resolute, were yet in the front of those brave and resolute ranks ; the men who were called to the helm, when the wisest and most sagacious were needed to steer the newly- launched vessel through the broken waves of the unknown sea; the men who, in their country's happier days, were found most worthy to preside over the Union they had so powerfully contributed to rear into greatness, these men are now no more. They have left us not singly, and in the sad but accus- tomed succession appointed by the order of nature ; but having lived, acted, and counselled, and risked all, and triumphed and enjoyed together, they have gone together to their great reward. In the morning of life without previ- ous concert, but with a kindred spirit they plunged together into a conflict which put to hazard all which makes life precious. When the storm of war and revolution raged, they stood side by side, on such perilous ground, that, had the American cause failed, though all else had been forgiven, they were of the few whom an incensed empire's vengeance would have pursued to the ends of the -earth. When they had served through their long career of duty, forgetting the little that had divided them, and cherishing the great com- munion of service, and peril, and success, which had united them, they walked in honorable friendship the declining pathway of age ; and now they have sunk down together in peace. Time, and their country's service, a like fortune and a like reward, united them ; and the last great scene confirmed the union. They were useful, honored, prosperous, and lovely in their lives, and in their deaths they were not divided. 134 EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. Happiest at the last, they were permitted almost to choose the hour of their departure ; to die on that day on which those who loved them best could have wished they might die. It is related as a singular happiness of Plato, that he died in a good old age at a banquet, amidst flowers and per- fumes and festal songs, upon his birthday. Our Adams and Jefferson died on the birthday of the nation ; the day which their own deed had immortalized, which their own prophetic spirit had marked out as the great festival of the land ; amidst the triumphal anthems of a whole grateful people ; throughout a country that hailed them as among the first and boldest of her champions, in the times that tried men's souls. Our jubilee, like that of old, is turned into sorrow. Among the ruins of Rome there is a shattered arch, erected by the Emperor Vespasian, when his son Titus returned from the destruction of Jerusalem.* On its broken panels and fall-ng frieze are still to be seen, represented as borne aloft in the triumphal procession of Titus, the well-known spoils of the second temple the sacred vessels of the holy place, the candlestick with seven branches, and in front of all, the silver trumpets of the jubilee, in the hands of captive priests, pro- claiming not now the liberty, but the humiliation and the sorrows, of Judah. From this mournful spectacle, it is said, the pious arid heart-stricken Hebrew, even to the present day, turns aside in sorrow. He will not enter Rome through the gate of the arch of Titus, but winds his way through the by-paths of the Palatine, and over the broken columns of the palace of the Caesars, that he may not behold these sad memorials. The jubilee of America is turned into mourning. Its joy is mingled with sadness ; its silver trumpet breathes a mingled strain. Henceforward, while America exists among the na- tions of the earth, the first emotion on the fourth of July will be of joy and triumph in the great event which immor- * See Hadriani Relandi de Spoliis Templi Hierosolymitani in Arcu Titiano Romse conspicuis, liber singularis ; in Ugolini's Thesaurus, Tom. T X. p. 1258. EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. 135 talizes the day ; the second will be one of chastened and tender recollection of the venerable men, who departed on the morning of the jubilee. This mingled emotion of triumph and sadness has sealed the beauty and sublimity of our great anniversary. In the simple commemoration of a victorious political achievement, there seems not enough to occupy our purest and best feelings. The fourth of July was before a day of triumph, exultation, and national pride ; but the angel of death has mingled in the glorious pageant to teach us we are men. Had our venerated fathers left us on any other day, it would have been henceforward a day of mourn- ful recollection. But now, the whole nation feels, as with one heart, that since it must sooner or later have been bereaved of its revered fathers, it could not have wished that any other had been the day of their decease. Our anniversary festival was before triumphant ; it is now triumphant and sacred. It before called out the young and ardent, to join in the public rejoicings ; it now also speaks, in a touching voice, to the retired, to the gray-headed, to the mild and peaceful spirits, to the whole family of sober freemen. It is henceforward, what the dying Adams pronounced it, " a great and a good day." It is full of greatness, and full of goodness. It is absolute and complete. The death of the men who declared our independence, their death on the day of the jubilee, was all that was wanting to the fourth of July. To die on that day, and to die together, was all that was wanting to Jefferson and Adams. Think not, fellow-citizens, that, in the mere formal dis- charge of my duty this day, I would overrate the melancholy interest of the great occasion ; I do any thing but intention- ally overrate it. I labor only for words, to do justice to your feelings and to mine. I can say nothing which does not sound as cold and inadequate to myself as to you. The theme is too great and too surprising, the men are too great and good, to be spoken of in this cursory manner. There is too much in the contemplation of their united characters, their services, the day and coincidence of their death, to be properly described, or to be fully felt at once. I dare not 136 EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. come here and dismiss, in a few summary paragraphs, the characters of men who have filled such a space in the history of their age. It would be a disrespectful familiarity with men of their lofty spirits, their rich endowments, their long and honorable lives, to endeavor thus to weigh and estimate them. I leave that arduous task to the genius of kindred elevation, by whom to-morrow it will be discharged.* I feel the mournful contrast in the fortunes even of the first and best of men, that, after a life in the highest walks of useful- ness ; after conferring benefits, not merely on a neighbor- hood, a city, or even a state, but on a whole continent, and a posterity of kindred men ; after having stood in the first estimation for talents, services, and influence, among millions of fellow-citizens, a day must come, which closes all up ; pronounces a brief blessing on their memory ; gives an hour to the actions of a crowded life ; describes in a sentence what it took years to bring to pass, and what is destined for years and ages to operate on posterity ; passes forgetfully over many traits of character, many counsels and measures, which it cost, perhaps, years of discipline and effort to mature ; utters a funeral prayer ; chants a mournful anthem ; and then dismisses all into the dark chambers of death and forgetfulness. But no, fellow-citizens ; we dismiss them not to the cham- bers of forgetfulness and death. What we admired, and prized, and venerated in them, can never be forgotten. I had almost said that they are now beginning to live ; to live that life of unimpaired influence, of unclouded fame, of unmingled happiness, for which their talents and services were destined. They were of the select few, the least portion of whose life dwells in their physical existence ; whose hearts have watched, while their senses have slept ; whose souls have grown up into a higher being ; whose pleasure is to be useful ; whose wealth is an unblemished reputation ; who respire the breath of honorable fame ; who * A Eulogy was delivered on Adams and Jefferson, on the following day, in Faneuil Hall, in Boston, by Daniel Webster. EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. 137 have deliberately and consciously put what is called life to hazard, that they may live in the hearts of those who come after. Such men do not, cannot die. To be cold and breathless ; to feel not and speak not ; this is not the end of existence to the men who have breathed their spirits into the institutions of their country, who have stamped their charac- ters on the pillars of the age, who have poured their hearts' blood into the channels of the public prosperity. Tell me, ye who tread the sods of yon sacred height, is Warren dead ? Can you not still see him, not pale and prostrate, the blood of his gallant heart pouring out of his ghastly wound, but moving resplendent over the field of honor, with the rose of heaven upon his cheek, and the fire of liberty in his eye ? Tell me, ye who make your pious pilgrimage to the shades of Vernon, is Washington indeed shut up in that cold and narrow house ? That which made these men, and men like these, cannot die. The hand that traced the charter of independence is, indeed, motionless ; the eloquent lips that sustained it are hushed ; but the lofty spirits that conceived, resolved, and maintained it, and which alone, to such men, " make it life to live," these cannot expire ; " These shall resist the empire of decay, When time is o'er, and worlds have passed away ; Cold in the dust the perished heart may lie, But that which warmed it once can never die." This is their life, and this their eulogy. In these oui feeble services of commemoration, we set forth not their worth, but our own gratitude. The eulogy of those who declared our independence is written in the whole history of independent America. I do not mean that they alone achieved our liberties ; nor should we bring a grateful oiler- ing to their tombs, in sacrificing at them the merits of their contemporarie's. But no one, surely, who considers the. history of the times, the state of opinions, and the obstacles that actually stood in the way of success, can doubt that, if John Adams and Thomas Jefferson had thrown their talents and influence into the scale of submission, the effect would VOL. I IS 138 EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. have been felt to the cost of America, for ages. No, it is not too much to say that ages on ages may pass, and the popula- tion of the United States may overflow the uttermost regions of this continent, but never can there be an American citizen who will not bear in his condition and in his welfare some trace of what was counselled, and said, and done by these great men. This is their undying praise ; a praise which knows no limits but those of America, and Avhicli is uttered not merely in these our eulogies, but in the thousand inar- ticulate voices of art and nature. It sounds from the wood- man's axe, in the distant forests of the west ; for what was it that unbarred to him the gates of the mountains ? The busy water-wheel echoes back the strain ; for what was it that released the industry of the country from the fetters of colonial restriction ? Their praise is borne on the swelling canvas of America to distant oceans, where the rumor of acts of trade never came ; for what was it that sent our canvas there ? and it glistens at home, in the eyes of a pros- perous arid grateful people. Yes, the people, the people rise up and call them blessed. They invoke eternal blessings on the men who could be good as well as great ; whose ambition was their country's welfare ; who did not ask to be rewarded by being allowed to oppress the country which they redeemed from oppression. I shall not, fellow-citizens, on this occasion, attempt a detailed narrative of the lives of these distinguished men. To relate their history at length would be to relate that of the country, from their first entrance on public life to their final retirement. Even to dwell minutely on the more con- spicuous incidents of their career, would cause me to trespass too far on the proper limits of the occasion. Let us only enumerate those few leading points in their lives and charac- ters, which will best guide us to the reflections we ought to make, while we stand at the tombs of these excellent and honored men. Mr Adams was born on the 30th of October, 1735, and Mr Jefferson on the 13th of April, 1743. One of them rose from the undistinguished mass of the community, while the other. EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. 139 born in higher circumstances, voluntarily descended to its level. Although, happily, in this country it cannot be said of any one, that he owes much to birth or family, yet it some- times happens, even under the equality which prevails among us, that a certain degree of deference follows in the train of family connections, apart from all personal merit. Mr Adams was the son of a New England farmer, arid in this alone, the frugality and moderation of his bringing up are sufficiently related. Mr Jefferson owed more to birth. He inherited a good estate from his respectable father ; but instead of asso- ciating himself with the opulent interest in Virginia, at that time, in consequence of the mode in which their estates were held and transmitted, an exclusive and powerful class, and of which he might have become a powerful leader, he threw himself into the ranks of the people. It was a propitious coincidence, that of these two eminent statesmen, one was from the north, and the other from the south ; as if, in the happy effects of their joint action, to give us the first lesson of union. The enemies of our independ- ence, at home and abroad, relied on the difficulty of uniting the colonies in one harmonious system. They knew the dif- ference in our local origin ; they exaggerated the points of dissimilarity in our sectional character. It was therefore most auspicious that, in the outset of the revolution, while the north and the south had each its great rallying point in Vir- ginia and Massachusetts, the wise and good men, whose influ- ence was most felt in each, moved forward in brotherhood and concert. Mr Quincy, in a visit to the southern colonies, had entered into an extensive correspondence with the friends of liberty in that part of the country. Richard Henry Lee and his brother Arthur maintained a constant intercourse with Samuel Adams. Dr Franklin, though a citizen of Pennsyl- vania, was a native of Boston ; and from the first moment of their meeting at Philadelphia, Jefferson and Adams began to cooperate cordially in the great work of independence. While theoretical politicians, at home and abroad, were speculating on our local peculiarities, and the British ministry were build- ing their hopes upon the maxim, Divide and conquer, they 140 EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. might well have been astonished to see the Declaration of Independence reported into Congress, by the joint labor of the son of a Virginia planter and of a New England yeoman. Adams and Jefferson received their academical education at the colleges of their native states, the former at Cambridge, the latter at William and Mary. At these institutions, they severally laid the foundation of very distinguished attain- ments as scholars, and formed a taste for letters which was fresh and craving to the last. They were both familiar with the ancient languages, and their literature. Their range in. the various branches of general reading was perhaps equally wide, and was uncommonly extensive ; and it is, I believe, doing no injustice to any other honored name, to say that, in this respect, they stood at the head of the great men of the revolution. Their first writings were devoted to the cause of their country. Mr Adams, in 1765, published his essay on the Canon and Feudal Law, which two years afterwards was re pub- lished in London, and was there pronounced one of the ablest performances which had crossed the Atlantic.* It expresses * The copy I possess of this work was printed by Almon, at London, in 1768, as a sequel to some other political pieces, with the following title and preliminary note : " The following dissertation, which was written at Boston, in New England, in the year 1765, and then printed there in the Gazette, being very curious, and having connection with this publication, it is thought proper to reprint it." "The author of it is said to have been Jeremy Gridley, Esq., attorney- general of the province of Massachusetts Bay, member of the General Court, colonel of the first regiment of militia, president of the Marine Soci- ety, and grand master of the freemasons. He died at Boston, Sept. 7, 1767. "w3 Dissertation on the Canon and Feudal Laic." This copy formerly belonged to Dr Andrew Eliot, to whom it was pre- sented by Thomas Hollis. Directly above the title is written, apparently in Dr A. Eliot's handwriting, " The author of this Dissertation is John Adams, Esq." And at the foot of the page is the following note, in the same handwriting, but marked with inverted commas, as a quotation, and signed T. H. " The Dissertation on the Canon and Feudal Law is one of the very finest productions ever seen from N. America." " By a letter from Boston in N. E., signed SUI JURIS, inserted in that EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. 141 the boldest and most elevated sentiments, in the most vigorous language ; and might have taught in its tone, what it taught in its doctrine, that America must be unoppressed, or must become independent. Among Mr Jefferson's first productions was, in like manner, a political essay, entitled " A Summary View of the Rights of British America." It contains a near approach to the ideas and language of the Declaration of Independence ; and its bold spirit, and polished, but at the same time, powerful execution, are known to have had their effect in causing its author to be designated for the high trusts confided to him in the Continental Congress. At a later period of life, Mr Jefferson became the author of the " Notes on Virginia," a work equally admired in Europe and America ; and Mr Adams 6f the " Defence of the American Constitu- tions," a performance that would do honor to the political literature of any country. But in enumerating their literary productions, it must be remembered that they were both em- ployed, the greater part of their lives, in the active duties of public service ; and that the fruits of their intellect are not to be sought in the systematic volumes of learned leisure, but in the archives of state, and in a most extensive public and private correspondence. The professional education of these distinguished statesmen had been in the law, and was therefore such as peculiarly fitted them for the contest in which they were to act as leaders. The law of England, then the law of America, is closely connected with the history of the liberty of England. Many of the questions at issue between the Parliament of Great Britain and the colonies were questions of constitu- tional, if not of common law. For the discussion of these questions, the legal profession, of course, furnished the best preparation. In general, the contest was, happily for the col- onies, at first forensic ; a contest of discussion and debate ; affording time and opportunity to diffuse throughout the valuable newspaper, the London Chronicle, July 19, it should seem the writer of it happily yet lives ! " T. H. This was said fifty-eight years ago ! 142 EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. people, and stamp deeply on their minds, the great principles which, having first been triumphantly sustained in the argu- ment, were then to be confirmed in the field. This required the training of the patriot lawyer, and this was the office which, in that capacity, was eminently discharged by Jeffer- son and Adams, to the doubtful liberties of their country. The cause in which they were engaged abundantly repaid the service and the hazard. It gave them precisely that breadth of view and elevation of feeling which the technical routine of the profession is too apt to destroy. Their prac- tice of the law soon passed from the narrow litigation of the courts to the great forum of contending empires. It was not nice legal fictions they were there employed to balance, but sober realities of indescribable weight. The life and death of their country was the all-important issue. Nor did the service of their country afterwards afford them leisure for the ordinary practice of their profession. Mr Jefferson indeed, in 1776 and 1777, was employed, with Wythe and Pendleton, in an entire revision of the code of Virginia ; and Mr Adams was offered, about the same time, the first seat on the bench of the Superior Court of his native state. But each was shortly afterwards called to a foreign mission, and spent the rest of the active years of his life, with scarce an interval, in the political service of his country. Such was the education and quality of these men, when the revolutionary contest came on. In 1774, and on the seventeenth of June, a day destined to be in every way illus- trious, Mr Adams was elected a member of the Continental Congress, of which body he was from the first a distinguished leader. In the month of June in the following year, when a commander-iri-chief was to be chosen for the American armies, and when that appointment seemed in course to belong to the commanding general of the army from Massa- chusetts and the neighboring states, which had rushed to the field, Mr Adams recommended George Washington to that all-important post, and was thus far the means of securing the blessing of his guidance to the American armies. In August, 1775, Mr Jefferson took his seat in the Continental EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. 143 Congress, preceded by the fame of being one of f he most accomplished and powerful champions of the cause, though among the youngest members of that body. It was the wish of Mr Adams, and probably of Mr Jefferson, that independ- ence should be declared in the fall of 1775 ; but the country seemed not then ripe for the measure. At length, the accepted time arrived. In May, 1776, the colonies, on the proposition of Mr Adams, were invited by the General Congress to establish their several state govern- ments. On the seventh of June, the resolution of independ- ence was moved by Richard Henry Lee. On the eleventh, a committee of five was chosen to announce this resolution to the world; and Thomas Jefferson and John Adams stood at the head of this committee. From their designation by ballot to this most honorable duty, their prominent standing in the Congress might alone be inferred. In their amicable contention and deference each to the other of the great trust of composing the all-important document, we witness their patriotic disinterestedness and their mutual respect. This trust devolved on Jefferson, and with it rests on him the im- perishable renown of having penned the Declaration of Inde- pendence. To have been the instrument of expressing, in one brief, decisive act, the concentrated will and resolution of a whole family of states ; of unfolding, in one all-impor- tant manifesto, the causes, the motives, and the justification of this great movement in human affairs ; to have been permitted to give the impress and peculiarity of his own mind to a charter of public right, destined, or, rather, let me say, already elevated, to an importance, in the estimation of men, equal to any thing human, ever borne on parchment, or expressed in the visible signs of thought, this is the glory of Thomas Jefferson. To have been among the first of those who foresaw and broke the way for this great consummation ; to have been the mover of numerous decisive acts, its un- doubted precursors ; to have been among many able anO generous spirits, united in this perilous adventure, by acknowledgment unsurpassed in zeal, and unequalled in abil- ity ; to have been exclusively associated with the author of 144 EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. the Declaration; and then, with a fervid and overwhelming eloquence, to haVe taken the lead in inspiring the Congress to adopt and proclaim it,. this is the glory of John Adams. Nor was it among common and inferior minds that these men were preeminent. In the body that elected Mr Jeiferson to draft the Declaration of Independence, there were other men of great ability. Franklin was a member of it, a states- man of the highest reputation in Europe and America, and especially master of a most pure, effective English style of writing. And Mr 'Adams was pronounced by Mr Jefferson himself the 1 ablest advocate of independence, in a Congress which could boast among its members such men as Patrick Henry, Richard Henry Lee, arid our own Samuel Adams. They were great and among great men ; mightiest among the mighty ; and enjoyed their lofty standing in a body, of which half the members might with honor have presided ovei the deliberative councils of a nation. Glorious as their standing 'in this council of sages has proved, they beheld the glory only in distant vision, while the prospect before them was shrouded with darkness and terror. " I am not transported with enthusiasm," is the language of Mr Adams, the day after the resolution was adopted. " I am well aware of the toil, the treasure, and the blood it will cost, to maintain this declaration, to support and defend these states. Yet, through all the gloom, I can see a ray of light and glory. I can see that the end is worth more than all the means." Nor was it the rash adventure of uneasy spirits, who had every thing to gain, and nothing to risk, by their enterprise. They left all for their country's sake. Who does not see that Adams and Jefferson might have risen to any station in the British empire open to natives of a colony ? They might have stood within the shadow of the throne which they shook to its base. It was in the full understand- ing of their air but desperate choice that they chose for their country. Many were the inducements which called them to another choice. The voice of authority ; the array of an empire's power ; the pleading's of friendship; the yearning of their hearts towards the land of their fathers' sepulchres EU'LOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. 145 the land which the great champions of constitutional liberty still made venerable ; the ghastly vision of the gibbet, if they failed, all the feelings which grew from these sources were to be stifled and kept 'down, for a dearer treasure was at stake. They were any thing but adventurers, any thing but malecontents. They loved peace, order, and law ; they loved a manly obedience to constitutional authority; but they loved freedom and their country more. How shall I attempt to follow them through the succession of great events which a rare and kind Providence crowded into their lives ? How shall I attempt to enumerate the posts they filled and the trusts they discharged, both in the coun- cils of their native states and of the confederation, both before and after the adoption of the federal constitution ; the codes of law and systems of government they aided in organ- izing ; the foreign embassies they sustained ; the alliances with powerful states they contracted, when America was weak ; the loans and subsidies they procured from foreign powers, when America was poor ; the treaties of peace and commerce which they negotiated ; their participation in the federal government on its organization, Mr Adams as the first vice-president, Mr Jefferson as the first secretary of state ; their mutual possession of the confidence of the only man to whom his country accorded . higher place ; and their successive administrations of the government, after his retire- ment ? These all are laid up in the annals of the country ; her archives are filled with the productions of their fertile and cultivated minds ; the pages of her history are bright with their achievements ; and the welfare and happiness of America pronounce, iri one general eulogy, the just encomium of their services. - Nor need we fear to speak of their political dissensions. If they who opposed each other, and arrayed the nation, in their arduous contention, were able in the bosom of private life to forget their former struggles, we surely may contemplate them, even in this relation, with calmness. Of the counsels adopted and the measures pursued, in the storm of political warfare, I presume not to speak. I knew these great men, VOL. i. 19 146 EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. not as opponents, but as friends to each other ; not in the keen prosecution of a political controversy, but in the culti- vation of a friendly correspondence. As they respected and honored each other, I respect and honor both. Time, too, has removed the foundation of their dissensions. The prin- ciples on which they contended are settled, some in favor of one, and some in favor of the other. The great foreign interests which lent ardor to the struggle have happily lost their hold on the American people ; and the politics of the country now turn on questions not agitated in their days. Meantime, I know not whether, if we had it in our power to choose between the recollection of these revered men as they were, and what they would have been without their great struggle, we could wish them to have been different, even in this respect. Twenty years of friendship succeeding ten of rivalry appear to me a more amiable, and certainly a more instructive, spectacle even than a life of unbroken concert. As a friend to both their respected memories, I would not willingly spare the attestation which they took pleasure in rendering to each other's characters. We are taught, in the valedictory lessons of Washington, that " the spirit of party is the worst enemy of a popular govern- ment." Shall we not rejoice that we are taught, in the lives of Adams and Jefferson, {hat the most imbittered contentions which as yet have divided us furnish no ground for lasting disunion ? The declining period of their lives presents their characters in the most delightful aspect, and furnishes the happiest illus- tration of the perfection of our political system. We behold a new spectacle of moral sublimity ; the peaceful old age of the retired chiefs of the republic ; an evening of learned, useful, and honored leisure following upon a youth and man- hood of hazard and service, and a whole life of alternate trial and success. We behold them, indeed, active and untiring, even to the last. At the advanced age of eighty-five years, our venerable fellow-citizen and neighbor was still competent to take a part in the convention for revising the state constitu- tion, to whose original formation, forty years before, he so EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. 147 essentially contributed ; and Mr. Jefferson, at the same pro- tracted age, was able to project, and carry on to their com- pletion, the extensive establishments of the University of Virginia. But it is the great and closing scene, which appears to crown their long and exalted career with a consummation almost miraculous. Having done so much and so happily for them- selves, so much and so beneficially for their country, at that last moment, when man can no more do any thing for his country or for himself, it pleased a kind Providence to do that for both of them, which, to the end of time, will cause them to be deemed not more happy in the renown of their lives, than in the opportunity of their death.* I could give neither force nor interest to the account of these sublime and touching scenes, by any thing beyond the simple recital of the facts already familiar to the public. Their deaths were nearly simultaneous. For several weeks, the strength of Mr Jefferson had been gradually failing, though the vigor of his mind remained Unimpaired. As he drew nearer to the last, and no expecta- tion remained that his term could be much prolonged, he expressed no other wish than that he might live to breathe the air of the fiftieth anniversary of independence. This he was graciously permitted to do. But it was evident, on the morning of the fourth, that Providence intended that this day, consecrated by his deed, should be solemnized by his death. On some momentary revival of his wasting strength, the friends around would have soothed him with the hope of continuing ; but he answered their encouragements only by saying, he did not fear to die. Once, as he drew nearer to his close, he lifted up his head, and murmured with a smile, " It is the fourth of July ; " while his repeated exclamation, on the last great day, was, Nunc dimittis, Domine " Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace." He depart- ed in peace, a little before one o'clock of this memorable day ; unconscious that his compatriot, who fifty years before . Tacit, J. Agricol. ViL Cap. XLV. 148 EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. had shared its efforts and perils, was now the partner of its glory. Mr Adams's mind had also wandered back, over the long line of great things, with which his life was filled, and found rest on the thought of Independence. When the discharges of artillery proclaimed the triumphant anniversary, he pro- nounced it "a great and a good day." The thrilling word of Independence, which, fifty years before, in the ardor of his manly strength, he had sounded out to the nations from the hall of the revolutionary Congress, was now among the last that dwelt on his lips ; and when, towards the hour of noon, he felt his noble heart growing cold within him, the last emo- tion which warmed it was, that "Jefferson still survives." But he survives riot ; he is gone. They are gone together ! Friends, fellow-citizens, free, prosperous, happy Americans ! The men who did so much to make you so are no more. The men who gave nothing to pleasure in youth, nothing to repose in age, but all to that country, whose beloved name filled their hearts, as it does ours, with joy, can now do no more for us ; nor we for them. But their memory remains, we will cherish it ; their bright example remains, we will strive to imitate it ; the fruit of their wise counsels and noble acts remains, we will gratefully enjoy it. They have gone to the companions of their cares, of their dangers, and their toils. It is well with them. The treas- ures of America are 'now in heaven. How long the list of our good, and wise, 'and brave, assembled there ! How few remain with lis ! There is our Washington ; and those who followed him in their country's confidence are now n)* 1 together with him, and all that illustrious company. The faithful marble may preserve their image ; the en- graven brass may proclaim their worth ; but the humblest sod of Independent America, with nothing but the dew-drops of the morning to gild it, is a prouder mausoleum than kings or conquerors can boast. The country is their monument. Its independence is their epitaph. But not to their country is their praise limited. The whole earth is the monument of illustrious men. Wherever an agonizing people shall EULOGY ON ADAMS AND JEFFERSON. 149 perish, in a generous convulsion, for want of a valiant arm and a fearless heart, they will cry, in the last accents of despair, O for a Washington, an Adams, a Jefferson ! Wher- ever a regenerated nation, starting up in its might, shall burst the links of steel that enchain it, the praise of our venerated fathers shall be remembered in their triumphal song ! The contemporary and successive generations of men will disappear, and in the long lapse of ages, the races of America, like those of Greece and Rome, may pass away. The fabric of American freedom, like all things human, however firm and fair, may crumble into dust. But the cause in which these our fathers shone is immortal. They did that to which no age, no people of civilized men, can be indifferent. Their eulogy will be uttered in other languages, when those we speak, like us who speak them, shall be all forgotten. And when the great account of humanity shall be closed, in the bright list of those who have best adorned and served it, shall be found the names of our Adams and our Jefferson ! THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. nr L ? ELLOw-OrrizENs : THE event which we commemorate is all-important, not merely in our own annals, but in those of the world. The sententious English poet has declared, that " the proper study of mankind is man ; " and of all inquiries of a temporal na- ture, the history of our fellow-beings is unquestionably among the most interesting. But not all the chapters of human history are alike important. The annals of our race have been filled up with incidents which concern not, or at least ought not to concern, the great company of mankind. History, as it has often been written, is the genealogy of princes, the field-book of conquerors ; arid the fortunes of our fellow-men have been treated only so far as they have been affected by the influence of the great masters and de- stroyers of our race. Such history is, I will not say a worth- less study, for it is necessary for us to know the dark side, as well as the bright side, of our condition. But it is a melan- choly study, which fills the bosom of the philanthropist and the friend of liberty with sorrow. But the history of Liberty, the history of men strug- gling to be free, the history of men who have acquired, and are exercising their freedom, the history of those great movements in the world, by which liberty has been estab- lished and perpetuated, forms a subject which we cannot con- template too closely. This is the real history of man, of the human family, of rational, immortal beings. This theme is one ; the free of all climes and nations are themselves a people. Their annals are the history of free- * Oration delivered at Charlestown, on the 4th of July, 1828. (150) THE HISTORY OP LIBERTY. 151 dom. Those who fell victims to their principles, in the civil convulsions of the short-lived republics of Greece, or who sunk beneath the power of her invading foes ; those who shed their blood for liberty amidst the ruins of the Roman repub- lic ; the victims of Austrian tyranny in Switzerland, and of Spanish tyranny in the Netherlands ; the solitary champions, or the united bands of high-minded and patriotic men, who have, in any region or age, struggled and suffered in this great cause, belong to that PEOPLE OF THE FREE, whose fortunes and progress are the most noble theme which man can contemplate. The theme belongs to us. We inhabit a country which has been signalized in the great history of freedom. We live under forms of government more favorable to its diffusion than any which the world has elsewhere known. A succes- sion of incidents, of rare curiosity, and almost mysterious connection, has marked out America as a great theatre of po- litical reform. Many circumstances stand recorded in our annals, connected with the assertion of human rights, which, were we not familiar with them, would fill even our own minds with amazement. The theme belongs to the day. We celebrate the return of the day on which our separate national existence was de- clared ; the day when the momentous experiment was com- menced, by which the world, and posterity, and we ourselves were to be taught, how far a nation of men can be trusted with self-government how far life, and liberty, and prop- erty are safe, and the progress of social improvement is secure, under the influence of laws made by those who are to obey them ; the day when, for the first time in the world, a numer- ous people was ushered into the family of nations, organized on the principle of the political equality of all the citizens. Let us then, fellow-citizens, devote the time which has been set apart for this portion of the duties of the day, to a hasty review of the history of liberty ; especially to a con- templation of some of those astonishing incidents which preceded, accompanied, or have followed the settlement of America, and the establishment of our constitutions ; and which plainly indicate a general tendency and cooperation of 152 THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. things towards the erection, in this country, of the great mon- itorial school of political freedom. We hear much at school of the liberty of Greece and Rome a great and complicated subject, which this is not the occasion to attempt to disentangle. True it is that we find, in the annals of both these nations, bright examples of public virtue, the record of faithful friends of their coun- try, of strenuous foes of oppression at home or abroad, - and admirable precedents of popular strength. But we nowhere find in them the account of a populous and exten- sive region, blessed with institutions securing the enjoyment and transmission of regulated liberty. In freedom, as in most other things, the ancient nations, while they made surprisingly near approaches to the truthj yet, for want of some one great and essential principle or instrument, came utterly short of it in practice. They had profound and ele- gant scholars ; but for want of the art of printing, they could not send information out among the people, where alone it is of great use in reference to human happiness. Some of them ventured boldly to sea, and possessed an aptitude for for- eign commerce ; yet for want of the mariner's compass, they could not navigate distant oceans, but crept for ages along the shores of the Mediterranean. In respect to freedom, they established popular governments in single cities ; but for want of the representative principle, they could not extend these institutions over a large and populous country. . But as a large and populous country, generally speaking, can alone possess strength enough for self-defence, this want was fatal. The freest of their cities accordingly fell a prey, sooner or later, either to a foreign invader or to domestic traitors. In this way, liberty made no firm progress in the ancient states. It was a speculation of the philosopher, and an experiment of the patriot ; but not an established state of society. The patriots of Greece and Rome had indeed suc- ceeded in enlightening the public mind on one of the cardinal points of freedom the necessity of an elected executive. The name and the office of a king were long esteemed .not only something to be rejected, but something rude and unciv- THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. 153 ilized, belonging to savage nations, ignorant of the rights of man, as understood in cultivated states. The word tyrant, which originally meant no more than monarch, soon became with the Greeks synonymous with oppressor and despot, as it has continued ever since. When the first Cassar made his encroachments on the liberties of Rome, the patriots even of that age boasted that they had " heard their fathers say, There was a Brutus once, that would have brooked The eternal devil, to keep his state in Rome, As easily as a king." So deeply rooted was this horror of the very name of king in the bosom of the Romans, that under their worst tyrants, and in the darkest days, the forms of the republic were pre- served. There was no name, under Nero and Caligula, for the office of monarch. The individual who filled the office was called Caesar and Augustus, after the first and second of the line. The word emperor (imperator) implied no more than general. The offices of consul and tribune were kept up ; although, if the choice did not fall, as it frequently did, on the emperor, it was conferred on his favorite general, and sometimes on his favorite horse. The senate continued to meet, and affected to deliberate; and in short, the empire began and continued a pure military despotism, ingrafted, by a sort of permanent usurpation, on the forms and names of the ancient republic. The spirit indeed of liberty had long since ceased to animate these ancient forms ; and when the barba- rous tribes of Central Asia and Northern Europe burst into the Roman empire, they swept away the poor remnant of these forms, and established upon their ruins the system of feudal monarchy, from which all the modern kingdoms are descend- ed. Efforts were made, in the middle ages, by the petty republics of Italy, to regain the political rights, which a long prescription had wrested from them. But the remedy of bloody civil wars between neighboring cities, was plainly more disastrous than the disease of subjection. The strug- gles of freedom, in these little states, resulted much as they VOL. i. 20 154 THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. had done in Greece ; exhibiting brilliant -examples of indi- vidual character, and short intervals of public prosperity, but no permanent progress in the organization of liberal govern- ments. At length, a new era seemed to begin. The art of printing was invented. The capture of Constantinople, by the Turks, drove the learned Greeks of that city into Italy, and letters revived. A general agitation of public sentiment, in various parts of Europe, ended in the religious reformation. A spirit of adventure had been awakened in the maritime nations, and projects of remote discovery were started ; and the signs of the times seemed to augur a great political regeneration. But, as if to blast this hope in its bud ; as if to counterbal- ance at once the operation of these springs of improvement ; as if to secure the permanence of the arbitrary institutions which existed in every part of the continent, at the moment when it was most threatened ; the last blow, at the same time, was given to the remaining power of the great barons the sole check on the despotism of the monarch which the feudal system provided ; and a new institution was firmly estab- lished in Europe, prompt, efficient, and terrible in its operation, beyond any thing which the modern world had seen, I mean the system of standing armies; in other words, a military force, organized and paid to support the king on his throne, and retain the people in their subjection. From this moment, the fate of freedom in Europe was sealed. Something might be hoped from the amelioration of manners, in softening down the more barbarous parts of political despotism ; but nothing was to be expected in the form of liberal institutions, founded on principle. The ancient and the modern forms of political servitude were thus combined. The Roman emperors, as I have hinted, maintained themselves simply by military force, in nominal accordance with the forms of the republic. Their power (to speak in modern terms) was no part of the constitution. The feudal sovereigns possessed a constitutional precedence in the state, which, after the diffusion of Christianity, they claimed by the grace of God ; but their power, in point of fact, was THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. 155 circumscribed by that of their brother barons. With the firm establishment of standing armies was consummated a system of avowed despotism, paralyzing all expression of the popular will, existing by divine right, and unbalanced by any effec- tual check in the state. It needs but a glance at the state of Europe, in the beginning of the sixteenth century, to see, that, notwithstanding the revival and diffusion of letters, the progress of the reformation, and the improvement of manners, the tone of the people, in the most enlightened countries, was more abject than it had been since the days of the Csesars. The state of England certainly compared favorably with that of any other part of Europe ; but who can patiently listen to the language with which Henry VIII. chides, and Elizabeth scolds, the lords and commons of the Parliament of Great Britain ? All hope of liberty then seemed lost ; in Europe, all hope was lost. A disastrous turn had been given to the general movement of things ; and in the disclosure of the fatal secret of standing armies, the future political servitude of man was apparently decided. But a change is destined to come over the face of things, as romantic in its origin as it is wonderful in its progress. All is not lost ; on the contrary, all is saved, at the moment when all seemed involved in ruin. Let me just allude to the incidents connected with this change, as they have lately been described by an accomplished countryman, now beyond the sea.* About half a league from the little seaport of Palos, in the province of Andalusia, in Spain, stands a convent dedicated to St Mary. Some time in the year 1486, a poor wayfaring stranger, accompanied by a small boy, makes his appearance on foot at the gate of this convent, and begs of the porter a little bread and water for his child. This friendless stranger is COLUMBUS. Brought up in the hardy pursuit of a mariner, occasionally serving in the fleets of his native country, with the burden of fifty years upon his frame, the unprotected * Irving's Life of Columbus. 156 ^.HE HISTORY OF LIBEKIY. foreigner makes his suit to the sovereigns of Portugal and Spain. He tells them that the broad, flat earth on which we tread is round ; and he proposes, with what seems a sacri- legious hand, to lift the veil which had hung, from the creation of the world, over the bounds of the ocean. He promises, by a western course, to reach the eastern shores of Asia the re- gion of gold, and diamonds, and spices ; to extend the sover- eignty of Christian kings over realms and nations hitherto un- approached and unknown ; and, ultimately, to perform a new crusade to the Holy Land, and ransom the sepulchre of our Savior with the new-found gold of the East. Who shall believe the chimerical pretension ? The learned men examine it, and pronounce it futile. The royal pilots have ascertained, by their own experience, that it is groundless. The priesthood have considered it, and have pronounced that sentence, so terrific where the Inquisition reigns, that it is a wicked heresy. The common sense and popular feeling of men have been kindled into disdain and indignation towards a project, which, by a strange new chimera, represented one half of mankind walking with their feet towards the other half. Such is the reception which his proposal meets. For a long time, the great cause of humanity, depending on the discovery of this fair continent, is involved in the fortitude, perseverance, and spirit of the solitary stranger, already past the time of life when the pulse of adventure beats full and high. If, sinking beneath the indifference of the great, the sneers of the wise, the enmity of the mass, and the persecu- tion of a host of adversaries, high and low, he give up the thankless pursuit of his noble vision, what a hope for man- kind is blasted ! But he does not sink. He shakes off his enemies, as the lion shakes the dew-drops from his mane. That consciousness of motive and of strength, which always supports the man who is worthy to be supported, sustains him in his hour of trial ; and at length, after years of expectation, importunity, and hope deferred, he launches forth upon the ur known deep, to discover a new world, under the patronage of Ferdinand and Isabella. THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. 157 The patronage of Ferdinand and Isabella ! Let us dwell for a moment on the auspices under which our country was discovered. The patronage of Ferdinand and Isabella ! Yes, doubtless they have fitted out a convoy worthy the noble temper of the man and the grandeur of his project. Con- vinced at length that it is no day-dream of a heated visionary, the fortunate sovereigns of Castile and Aragon, returning from their triumph over the last of the Moors, and putting a victorious close to a war of seven centuries' duration, have no doubt prepared an expedition of well-appointed magnificence to go out upon this splendid search for other worlds. They have made ready, no doubt, their proudest galleon to waft the heroic adventurer upon his path of glory, with a whole armada of kindred spirits to accompany him. Alas ! from his ancient resort of Palos, which he first visitod as a mendicant, in three frail barks, of which two were without decks, the great discoverer of America sails forth on the first voyage across the unexplored ocean ! Such is the patronage of kings. A few years pass by ; he discovers a new hemisphere ; the wildest of his visions fade into insig- nificance before the reality of their fulfilment ; he finds a new world for Castile and Leon, and comes back to Spain loaded with chains. Republics, it is said, are ungrateful ; such are the rewards of monarchies ! With this humble instrumentality did it please Providence to prepare the theatre for those events by which a new dis- pensation of liberty was to be communicated to man. But much is yet to transpire before even the commencement can be made in the establishment of those institutions by which this great advance in human affairs was to be effected. The discovery of America had taken place under the auspices of the government most disposed for maritime adventure, and best enabled to extend a helping arm, such as it was, to the enterprise of the great discoverer. But it was not from the same quarter that the elements of liberty could be introduced into the new world. Causes, upon which I need not dwell, made it impossible that the great political reform should go forth from Spain. For this object, a new train of incidents was preparing in another quarter. 158 THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. The only real advances which modern Europe had made in freedom, had been made in England. The cause of consti- tutional liberty in that country was persecuted, was subdued ; but not annihilated, nor trampled out of being. From the choicest of its suffering champions were collected the brave band of emigrants who first went out on the second, the more precious voyage of discovery the discovery of a land where liberty and its consequent blessings might be established. A late English writer * has permitted himself to say, that the original establishment of the United States, and that of the colony of Botany Bay, were pretty nearly modelled on the same plan. The meaning of this slanderous insinuation is, that the United States were settled by deported convicts, in like manner as New South Wales has been settled by transported felons. It is doubtless true that, at one period, the English government was in the habit of condemning to hard labor, as servants in the colonies, a portion of those who had received the sentence of the law. If this practice makes it proper to compare America with Botany Bay, the same comparison might be made of England herself, before the practice of transportation began, and even now ; inasmuch as a considerable number of convicts are at all times retained at home. In one sense, indeed, we might doubt whether the allegation were more of a reproach or a compliment. During the time that the colonization of America was going on the most rapidly, some of the best citizens of England, if it be any part of good citizenship to resist oppression, were immured in her prisons of state or lying at the mercy of the law.f Such were some of the convicts by whom America was settled men convicted of fearing God more than they feared man ; of sacrificing property, ease, and all the comforts of life, to a sense of duty and the dictates of conscience ; men convicted of pure lives, brave hearts, and simple manners. The enterprise was led by RALEIGH, the chivalrous convict, * London Quarterly Review for January, 1828. t See Mr Walsh's United States and Great Britain, Sect II THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. 159 who unfortunately believed that his royal master had the heart of a man, and would not let a sentence of death, which had slumbered for sixteen years, revive and take effect after so long an interval of employment and favor. But nullum tempus occurrit regi. The felons who followed next were the heroic and long-suffering church of ROBINSON, at Leyden, CARVER, BREWSTER, BRADFORD, WINSLOW, and their pious associates, convicted of worshipping God according to the dictates of their consciences, and of giving up all, country, property, and the tombs of their fathers, that they might do it unmolested. Not content with having driven the Puri- tans from her soil, England next enacted or put in force the oppressive laws which colonized Maryland with Catholics, and Pennsylvania with Quakers. Nor was it long before the American plantations were recruited by the Germans, con- victed of inhabiting the Palatinate, when the merciless armies of Louis XIV. were turned into that devoted region ; and by the Huguenots, convicted of holding what they deemed the simple truth of Christianity, when it pleased the mistress of Louis XIV. to be very zealous for the Catholic faith. These were followed, in the next century, by the Highlanders, con- victed of the enormous crime, under a monarchical govern- ment, of loyalty to their hereditary prince, on the plains of Culloden ; and the Irish, convicted of supporting the rights of their country against what they deemed an oppressive external power. Such are the convicts by whom America was settled. In this way, a fair representation of whatsoever was most valuable in European character the resolute industry of one nation, the inventive skill and curious arts of another, the courage, conscience, principle, self-denial of all was winnowed out, by the policy of the prevailing governments, as a precious seed wherewith to plant the American soil. By this singular coincidence of events, our country was con- stituted the great asylum of suffering virtue and oppressed humanity. It could now no longer be said, as it was of the Roman empire, that mankind was shut up, as if in 3 vast prison house, from whence there was no escape. The 160 THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. political and ecclesiastical oppressors of the world allowed their persecution to find a limit at the shores of the Atlantic They scarce ever attempted to pursue their victims beyond its protecting waters. It is plain that in this way alone, the design of Providence could be accomplished, which provided for one catholic school of freedom in the western hemi- sphere. For it must not be a freedom of too sectional and peculiar a cast. On the stock of the English civilization, as the general basis, were to be ingrafted the languages, the arts, and the tastes of the other civilized nations. A tie of consanguinity must connect the members of every family of Europe with some portion of our happy land ; so that in all their trials and disasters, they may look safely beyond the ocean for a refuge. The victims of power, of intolerance, of war, of disaster, in every other part of the world, must feel that they may find a kindred home within our limits. Kings, whom the perilous convulsions of the day have shaken from their thrones, must find a safe retreat ; and the needy emigrant must at least not fail of his bread and water, were it only for the sake of the great discoverer, who was himself obliged to beg them. On this corner-stone the temple of our freedom was laid from the first, " For here the exile met from every clime, And spoke in friendship every distant tongue ; Men, from the blood of warring Europe sprung, Were here divided by the running brook." This peculiarity of our population, which some have thought a misfortune, is in reality one of the happiest circum- stances attending the settlement of the country. It assures the exile from every part of Europe a kind reception from men of his own tongue and race. Had we been the unmixed descendants of any one nation of Europe, we should have retained a moral and intellectual dependence on that nation, even after the dissolution of our political connection had taken place. It was sufficient for the great purposes in view, that the earliest settlements were made by men who had fought the battles of liberty in England, and who brought with them THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. 161 the rudiments of constitutional freedom to a region where no deep-rooted prescriptions would prevent their development. Instead of marring the symmetry of our social system, it is one of its most attractive and beautiful peculiarities, that, with the prominent qualities of the Anglo-Saxon character, inher- ited from our English fathers, we have an admixture of almost every thing that is valuable in the character of most of the other states of Europe. Such was the first preparation for the great political reform, of which America was to be the theatre. The colonies of England of a country where the supremacy of laws and the constitution is best recognized the North American colonies were protected, from the first, against the intro- duction of the unmitigated despotism which prevailed in the Spanish settlements ; the continuance of which, down to the moment of their late revolt, prevented the education of those provinces in the exercise of political rights ; and, in that way, has thrown them into the revolution inexperienced and unprepared victims, some of them, to a domestic anar- chy scarcely less grievous than the foreign yoke they have thrown off. While, however, the settlers of America brought with them the principles and feelings, the political habits and temper, which defied the encroachments of arbitrary power, and made it necessary, when they were to be oppressed, that they should be oppressed under the forms of law, it was an unavoidable consequence of the state of things a result, perhaps, of the very nature of a colonial government that they should be thrown into a position of controversy with the mother country, and thus become familiar with the whole energetic doctrine and discipline of resistance. This formed and hardened the temper of the colonists, and trained them up to a spirit meet for the struggles of separation. On the other hand, by what I had almost called an acci- dental circumstance, but one which ought rather to be con- sidered as a leading incident in the great train of events connected with the establishment of constitutional freedom in this country, it came to pass that nearly all the colonies (founded as they were on the charters granted to corporate VOL. I. 21 162 THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. institutions in England, which had for their object the pursuit of the branches of industry and trade pertinent to a new plantation) adopted a regular representative system, by which, as in ordinary civil corporations, the affairs of the community are decided by the will and voices of its members, or those authorized by them. It was no device of the parent govern- ment which gave us our colonial assemblies. It was no refinement of philosophical statesmen to which we are in- debted for our republican institutions of government. They grew up, as it were, by accident, on the simple foundation I have named. " A house of burgesses," says Hutchinson, 1 broke out in Virginia, in 1620 ; " and, " although there was no color for it in the charter of Massachusetts, a house of deputies appeared suddenly in 1634." " Lord Say," observes the same historian, " tempted the principal men of Massa- chusetts to make themselves and their heirs nobles and abso- lute governors of a new colony ; but, under this plan, they could find no people to follow them." At this early period, and in this simple, unpretending man- ner, was introduced to the world that greatest discovery in political science, or political practice, a representative republi- can system. " The discovery of the system of the represen- tative republic," says M. de Chateaubriand, "is one of the greatest political events that ever occurred." But it is not one of the greatest, it is the very greatest ; and, combined with another principle, to which I shall presently advert, and which is also the invention of the United States, it marks an era in human affairs a discovery in the great science of social life, compared with which every thing else, that termi- nates in the temporal interests of man, sinks into insignifi- cance. Thus, then, was the foundation laid, and thus was the preparation commenced, of the grand political regeneration. For about a century and a half this preparation was carried on. Without any of the temptations which drew the Spanish adventurers to Mexico and Peru, the colonies throve almost beyond example, and in the face of neglect, contempt, and persecution. Their numbers, in the substantial middle classes THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. 163 of life, increased with singular rapidity : no materials out of which an aristocracy could be formed ; no great eleemosy- nary establishments to cause an influx of paupers. There was nothing but the rewards of labor and the hope of freedom. But at length this hope, never adequately satisfied, began to turn into doubt and despair. The colonies had become too important to be overlooked ; their government was a prerogative too important to be left in their own hands ; and the legislation of the mother country decidedly assumed a form which announced to the patriots that the hour at length had come when the chains of the great discoverer were to be avenged, the sufferings of the first settlers to be com- pensated, and the long deferred hopes of humanity to be fulfilled. You need not, friends and fellow-citizens, that I should dwell upon the incidents of the last great act in the colonial drama. This very place was the scene of some of the earliest and the most memorable of them ; their recollection i-: a part of your inheritance of honor. In the early councils and first struggles of the great revolutionary enterprise, the citizens of this place were among the most prominent. The measures of resistance which were projected by the patriots of Charlestown were opposed but by one individual. An active cooperation existed between the political leaders in Boston and this place. The beacon light which was kindled in the towers of Christ Church, in Boston, on the night of the eighteenth of April, 1775, was answered from the steeple of the church in which we are now assembled. The intrepid messenger who was sent forward to convey to HANCOCK and ADAMS the intelligence of the approach of the British troops, was furnished with a horse, for his eventful errand, by a respected citizen of this place. At the close of the following momentous day, the British forces the remnant of its dis- asters found refuge, under the shades of night, upon the heights of Charlestown ; and there, on the ever-memorable seventeenth of June, that great and costly sacrifice in the cause of freedom was consummated with fire and blood 164 THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. Your hill-tops were strewed with the illustrious dead ; your nomes were wrapped in flames ; the fair fruits of a cen- tury and a half of civilized culture were reduced to a heap of bloody ashes, and two thousand men, women, and chil- dren turned houseless upon the world. With the exception of the ravages of the nineteenth of April, the chalice of woe and desolation was in this manner first presented to the 'c'ps of the citizens of Charlestown. Thus devoted, as it were, to the cause, it is no wonder that the spirit of the rev- olution should have taken possession of their bosoms, and been transmitted to their children. The American, who, in any part of the Union, could forget the scenes and the prin- ciples of the revolution, would thereby prove himself unwor- thy of the blessings which he enjoys; but the citizen of Charlestown, who could be cold on this momentous theme, must hear a voice of reproach from the walls, which were reared on the ashes of the seventeenth of June a piercing cry from the very sods of yonder hill. The revolution was at length accomplished. The political separation of the country from Great Britain was effected ; and it now remained to organize the liberty which had been reaped on bloody fields to establish, in the place of the government whose yoke had been thrown off, a government at home, which should fulfil the great design of the revolu- tion, and satisfy the demands of the friends of liberty at large. What manifold perils awaited the step ! The danger was great that too little or too much would be done. Smart- ing under the oppressions of a distant government, whose spirit was alien to their feelings, there was great danger that the colonies, in the act of declaring themselves sovereign and independent states, would push to an extreme the prerogative of their separate independence, and refuse to admit any authority beyond the limits of each particular common- wealth. On the other hand, achieving their independence beneath the banners of the continental army, ascribing, and justly, a large portion of their success to the personal quali- ties of the beloved Father of his Country, there was danger not less imminent, that those who perceived the evils of the THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. 165 opposite extreme, would be disposed to confer too much strength on one general government ; and would, perhaps, even fancy the necessity of investing the hero of the revo- lution, in form, with that sovereign power which his personal ascendency gave him in the hearts of his countrymen. Such and so critical was the alternative which the organization of the new government presented, and on the successful issue of which the entire benefit of this great movement in human affairs was to depend. The first effort to solve the great problem was made in the course of the revolution, and was without success. The arti- cles of confederation verged to the extreme of a union too weak for its great purposes ; and the moment the pressure of the war was withdrawn, the inadequacy of this first project of a government was felt. The United States found them- selves overwhelmed with debt, without the means of paying it. Rich in the materials of an extensive commerce, they found their ports crowded with foreign ships, and themselves without the power to raise a revenue. Abounding in all the elements of national wealth, they wanted resources to defray he ordinary expenses of government. For a moment, and to the hasty observer, this last eftort for the establishment of freedom had failed. No fruit had sprung from this lavish expenditure of treasure and blood. We had changed the powerful protection of the mother country into a cold and jealous amity, if not into a slumber- ing hostility. The oppressive principles against which our fathers had struggled, were succeeded by more oppressive realities. The burden of the British navigation act was, as operating on the colonies, removed, but it was followed by the impossibility of protecting our shipping by a navigation law of our own. A state of material prosperity, existing be- fore the revolution, was succeeded by universal exhaustion ; and a high and indignant tone of militant patriotism, by uni- versal despondency. It remained, then, to give its last great effect to all that had been done, since the discovery of America, for the establish- ment of the cause of liberty in the western hemisphere, and. 166 THE HISTOEY OF LIBERTY. by another more deliberate effort, to organize a government by which not only the present evils, under which the country was suffering, should be remedied, but the final design of Providence should be fulfilled. Such was the task which devolved on the statesmen who convened at Philadelphia, on the second day of May, 1787, of which General Washington was elected president, and over whose debates your towns- man, Mr Gorham, presided for two or three months, as chair- man of the committee of the whole, during the discussion of the plan of the federal constitution. The very first step to be taken was one of pain and regret The old confederation was to be given up. What misgivings and grief must not this preliminary sacrifice have occasioned to the patriotic members of the convention ! They were attached, and with reason, to its simple majesty. It was weak then, but it had been strong enough to carry the colonies through the storms of the revolution. Some of the great men, who led up the forlorn hope of their country, in the hour of her dearest peril, had died in its defence. Could not a little inefficiency be pardoned to a Union with which France had made an alliance, and England had made peace ? Could the proposed new government do more or better things than this had done ? Who could give assurance, when the flag of the old thirteen was struck, that the hearts of the people could be rallied to another banner? Such were the misgivings of some of the great men of that day the Henrys, the Gerrys, and other eminent anti- federalists, to whose scruples it is time that justice should be done. They were the sagacious misgivings of wise men, the just forebodings of brave men, who were determined not to defraud posterity of the blessings for which they had all suf- fered, and for which some of them had fought. The members of that convention, in going about the great work before them, deliberately laid aside the means by which all preceding legislators had aimed to accomplish a like work. In founding a strong and efficient government, adequate to the raising up of a powerful and prosperous people, their first step was to reject the institutions to which other governments THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. 167 traced their strength and prosperity, or had, at least, regarded as the necessary conditions of stability and order. The world had settled down into the belief that an hereditary monarch was necessary to give strength to the executive power. The framers of our constitution provided for an elective chief magistrate, chosen every four years. Every other country had been betrayed into the admission of a distinction of ranks in society, under the absurd impression that privileged orders are necessary to the permanence of the social system. The framers of our constitution established every thing on the pure natural basis of a uniform equality of the elective franchise, to be exercised by all the citizens, at fixed and short intervals. In other countries, it had been thought necessary to constitute some one political centre, towards which all political power should tend, and at which, in the last resort, it should be exercised. The framers of the constitution devised a scheme of confederate and representa- tive sovereign republics, united in a happy distribution of powers, which, reserving to the separate states all the political functions essential to local administration and private justice, bestowed upon the general government those, and those only, required for the service of the whole. Thus was completed the great revolutionary movement ; thus was perfected that mature organization of a free system, destined, as we trust, to stand forever, as the exemplar of popular government. Thus was discharged the duty of our fathers to themselves, to the country, and to the world. The power of the example thus set up, in the eyes of the nations, was instantly and widely felt. It was immediately made visible to sagacious observers that a constitutional age had begun. It was in the nature of things, that, where the former evil existed in its most inveterate form, the reaction should also be the most violent. Hence the dreadful excesses that marked the progress of the French revolution, and, for a while, almost made the name of liberty odious. But it is not less in the nature of things, that, when the most indis- putable and enviable political blessings stand illustrated before the world, not merely in speculation and in theory, but in 168 THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. living practice and bright example, the nations of the earth, in proportion as they have eyes to see, and ears to hear, and hands to grasp, should insist on imitating the example France clung to the hope of constitutional liberty through thirty years of appalling tribulation, and now enjoys the freest constitution in Europe. Spain, Portugal, the two Italian kingdoms, and several of the German states, have entered on the same path. Their progress has been and must be various ; modified by circumstances : by the interests and passions of governments and men ; and, in some cases, seemingly arrested. But their march is as sure as fate. If we believe at all in the political revival of Europe, there can be no really retrograde movement in this cause ; and that which seems so in the revolutions of government, is, liko that of the heavenly bodies, a part of their eternal orbit. There can be no retreat, for the great exemplar must stand, to convince the hesitating nations, under every reverse, that the reform they strive at is real, is practicable, is within their reach. Efforts at reform, by the power of action and reaction, may fluctuate ; but there is an element of popular strength abroad in the world, stronger than forms and institutions, and daily growing in power. A public opinion of a new kind has arisen among men the opinion of the civilized world. Springing into existence on the shores of our own continent, it has grown with our growth and strengthened with our strength ; till now, this moral giant, like that of the ancient poet, marches along the earth and across the ocean, but his front is among the stars. The course of the day does not weary, nor the darkness of night arrest him. He grasps the pillars of the temple where Oppression sits enthroned, not groping and benighted, like the strong man of old, to be crushed himself beneath the fall ; but trampling, in his strength, on the massy ruins. Under the influence, I might almost say the unaided influ- ence, of public opinion, formed and nourished by our example, three wonderful revolutions have broken out in a generation. That of France, not yet consummated, has left that country ''which it found in a condition scarcely better than Turkey) THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. 169 in the possession of the blessings of a representative constitu- tional government. Another revolution has emancipated the American possessions of Spain, by an almost unassisted action of moral causes. Nothing but the strong sense of the age, that a government like that of Ferdinand ought not to subsist over regions like those which stretch to the south of us, on the continent, could have sufficed to bring about their eman- cipation, against all the obstacles, which the state of society among them opposes at present, to regulated liberty and safe independence. When an eminent British statesman (Mr Can- ning) said of the emancipation of these states, that " he had called into existence a new world in the west," he spoke as wisely as the artist who, having tipped the forks of a con- ductor with silver, should boast that he had created the light- ning, which it calls down from the clouds. But the greatest triumph of public opinion is the revolution of Greece. The spontaneous sense of the friends of liberty, at home and abroad. without armies, without navies, without concert, and acting only through the simple channels of ordinary com- munication, principally the press, has rallied the govern- ments of Europe to this ancient and favored soil of freedom. Pledged to remain at peace, they have been driven by the force of public sentiment into the war. Leagued against the cause of revolution, as such, they have been compelled to send their armies and navies to fight the battles of revolt. Dignifying the barbarous oppressor of Christian Greece with the title of " ancient and faithful ally," they have been con- strained, by the outraged feeling of the civilized world, to burn up, in time of peace, the navy of their ally, with all his antiquity and all his fidelity ; and to cast the broad shield of the Holy Alliance over a young and turbulent republic. This bright prospect may be clouded in ; the powers of Europe, which have reluctantly taken, may speedily abandon the field. Some inglorious composition may yet save the Ottoman empire from dissolution, at the sacrifice of the liberty of Greece, and the power of Europe. But such are not the indications of things. The prospect is fair, that the political regeneration which commenced in the west, is now going VOL. i. 22 '70 THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. backward to resuscitate the once happy and long-dese .u regions of the older world. The hope is not now chimerical, that those lovely islands, the flower of the Levant, the shores of that renowned sea, around which all the associa- tions of antiquity are concentrated, are again to be brought back to the sway of civilization and Christianity. Happily, the interest of the great powers of Europe seems to beckon them onward in the path of humanity. The half-deserted coasts of Syria and Egypt, the fertile but almost desolated archipelago, the empty shores of Africa, the granary of ancient Rome, seem to offer themselves as a ready refuge for the crowded, starving, discontented millions of Western Europe. No natural nor political obstacle opposes itself to their occupation. France has long cast a wishful eye on Egypt. Napoleon derived the idea of his expedition, which was set down to the unchastened ambition of a revolutionary soldier, from a memoir found in the cabinet of Louis XVI. England has already laid her hand an arbitrary, but a civilized and Christian hand on Malta ; and the Ionian Isles, and Cyprus, Rhodes, and Candia must soon follow. It is not beyond the reach of hope, that a representative republic may be estab- lished in Central Greece and the adjacent islands. In this way, and with the example of what has here been done, it is not too much to anticipate, that many generations will not pass, before the same benignant influence will revisit the awakened East, and thus fulfil, in the happiest sense, the vis- ion of Columbus, by restoring a civilized population to the primitive seats of our holy faith. Fellow-citizens, the eventful pages in the volume of human lortune are opening upon us with sublime rapidity of suc- cession. It is two hundred years this summer since a few of that party who, in 1628, commenced in Salem the first settlement of Massachusetts, were sent by Governor Endecott to explore the spot where we stand. They found that one pioneer, of the name of WALFORD, had gone before them, and had planted himself among the numerous and warlike sav- ages in this quarter. From them, the native lords of the soil, these first hardy adventurers derived their title to the lands on THE HISTORY OF LIBERT\ 171 which they settled ; and in some degree, prepared the way by the arts of civilization and peace, for the main body of the colonists of Massachusetts, under Governor Winthrop, who, two years afterwards, by a coincidence which you will think worth naming, arrived in Mystic River, and pitched his patri- archal tent on Ten Hills, upon the seventeenth day of June, 1630. Massachusetts at that moment consisted of six huts at Salem, and one at this place. It seems but a span of tim< as the mind ranges over it. A venerable individual is living, at the seat of the first settlement, whose life covers one half of the entire period : * but what a destiny has been unfolded before our country ! what events have crowded your an- nals ! what scenes of thrilling interest and eternal glory have signalized the very spot where we stand ! In that unceasing march of things, which calls forward the successive generations of men to perform their part on the stage of life, we at length are summoned to appear. Our fathers have passed their hour of visitation ; how worthily, let the growth and prosperity of our happy land and the security of our firesides attest. Or, if this appeal be too weak to move us, let the eloquent silence of yonder fa- mous heights let the column which is there rising in simple majesty recall their venerable forms, as they toiled in the hasty trenches through the dreary watches of that night of expectation, heaving up the sods, where many of them lay, in peace and in honor, before the fol- lowing sun had set. The turn has come to us. The trial of adversity was theirs ; the trial of prosperity is ours. Let us meet it as men who know their duty, and prize their bless- ings. Our position is the most enviable, the most responsible, which men can fill. If this generation does its duty, the cause of constitutional freedom is safe. If we fail if we fail, not only do we defraud our children of the inheritance which we received from our fathers, but we blast the hopes of the friends of liberty throughout our continent, throughout Europe, throughout the world, to the end of time. * The late venerable Dr Holyoke, of Salem. 172 THE HISTORY OF LIBERTY. History is not without her examples of hard-fought fields, where the banner of liberty has floated triumphantly on the wildest storm of battle. She is without her examples of a people by whom the dear-bought treasure has been wisely employed and safely handed down. The eyes of the world are turned for that example to us. It is related by an ancient historian,* of that Brutus who slew Ceesar, that he threw himself on his sword, after the disastrous battle of Philippi, with the bitter exclamation, that he had followed virtue as a substance, but found it a name. It is not too much to say, that there are, at this moment, noble spirits in the elder world, who are anxiously watching the practical operation of our institutions, to learn whether liberty, as they have been told, is a mockery, a pretence, and a curse, or a blessing, for which it becomes them to brave the scaffold and the cimeter. Let us then, as we assemble on the birthday of the nation, as we gather upon the green turf, once wet with precious blood, let us devote ourselves to the sacred cause of CONSTI- TUTIONAL LIBERTY. Let us abjure the interests and passions which divide the great family of American freemen. Let the rage of party spirit sleep to-day. Let us resolve that our children shall have cause to bless the memory of their fathers, as we have cause to bless the memory of ours. Dio Cassius, Lib. XLVII. in fin. MONUMENT TO HARVARD.* WE are assembled, fellow-students and fellow-citizens, to witness the erection of a simple monument to the memory of John Harvard. It is known to you all, with what ready /orethought our Pilgrim fathers provided for the education of those who should come after them. Six years only had elapsed, from the time that Governor Winthrop, with the char- ter of the colony, landed on the banks of Mystic River, when the General Court appropriated four hundred pounds, out of the scanty resources at its command, for the erection of a school or college at Cambridge, then called Newtown. f The views of our worthy fathers, at that time, probably did not extend beyond the establishment of a grammar school. But that Providence, which on so many other occasions watched over the infancy of America, and gave the right direction to its first beginnings, was vigilant here. In the year 1637, (the year following that in which the school at Newtown was established,) the Rev. John Harvard arrived in the colony. As he was admitted a freeman in November, 1637, it is supposed that he came over in the autumn of that year. This ever-memorable benefactor of learning and religion in America, had been educated at the university of Cam- bridge in England, was a master of arts of Emmanuel College in that university, and afterwards a minister of the gospel. But in what part of England, or in what year he was born ; * Address delivered at the erection of a monument to John Harvard, in the graveyard at Charlestown, on the 26th of September, 1828. f See note A, at the end. (173) 174 MONUMENT TO HARVARD. where he was settled in the ministry ; and what were the circumstances of his life, before leaving his native land, are matters as yet unknown to us. We are not without hopes, that in answer to inquiries addressed to the college in Eng- land where our founder was educated, we may yet derive some information on these interesting points.* The scanty notices which our early histories contain of him, lead us to suppose that he brought to this country the disease which soon proved fatal to him. He engaged, how- ever, in the duties of his profession, and was employed as a preacher in the church in this place. But his usefulness in that calling was destined to a short duration. He died on the fourteenth of September of the year following his arrival corresponding, in the new style, to the twenty-fourth of Sep- tember; performing in his last act a work of liberality, destined, we trust, to stand while America shall endure, and with a usefulness as wide as its limits. By his last will, he bequeathed to the colony, for the endowment of the school at Newtown, one moiety of his estate, amounting to a sum little short of eight hundred pounds ; a bequest which, even in the present prosperous state of the country, would be thought liberal, and which, in its condition at that time, may truly be called munificent. This donation gave an instantaneous impulse to the pro- jected establishment. It was determined, by the court, to erect the school into a college. In filial commemoration of the place where several of our fathers had been educated, the name of Newtown was changed to that of Cambridge ; and the college itself was called by that of Harvard. And thus did our worthy founder become the instrument in the hand of Providence of effecting the design which the pious leaders of the colony had most at heart. Such he was felt to be by his contemporaries. In a letter written by some of them, in 1642, they say, " After God had carried us safe to New England, and we had builded our houses, provided necessaries for our livelihood, reared convenient places for * See note B, at the end. MONUMENT TO HARVARD. 175 God's worship, and settled the civil government, one of the next things we longed for and looked after was to advance learning, and perpetuate it to posterity, dreading to leave an illiterate ministry to the churches, when our present ministers should lie in the dust. And as we were thinking and consult- ing how to effect this great work, it pleased God to stir up the heart of one Mr Harvard (a godly gentleman and lover of learning, then living amongst us) to give the one half of his estate towards the erecting of a college, and all his library."* The college instantly went into operation, on the footing of the ancient institutions of Europe ; and in 1642, four years only after the decease of Harvard, sent forth its first class of graduates ; men who rose to eminence in the minis- try of the gospel, in the legal profession, and in the public service, both at home and abjoad. One of the first class graduated at Cambridge was sent, both by Cromwell and Charles II., as minister to the States General of Holland. One became a fellow of a college at Oxford ; two received degrees of medicine at Leyden and Padua ; one received a degree of divinity at Dublin ; and on one was conferred the degree of doctor of divinity at Oxford, then, as now, the greatest academical distinction to which an English theologian can attain.f Nor was it without example that young men were sent from England to receive their education at Harvard College, within a few years after its foundation. J With such energy and spirit did our alma mater spring into being ; and so decisive is the evidence, that, even in that first stage of the existence of the college, it furnished an education adequate to every department of the civil or sacred service of the country, and not inferior to that of the distin- guished schools in Europe. But it would belong rather to a history of the college than to a eulogy on its founder, to pursue this narrative. I will * New England's First Fruits. Mass. Hist Coll. I. p. 202. First Series. \ See note C, at the end. J Johnson's Wonder- Working Providence. Mass. Hist ColL New Series. VII. 29. 176 MONUMENT TO HARVARD. only add, that, till about the end of the seventeenth century, it remained the only college in America ; and, consequently, up to that period, almost the only source of liberal education accessible on this side of the Atlantic. It is, then, fellow-students, one hundred and ijnety years, this day, since the death of the man who was recognized by his contemporaries as the founder of the most ancient semi- nary of learning in the country, the college where we re- ceived our education. In paying these honors to his single name, we do no injustice to other liberal benefactors of earlier or later times. It is a part of the merit of those who go forward in works of public usefulness and liberality, that they construct a basis on which others of kindred temper, who come after them, may build ; and awaken a spirit which may lead to services still more important than their own. But, considering the penury of the colony, the exhaustion of its first settlers, and the extreme difficulty which must, in consequence, have attended the foundation of a college, it is not easy to estimate the full importance of the early and liberal benefactions of the man whom we commemorate. But for his generosity, the people might have been depressed for the want of that hope which they built on such an insti- tution, and from the fear of an uneducated posterity ; and society might so far have yielded to the various causes of degeneracy incident to a remote and feeble colony, as never afterwards to have felt the importance of learning, nor made provision for the education of the people a result, we may safely say, which would have been fatal to the character of this community. But it was otherwise ordered for our welfare. A generous spirit was guided to our shores, for no other purpose, as it would seem, but to dispense the means requisite for the foun- dation of a college. Less than two hundred years have elapsed, and not much less than six thousand names are borne on the catalogue of the institution, whose venerable walls are, indeed, a noble monument to their founder. There is a tradition, that, till the revolutionary war, a gravestone was standing within this enclosure, over the spot where his ashes MONUMENT TO HARVARD. 177 repose. With other similar memorials, it was destroyed at that period ; and nothing but the same tradition remains to guide us to the hallowed spot. Upon it we have erected a plain and simple, but at the same time, we apprehend, a per- manent memorial. It will add nothing to the renown of him who is commemorated by it ; but it will guide the grateful student and the respectful stranger to the precincts of that spot, where all that is mortal rests of one of the earliest and most efficient of the country's benefactors. It is constructed of our native granite, in a solid shaft of fifteen feet elevation, and in the simplest style of ancient art. On the eastern face of the shaft, and looking towards the land of his birth and education, we have directed his name to be inscribed upon the solid granite ; and we propose to attach to it, in a marble tablet, this short inscription, in his mother tongue : " On the twenty-sixth day of September, A. D. 1828, this Stone was erected by the Graduates of the University at Cambridge, in honor of its Founder, who died at Charlestown, on the twenty-sixth day of Sep- tember, A. D. 1638." On the opposite face of the shaft, and looking westward, toward the walls of the university which bears his name, we have provided another inscription, which, in consideration of his character as the founder of a seat of learning, is expressed in the Latin tongue : " In piam et perpetuam memoriam JOHANNIS HARVARDII, annis fere ducentis post obitum ejus peractis, academic qute est Cantabrigise Nov- Anglorum alumni, ne diutius vir de litteris nostris optime meritus sine monumento quamvis humili jaceret, hunc lapidem ponendum curavemnt." And now let no man deride our labor, however humble, as insignificant or useless. With what interest should we not gaze upon this simple and unpretending shaft, had it been erected at the decease of him whom it commemorates, and did we now behold it gray with the moss and beaten with the storms of two centuries ! In a few years, we, who now perform this duty of filial observance, shall be as those who VOL. i. 23 178 MONUMENT TO HARVARD. are resting beneath us ; but our children and our children's children, to the latest generation, will prize this simple memorial, first and chiefly for the sake of the honored name which is graven on its face, but with an added feeling of kind remembrance of those who have united to pay this debt of gratitude. When we think of the mighty importance, in our commu- nity, of the system of public instruction, and regard the ven- erable man whom we commemorate, as the first to set the example of contributing liberally for the endowment of places of education, (an example faithfully imitated in this region, in almost every succeeding age,) we cannot, as patriots, admit that any honor which it is in our power to pay to his memory, is beyond his desert. If we further dwell on our own obli- gation, and consider that we ourselves have drank of the streams that have flowed from this sacred well, that in the long connection of cause and effect, which binds the generations of men indissolubly to each other, it is perhaps owing to his liberality that we have enjoyed the advantages of a public education, we shall surely feel, as students, that the poor tribute we have united to render to his memory falls infinitely below the measure either of his merit or of our obligation. But, humble as they are, let these acts of acknowledgment impress on our bosoms a just estimate of desert. Of all the first fathers of New England, the wise and provident rulers, the grave magistrates, the valiant captains, those who counselled the people in peace, and led them in war, the gratitude of this late posterity has first sought out the spot where this transient stranger was laid to rest, scarce a year after his arrival in America. It is not that we are insensible to the worth of their characters, nor that we are ungrateful for their services. But it was given to the venerated man whom we commemorate this day first to strike the key-note in the character of this people first to perceive with a prophet's foresight, and to promote with a princely liberality, considering his means, that connection between private mu- nificence and public education, which, well understood and MONUMENT TO HARVARD. 179 pursued by others, has given to New England no small por- tion of her name and her praise in the land. What is there to distinguish our community so honorably as its establish- ments for general education, beginning with its public schools, supported wholly by the people, and continued through the higher institutions, in whose endowment public and private liberality has gone hand in hand? What so eminently reflects credit upon us, and gives to our places of education a character not possessed by those of many other communities, as the number and liberality of the private ben- efactions which have been made to them ? The excellent practice of liberal giving has obtained a currency here, which, if I mistake not, it possesses in few other places. Men give, not merely from their abundance, but from their competence ; and following the great example, which we now celebrate, of John Harvard, who gave half his fortune and all his books, it is no uncommon thing for men to devote a very considera- ble portion of estates not passing the bounds of moderation, to the endowment of public institutions. And well does the example of Harvard teach us, that what is thus given away is in reality the portion best saved and longest kept. In the public trusts to which it is confided, it is safe, as far as any thing human is safe, from the vicissitudes to which all else is subject. Here, neither private extrava- gance can squander, nor personal necessity exhaust it. Here it will not perish with the poor clay to whose natural wants it would else have been appropriated. Here, unconsumed itself, it will feed the hunger of mind, the only thing on earth that never dies, and endure, and do good for ages, after the donor himself has ceased to live, in aught but his bene- factions. There is in the human heart a natural craving to be remembered by those who succeed us. It is not the first passion which awakens in the soul, but it is the strongest which animates, and the last which leaves it. It is a sort of instinctive philosophy, which tells us, that we who live, and move about the eatth, and claim it for our own, are not the 180 MONUMENT TO HARVARD. human rcCce ; that those who are to follow us when we are gone, and those that here lie slumbering beneath our feet, are with us but one company, of which we are the smallest part. It tells us, that the true glory of man is not that which blazes out for a moment, and dazzles the contemporary spectator; but that which lives when the natural life is gone ; which is acknowledged by a benefited and grateful posterity, whom it brings back, even as it does us at this moment, with thankful offerings at an humble tomb ; and gives to an otherwise ob- scure name a bright place in the long catalogue of ages. We stand here amidst the graves of some of the earliest and best of the fathers and sons of New England. Men of usefulness and honor in their generation lie gathered around us, and among them, no doubt, not a few, whose standing in the community, whose public services, and whose fortune placed them, in the estimate of their day, far above the hum- ble minister of the gospel, who landed on our shores but to leave them forever. But were it given to man to live over the life that is passed, and could the voice of a superior being call on the sleepers beneath us to signify whether they would not exchange the wealth and the honors they enjoyed for the deathless name of this humble stranger, how many would gladly start up to claim the privilege ! We have now, fellow-students, discharged our duty to the memory of a great benefactor of our country. In this age of commemoration, as it has been called, it was not meet that the earliest of those to whom we all are under obligations, should be passed over. Nor is it we, who are here assembled, nor the immediate inhabitants of this vicinity, who are alone united in this grateful act. What is done for intellectual im- provement is as little bounded by space as by time. Not a few of the sons of Harvard, in the distant parts of the Union, have promptly contributed their mite towards the erection of this humble structure. While the college which he founded shall continue to the latest posterity, a monument not unwor- thy of the most honored name, we trust that this plain me- morial also will endure. While it guides the dutiful votary MONUMENT TO HARVARD. 181 to the spot where his ashes are deposited, it will teach to those who survey it the supremacy of mental and moral desert, and encourage them too, by a like munificence, to aspire to a name, as bright as that which stands engraven on its shaft : clarum et venerabile nomen Gentibus, et multum nostrse quod proderat urbi 1 NOTES. NOTE A, p. 173. ALMOST all the information in our possession, on the subject of Harvard, is found in the following note of the learned and accurate editor of Win- throp's Journal : " We must regret that Winthrop has taken no notice of the ever-honored name of Rev. John Harvard, except in the loose memo- randa at the end of his MSS. From our Colony Records, I find he was made free 2d November, 1637, at the same time with Rev. John Fiske. By a most diligent antiquary, John Farmer, Esq., of Concord, N. H., this information is given me from Rev. Samuel Danforth's Almanac for 1648 : ' 7 mo. 14 day, 1638, John Harvard, Master of Arts, of Emmanuel College in Cambridge, deceased, and, by will, gave the half of his estate (which amounted to about 700 pounds) for the erecting of the College.' My cor- respondent adds, ' I do not recollect that any other authority gives the exact time of his death, or the college at which he was educated.' Johnson, Lib. II. c. 12 and 19, has favored us with more than any other book. It is pecu- liarly vexatious to learn from Mather of the founder of the college, which he so much and so often desired, happily in vain, to rule, only the amount of his bequest, and that he died of consumption. The sons of the oldest university in our country will be pleased with my extract from our Colony Records, I. 179, of the first motion in this blessed work. ' The court agreed to give 400 pounds towards a school or college, whereof 200 pounds to be paid the next year, and 200 pounds when the work is finished, and the next court to appoint where and what building.' This was in October, 1636, in the midst of the war with the Pequots, and the beginning of the Antinomian controversy ; and we should remember that the appropriation was equal to a year's rate of the whole colony. Harvard's will was probably nuncupative, as it is nowhere recorded." Savage's edition of Winthrop's Journal, Vol. II. pp. 87, 88. Cotton Mather mentions 779 17s. 2d. as the precise sum bequeathed by Harvard. Governor Winthrop says about 800. In New England's First Fruits, Harvard's estate is said to have been, " in all, about 1700." It is probable, therefore, that, in the foregoing extract from Danforth's Almanac, we ought, instead of 700, to read 1700. A Latin elegy to the memory of Harvard, written by John Wilson, is subjoined by Mather to his account of the foundation of the college. In (182) NOTES. 183 this elegy, (in which Harvard is represented as speaking,) the following lines occur : " Me (licet indignum) selegit gratia Christ! Fundarem musis, qui pia tecta piis. (Non quod vel chara moriens uxore carerem Aut haeres alius quod mihi nullus erat ;) Haeredes vos ipse meos sed linquere suasit Usque ad dimidium sortis opumque Deus ; Sat ratus esse mihi sobolis, pietatis amore Educet illustres si schola nostra viros." From these lines it might be inferred that Harvard left a widow, and some other heir, who was not his son. Since the above was written, in addition to the facts contained in the following note B, a very valuable gleaning has been made from the records of the church and town, by the accurate and judicious historian of Charles- town, Mr Richard Frothingham, Jun. From this source, we learn that Harvard was admitted an inhabitant on the 6th of August, 1637; that he was admitted, with his wife Anne, a member of the church, on the 6th of November ; and was " some time minister of God's word " in Charlestown, although no account is found in the records of his ordination. It further appears, from the town records, that he had a share in a division of land in 1637 and 1638 ; in 1637, a grant was made to him of "three and a half feet of ground for a portal " for his house ; and on the 26th of April, 1638, he was one of a committee " to consider of some things tending towards a body of laws." Mr F. makes it quite probable that the widow of Harvard married Rev. Thomas Allen. The house built by Harvard was standing in 1697. See Frothingham's History of Charlestown, pp. 74, 75. I take this opportunity to acknowledge the inadvertence with which I fell into the popular error, not only in the former editions of this address, but in the tablet attached to the monument, in making the reduction from old to new style, in the date of the death of Harvard. He died on the 14th of Sep- tember, 1638 ; which, as the difference between the styles was then ten days, corresponds, of course, with the 24th of September. My attention was kindly called to this error by Rev. W. J. Budington, who has correctly explained the subject, in his " History of the First Church of Charlestown." p. 182. NOTE B, p. 174 Since this address was delivered, the register of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, has been examined by President Sparks, Hon. James Savage, and by the author. It appears that John Harvard entered that college as a pensioner, 17th April, 1628; that he commenced Bachelor of Arts in 1631, 184 NOTES. and took the degree of Master of Arts in 1635. The fruit of Mr Savage's researches will be found in Massachusetts Hist Coll., Third Series, Vol. VIII. pp. 247, 249. The family of Harvard still exists in England. A letter to the author of this volume, from the Rev. John Harvard, a respectable clergyman of the Wesleyan church, may be found in Hon. S. A. Eliot's " History of Harvard College," Appendix, p. 134. This gentleman is descended from the brother of our distinguished benefactor; but the traditions of the family in England do not go so far back as the accounts which have been preserved or collected on this side of the water. NOTE C, p. 175. The following is the list of the first class of Harvard College, as it stands in the catalogue : 1642. Benjamin Woodbridge, Mr. et Oxon. 1648, S. T. D. . *1684 GEORGIUS DOWNING, Eques 1660, Baronettus 1663, Oliv. Crom. et Caroli II. Leg. apud Resp. Bat *1684 Johannes Bulfdey, Mr. *1689 Gulidmus Hubbard, Mr. *1704 Samuel Bellingham, Mr., M. D. Lugd Johannes Wilson, Mr. *1691 Henricus Saltonstall, M. D. Patav. 1649 et Oxon. 1652, Socius Tobias Barnard Nathaniel Brewster, Th. Bac. Dublin. *1690 Of these graduates at Harvard College, of the first class, Woodbridge was settled in the ministry at Newbury, in Berkshire, England. Curious particulars of Sir George Downing* are given in Hutchinson, Vol. I. p. 107, but particularly in Savage's edition of Winthrop's Journal, Vol. II. pp. 241, 242. A descendant of Sir George Downing, of the same name, founded Downing College, at Cambridge, in England, on a more liberal foundation than any other college in that university. Bulkley was settled as a clergyman at Fordham, in England, and, after his ejectment as a non- conformist, practised physic with success in London. He was the son of the eminent divine of the same name, the founder of Concord, in Middlesex county. Hubbard was the minister of Ipswich, the famous historian of New England and of the Indian wars. Wilson was minister of Dorches- ter, and is, with several others of this class, among whom are Barnard and Brewster, particularly commemorated by Johnson, in the " Wonder- Working Providence." * He has recently been made the subject of two very learned and interest- ing lectures, delivered before the Massachusetts Historical Society, by Mr Charles W. Uphain, of Salem APPENDIX. ON the 6th of September, 1827, a few gentlemen, graduates of Harvard University, happened to be assembled at the house of Dr George Parkman in Boston. Some conversation took place on the propriety of erecting a monument to the memory of JOHN HARVARD, the founder of the University at Cambridge. The proposal met with the hearty concurrence of the gentlemen present, and was believed to be one which would prove accept- able to the graduates at large. In order to carry it into effect, without unnecessary delay, it was determined to proceed immediately to the adop- tion of the steps necessary to be taken to bring the subject before the alumni of the college. The meeting was accordingly organized, and, in pursuance to the resolutions adopted by it, the following Circular was issued : " A meeting of a few individuals who have received their education at Har- vard College was held in Boston, on the 6th instant. The Hon. F. C. Gray was called to the chair, and Mr E. Everett appointed secretary. " The object of the meeting was stated to be, to consider the propriety of paying a tribute of respect to the memory of John Harvard, founder of the University at Cambridge, by erecting a suitable monument in the graveyard at Charlestown, where he lies buried : and, on motion, it was " Resolved, That the chairman and secretary of this meeting be requested to prepare a statement on this subject, to be submitted to the graduates of Harvard College, inviting a subscription of one dollar each, for the object proposed. " Resolved, That the Hon. P. O. Thatcher be requested to act as treasurer of the fund to be raised; and that the chairman, secretary and treasurer adopt the requisite measures for the erection of the monument. " The meeting was then dissolved. " Copy from the record, "Attest, EDWARD EVERETT, Secretary." In pursuance of the foregoing resolutions, the undersigned beg leave to submit the following statement to the graduates of Harvard College : VOL. I. 24 (185) 186 APPENDIX. John Harvard was educated at Emmanuel College, in the University of Cambridge, in England, and, having received the degree of Master of Arts was settled as a minister in that country. He came over to America, as is supposed, in 1637, having been admitted a freeman of the colony on the 2d of November in that year. After his arrival in this country, he preached a short time at Charlestown, but was laboring under consumption, and died September 14, 1638. By his will, he left the half of his estate (which amounted in the whole to 1559 14s. 4d.) as an endowment of the college, which the General Court, two years before, had determined to establish ; and which, in honor of this singular liberality, was, by order of the court, thence- forward called by his name. These few facts are all which our histories have preserved to us, relative to this ever-honored name. The previous life of the stranger, who, in the short . space of a year passed in a state of declining health, was able to lay this great foundation of good for remote posterity, is unknown. Of his brief ministry in Charlestown nothing is recorded. We are unacquainted even with the age at which he died ; and no memorial exists to point out the spot where his ashes rest, upon the burying hill in Charlestown. In our ancient and venerable "University, a most illustrious, and, we trust, imperishable monument has been reared to his memory. But it has appeared to many of the children of our alma mater, that common respect towards the name of a public benefactor suggests the propriety of marking out, by a suitable memorial, the spot where his mortal remains are deposited. It seems unbecoming that the stranger, who inquires for such a memorial of the earli- est benefactor of the cause of education in the country, should be told that none such has been raised. Under the influence of these feelings, the undersigned have been directed to submit to the consideration of those who have received their education at Harvard College the propriety of erecting a simple and suitable monument to the memory of its founder, on the burying hill in Charlestown. It is proposed that it should be a plain, substantial, permanent work, of moderate cost, to be executed in hewn granite. With a view to unite in this dutiful act as many of the sons of Harvard as approve the object, it has been thought proper to limit the proposed subscription to one dollar from each individual. Although it is only to the sons of Harvard that the undersigned have thought themselves authorized directly to address this invitation, yet, as the college at Cambridge may be regarded as the parent stock of nearly all the New Eng- land seminaries, we shall cordially welcome the cooperation of those among us, who, although not educated at Cambridge, share with us in our respect for the memory of the first benefactor of American Letters. As soon as the requisite arrangements can take place, personal application will be made to the alumni of the college resident in Boston and other large towns, with a view of receiving the subscriptions, to the amount of one dollar from each individual, of those who may be inclined to unite in this act of dutiful commemoration. Gentlemen to whom, from their remote and dis- peised places of residence, it may not be practicable to make this personal application, are invited to transmit their subscription by letter, addressed to the secretary. A list of the subscribers, with a memorandum of the pro- ceedings towards effecting the object proposed, will be deposited in the archives of Harvard College. APPENDIX. 18? The suitable steps for erecting the work will be taken without unnecessary delay. Meantime it is requested, as this statement is not addressed to the public, that it may not find its way into the newspapers. F. C. GRAY, Chairman. EDWARD EVERETT, Secretary. BOSTON, September 14, 1827. In consequence of this invitation, a considerable number of the gradu- ates of the college subscribed the sum proposed towards the erection of the monument. In the summer of 1828, the committee of arrangements found themselves enabled to proceed to the execution of their trust They applied to the selectmen of Charlestown for permission to erect the monu- ment on the burying hill in that town, which request was promptly granted. A contract was then entered into, between the treasurer of the fund and Mr Solomon Willard, architect, for the immediate execution of the work. In pursuance of this contract, the monument was hewn, by permission, from the quarry of the Bunker Hill Monument Association, at Quincy. Mr Almoran Holmes was employed by the architect to transport it from the quarry to the burying hill For this purpose nineteen yoke of oxen were employed. Its weight is between twelve and thirteen tons. It was raised to its position on the hill by Mr Holmes, on the 26th of the month, by the application of a powerful apparatus, by which the mass was held suspended freely in the air, till, at a signal given, it was lowered to its destined place. The monument is a solid obelisk, fifteen feet in height, four feet square at the larger extremity, and two at the smaller, and rises from a substantial foundation, without a base, from the surface of the ground. On the eastern face is inscribed the name of Harvard, in large letters and in high relief the first experiment, it is believed, of this kind in working the granite of this country. Beneath this name is an English inscription, and on the oppo- site face an inscription in Latin, wrought in white marble tablets by Mr A. Carey, and attached to the shaft. The monument is enclosed in a simple iron railing, surrounding a space nine feet square, and stands on a beautiful and commanding position on the top of the burying hill in Charlestown. The 26th day of September, being the anniversary of the decease of Harvard,* was fixed upon for the erection of the monument, of which notice was given in the public papers the day before. The corporation and faculty of Harvard College, the president of the United States, the Rev. Dr Kirkland, the committee appointed by the citizens of Charlestown on the subject of the monument, Hon. T. H. Perkins, president of the Bunker Hill Monument Association, and S. Willard, Esq., architect of the monument, had been invited by the committee of arrangements to attend on this occasion. A large company of spectators, students of the univer- sity, and citizens at large, were also present At eleven o'clock precisely the Rev Dr Walker, pastor of the Second Congregational Church ir * See the concluding paragraph of note 'A, p. 183. 188 APPENDIX. Charlestown, introduced the ceremonial by a prayer, and the monument was then lowered to its permanent position. The president of the United States, having been obliged to return to Washington, and being thereby prevented from attending on this occasion, had addressed the following letter to Dr Parkman, a member of the com- mittee of arrangements, which was now read : WAiHiKOTOif, Septembtr 21, 1828. DEAR SIR : Among the many privations incident to my sudden but necessary departure from home, to return to my family here, was that of the pleasure which I had indulged the hope of enjoying, by personal participation in that act of filial reverence to the memory of our common benefactor, "one Mr Harvard," in which you are so worthily engaged. In compliance with your request, I had, I believe, rashly promised to address a few remarks to the spectators who may be assembled to witness the erection of this tardy monument a monument creditable to the feelings of those by whom it is now raised, but which can add little to the renown of him whom it is intended to honor. The name of Harvard is not one of those towards which his own age or their posterity can be chargeable with ingratitude. From the very interesting printed paper enclosed in your letter, it appears that from the first institution of the college it received his name an honor far beyond the reach of brass, marble, or granite. A single act of posthumous benevolence has enrolled him among the benefactors of mankind ; and of the thousands who in the lapse of two centuries have drank from the fountain of living waters opened in the rock of the desert at the touch of his staff, what soul so insensible has there been among them, as not to cherish the memory of him, to whose bounty they have been indebted for so much of their intellectual cultivation and of their moral refinement ! His name, identified from the first with the University which he founded, shares in all the honors of all her sons ; and his bequest, the amount of which must be measured by the spirit with which it was bestowed, has erected to his honor a monument in the heart of every pupil admitted within her walls, which, renewed from year to year, and mul- tiplied from age to age, will endure long after granite, brass, and marble shall have crumbled into dust. I do not think it surprising that the contemporary memorials of the person and character of Mr Harvard are so scanty. Your " New England's First Fruits " mention him with honor as a godly gentleman, and a lover of learn- ing : but these were qualities very common among the first settlers of New England. All the principal founders both of the Plymouth and Massachu- setts colonies were persons of family, education, and high intellectual refine- ment. Neither trading, speculation, nor romantic adventure, had any share in the motives of their emigration. There might be, and doubtless was, some mixture of worldly ambition interwoven with the purposes of individuals among them ; but in the annals of the world New England stands alone as emphatically the colony of conscience. Mr Harvard was not one of the origi- nal settlers. He came eight or ten years after them, when provision had been amply made for the first wants of nature and of society. Food, raiment, APPENDIX shelter, the worship of God, and civil government, had all been successively acquired and instituted. These are the first necessities of civilized man, and these having been supplied, the next in natural course was education. Har- vard came, with a considerable estate, precisely at the time when this want was pressing most heavily upon them. Other colonies have fallen into the practice of sending their children to be educated in the schools and colleges of the mother country. But it was precisely against the doctrines of those schools and colleges that the New England colonies had been settled. They were therefore debarred of that resource, and constrained to rely for the edu- cation of their children upon themselves. Harvard was himself a clergyman. Possessed of a fortune competent to a comfortable subsistence in his native country, his emigration could have been dictated only by principles of moral and religious duty. But these motives were common to the great mass of the first settlers, whose sincerity had been tested by greater sacrifices and sufferings than appear to have been required or endured by him. He probably was not involved in those vehement reli- gious controversies upon questions unintelligible to us and to them, but upon which they wasted their understanding and their affections. He was not distinguished among the divines of the age as a disputant. He took a less beaten path to the veneration of after times, and a shorter road to heaven. I shall assuredly be with you, at the performance of your truly filial duties, in spirit and inclination. For your kind, good wishes accept the hearty return and thanks of your friend and brother pupil of Harvard, J. Q. ADAMS. To Dr GEORGE PABKMAN, Boston. The foregoing address was then delivered by Mr EDWARD EVERETT, a member of the committee of arrangements, and at their request. SPEECH AT NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE.* MR PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN: THE toast which has just been announced, and the kind attention, of which I find myself on this occasion the object, demand my particular acknowledgments. Coming among you from a remote district of the country ; personally ac- quainted, on my arrival, with but a single individual besides your distinguished representative in Congress, (Hon. John Bell ;) possessing none of those public and political claims on your notice, which are usually acknowledged by courtesies of this kind, I find myself the honored guest of this day ; cordially greeted by so large a company, where I could have expected only to form a few acquaintances ; and made to feel myself at home in the land of strangers. I should feel that sense of oppression which unmerited honor ought always to produce, did I look within myself for the reason of this flat- tering distinction. It is not there, gentlemen, that I look for it. I know that it flows from a much higher source ; from your ready hospitality ; from your liberal feeling, which is able to take in those parts of the republic which are the most remote from you. and which disposes you, even towards the person of an individual stranger, to strengthen the bonds of good will between all the brethren of the great American family. It is in this view of the subject, alone, that I could reconcile my accepting this kind proffer of your public atten- tions with the inoffensive privacy which it is my study to preserve in my present journey ; for- the sake of which I have been led, on more than one occasion since I left home, to * Delivered at a public dinner at Nashville, Tennessee, 2d June, 1829 (190) SPEECH AT NASHVILLE. 191 express a wish to be excused from similar attentions on the part of political friends attentions which would have implied a public standing which I do not possess, and would have caused my excursion to be ascribed to another than its real motive. That motive, gentlemen, is the long-cherished wish to be- hold, with my own eyes, this western world, not of promise merely, but of most astonishing and glorious fulfilment. The wonders, as they may justly be called, of the west ; the prodigious extent of the territory ; the magnitude of the streams that unite into one great system the remotest parts of this almost boundless region ; the fertility of its soil, of which the accounts, till they are verified by actual observa- tion, seem rather like the fables of romance than sober narra- tive, were among the earliest objects that attracted my youthful curiosity. While visiting some of the most ancient abodes of civilization in the old world, I had frequent occa- sion to observe, (and I have no doubt, Mr President,* that your observation confirmed the fact,) that the curiosity of the intelligent men of Europe is more awake on the subject of this, than of any other portion of our country. Of the At- lantic coast they have some general knowledge, arising from the length of time since it was settled, and the political events of which it has been the theatre ; but the valley of the Mis- sissippi seems to have presented itself, as it were suddenly, to their imaginations, as a most peculiar, important, ancl hitherto comparatively unknown region. But from the time that I have been led more particularly to reflect on the western country, in its social relations to the rest of the Union, I have felt an irresistible desire to endeavor to understand, from personal observation, the stupendous work of human advancement which is here going on, and of which the history of mankind certainly affords no other example. I cannot but think it the most interesting subject of contemplation which the world at present affords. Apart from the grand natural features of the * Hon. Geo. W. Campbell, formerly secretary of the treasury, and minister of the United States at St Petersburg. 192 SPEECH AT NASHVILLE. scene, the aspect of populous towns, springing like an exha- lation from the soil. of a vacant or savage wilderness trans- muted, in one generation, into a thickly inhabited territory, must certainly appeal as strongly to the inquisitive mind, as the sight of crumbling towers, of prostrate columns, of cities once renowned and powerful reduced to miserable ruins, and crowded provinces turned into deserts. While these latter objects are thought sufficient to reward the trav- eller for a distant pilgrimage to foreign countries, he may well be pardoned for feeling himself attracted by the opposite spectacle which is presented to him at home a scene, not of decay, but of teeming life ; of improvement almost too rapid to seem the result of human means. It is a remark often quoted of a celebrated foreign states- man, (M. de Talleyrand,) that America presents, as you travel westward, in point of space, the same succession of appear- ances which may be traced in Europe, as you go back in point of time ; that as you move from the coast towards the interior, on this continent, you pass through those stages of civilization which are found in Europe, as you follow its his- tory back to the primitive ages. If we take the aboriginal tribes of our continent into the survey, there is some founda- tion for the remark ; but applied to our own population, it is rather ingenious than solid. The scene presented by our western country is not that of a barbarous race growing up, like the primitive tribes of Europe, into civilized nations ; but it is the far more rapid and intelligent progress of a civilized people extending itself through a rude wilderness, and trans- planting the mature arts of life into the hidden recesses of the forest. The traveller who penetrates a thousand or fifteen hundred miles from the coast, to the interior, may find, it is true, the log hut of the first settler, as he may find within the limits of Philadelphia and New York, ay, of Paris or London, many a wretched hovel far less commodious ; but he will also find here substantial dwellings, spacious and even magnificent mansions, the abodes of competence and of abundance, surrounded by all the indications of the im- proved arts of life. I have learned, to my astonishment, that SPEECH AT NASHVILLE. 193 within twenty years the city of Nashville has grown up, from not exceeding four or five brick houses, to its present condi- tion, as a large, populous, and thriving capital ; the mart of a great and increasing commerce ; exhibiting, for the number of its inhabitants, as many costly edifices as any city in the Union. The log houses have disappeared, not in the lapse of two thousand, or even of two hundred years, but in the lapse of twenty years. The primitive forts of the old hunters are gone, not by the decay of age, but in the progress of society for a single generation. Far as we axe from the coast, we find ourselves, as we walk abroad, not in the rude infancy of society, but in the midst of its arts, its refinements, and its elegancies the product, not of centuries, but of the life of man. We are told, that " A thousand years scarce serve to form a state ; An hour may lay it in the dust." The reverse seems almost true. While we contemplate in Europe the fate of kingdoms that have been tottering for ages on the brink of decay, slowly dying for a thousand years, we behold our own republics rising into maturity within the experience of a generation. Were they not our countrymen, our fathers, did not the gray hairs of a few surviving vet- erans carry conviction to our minds, we could scarce credit the narrative of the pioneers of the western settlements. It was not till 1764, that even Daniel Boone, whose flight from wilderness to wilderness forms a sort of Hegira in the west, made his appearance in East Tennessee. The first cession of land obtained by treaty of the Indians in this state, is of no older date than April, 1775 a momentous month : as if the great order of events in the country's progress required, that simultaneously as the blow was struck which gave inde- pendence to America, the portals of the western mountains should be thrown open to her sons, who had hitherto been expressly forbidden to extend their settlements beyond the Ohio. All those high-spirited adventurers cannot have passed oft' the stage, who moved forward at the head of the column of the first emigrants. It is related that in the year 1766, VOL. i. 25 194 SPEECH AT NASHVILLE. not a white man was found settled on the Tennessee or the Cumberland, by a party who in that year descended these rivers. The population of the state, at the present period, cannot be less than 600,000.* But it is not merely the rapid growth of the western settle- ments into populous states, that surprises the traveller from the sea-coast. For this growth he must be prepared, because he finds it set down in the statistical tables of the country, and because, as a mere matter of figures, he cannot but com- prehend it. What strikes him with astonishment, is the ad- vanced state of the community, the social improvement which he witnesses. He finds this great region abounding not merely with fertile lands, but with highly cultivated farms, filled, not with wild hunters, but with a substantial yeomanry. The forests are interspersed, like the regions he has left, with villages active with all the arts of life. He descends the mighty rivers in one of those floating castles half ware- house and half palace which the genius of Fulton has launched on all our waters; built here in greater numbers than in the east, and with at least equal magnificence ; and on these rivers he finds, from Pittsburg down to New Orleans, a succession of large towns, surpassed only by a few of the Atlantic cities ; growing fast into rivalry with some of them ; and already rich, not merely in wealth, but in all the refine- ments of life, and in all the institutions that adorn the nature of social, intellectual, moral, and religious man. Such a spectacle cannot be contemplated without mingled feelings of astonishment and gratification. I am sure you will pardon me for adding that it enhances the pleasure with which a son of New England contemplates it, to find that among those who have swelled the numbers of this great family, who have come not merely to share your prosperity, but, in former days, to partake the more doubtful fortunes of the early settlements, are not a few of the children of that distant region. He rejoices that he is able, in addition to the ties of common language, government, and laws, to trace * In 1840, it was 829,210. SPEECH AT NASHVILLE. 195 those of common origin and kindred blood. Nor does he rejoice alone. The feeling, I am sure, is mutual. This fes- tive occasion, gentlemen, is a pledge that you, too, are not less willing to seize an opportunity, however slight, of promoting that mutual good will, which is more important for the per- petuity of the Union than all the forms of the constitution. The beloved land of my birth, gentlemen, compared with yours, is, generally speaking, a barren region. Our rocks and sands do not yield those rich harvests which clothe your more fertile soil with plenty ; nor are we connected with our sister states by noble streams like yours, which penetrate the country for thousands of miles, and bind the deepest interior to the marts on the coast. But I may venture to assure you, on behalf of my fellow-citizens at home, that we behold, not with envy, but with pride, your natural advantages and wonderful progress. When we are visited by strangers from Europe, after we have shown them what is most worthy of notice among ourselves, we habitually add that this is little, compared with the astonishing advancement of the west. We boast of your improvements as more surprising than our own. We are in the habit of contrasting our comparatively tardy progress under a foreign colonial system with your more rapid growth beneath the cheering influence of American independence. We look to you to complete the great under- taking which was but begun by the fathers of the American people, who settled the Atlantic coast. Reflecting men in hat region never regarded the great work to be performed in America as confined to the settlement of the strip along the shore. It was to open the whole western world as an abode of civilized freemen ; and we wish you God-speed in accom- plishing your share of the noble work. Two centuries have passed away since the first settlers of the Atlantic coast were struggling with those hardships which the generation imme- diately preceding you was here called to encounter ; and we cordially rejoice that a period of thirty years has purchased for you that security and prosperity which were with us the growth of a century and a half. We feel happy in the 196 SPEECH AT NASHVILLE. belief, that, in your further advancement, you will not foiget the cradles of the American race, and that you will bear in kindly remembrance the men and the deeds which are among the dearest titles of our glory. In casting the eye over the map of your state, we behold among the names of your counties those of our Lincoln, Greene, Knox, Warren, and Perry. We feel that our hearts are thus linked together by the tie of common devotion to the precious memory of our great and good men ; and we confidently rest in the assur- ance, that when the present generation, with us as with you, shall have passed away, our children will unite with yours in the tribute of gratitude to those, who, whether at the north or south, the east or the west, have stood or fallen in their country's cause. Gentlemen, it has been justly stated, that, when the next census shall be taken, the valley of the Mississippi will probably be found to contain a population larger than that with which the old thirteen states plunged into the revolu- tionary war ; and when, after a period of ten years more, yet another enumeration shall be made, you will then, perhaps, outvote us in the councils of the nation. The sceptre will then depart from Judah, never to return. We look forward to that event without alarm, as in the order of the natural growth of this great republic. We have a firm faith that our interests are mutually consistent ; that if you prosper, we shall prosper ; if you suffer, we shall suffer ; that our strength will grow with the closeness of our union ; and that our children's welfare, honor, and prosperity will not suffer in the preponderance, which, in the next generation, the west must possess in the balance of the country. One word more, gentlemen, and I will relieve your pa- tience. In the course of human events, it is certain that we who are now assembled shall never all be assembled together again. It is probable, that, when we shall part this evening, the most of us will do it to meet no more on earth. Allow me, with the seriousness inseparable from that feeling, to assure you that this unexpected and flattering mark of your SPEECH AT NASHVILLE. 197 kindness will never be forgotten by me or mine ; but, at whatever distance of time or place, and in whatever vicissi- tudes of fortune, will be remembered as one of the most grateful incidents of my life. Permit me, in taking my seat, to reciprocate the sentiment last announced, by proposing, THE INHABITANTS OF NASHVILLE: MAT THEIR PROS- PERITY, LIKE THEIR ClTY, BE FOUNDED ON A ROCK. SPEECH AT LEXINGTON, KENTUCKY/ MR PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN : CUSTOM and propriety forbid me to remain silent ; but I hope it would be superfluous, as I am sure it would be unavailing, to attempt to express my feelings on receiving the kind attentions of this company. No gentleman, who has himself had occasion, while absent from home, to experience the value of acts of private or public hospitality, will doubt the sentiments excited in me by these testimonials of your favorable opinion. If the welcome that awaits him beneath his own roof, on his return, make the most direct appeal to the sensibilities of the traveller, it is with a satisfaction scarcely inferior, heightened by a sense of obligation, that he receives in a distant region those proofs of kindness and assurances of good will, in which he seems to recover some of the best endearments of home in the land of strangers. I would spare you, gentlemen I would spare myself the effort to describe, in set phrases, what, if felt, needs no explanation ; what, if it be not felt, cannot be explained ; and beg you, with the plainness of a sincere and grateful heart, to believe that I place the proper value on this public and cordial manifestation of your friendly feeling ; and that, while I take to myself and feel honored in doing so so much of it as flows from your hospitable regard towards a stranger, I rejoice more specially in this festive meeting, as a pledge of good will between the distant sections of the Union to which we respectively belong. That Union, gen- tlemen, resting as it does on a political basis, must derive * Delivered at a public dinner, at Lexington, Kentucky, 17th June, 1829. (198) SPEECH AT LEXINGTON. 199 much of its strength and value from harmony and cordiality between the distant members. In a despotic government, resting on the principle of the immediate subordination of all the parts to one head, this harmony among the subjects is not necessary. It may even be the interest of the sovereign to play off the jealousies of the different parts of the state against each other, thus preventing them from combining against himself. But in a popular government, where every thing is ultimately referred to the will of the citizens, mutual good will between them is all-important. It is therefore most fortunate for us that the basis on which our Union rests is natural, broad, and stable. 'The several parts of which it is composed have not been bound to each other by the measures of a preponderating political power, exerted by the stronger members to attach the weaker to their sovereignty. Nor do we owe our gathering together into this family of states to the intermarriage of northern Ferdi- nands with southern Isabellas. Our Union was not cemented by the sealing-wax of diplomatic congresses, where foreign statesmen sit in judgment to parcel out reluctant provinces among rival empires ; nor by the blood of disastrous battle-^ fields. Had such been the origin of our association, we might have expected that incurable antipathies would exist between the discordant members, and that a union com- menced in power, violence, or intrigue, would continue in disgust while it lasted, and end in civil war. On the con- trary, among numerous instructive aspects in which our polit- ical system presents itself to the contemplation of the friends of liberty, none is more important than that in which it teaches how a popular government is to be extended over a vast region of country, filled by a rapidly increasing popula- tion, by means of a confederation of states. The superficial observer, not merely abroad, but at home, may regard the; multiplication of states, with their different local interests, as an alarming source of dissension, threatening eventual destruc- tion to the republic. But had the sagacity of the most pro- found politician been exercised, to contrive a mode in which the continent of North America should become one broad 200 SPEECH AT LEXINGTON. theatre for the exercise of the rights and the enjoyment and perpetuation of the privileges of republican government and rational liberty, it may well be doubted whether any other so effectual, and at the same time so simple, could have been devised by him, as the creation of a number of separate states, successively formed, as a population becoming dense in the older settlements had poured itself into the newer fields of adventure and promise ; united by a confederacy in the pursuit of all objects of common and general interest ; and separate, independent, and sovereign as to all of individ- ual concern. It is thus that our Union is extending itself, not as a mere matter of political arrangement, still less by compulsion and power, but by the choice and act of the individual citizens. What have we seen in all the newly-settled portions of the Union ? The hardy and enterprising youth finds society in the older settlements comparatively filled up. His portion of the old family farm is too narrow to satisfy his wants or his desires, and he goes forth, with the paternal blessing, and generally with little else, to take up his share of the rich heritage which the God of nature has spread before him in this western world. He quits the land of his fathers the scenes of his early days with tender regret glistening in his eye, though hope mantles on his cheek. He does not, as he departs, shake off the dust of the venerated soil from his feet ; but he goes on the bank of some distant river, to per- petuate the remembrance of the home of his childhood. He piously bestows the name of the spot where he was born on the spot to which he has wandered ; and while he is laboring with the difficulties, struggling with the privations, languish- ing, perhaps, under the diseases incident to the new settlement and the freshly opened soil, he remembers the neighborhood whence he sprang ; the roof that sheltered his infancy ; the spring that gushed from the rock by his father's door, where he was wont to bathe his heated forehead, after the toil of his youthful sports ; the village school-house ; the rural church ; the graves of his father and his mother. In a few years, a new community has been formed ; the forest has SPEECH AT LEXINGTON. 201 disappeared beneath the sturdy arm of the emigrant ; his chil- dren have grown up, the hardy offspring of the new clime ; and the rising settlement is already linked, in all its partialities and associations, with that from which its fathers and founders had wandered. Such, for the most part, is the manner in which the new states have been built up ; and in this way a foundation is laid, by Nature herself, for peace, cordiality, and brotherly feeling between the ancient and recent settlements of the country. It is, however, the necessary course of things, that, as the newly-settled portion of the country is organized into states, possessing each the local feeling and local interests of sepa- rate political communities, some prejudices like the domes- tic dissensions of the members of the same family should spring up among them, or between them and the older states. These may owe their origin to the more exclusive settlement of some of the new states from some of the old ones respec- tively ; to supposed inconsistency of the interests of different sections of the country ; to the diversity of manners incident to the peculiarity of geographical and social position, and the leading pursuits of life ; or to the conflicts of party politics, which are of necessity, in a free country, often capricious, and as violent as they are uncertain. From these and other causes, on which I need not dwell, and without any impeach- ment of the prosperous operation of our system, prejudices may arise between the different sections of the country, calculated to disturb that harmony, for which a deep founda- tion is laid in nature, and which it is all-important to preserve, and if possible to increase. To remove these prejudices, to establish kind feelings, to promote good will between the different members of the political family, appears to me, without exception, the most important object at which a patriotic citizen, in any portion of the country, can aim. Our union is our strength, and our weakness too ; our strength, so long as it exists unimpaired and cherished ; our weakness, whenever discord shall expose a vulnerable point to hostile art or power. Even the separate prosperity of the states supposing they could prosper separately, which they cannot VOL. i. 26 202 SPEECH AT LEXINGTON. is not enough ; I had almost said, is to be deprecated They ought, for their perfect safety, to owe their prosperity in some degree to each other ; to mutual dependence ; to common interest, and the common feeling derived from it, or strengthened by it. It is with these sentiments, (if I may be permitted to allude to my own public conduct before a company of gentle- men of various political opinions, and on an occasion conse- crated to the oblivion of every topic of party strife,) that since I have been a member of Congress, I have supported the policy which aims to open or to perfect the communica- tion between the distant sections of the country, particularly by the extension and preservation of the National Road. The state of which I am a citizen has already paid between one and two hundred thousand dollars towards the construction and repair of that road ; and I doubt not she is prepared to contribute her proportion towards its extension to the place of its destination, as well as towards the completion of the full design, by constructing a lateral branch through this state and the states south of Kentucky, to the Gulf of Mexico. The friends of internal improvement in the Atlantic States do not pretend to be indifferent to their own interest. They know that the National Road is a highway for the products of their factories, their fisheries, and their commerce. But I trust also they act upon higher principles a regard to the national Union ; that they perceive what Washington per- ceived, and began to inculcate, in the very moment of cessa- tion from war, almost before he had put off his harness,* that nothing is more essential to the strength of this Union than an easy communication from east to west. Subsidiary, in no small degree, to this, and every other measure of legislative enactment aiming at the same end, is that interchange of the courtesies of social life by which kind feelings are to be awakened or fostered. As between individuals, so between states, which are composed of indi- viduals, there is a temper and a feeling, as important to be * See Vol. II. p. 153. SPEECH AT LEXINGTON. 203 rightly directed as the course of legislation or the public pol- icy. On this topic, although perhaps more appropriate to the occasion, I could not, within any reasonable limits, nor with- out going beyond the bounds of delicacy towards the audience I address, express all that I feel ; all that has been inspired in my bosom, by what I have witnessed of the courtesy, the cordiality, the hospitality of the west. I would not, to be sure, be thought to have been so uninformed of any part of the country, as to be wholly ignorant of the state of public sentiment prevailing in it, on any important point. But it will not, I hope, be thought impertinent, if I say that it has been not without some surprise, as well as the highest grati- fication, that I have made a journey of between three and four thousand miles in the west, in the public conveyances by land and water, always without a companion, often un- known, and without having heard a syllable which could give pain to the feelings of (what I trust I shall ever show myself) a dutiful son of New England. I cannot but cherish the hope, that improving means of communication between the states will put it in the power of increasing numbers of our brethren in other parts of the Union to give as good an account of that portion of it to which I belong, and from an experience as agreeable. Gentlemen, there is no place in the west I have taken a greater interest in visiting, than your hospitable town an interest strengthened by the former residence of a beloved and lamented brother among you, and his connection with the university here established, which has already done so much, and is destined, I am sure, to do so much more, for the pullic good in this part of the country. Every patriot, every reflecting man, who considers that useful knowledge, widely diffused, is the only sure basis of enlightened freedom, sym- pathizes with you in your regret for that disaster, which has reduced its well-provided apartments and stately walls to mel- ancholy ruins. The public spirit which raised, will, I doubt not, speedily restore, those walls, and infuse new energy into an institution justly ranked among the most respectable in the country, an honor to this town and to the state, and a 204 SPEECH AT LEXINGTON. public benefit to the west. Indeed, in the early care which, in this and some of the neighboring states, has been had for the establishment of places of education, though much is naturally still to be done, I recognize the spirit which animat- ed the Pilgrim fathers of New England (never to be men- tioned by their descendants without praise) in the same cause. You have had your Morrison, as we had our Harvard. As a community, you have already given pledges that you are de- termined your posterity shall have cause to bless your mem- ory, as we have to bless the memory of our ancestors. Let but the foundations be deeply laid in a liberal public and private patronage, and the intellectual edifice the solid fabric of an enlightened community will stand firm, though the brick and the marble may for a time sink beneath the devouring flames, and the scientific treasures they contained be reduced to dust and ashes. There is one association recalled to my mind, in visiting this place, to which I should be unpardonable, if I were insen- sible an association which has perpetuated, in the name of your city, that of an ever-memorable village in the county I inhabit, and in the near neighborhood of my residence. When the news of the battle of Lexington, on the nineteenth of April, 1775, reached a party of hunters assembled at the spring in this place, they resolved, in prophetic commemora- tion of that event, to give the name of Lexington to the place of their encampment, and the town that should there be founded. Not more than fifty years, I believe, have passed away since the actual laying out of this town ; and, in that period, what a monument have not you and your fathers reared to the brave and good men, who, at that doubtful crisis of the country's fate, on the morn of her independence, offered up their lives in her sacred cause ! They were not of your kindred, except in the kindred of struggling liberty, and by the blood which they shed for your freedom as for their own. They lie in their humble graves, in the beautiful village where they fell, and a simple stone marks the scene of their costly sacrifice ; but how worthily, in the remote west, has their pious self-devotion been commemorated, ii? SPEECH AT LEXINGTON. 205 the ample streets, the sightly dwellings, the substantial public edifices, in the charitable, the literary, the religious founda- tions of this important town ! The day of our present meeting carries us back, by a natural and most interesting coincidence, to the same event- ful period ; to the battle-fields, which have rendered so many portions of the Atlantic coast a classic soil ; and to those historical recollections, which are a rich portion of the moral treasures of United America. It is the seventeenth of June. On that day, fifty-four years ago, the heights of Charlestown, the place of my residence, were the scene of that great and costly sacrifice to the cause of American liberty. The precious blood there shed flowed not alone for the ancient colonies, by whom the revolutionary war was fought ; but for you, also, their hopeful offspring. O that the brave and devoted spirits who there offered up their lives could have caught a glimpse, in their dying moments, of the prosperity they were achieving for regions then beyond the line of American colonization, and for the millions that are springing up in the mighty west ! O that they could have anticipated, in the last agony, the tribute of gratitude which beams in your glistening eyes ! But little more than half a century has elapsed since that momentous event ; and meantime, in the astonishing progress of our country, this state, then an almost pathless wilderness, half explored, untilled, or tilled only by the bold hunter, who went to the field with a spade in one hand and a rifle in the other, has become itself the parent of other rising states. Beyond the Wabash beyond the Mississippi there are now large communities, who look to these their native fields with the same feelings with which your fathers looked back to their native homes in Virginia. I have myself, within a week or two, heard an individual, who had been to explore for himself a new home in Illinois, and was on his return to take out his family to the chosen spot, even while commend- ing the abundance and fertility of the vast prairies in that region, check himself, as we were passing by some of the prosperous settlements, the comfortable houses, the rich corn- 206 SPEECH AT LEXINGTON. fields, the pleasant meadows, the beautiful woodland pastures of his native state, and exclaim, " After all, there is nothing on God's earth like old Kentucky ! " And thus, gentlemen, it is that civilization, improvement, and our republican institutions of government are making their auspicious progress from region to region, throughout the continent, founded on the happiest conception of political wisdom, and confirmed by the dear ties of nature and kindred. The rapid growth of the country has brought into unusual association those opposite feelings and relations which belong respectively to ancient and modern states, and were never before combined in one. And the torch of enlightened liberty, originally kindled at the altars of James- town and Plymouth, and long ago transmitted across the mountains, is still travelling onward and onward, through the wide west. It requires no great stretch of the imagination to trace its auspicious path to regions yet lying in the un- tenanted solitude of nature ; nor to apply to it, with still happier augury, the beautiful language by which the poet has described the revival of freedom among the nations of the elder world : "I saw the expecting regions stand, To catch the coming flame in turn ; I saw, from ready hand to hand, The bright but struggling glory burn. And each, as she received the flame, Lighted her altar with its ray ; Then, smiling to the next who came, Speeded it on its sparkling way." But, Mr President, I must check myself on this delightful theme, and spare your patience. Allow me, in sitting down, to renew my thanks to this respectable company, for their friendly and hospitable attentions, and to propose the follow- ing sentiment : THE EASTERN AND WESTERN STATES : ONE IN ORIGIN, ONE IN INTEREST .* UNITED IN GOVERNMENT, MAY THEY BE WILL MORE UNITED BY MUTUAL GOOD WILL. SPEECH AT THE YELLOW SPRINGS, IN OHIO.* MR CHAIRMAN : PERMIT me to thank you and this respectable company for the sentiment just announced, although I find it difficult to do so in any suitable terms. It is known to most of the company that I arrived here two or three hours since, with my worthy friend, your fellow-citizen, (Mr Fales, of Dayton,) with no other anticipation than that of enjoying the natural beauties of this lovely spot, where every thing seems com- bined that can delight the eye, afford recreation, and promote health. To meet, in addition to the gratification of a visit to so agreeable a retreat, the kind and unexpected welcome of such a company, inspires me, I need not say, with emo- tions which I had better leave to your indulgence to imagine, than attempt to express. Allow me, therefore, to pass from a topic so unimportant as my private feelings, and dwell a few moments on those views which present themselves to the mind of the stranger in visiting your prosperous state. My first distinct impressions relative to this state were formed some thirteen years ago, in the interior of the conti- nent of Europe, from a work which had then just been published by your distinguished fellow-citizen, Dr Drake " The Picture of Cincinnati." Having at that time an oppor- tunity, through the pages of one of the literary journals of Germany, f to call the attention of the reading public in that quarter to the wonderful progress you had made and were * Delivered at a public dinner, at the Yellow Springs, in Ohio, June 29, 1829. t The Gottingische gelehrte Anzeigen, for 1st September, 1817. (207) 208 SPEECH AT THE YELLOW SPRINGS. making, as set forth in the work alluded to, I found the account to be received almost with incredulity. Nor was this wonderful. I remember to have passed eighteen months in that country, traversing it, to a considerable extent, in several directions, before I had seen one new house in prog- ress of erection. With such a state of things about them, (the consequence of the disastrous political condition of Europe,) you can easily conceive that they found it difficult to credit the statement, when they were told that Ohio contained in 1787 not a single white settlement, in 1790 three thousand inhabitants, in 1800 forty-two thousand, in 1810 two hundred and thirty thousand, and in 1815 at least four hundred thousand ; * and that this was not the over- pouring of the whole redundant population of the old states into one favorite resort of emigration, but that half a dozen other new states had been growing up with nearly equal rapidity at the same time, while the old states also had been steadily on the increase. It is not surprising that such facts, told to a community whose population is nearly stationary, should scarcely gain credence. Such was the impression produced by the condition of your state in 1815. The next time my attention was more particularly called to the subject was about two years since, by another interesting work, the well-known pamphlet, entitled " Cincinnati in 1826," in which some general views are given of the progress of Ohio. From this it appeared, that in the interval between the two publications, new won- ders of advancement had been made ; and further strides had been taken, astonishing even to the eye familiarized to the improvements by which you are surrounded. In this short period, regular communications by stage-coaches had been established ; the National Road had entered your limits ; your rivers had become thronged with steamboats ; and your popu- lation had doubled. But your progress did not stop at this period. On the contrary, it now received perhaps its most powerful stimulus. Your canal policy the glory and pros- * In 1840, the population of Ohio was 1,519,467. SPEECH AT THE YELLOW SPRINGS. 209 per ity of the state had been determined upon, and a com- mencement made in its vigorous execution. In the latest publications relative to your state, particularly in " The Geog- raphy and the History of the Valley of the Mississippi," the still more rapid progress produced by this new stimulus is indicated. But even this does not bring it down to the present hour. On the points where the system of communi- cation is complete, the effect has been magical. The popula- tion of Cincinnati, by accurate estimate, has risen since 1825 from sixteen to twenty-five thousand ; and, as I have been informed, on the best authority, an increase in the value of its real property has taken place equal to the whole expense of the Miami Canal. But no book can describe your state farther down than to the moment when it is written. Its condition changes, while the geographer is casting up the figures that represent it. As well might you, by the theo- retical rules of navigation, attempt to designate the position of a steamboat on the Ohio, when it is swollen by the floods of spring. While you are fixing your quadrant, the boat is swept downwards for miles on the bosom of the rushing stream. These and similar facts, sir, would the less merit frequent repetition, were the rapid progress of the country occasioned merely by the abundance of fertile land, operating as a temp- tation to the adventurer in search of fortune. But when we contrast the progress of the Western States of our Union with that of the British possessions in their immediate neigh- borhood, we see that other causes have been at work to pro- duce this unparalleled state of things. It is well known that the British government has held out very strong temptations to persons disposed to emigrate to its North American posses- sions. The expense of crossing the ocean has been defrayed, grants of land have been made, freedom from taxes guaran- tied, and implements of husbandry furnished, (if we are not misinformed,) at the public expense. Some portion of the land itself, in those possessions, for natural fertility, climate, and geographical position, is equal to any part of the Western VOL. i. 27 210 SPEECH AT THE YELLOW SPRINGS. States. But while some of those states have been adding to their numbers from thirty to one hundred thousand inhabit- ants yearly, it has been publicly stated, of late, by an inhab- itant of Upper Canada, that the increase of that province, emigration included, has not for ten years exceeded four thousand five hundred per annum. We learn, from this contrast, that the growth of your v, astern country is not merely the progress of its citizens in numerical multiplication. It is civilization personified and embodied, going forth to take possession of the land. Tt is the principle of our institutions, advancing not so much with the toilsome movement of human agency, but rather like the grand operations of sovereign Providence. It seems urged along its stupendous course, as the earth itself is propelled in its orbit, silent and cairn, like the moving planet, with a speed we cannot measure ; yet not, like that, without a monument to mark its way through the vacant regions of space, but scattering hamlets, and villages, and cities on its path, the abodes of civilized and prosperous millions. The ties of interest which connect all the states of this Union are innumerable ; and those of mutual good will are destined, I trust, to add all their strength to the compact. It ought to be the desire and the effort of every true patriot to merge in one comprehensive feeling all discordant sectional preferences. But the circumstances of first settlement and geographical proximity will produce associations not incon- sistent with the one great principle of union, and resting on a basis too natural to be discredited. It cannot be expected that New England and the Middle States should not feel complacency in reflecting that the foundations of Ohio were laid by some of their citizens that the germs of your growth were derived from our soil. Acknowledging the high traits of character to be found in the various strongly-marked sections of the country, we cannot be insensible to the pre- vailing affinity between your population and ours. In the leading characteristics of society here we recognize the quali- ties to which we have been familiarized at home. While we SPEECH AT THE YELLOW SPRINGS. 211 witness your auspicious progress, we take pride in reflecting that it is the extension of our own immediate kindred the ripening of a fruit which our fathers planted. Nor is this similarity confined to things of a superficial nature, belonging rather to the province of manners than in- stitutions. In many concerns of highest moment, and partic- ularly in the system of public schools commenced in Ohio, we behold an assurance that your vast community is destined to grow up into a still nearer resemblance of what we deem the best feature of ours. Regarding the mind of the citizens as the most precious part of the public capital, we have felt that an efficient plan of general education is one of the first elements of public wealth. The diffusion of intelligence has furnished us our best compensation for our narrow limits and moderately fertile soil ; and the tax which has effected it has returned with the richest interest to the citizens. We rejoice to see you adopting the same policy, and providing for a pos- terity instructed in the necessary branches of useful knowl- edge. Such a policy, besides all its other benefits, binds the different members of the body politic by the strongest ties. It lays the rich under contribution for the education of the poor ; and it places the strong watchman of public intelli- gence and order at the door of the rich. In the first adoption of such a system, difficulties are to be expected ; it cannot go equally well into operation in every quarter ; perhaps not per- fectly in any quarter. But the man, or the body of men, that shall effectually introduce it, will perform a work of pub- lic utility, of which the blessing and the praise will never die. It has been frequently remarked that our beloved country is set up, by Providence, as a great exemplar to the world, from which the most enlightened and best governecT of the ancient nations have much to learn. When we think how recently our continent itself was discovered, that almost ever since it has been subjected to foreign rule, and left unshielded, to receive every impression that could be stamped on it by foreign ascendency, we must feel that it is extraordinary that we have been able to constitute ourselves an acknowledged 212 SPEECH AT THE YELLOW SPRINGS. subject of envy and imitation to all the communities on earth. But when we of the old states turn our attention to the spectacle beneath our eyes at home, we are astonished to find that our comparatively ancient commonwealths, monitors as we deemed them in the great school of improvement, are obliged to come in turn and take a most important lesson from you. In your great works of internal improvement, in the two canals, one of which you have completed, and the other of which you are pushing to its completion, at large public expense and under circumstances requiring no ordinary measure of legislative courage, you are setting an example to the oldest states of the confederacy. Forty years since, and the only white population connected with Ohio was on its way, in a single wagon, from Massachusetts to this place.* * The reference is to an incident, alluded to in the following manner, in a speech of the author, at the celebration of the second centennial anniver- sary of the settlement of Salem, 18th September, 1828: " But, sir, while on this happy occasion we contemplate, with mingled feelings of pride and joy, the lovely and august form of our America, rising as it were from the waves of the ocean, with the grace of youth in all her steps, and the heaven of liberty in her eye, there is another aspect, under which we are led by natural association to regard her, as we consider the family of republics which have sprung into being beyond the mountains. The graceful and lovely daughter has become the mother of rising states. While our thoughts, on this day, are carried back to the tombs of our fathers beyond the sea, there are millions of kindred Americans beyond the rivers and mountains, whose hearts are fixed on the Atlantic coast, as the cradle of their political existence. If the states of the coast were struck from existence, they would already have performed their share of the great duty, as it has been called, of social transmission. A mighty wilderness has been colonized, almost within our own day, by the young men of the Atlan- tic coast; not driven by the arm of persecution from the land of their birth, but parting, with tearful eyes, from their pleasant homes, to follow the guiding hand of Providence to the western realms of promise. " It is just forty years this summer, since a long, ark-like looking wagon vras seen traversing the roads, and winding through the villages of Essex and Middlesex, covered with black canvas, inscribed on the outside, in large letters, ' To Marietta, on the Ohio.' That expedition, under Dr Cutler, of this neighborhood, was the first germ of the settlement of Ohio, which now contains near a million of inhabitants. Forty years have scarce passed by, since this great state, with all its settlements, improvements, its mighty SPEECH AT THE YELLOW SPRINGS. 213 You have now a system of artificial navigation of nearly four hundred miles, rapidly advancing to its completion ; while the Massachusetts railroad is still locked up in the portfolio of the commissioners who have surveyed the route. It is, however, one of the happy effects of our separation into dif- ferent states, that it gives scope for a generous emulation, in objects of public utility. It is hardly to be believed, that the ancient settlements on the coast will consent to be long be- hind the younger states of the west in the march of improve- ment ; or fearful, with their abundant capital, to commence those great public enterprises which have not been found beyond the reach of your infant resources. Happy the region where such are the objects of competition between neighboring states ! Permit me, in conclusion, gentlemen, to revert to the idea with which I commenced the marvellous progress of the west. The settlement of Ohio and the other north-western states may be considered as dating from the ordinance of 1787. The individual who drew that ever-memorable statute is still living, a most respected citizen and eminent jurist of Massachusetts Nathan Dane. Of those also who first emi- grated to this region, and encountered the hardships of the wilderness, and the perils of the savage foe, all have not passed away. What events have been crowded into the lives of such men ! It is only when we consider what they found the country, and what they handed it down to this genera- tion, that we learn the efficacy of public and private virtue, canals and growing population, was covered up (if I may so say) under the canvas of Dr Cutler's wagon. Not a half century, and a state is in existence, (twice as large as our old Massachusetts,) to whom not Old Eng- land, but New England, is the land of ancestral recollection. Yes, sir, on richer soils and broader plains than ours, there is a large community of men, to whom our rocks and our sands will be forever dear. Ten years ago, there were thirteen or fourteen settlements west of the Alleghanies, bearing the name of Salem, the city of peace ; one in Kentucky, one in Indiana, eight or nine in Ohio, all bearing the name of the spot where we are now assembled where the fathers of Massachusetts first set foot, two hundred veara ago." 214 SPEECH AT THE YELLOW SPRINGS. of wise counsel, of simple manners, of frugal habits, and an inborn love of liberty ! But I forbear, sir, to enlarge on con- siderations so familiar to this respected company, and only ask permission, in conclusion, to propose the following sen- timent : THE STATE OF OHIO: FOUNDED BY THE VIRTUES OF THE LAST GENERATION, SUSTAINED BY THE PUBLIC SPIRIT CF THIS, ITS PROSPERITY IS SURE. THE SETTLEMENT OP MASSACHUSETTS.* THIS day completes the second century since Governor Winthrop explored the banks of the Mystic River.f From his arrival at Charlestown, accompanied by a large number of settlers, furnished with a supply of every thing necessary for the foundation of the colony, and especially, bringing with them the colonial charter, may, with great propriety, be dated the foundation of Massachusetts, and in it that of New England. There are other interesting events in our early history, which have in like manner been justly commemorat- ed, for their connection with the same great era. The land- ing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth has been regarded, from the first, as a period from which we may with propriety date the settlement of New England ; and has been celebrated with every demonstration of pious and grateful respect. The completion of the second century, from the arrival of Gov- ernor Endecott at Salem, was noticed two years since, by our fellow-citizens of that place, in a manner worthy of the in- terest and magnitude of the event ; and the anniversary of the settlement of Boston is reserved for a like celebration, in the autumn of the present year. Were these celebrations a matter of mere ceremonial ob- servance, their multiplication would be idle and oppressive. But they are all consecrated to events of real interest. They have a tendency to extend the knowledge of the early history * Address delivered before the Charlestown Lyceum, on the 28th of June, 1830, the anniversary of the arrival of Governor Winthrop. t The proper equivalent of 17th June, 1630, old style, is 27th June, 1630, new style; sne the last paragraph of note A, p. 183 (215) 216 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. of the country. They are just tributes to the memory of worthy men, to whom we are under everlasting obligations. They furnish fit occasions for inculcating the great principles which led to the settlement of our country ; and, by connect- ing some interesting associations with the spots familiar to us by daily visitation, they remind us that there is something worthy 4o be commemorated in the soil which we inhabit ; and thus furnish food for an enlightened patriotism. The character of our government has made this the chief means of perpetuating, by sensible memorials, the fame of ex- cellent men and great achievements. Wisely discarding those establishments which have connected with hereditary possessions in the soil, and transmissible dignities in the state, the name and family of discoverers and conquerors, it has been, with us. left to the affection and patriotism by which the observance of these occasions is prompted, to pre- serve the worth of our forefathers from forgetfulness. For these considerations, it was thought expedient by the members of the Charlestown Lyceum, that the arrival of Governor Winthrop on our shores, with the charter of the colony, should not pass unnoticed. When I was first request- ed to deliver an address on the occasion, it was my expecta- tion that it would be done with no greater publicity than that with which the lectures before this institution have been usually delivered. The event, however, has been considered as of sufficient importance to receive a more public notice ; and in this opinion of the members of the Charlestown Lyceum, and our fellow-citizens who unite with them, I have cheer- fully acquiesced. It will not, however, be expected of me wholly to abandon the form which my address, in its origin, was intended to assume, although less adapted than I could wish to the character of this vast audience before which I have the honor to appear. In performing the duty which devolves upon me, in conse- quence of this arrangement, I propose briefly to narrate the history of the event which we celebrate, and then to dwell on some of the general topics which belong to the day and the occasion. THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 217 When America was discovered, the great and interesting questions presented themselves, What right had the European discoverers in the new-found continent ? and in what way were its settlement and colonization to proceed ? The first discovery was made under the auspices of Eu- ropean governments, which admitted the right of the head of the Catholic church to dispose of all the kingdoms of the earth ; and, of course, of all newly-discovered regions which had not before been appropriated. This right of the head of the Catholic church was recognized by Protestant princes only- so far as it might be backed by that of actual discovery ; and although the kings of Spain and Portugal had received from the pope a distributive grant of all the newly-discovered countries on the globe, the sovereign of England claimed the right of making his own discoveries, and appropriating them as he pleased to the benefit of his own subjects and govern- ment. Under this claim, and in consequence of the discov- eries of Cabot, our mother country invested herself with this great and ultimate right of disposing of the American conti- nent, from the Gulf of Mexico, northwardly, till it reached the limits covered by the like claim of actual discovery on the part of other governments.* It is not my intention to enter into the discussion of the nature and extent of this right of discovery. If we admit that it was the will of Providence, and for the interest of humanity, that America should be settled by a civilized race of men, we admit, at the same time, a perfect right, in some way or other, to effect that settlement. And though it may be out of our power to remove all the difficulties which attend the question, although we cannot, perhaps, on the received principles of natural law, theoretically reconcile the previous rights of the aboriginal population with the accruing rights of the discoverers and settlers, yet we must either allow that those rights are not, upon the whole, irreconcilable, or we must maintain that it was the will of Providence, and * Opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States, in the case of Johnson & Graham's Lessees vs. Mclntosh, 8th Wheaton. VOL. t 28 218 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. for the greatest good of mankind, that America should remain ill the condition in which the discoverers found it. No judicious person, at the present day, will maintain this ; and no such opinion was entertained by the governments of Europe, nor by the enterprising, patriotic, and liberal men on whom it devolved to deal practically with this great subject. How great it was, it is true, they did not feel ; as we, with a like subject thrown practically into our hands, I mean the settlement of our own vacant public domain, are equally insensible to its importance. Although there is a great lodg- ment of civilized men on this continent, which is rapidly extending itself, yet there is still a vast region wholly unset- tled, and presenting very nearly the same aspect to us which the whole North American continent did to our forefathers in Great Britain. But no man, I think, who analyzes either the popular sentiment of this community, or the legislative policy of this government, will deny that the duty to be performed by the people of this generation, in reference to these unset- tled regions of our country, has scarce ever presented itself in its magnitude, grandeur, and solemnity, to the minds either of people or of rulers. It was justly remarked, more than once this winter, in the great debate in the Senate of the United States, nominally on the subject of the public domain, that this subject was the only one not glanced at in the discussion ; and that subject, I may say without fear of contradiction, is as important to the people of the United States, and to the cause of liberty throughout the world, as the question of colonizing America, which presented itself to the nations and governments of Europe in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. These questions are never comprehended till it is too late. Experience alone unfolds their magnitude. We may strain our minds to grasp them, but they are beyond our power. There is no political calculus which can deal with the vast elements of a nation's growth. Providence, or destiny, or the order of things, in which, while we think ourselves the agents, we are humble instruments, aided by some high impulses from the minds and hearts of wise and great men, TH.E SETTLEMENT OF MASS ACHtt SETTS. 219 catching a prophetic glimpse of the future fortunes of our race, these decide the progress of nations, and sometimes educe consequences the most stupendous from causes seem- ingly least proportionate to the effect. But though we do not find any traces in the public senti- ment, or in the legislation of Europe, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, of an accurate foresight of the great work which that age was called upon to perform, yet there was unquestionably a distinct perception that the enclosure of the civilized families of the earth had been suddenly en- larged. Spain and Portugal poured themselves forth impetu- ously into the new-found region ; and Great Britain, though with something of a constitutional tardiness, followed the example. The first British patents, for the settlement of the discov- eries on the North American continent, were those of Sir Humphrey Gilbert and Sir Walter Raleigh, in the latter quar- ter of the sixteenth century. These and some similar grants were vacated, from inability to fulfil their conditions ; or from other causes, failed to take permanent effect. When Queen Elizabeth died, in 1603, not a European family was known to exist on the continent of North America, north of the Gulf of Mexico. On the tenth of April, 1606, King James granted a patent, dividing that portion of North America which lies between the thirty-fourth and forty-fifth degrees of latitude, into two nearly equal districts. The southern, called the first colony, he granted to the London Company. The northern, called the second colony, he granted to the Plymouth Com- pany ; and allotted it, as a place of settlement, to several knights, gentlemen, and merchants of Bristol, Plymouth, and other parts of the west of England. This patent conveyed a grant of the property of the land along the coast, for fifty miles, on each side from the place of their first habitation, and extending one hundred miles into the interior. Under these charters, various attempts at colonization and settlement were made, and, at first, with very doubtful suc- cess, by the Virginia Company. These, of course, it is no part of our present business to pursue. In 1614, the adven- 220 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. turous Captain Smith, famous in his connection with the settlement of Virginia, was sent out by four individuals in England, who were disposed to engage in an enterprise on these distant shores, to explore the coast of North Virginia. He arrived on the coast of Maine at the end of April, 1614; and in the course of the following summer, he visited the north-eastern shores of America, from the Penobscot River to Cape Cod ; entered and examined the rivers, surveyed the country, and carried on a trade with the natives. Having, on his return to England, constructed, from his surveys, a ma r 'tf the country, it was submitted to Prince Charles, who gave the name of New England to the region explored by Smith, and bestowed his own name on what was then sup- posed to be its principal river. The season in which Captain Smith visited the country, is that in which it appears in its greatest beauty. His account of it was such as to excite the attention and kindle the imagination of men in England ; and the profitable returns of his voyage united with these impressions to strengthen the disposition which was felt to colonize the newly-explored region. Several attempts were accordingly made, to that end, for the benefit and under the auspices of the Plymouth Company, but all without success. The great enterprise was reserved to be accomplished by a very different instrumentality. In 1617, the church of Mr Robinson, at Leyden, had come to the resolution of exiling themselves to the American wil- derness. As the principal attempts at settlement had been made in the southern colony, or Virginia, their thoughts were turned to that quarter, and they sent two of their number to London, to negotiate with the Virginia Company on the terms of their settlement, and to ascertain whether liberty of con- science would be allowed them in the new country. The Virginia Company was disposed to grant them a patent, with as ample privileges as it was in their power to convey. The king, however, could not be induced to patronize the design, and promised only a connivance in it so long as they demeaned themselves peaceably. In 1619, the arrangement was finally made with the Virginia Company; and in the THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 221 following year, the ever-memorable emigration to Plymouth took place. In consequence of the treacherous and secret interference of the Dutch, who had their own designs upon that part of the coast which had been explored by Hudson, the captain of the vessel which transported the first company to America conveyed them to a place without the limits of the patent of the Virginia Company, and where, of course, the Pilgrims were set down beyond the protection of any grant and the pale of any law. In three or four years, a patent was obtained of the Plymouth Company, and on this sole basis the first New England settlement rested, till its incorporation with the colony of Massachusetts Bay. In the year 1620, the old patent of the Plymouth Company was revoked, and a new one was granted to some of the highest nobility and gentry of England, and their associates, constituting them and their successors " the council estab- lished at Plymouth, in the county of Devon, for the planting, ruling, ordering, and governing of New England in America." By this patent, that part of America which lies between the fortieth and forty-eighth degrees of north latitude in breadth, and in length by all the breadth aforesaid, throughout the main, from sea to sea, was given to them, in absolute prop- erty. Civil and jurisdicti*>nal powers, like those which had been granted by the Virginia patent, were conferred on the council established by this charter ; on which, as on a basis, rested all the subsequent patents and grants of this portion of the country. By this grant, a considerable part of the present British colonies in North America; the whole of the New England States, and of New York ; about half of Pennsyl- vania ; two thirds of New Jersey and Ohio ; a half of Indiana and Illinois ; the whole of Michigan, Wisconsin, and the terri- tory of the United States westward of them, and on both sides of the Rocky Mountains, and from a point considerably within the Mexican dominions on the Pacific Ocean, nearly up to Nootka Sound, were liberally granted by King James " to the council established at Plymouth, in the county of Devon." From the period of the landing of the Pilgrims at Plyra- 222 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. outh, the intolerance of the established church in England became daily more oppressive. The non-conforming ministers were silenced, ejected, and imprisoned ; and numerous exam- ples of the extremest rigor of the law were made, both of them and the laity. The extent to which these severities were carried may be estimated from their amount in a single instance. On the impeachment of Bishop Wren, it was charged that during two years and a half, for which he administered the diocese of Norwich, fifty ministers were deprived of their places, for not complying with the prescribed ceremonies, and three thousand of the laity compelled to leave the kingdom. These increasing severities, and the necessity under which conscientious men were laid of abandoning their principles or their homes, turned the thoughts of many persons of con- sideration and property towards a permanent asylum in New England. The first steps were restrained and gradual ; but a few years witnessed the fulfilment of the design. In 1624, Mr White, of Dorchester, in England, a celebrated non- conforming minister, induced a number of merchants and other gentlemen to attempt another settlement ; and by their contributions, under a license obtained from the Plymouth settlers, an establishment was commenced at Cape Ann. The care of this establishment was the following year committed by the proprietors to Mr Roger Conant, a person of great worth, who had, however, retired from the colony at Plym- outh. After a short residence at Cape Ann, Roger Conant removed a little farther to the westward, and fixed upon a place called by the Indians Naumkeag, as a mo"e advanta- geous place of settlement. The accounts of this ^lace circu- lated in England, among those who were maturing this design ; and Mr Conant, though deserted by almost all his brethren, was induced by Mr White to remain at Salem, by the promise of procuring a patent and a reinforcement of settlers. Accordingly, on the nineteenth of March, 1628, an agreement was concluded between the council of Plymouth and certain gentlemen associated in the neighborhood of Dor- chester, in England, under the auspices of Mr White, of that THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 223 place ; and a patent was conveyed to these associates of all the tract of country lying between three miles north of the Morrimac and three miles south of Charles Rivers, and extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. These associates were Sir Henry Roswell, Sir John Young, Thomas Southcoat, John Humphrey, John Endecott, and Simon Whetcomb ; and the patent ran to them, their heirs and associates. Mr White, in pursuit of his project for establishing a colony for the non-conformists, was in communication with persons of that description, in different parts of England ; and, through his agency, the six patentees, whose names I have just mentioned, were brought into connection with several religious persons in London and the neighboring country, who at first associated with them, and afterwards purchased out the right of the three first named of the six patentees.* Among these new associates were John Winthrop, Isaac Johnson, and Sir Richard Saltonstall. Thus reenforced, the strength of the company was vigor- ously bent upon the establishment of the colony in New England. They organized themselves, by choosing Matthew Cradock governor of the colony, and Thomas Goff deputy governor, and eighteen assistants. By this company, and in the course of the same summer of 1628, John Endecott was sent over, with a considerable number of planters and ser- vants, to " establish a plantation at Salem, to make way for settling the colony, and be their agent to order all affairs, till the patentees themselves should come." Endecott sailed from Weymouth on the twentieth of June ; and his first letter to the company in London bears date thirteenth Sep- tember, 1628. In the same year of 1628, the foundation of the town, of Charlestown was laid, under the patronage of Governor En- * See the detail in Governor Dudley's most interesting letter to thd Countess of Lincoln, of 12th March, 1630, written, as he says, "rudely, naving yet no table nor other room to write in than by the fireside, on my knee, in this sharp winter." Historical Collections, First Series, Vol VIII. p. 86. 224 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. decott, but not, I apprehend, by any of the members of his party. As this is a matter of some local importance, I shall dwell for a moment upon it. It is well known that Ralph, William, arid Richard Sprague, in the course of the summer of 1628, traversed the country between Salem and Charles River, and made a settlement at Charlestown ; and it is com- monly supposed, that, as they came from Salem with Gov- ernor Endecott's consent, they were' of the company which he brought over.* On looking, however, into our ancient records, I find the following remark. After relating the arrival of Endecott at Salem, the record goes on to say : " Under whose wing, there were a few, also, that settle and plant up and down, scattering in several places of the bay ; where, though they meet with the dangers, difficulties, and wants attending new plantations in a solitary wilderness, so far remote from then- native country, yet were they not long without company ; foi in the year of our Lord one thousand six hundred and twenty-eight came over from England several people, at their own charges, and arrived at Salem. After which, people came over yearly in great numbers ; in years many hundreds arrived, and settled not only in the Massachusetts Bay, but did suddenly spread themselves into other colonies also. " Among those who arrived at Salem, at their own charge, were Ralph Sprague, with his brethren Richard and William, who, with three or four more, by joint consent and approba- tion of Mr John Endecott, governor, did the same summer of anno 1628 undertake a journey from Salem, and travelled the woods about twelve miles to the westward, and lighted of a place situate and lying on the north bank of Charles River, full of Indians, called Aberginians. Their old chief sachem being dead, his eldest son, by the English called John Saga- more, was their chief ; a man naturally of gentle and good * " The Spragues, (who went thither [to Charlestown] from Endecott'a company at Salem.)" Winthrop's Journal, Savage's edition, VoL I. p. 53., note. And so other writers. THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 225 disposition, by whose free consent they settled about the hill of the same place, by the natives called Mishawum ; where they found one English palisadoed and thatched house, wherein lived Thomas Walford, a smith, situate on the south end of the westernmost hill of the east field, a little way from Charles River side ; and, upon surveying, they found it was a neck of land generally full of stately timber, as was the main, and the land lying on the east side of the river called Mistick River; (from the farm Mr Cradock's servants had planted, called Mistick, which this river led up into ;) indeed, generally, all the country round about was an uncouth wil- derness, full of timber." This passage seems to establish the fact that the three SpragUes, the founders of the settlement in this place, were not members of Governor Endecott's company, but independ- ent adventurers, who came over to Salem at their own cost. They were persons of character, substance, and enterprise ; excellent citizens, generous public benefactors, and the heads of a very large and respectable family of descendants. The patent from the council of Plymouth gave to the associates as good a right to the soil as the council possessed, but no powers of government. For this object, the royal charter was necessary. An humble petition for such a charter was presented to the king in council ; and on the fourth of March, 1629, the charter passed the seals, confirming the patent of the council of Plymouth, and creating the governor and company of the Massachusetts Bay, in New England, a body politic and corporate, in deed, fact, and name. By this charter, the company were empowered to elect forever, out of the freemen of said company, a governor, deputy governor, and eighteen assistants, annually, on the fourth Wednesday of Easter term, and to make laws not repugnant to the laws of England.* At a meeting, or court, as it was called, of this company, held at London, on the thirtieth of April following, a form of government was adopted for the colony. By this form of * Hazard's State Papers, Vol. I. pp. 239255. VOL. i. 29 226 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. government, the direction of affairs was committed to thirteen individuals, to be resident in the colony, one of whom shall be governor. Mr Endecott was, by the same instrument, appointed governor, and six individuals were named council- lors. These seven persons were authorized to choose three more ; and the remaining two, requisite to make up the number of twelve, were to be designated by the old planters, as they were called, or persons who had settled in New England previous to the Massachusetts patent ; and whose rights, though not provided for by that instrument, were treated with tenderness by the patentees. These magistrates were to continue in office one year. The mode in which their successors were to be chosen is not specified by this form of government, but was probably intended to be the same as that observed in the first election.* In the course of this summer of 1629, six ships in the service of the company sailed for the infant colony, carrying with them an ample supply of provisions and three hundred settlers. Mr Francis Higginson, who was named first on the list of the councillors chosen by the company, and the other ministers sent out for the spiritual instruction of the colony, embarked for Naumkeag, or Salem, in this fleet. The position at Salem not being thought adapted to become the capital. Mr Thomas Graves, an engineer in the service of the company, with about one hundred of the company's servants under his care, removed to this place in the course of the summer of 1629, where the Spragues and their com- panions had established themselves the year before ; and at this time, from the name of the river on which it stands, they called the place Charlestown.f Thus far the proceedings of the company were conducted on the footing of a trading corporation, organized in England, for the purpose of carrying on a commercial establishment in a foreign and dependent region. Whatever higher motive * Hazard, Vol. I. p. 263. From Massachusetts Records, A. folio 9. f This event, and that of the arrival of Governor Winthrop, are, by a / very singular anachronism, dated, the one in 1628, and the other in 1629, m our Charlestown Records. THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 22? had been proposed to themselves by the active promoters of the colony, the royal government of Great Britain, in grant- ing the charter of the company, had probably no design to lay the foundation of a new commonwealth established on principles at war with those of the mother country. But larger designs were entertained on the part of some of the high-minded men who engaged in the undertaking. The civil and ecclesiastical oppression of the times had now reached that point of intolerable severity to which the evils of humanity are sometimes permitted to extend when Provi- dence designs to apply to them a great and strange remedy. It was at this time, to all appearance, the reluctant but delib- erate conviction of the thinking part of the community of that great class in society which constitutes the strength of England as of America that Old England had ceased to be a land for men of moderate private fortunes to live in. Society was tending rapidly to that disastrous division of master and dependant which is fatal to all classes of its members. The court was profligate, corrupt, and arbitrary beyond example, and it remained to be seen whether the constitution of the government contained any check on its power and caprice. In the " Considerations for the Planta- tion of New England" drawn up a year or two before by those who took the lead in founding the colony of Massa- chusetts Bay, it was forcibly stated, " that England grew weary of her inhabitants ; insomuch that man, which is the most precious of all creatures, was there more vile and base than the earth he trod on ; and children and families (if un weal thy) were accounted a burdensome encumbrance, in- stead of the greatest blessing." From such a state of things, and in the assurance of a per- fect remedy in New England for some of the evils which they suffered, a considerable number of persons of great respect- ability, of good fortune, and of consideration in society, came to the resolution of leaving their native land, and laying the foundation of a better social system on these remote and uninhabited shores. As a preliminary to this, however, they required a total change of the footing on which the attempts 228 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. at colonization had hitherto proceeded. It fell far short of their purpose to banish themselves to the new world as the dependent servants of a corporation in London; and they required, as a previous condition, that the charter of the colony and the seat of its government should be transferred from London to America. This was the turning point in the destiny of New England. Doubting the legality of such a step, they took the advice of counsel learned in the law, and from them received the opinion that the proposed transfer of the charter was legal. Against this opinion there is, at the present day, a pretty general consent of the writers on America, both in England and the United States ; and it may therefore be deemed presumptuous in me to express an oppo- site judgment. But, though the removal of the charter was not probably contemplated, I find in it no condition prescribed, that the meetings of the corporation, or the place of deposit of the charter itself, should be in London, or any other par- ticular place. The very design for which the charter was granted to the company implied, of course, the possibility that a part of the freemen that compose it should reside in New England ; and I perceive nothing in the instrument forbidding them all to reside in that part of the king's dominions. Those whose professional advice had been taken on the subject of removing the charter, having decided in favor of the legality of that measure, its expediency was submitted, at a court of the company held at London, on the twenty- eighth of July, 1629 ; and on the twenty-ninth of August, after hearing the reports of two committees, raised to consider the arguments for and against the removal, it was, by the generality of the company voted, that the patent and govern- ment of the company be transferred to New England. At a subsequent meeting, held October twentieth, "the court having received extraordinary great commendation of Mr John Winthrop, both for his integrity and sufficiency, as being one very well fitted for the place, with a full consent choose him governor for the ensuing year, to begin this day." On the same day the deputy governor and assistants were THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 229 shosen, of persons at that time purposing to emigrate, some of whom, however, never executed this design. John Winthrop was a gentleman of good fortune, and was born at Groton, in the county of Suffolk, on the twelfth of January, 1587,* and was educated by his father, who was himself eminent for skill in the law, to that profession. John Winthrop was so early distinguished for his gravity, intelli- gence, and learning, that he was introduced into the magis- tracy of his county at the age of eighteen, and acquitted himself with great credit in the discharge of its duties. His family had, for two generations at least, distinguished itself for its attachment to the reformed religion ; and John Winthrop was of that class of the English church who thought that the work had not all been accomplished in throwing off their allegiance to Rome. I believe we have no account of the circumstances by which he was first led to take an interest in the settlement of New England ; nor does his name occur in connection with the early history of th colony, till we find it mentioned among those who, in 1628, united themselves with the Dorchester adventurers. Having been, in October, 1629, elected governor of the new colony, for such it is henceforward to be regarded, he prepared him- self to enter on this great enterprise by disposing of his patrimony in England, which was valued at a rent of six or seven hundred pounds sterling per annum. The feelings with which he addressed himself to the noble work may be partly conceived from the nature of the enterprise and the character of the man, and they are more fully set forth in his most admirable letters to his wife and son, with which the world has lately been favored. On the twenty-second of March, 1629, we find the gov- ernor, with two of his sons, on board a vessel at the Isle of Wight, bound for America, with Dudley, the deputy governor, and several of the assistants, and with a large number of * Mather says June. I am inclined to think that this, with numerous other errors, which have exposed Mather to severe reprehension, on the score of inaccuracy, was a misprint arising from the circumstance, that his work was printed in London, and consequently not corrected by him. 230 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. emigrants, embarked in a fleet which, with the vessels that preceded and followed them, the same season, amounted in the whole to seventeen sail, all of which reached New England. From the period at which Governor Winthrop set sail for New England, till a short time before his death, he kept a journal of his life from day to day ; which has fortunately been preserved to us, partly in the original manuscript, of which a portion was brought to light, and for the first time published, a few years ago.* The voyage of Governor Win- throp was unattended with any considerable incident, and on the twelfth of June, after a passage of about six weeks, the vessel in which he sailed came to anchor off Salem. On landing, they found the colony there in an improsperous condition, eighty of their number having died the preceding winter, and the survivors looking for support to the supplies expected by the governor, which unfortunately did not arrive in the vessel which brought him. The intention had been already taken not to establish the seat of government at Salem. After lying a few days at anchor off that place, Governor Winthrop undertook to explore the Massachusetts Bay, "to find a place for sitting down." On the seventeenth of June, old style, he proceeded up the Mystic River as far as the spot which he occupied as a coun- try residence during his life, and which has preserved to the present day the name of the Ten Hills, given to it by him. Our records give but a melancholy account of the condition of things which the colonists were called to encounter in their establishment at this place. We there read, that " The governor and several of the assistants dwelt in the great house, which was last year built in this town by Mr Graves and the rest of their servants. The multitude set up cottages, booths, and tents about the Town Hill. They had long passage. Some of the ships were seventeen, some eighteen weeks a coming. Many people arrived sick of the * By Hon. James Savage, with learned annotations on the whole work, now for the first time published entire, in two volumes. THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 231 scurvy, which also increased much after their arrival, for want of houses, and by reason of wet lodgings, in their cottages, &c. Other distempers also prevailed, and although people were generally very loving and pitiful, yet the sickness did so prevail, that the whole were not able to tend the sick as they should be tended ; upon which many perished and died, and were buried about the Town Hill ; by which means the provisions were exceedingly wasted, and no supplies could now be expected by planting ; besides, * there was miserable damage and spoil of provisions by sea, and divers came not so well provided as they would, upon a report, whilst they were in England, that now there was enough in New England." It was the intention of the governor, and the chief part of those who accompanied him, to establish themselves perma- nently in this place ; and to .this end the governor made preparation for building his house here. But, as our records proceed, "the weather being hot, many sick, and others faint, after their long voyage, people grew discontented for want of water, who generally notioned no water good for a town but running springs ; and though this neck do abound in good water, yet, for want of experience and industry, none could then be found to suit the humor of that time, but a brackish spring in the sands, by the water-side, on the west side of the north-west field, which could not supply half the necessities of the multitude, at which time the death of so many was concluded to be much the more occasioned by this want of good water." In consequence of this difficulty, numbers of those who had purposed to settle themselves at Charlestown, sought an establishment at other places, as Watertown and Dorchester ; and still more removed to the other side of the river, and laid the foundation of Boston. " In the mean time," continue our records, " Mr Black- stone dwelling on the other side of Charles River, alone, at a place by the Indians called Shawmut, where he only had a cottage, at or not far off the place called Blackstone's Point, he came and acquainted the governor of an excellent spring 232 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. there, withal inviting him and soliciting him thither ; where- upon, after the death of Mr Johnson and divers others, the governor, with Mr Wilson, and the greatest part of the church, removed thither." Such were the inconveniences and distresses of the first settlement, which bore so heavily on the health and spirits of the colonists, that on the return of the vessels which brought them out, more than a hundred went back to Eng- land. But the necessary limits of this address will not permit me to pursue the narrative, and I can only ask your attention to a few of those reflections, which are suggested by the occa- sion. What our country is, which has sprung from these begin- nings, we all see and know ; its numbers bordering upon twelve millions, if they do not exceed it ; * its great abundance in all that composes the wealth and the strength of nations ; its rich possession of the means of private happiness ; its progress in the useful and refined arts of life ; its unequalled enjoyment of political privileges ; its noble provision of lit- erary, social, charitable, and religious establishments, consti- tuting, together, a condition of prosperity, which, I think, has never been equalled on earth. What our country was, on the day we commemorate, it is difficult to bring distinctly home to our minds. There was a feeble colony in Virginia ; a very small Dutch settlement in New York ; a population of about three hundred at Plymouth ; about as many more English inhabitants, divided between Salem and Charles- town ; a few settlers scattered up and down the coast ; and all the rest a vast wilderness, the covert of wild beasts and savages. In this condition of things, the charter of the colony was brought over, and the foundations were laid of a new state. In the motives which led to this enterprise, there were unquestionably two principles united. The first projects of The population will not probably fall much short of 24,000,000, by the census to be taken this year, (1850.) THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 233 settling on the coast of New England had their origin in commercial adventure ; and without the direction given by this spirit to the minds of men, and the information brought home by fishing and trading vessels, the attempt would prob- ably have never been made to establish a colony. It deserves to be remarked, therefore, in an age like the present, when it is too much the practice to measure the value of all public enterprises by the returns in money which they bring back to their projectors, that probably a more unprofitable specula- tion, in a financial light, than that of the council of Plymouth, was never undertaken. In a few years, they gladly surren- dered their patent to the crown ; and it is doubtful whether, while they held it, they divided a farthing's profit. Yet, under their patent, and by their grant, was undertaken and accomplished perhaps the greatest work on record in the annals of humanity. Mixed with this motive of commercial speculation (itself liberal and praiseworthy) was another, the spring of all that is truly great in human affairs, the conservative and redeem- ing principle of our natures, I mean the self-denying enthusiasm of our forefathers, sacrificing present ease for a great end. I do not mean to say that even they had an accurate foresight of the work in which they were engaged. What an empire was to rise on their humble foundations, imagination never revealed to them, nor could they, nor did they, conceive it. They contemplated an obscure and humble colony, safe beneath the toleration of the crown, where they could enjoy, what they prized above all earthly things, the liberty of conscience in the worship of God. Stern as they are portrayed to us, they entertained neither the bitter- ness of an indignant separation from home, nor the pride of an anticipated and triumphant enlargement here. Their enthusiasm was rather that of fortitude and endurance, passive and melancholy. Driven though they were from their homes by the oppression of the established church, they parted from her as a dutiful child from a severe but venerated parent. " We esteem it our honor," say they, in their inimitable letter from on board the Arbella, " to call the church of England. VOL. i. 30 234 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. from which we rise, our dear mother ; and we cannot, part from our native country, where she specially resideth, without much sadness of heart, and many tears in our eyes ; ever acknowledging that such hope and part as we have obtained in the common salvation we have received in her bosom, and sucked it from her breasts." And having, in this same pathetic appeal, invoked the prayers of their brethren in England for their welfare, they add, " What goodness you shall extend to us, in this or any other Christian kindness, we, your brethren, shall labor to repay, in what duty we are or shall be able to perform ; promising, so far as God shall enable us, to give him no rest on your behalf, wishing our heads and hearts may be fountains of tears for your everlasting welfare, when we shall be in our poor cottages in the wilderness, overshadowed with the spirit of supplication, through the manifold necessities and tribulations which may not altogether unexpectedly, nor, we hope, unprofitably, befall us."* In the spirit that dictated these expressions, the disinter- ested enthusiasm of men, giving up home, and friends, and their native land, for a conscientious principle, we behold not merely the cause of the success of their enterprise, but the secret source of every great and generous work, especially in the founding of social institutions, that was ever performed. One trading company after another had failed ; charters had been given, enlarged, and vacated ; well-appointed fleets had been scattered or returned without success, and rich adven- tures had ended in ruin ; when a few aggrieved and consci- entious men, turning their backs on plenty at home, and setting their faces towards want and danger in the wilderness, took up and accomplished the work. The esteem in which we of the present day hold their characters, and the sympathy we feel in their trials, are, perhaps, qualified by finding that this enthusiasm which inspired them was almost wholly expended on the concerns of the church, and was associated in that respect with opinions and feelings, as we may think, not the most enlarged and * Hutchinson, Vol. I. Appendix, No. 1. THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 235 liberal. This prejudice, however, (for such I regard it,) ought not to be permitted to establish itself in the minds of any generation of the descendants of the fathers of New England. The spirit that actuated them was the great principle of disinterested enthusiasm the purest and best that can warm the heart and govern the conduct of man. It took a direction towards the doctrines and forms of the church, partly, of course, because religion is a matter on which tender and ardent minds feel with the greatest sensibility ; but mainly because they were, in that respect, oppressed and aggrieved. It was precisely the same spirit which animated our fathers in the revolution, assuming then the form of the passion for civil liberty, and struggling against political oppression, be- cause this was the evil which they suffered. And it is the same principle, which, in every age, wars against tyranny, sympathizes with the oppressed, kindles at the report of gen- erous actions, and, rising above selfish calculation and sensual indulgence, learns " to scorn delights and live laborious days ; " and is ready, when honor and duty call, to sacrifice property, and ease, and life. There is another thing that must be borne in mind when we sit in judgment on the character of our fathers. The opinions which men entertain, especially on great social insti- tutions and the duties which grow out of them, depend very much on the degree of intelligence prevailing in the world. Great men go beyond their age, it is true ; but there are limits to this power of anticipation. They go beyond it in some things, but not in all, and not often in any to the utmost point of improvement. Lord Bacon laid down the principles of a new philosophy, but did not admit the Copernican sys- tem. Men who have been connected with the establishment of great institutions ought to be judged by the general resu.t of their work. We judge of St Peter's by the grandeur of the elevation and the majesty of the dome, not by the flaws in the stone of which the walls are built. The fathers of New England, a company of private gentlemen, of moderate fortunes, bred up under an established church and an arbitrary and hereditary civil government, came over the Atlantic two 236 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. hundred years ago. They were imperfect, they had faults, they committed errors. But they laid the foundations of the state of things which we enjoy of political and religious freedom ; of public and private prosperity ; of a great, thriv- ing, well-organized republic. What more could they have done ? What more could any men do ? Above all, what lesson should we have given them, had we been in existence, and called to advise on the subject ? Most unquestionably we should have discouraged the enterprise altogether. Our political economists would have said, Abandon this mad scheme of organizing your own church and state, when you can have all the benefit of the venerable establishments of the mother country, the fruit of the wisdom of ages, at a vastly less cost. The capitalists would have said, Do not be so insane as to throw away your broad acres and solid guineas in so wild a speculation. The man of common sense, that dreadful foe of great enterprises, would have discredited the whole project. Go to any individual of the present day, situated as Governor Winthrop was, at his family mansion, at Groton, in England, in the bosom of a happy home, sur- rounded by an affectionate, prosperous family, in the enjoy- ment of an ample fortune, and tell him, inasmuch as the government has ordained that the priest should perform a part of the sacred service in a white surplice, and make the sign of the cross in baptism, that therefore he had better convert his estate into money, and leave his home and fam- ily, and go and settle a colony on one of the islands of the Pacific Ocean, or establish himself at the mouth of the Columbia River, where he would have liberty of conscience. I think he would recommend to his adviser to go and estab- lish himself at a certain mansion which benevolence has provided, a little to the north of Lechmere's Point. I do not say the cases are wholly parallel ; but such would be the view now taken, on the principles which govern men in our state of society, of such a course as that which was pursued by Governor Winthrop and his associates. I deduce from this, not that they were high-minded, and we base and degenerate ; I will not so compliment the fathers THE SETTLEMENT OF M ASS ACHUSE 1 TS. 237 at the expense of the sons. On the contrary, let the crisis arrive ; let a state of things present itself, (hardly conceivable, to be sure, but within the range of possibility,) when our beloved New England no longer afforded us the quiet posses- sion of our rights, I believe we should then show ourselves the worthy descendants of the Pilgrims ; and if the earth contained a region, however remote, a shore, however bar- barous, where we could enjoy the liberty denied us at home, that we should say, " Where liberty is, there is my country," and go and seek it. But let us not, meantime, nourished as we are out of the abundance which they, needy and suffer- ing themselves, transmitted to us, deride their bigotry, which turned trifles into consequence, or wonder at their zeal, which made great sacrifices for small inducements. It is ungrateful. Nor let us suppose that it would be too safe to institute a comparison between our fathers and ourselves, even on those points with regard to which we have both been called to act. It has so happened, that the government of the United States has, in the course of the last year, been obliged to consider and act on a subject which was one of the first and most anx- ious that presented itself to the early settlers of New England, I mean our relations with the Indian tribes. In alluding to this subject, I freely admit that, in the infancy of the col- onies, when the Indians were strong and the colonists weak, when the savage, roaming the woods with the tomahawk and scalping-knife, was a foe to the New England settlements alike dangerous and dreadful, some actions were committed in the settlements, in moments of excitement, which we can-^ not too deeply condemn, nor too sadly deplore. In allusion to these actions, and in vindicating the course which, during the past year, has been pursued towards the tribes of civilized Indians resident within the United States, it has been argued that they have not been treated with greater severity by the government of the United States, or of any of the separate states, than they were treated by the fathers of New Eng- land. But it would seem not enough for an age which is so liberal of its censures of the Puritans, to show itself only not 238 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. more oppressive than they. Has civilization made no prog- ress in two hundred years ? Will any statesman maintain, that the relation of our Union to the feeble and dependent tribes within its limits is the same as that of the infant col- onies towards the barbarous nations which surrounded them ? It was the opinion of that age that the royal patents gave a perfect right to the soil. We have hitherto professed to believe that nothing can give a perfect right to the soil occu- pied by the Indian tribes but the free consent of these tribes, expressed by public compact, to alienate their right, whatever it be. They believed that heathen nations, as such, might be rightfully dispossessed by Christian men. We have professed to believe that this would be a very equivocal way of show- ing our Christianity. And yet, notwithstanding these opin- ions, I do not recollect that, in a single instance, our fathers claimed a right to eject the native population. For a long time they were the weaker party. Among the first acts of the Plymouth colony was an amicable treaty with the nearest and most powerful Indian chieftain, who lived and died their friend. The colonists of Massachusetts, in a letter of instruc- tions* from the company, of May twenty-eighth, 1629, were directed to make a reasonable composition with the Indians who claimed lands within their patent. The worthy found- ers of Charlestown, an enterprising handful of men, settled down here, with the free consent of the powerful tribe in their neighborhood, whose chief remained the friend of the English to the last. In a word, the opinions of our forefathers, on this interesting subject, are expressed by Mr Pynchon, of Springfield, with a discrimination and pointedness almost prophetic of the present contest. " I grant," says he, in ref- erence to a particular case, " that all these Indians f are within the line of the patent ; but yet you cannot say they are your subjects, nor yet within your jurisdiction, till they have fully subjected themselves, (which I know they have not,) and * Hazard's State Papers, Vol. I. p. 277 ; to the same effect, also, a still earlier letter of instructions. f See the case referred to in Winthrop's Journal, Savage's edition, Vol. II. p. 384. THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 239 until you have bought their land. Until this be done, they must be esteemed as an independent, free people." Contrast these doctrines with those latterly advanced by the government, both of the United States and several of the individual states : That the State charters give a perfect right to the soil and sovereignty within their nominal limits, and that the Indians have only a right of occupancy, and that by permission; that the treaties with them, negotiated for fifty years, with all the forms of the constitution, bind them as far as the treaties contain cessions of land, but do not bind us, when we guaranty the remainder of the land to them ; that when the Indians, on the faith of these treaties, cry to us for protection against state laws, unconstitutionally passed, with the known design and to the admitted effect of compelling them to leave their homes, it is within the com- petence of the executive, without consulting the national legislature, to withhold this protection, and advise the Indians, as they would escape destruction, to fly to the distant wilder- ness ; and all this in the case, not of savage, unreclaimed tribes, such as our forefathers had to deal with, who lived by the chase, without permanent habitations, to whom one tract of the forest was as much a home as another, but tribes whom we have trained to civilization, whom we have converted to our religion ; who live, as we do, by the indus- trious arts of life, and who, in their official papers, written by themselves, plead for their rights in better English than that of the high officers of the government, who plead against them. But I protest against bringing the actions of men, in one age, to the standard of another, in things that depend on the state of civilization and public sentiment throughout the world. Try our fathers by the only fair test, the standard of the age in which they lived ; and 1 believe that they admit a very good defence, even on the point where they are sup- posed to be most vulnerable that of religious freedom. I do not pretend that they were governed by an enlightened spirit of toleration. Such a spirit, actuating a large commu- nity, made up of men of one mind, and possessing absolute 240 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. power to compel the few dissenters to conform, is not so common, even at the present day, as may be thought. I have great doubts whether the most liberal sect of Christians now extant, if it constituted as great a majority as our forefathers did of the community, and if it possessed an unlimited civil and ecclesiastical power, would be much more magnanimous than they were, in its use. They would not, perhaps, use the scourge, or the halter ; humanity proscribes them alto- gether, except for the most dangerous crimes ; but that they would allow the order of the community to be disturbed by the intrusion of opposite opinions, distasteful to themselves, I have great doubts. With all the puritanical austerity, and - what is much more to be deplored the intolerance of dissent, which are chargeable to our fathers, they secured, and we are indebted to them for, two great principles, without which all the candor and kindness we may express towards opponents, go but a short step towards religious freedom. One of these is the independence of each individual church ; the other, the separation of church and state. Our fathers were educated under an ecclesiastical system, which com- bined all the churches into one body. They forbore to imitate that system here, though the hierarchy of the new churches would have been composed of themselves, with John Cotton at its head. They were educated in a system where the church is part of the state, and vast endowments are bestowed, in perpetuity, upon it. This, too, our fathers could have imitated, securing to themselves while they lived, and those who thought with them when they were gone, the usufruct of these endowments, as far as the law could work such assurance. They did neither, although they had purchased the fair right of doing what they pleased, by ban- ishing themselves, for that very reason, from the world. They did neither, although they lived in an age, when, had they done both, there was no one who could rightfully cast reproach upon them. In all the wide world, there was not a government, nor a people, that could rebuke them, by precept or example. Where was there ? In England, the fires of Papacy were hardly quenched, when tyrannies scarcely less THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 241 atrocious, against the Puritans, began. In Prance, the Protestants were at the mercy of a capricious and soon- revoked toleration. The Catholics, in Germany, were unchaining their legions against the Lutherans ; and in Hol- land, reformed Holland, fine and imprisonment were the reward of Grotius, the man in whom that country will be remembered ages after the German Ocean has broken over her main dike. Had our forefathers laid the foundation of the most rigid ecclesiastical system that ever oppressed the world, and locked up a quarter part of New England in mortmain, to endow it, there was not a community in Chris- tendom to bear witness against them. If we would, on a broad, rational ground, come to a favor- able judgment, on the whole, of the merit of our forefathers, the founders of New England, we have only to compare what they effected, with what was effected by their countrymen and brethren in Great Britain. While the fathers of New England, a small band of individuals, for the most part of little account to the great world of London, were engaged, on this side of the Atlantic, in laying the foundations of civil and religious liberty in a new commonwealth, the patriots in England undertook the same work of reform in that country. There were difficulties, no doubt, peculiar to the enterprise, as undertaken in each country. In Great Britain, there was the strenuous opposition of the friends of the established system ; in New England, there was the difficulty of creating a new state, out of materials the most scanty and inadequate. If there were fewer obstacles here, there were greater means there. They had all the refinements of the age, which the Puritans are charged with having left behind them ; all the resources of the country, while the Puritans had nothing but their own slender means ; and, at length, all the patronage of the government ; and with them they overthrew the church ; trampled the House of Lords under foot ; and brought the king to the block. The fathers of New Eng- land, from first to last, struggled against almost every con- ceivable discouragement. While the patriots at home were dictating concessions to the king, and tearing his confidential VOL. I. 31 242 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. friends from his arms, the patriots of America could scarcely keep their charter out of his grasp. While the former were wielding a resolute majority in parliament, under the lead of the boldest spirits that ever lived, combining with Scotland, and subduing Ireland, and striking terror into the continental governments, the latter were forming a frail union of the New England colonies, for immediate defence, against a savage foe. While the " Lord General Cromwell," (who seems to have picked up this modest title among the spoils of the routed aristocracy, ) in the superb flattery of Milton, "Guided by faith, and matchless fortitude, To peace and truth his glorious way had ploughed, And on the neck of crowned fortune proud Had reared God's trophies," our truly excellent and incorruptible Winthrop was com- pelled to descend from the chair of state, and submit to an impeachment. And what was the comparative success? There were, to say the least, as many excesses committed in England as in Massachusetts Bay. There was as much intolerance on the part of men just escaped from persecution ; as much bigotry on the part of those who had themselves suffered for con- science' sake ; as much unreasonable austerity ; as much sour temper ; as much bad taste ; as much for charity to forgive, and as much for humanity to deplore. The temper, in fact, in the two commonwealths was much the same, and some of the leading spirits played a part in both. And to what effect ? On the other side of the Atlantic the whole experiment ended in a miserable failure. The commonwealth became succes- sively oppressive, hateful, contemptible ; a greater burden than the despotism on whose ruins it was raised. The people of England, after sacrifices incalculable of property and life, after a struggle of thirty years' duration, allowed the general, who happened to have the greatest number of troops at his command, to bring back the old system King, lords, and church with as little ceremony as he would employ in issuing the orders of the day. After asking, for thirty years, THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. 243 What is the will of the Lord concerning his people ? What is it becoming a pure church to do ? What does the cause of liberty demand in the day of its regeneration? there was but one cry in England What does General Monk think ? What will General Monk do ? Will he bring back the king with conditions, or without ? And General Monk concluded to bring him back without. On this side of the Atlantic, and in about the same period, the work which our fathers took in hand was, in the main, successfully done. They came to found a republican colony. They founded it. They came to establish a free church. They established what they called a free church, and trans- mitted to us what we call a free church. In accomplishing this, which they did anticipate, they brought also to pass what they did not so distinctly foresee, what could not, in the nature of things, in its detail and circumstance, be antici- pated, the foundation of a great, prosperous, and growing republic. We have not been just to these men. I am dis- posed to do all justice to the memory of each succeeding generation. I admire the indomitable perseverance with which the contest for principle was kept up under the second charter. I reverence, this side idolatry, the wisdom and for- titude of the revolutionary and constitutional leaders, but I believe we ought to go back beyond them all for the real framers of the commonwealth. I believe that its foundation stones, like those of the Capitol of Rome, lie deep and solid, out of sight, at the bottom of the walls, Cyclopean work, the work of the Pilgrims, with nothing below them but the rock of ages. I will not quarrel with their rough corners or uneven sides ; above all, I will not change them for the wood, hay, and stubble of modern builders. But it is more than time, fellow-citizens, that I should draw to a close. These venerable foundations of our repub- lic were laid, on the very spot where we stand, by the fathers of Massachusetts. Here, before they were able to erect a suitable place for worship, they were wont, beneath the branches of a spreading tree, to commend their wants, their sufferings, and their hopes to Him that dwelleth not in houses 244 THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS made with hands ; here they erected their first habitations ; here they gathered their first church ; here they made their first graves. Yes, on the very spot where we are assembled, now crowned with this spacious church, surrounded by the com- fortable abodes of a dense population, there were, during the first season after the landing of Winthrop. fewer dwell- ings for the living than graves for the dead. It seemed the will of Providence that our fathers should be tried by the extremities of either season. When the Pilgrims approached the coast of Plymouth, they found it clad with all the terrors of a northern winter. " The sea around was black with storms, And white the shores with snow." We can scarcely now think, without tears, of a company ol men, women, and children, brought up hi tenderness, exposed, after several months' uncomfortable confinement on ship- board, to the rigors of our November and December sky, on an unknown, barbarous coast, whose frightful rocks, even now, strike terror into the heart of the returning mariner, though he knows that the home of his childhood awaits him within their enclosure. The Massachusetts Company arrived at the close of June. No vineyards, as now, clothed our inhospitable hill-sides ; no blooming orchards, as at the present day, wore the livery of Eden, and loaded the breeze with sweet odors ; no rich pastures, nor waving crops, stretched beneath the eye along the way side, from village to village, as if Nature had been spreading her floors with a carpet, fit to be pressed by the footsteps of her descending God ! The beauty and the bloom of the year had passed. The earth, not yet subdued by culture, bore upon its untilled bosom nothing but a dismal forest, that mocked their hunger with rank and unprofitable vegetation. The sun was hot in the heavens. The soil was parched, and the hand of man had not yet taught its secret springs to flow from their fountains. The wasting disease of the heart-sick mariner was upon the men ; and the THE SETTLEMENT OF MASSACHUSETTS. women and children thought of the pleasant homes of Eng- land as they sank down, from day to day, and died at last for want of a cup of cold water in this melancholy land of promise. From the time the company sailed from England, in April, up to the December following, there died not less than two hundred persons, nearly one a day. They were buried, say our records, about the Town Hill. This is the Town Hill. We are gathered over the ashes of our forefathers. It is good, but solemn, to be here. We live on holy ground ; all our hill-tops are the altars of precious sacrifice. This is stored with the sacred dust of the first victims in the cause of liberty. And that* is rich from the life stream of the noble hearts who bled to sustain it. Here, beneath our feet, unconscious that we commemorate their worth, repose the meek and sainted martyrs whose flesh sunk beneath the lofty temper of their noble spirits; and there rest the heroes who presented their dauntless foreheads to the God of battles, when he came to his awful baptism of blood and of fire. Happy the fate which has laid them so near to each other, the early and the latter champions of the one great cause ! And happy we, who are permitted to reap in peace the fruit of their costly sacrifice ! Happy, that we can make our pious pilgrimage to the smooth turf of that venerable summit, once ploughed with the wheels of maddening artillery, ringing with all the dreadful voices of war, wrapped in smoke, and streaming with blood ! Happy, that here, where our fathers sank, beneath the burning sun, into the parched clay, we live, and assemble, and mingle sweet counsel and grateful thoughts of them, in comfort and peace ! Bunker HilL ON THE IMPORTANCE OE SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE TO PRACTICAL MEN, AND ON THE ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT.* THE chief object of the Mechanics' Institute is, to diffuse useful knowledge among the mechanic class of the commu- nity. It aims, in general, to improve and inform the minds of its members ; and particularly to illustrate and explain the principles of the various arts of life, and render them familiar to those who are to exercise these arts as their occupation. It is, also, a proper object of the Institute to point out the connection between the mechanic arts and the other pursuits and occupations, and show the foundations which exist in our very nature for a cordial union between them all. These objects recommend themselves strongly to general approbation. While the cultivation of the mind, in its more general sense, and in connection with morals, is as important to mechanics as to any other class, nothing is plainer than that those, whose livelihood depends on the skilful practice of the arts, ought to be instructed, as far as possible, in the scientific principles and natural laws on which the arts are founded. This is necessary, in order that the arts themselves should be pursued to the greatest advantage ; that popular errors should be eradicated ; that every accidental improve- ment in the processes of industry, which offers itself, should be readily taken up and pursued to its principle ; that false notions, leading tq waste of time and labor, should be pre- * The following essay contains the substance of addresses delivered by the author, before several institutions for scientific improvement (246) IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE. 247 vented from gaining or retaining currency ; in short, that the useful, like the ornamental, arts of life should be carried to the point of attainable perfection. The history of the progress of the human mind shows us, that, for want of a diffusion of scientific knowledge among practical men, great evils have resulted both to science and practice. Before the invention of the art of printing, the means of acquiring and circulating knowledge were few and ineffectual. The philosopher was, in consequence, exclusively a man of study, who, by living in a monastic seclusion, and by delving into the few books which time had spared, particularly the works of Aristotle and his commentators, succeeded in mastering the learning of the day ; learning mostly of an abstract and metaphysical nature. Thus, living in a world, not of practice, but speculation, and seldom bringing his theories to the test of observation, his studies assumed a visionary character. Hence the projects for the transmutation of metals a notion not originating in any observation of the qualities of the different kinds of metals ; but in reasoning, a priori, on their supposed identity of sub- stance. So deep-rooted was this delusion, that a great part of the natural science of the middle ages consisted in projects to convert the baser metals into gold. Such a project, at the present day, would no more be countenanced by intelligent, well-informed persons, practically conversant with the nature of the metals, than a project to transmute pine into oak, or fish into flesh. In like manner, by giving science wholly up to the philoso- phers, and making the practical arts of life merely a matter of traditionary repetition, from one generation to another of uninformed artisans, much evil of an opposite kind was occasioned. Accident, of course, could be the only source of improvement ; and, for want of acquaintance with the leading principles of mechanical philosophy, the chances were greatly multiplied against these accidental improve- ments. For want of the diffusion of information among practical men, the principles prevailing in an art in one place were unknown in other places j and processes existing at one 248 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE. period were liable to be forgotten, in the lapse of time. Mys- teries and secrets, easily kept in such a state of things, and cherished by their possessor, as a source of monopoly, were so common, that mystery is still occasionally used as synony- mous with trade. This also contributed to the loss of arts once brought to perfection, such as that of staining glass, as practised in the middle ages. Complicated machinery was out of the question ; for it requires for its invention and im- provement the union of scientific knowledge and practical skill. The mariner was left to creep along the coast, while the astronomer was casting nativities ; and the miner was reduced to the most laborious and purely mechanical process- es, to extract the precious metals from the ores that really contained them ; while the chemist, who ought to have taught him the method of amalgamation, could find no use for mer- cury, but as a menstruum, by which baser metals could be turned into gold. At the present day, this state of things is certainly changed. Popular treatises and works of reference have made the great principles of natural science generally accessible. It certainly is in the power of almost every one, by pains and time properly bestowed, to acquire a decent knowledge of every branch of practical philosophy. But still, it would appear, that, even now, this part of education is not on the right footing. Generally speaking, even now, all actual instruction in the principles of natural science is confined to the colleges ; and the colleges are, for the most part, frequented only by those intended for professional life. The elementary knowl- edge of science which is communicated at the colleges is, indeed, useful in any and every calling ; but it does not seem right, that none but those intended for the pulpit, the bar, or the profession of medicine, should receive instruction in those principles which regulate the operation of the mechanical powers, and lie at the foundation of complicated machinery ; which relate to the navigation of the seas, the smelting and refining of metals, the composition and improvement of soils, the reduction to a uniform whiteness of the vegetable fibre, the mixture and application of colors, the motion and pressure AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 249 of fluids in large masses, the properties of light and heat, the laws of magnetism, electricity, and galvanism. It would seem that this kind of knowledge was more immediately requisite for those who are to be employed in making or using labor-saving machinery, who are to traverse the ocean, to lay out and direct the construction of canals and railroads, to build steam engines and hydraulic presses, to work mines, and to conduct large agricultural and manufacturing estab- lishments. Hitherto, with some partial exceptions, little has been done systematically to afford to those engaged in these pursuits that knowledge, which, however convenient to others, would seem essential to them. There has been scarce any thing which could be called education for practical life ; and those persons, who, in the pursuit of any of the useful arts, have signalized themselves, by the employment of scien- tific principles, for the invention of new processes, or the improvement of the old, have been self-educated men. I am aware that it is often made an argument against scientific education, that the greatest discoveries and inventions have been either the production of such self-educated men, or have been struck out by accident. There certainly is some truth in this. So long as there is no regular system of scien- tific education for the working classes, it is a matter of neces- sity, that, if any great improvement be made, it must be either the result of accident, or the happy thought of some powerful native genius, who forces his way, without educa- tion, to the most astonishing results. This, however, is no more the case, with respect to the useful arts and the mechan- ical pursuits, than with respect to all the other occupations of society ; and it would continue to be the case, after the establishment of the best system of scientific education. We find, in every pursuit and calling, some instances of remark- able men, who, without an early education adapted to the object, have raised themselves to great eminence. Lord Chan- cellor King, in England, was a grocer at that period of life which is commonly spent in academical study by those des- tined for the profession of the law. Chief Justice Pratt, of New York, having been brought up a carpenter, was led by VOL. i. 32 250 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, a severe cut from an axe, which unfitted him for work, to turn his attention to the law. Franklin, who seemed equally to excel in the conduct of the ordinary business of life, in the sublimest studies of philosophy, and in the management of the most difficult state affairs, was bred a printer. All these callings are quite respectable, but no one would think of choosing either of them as the school of the lawyer, judge, or statesman. The fact that the native power of genius sometimes makes its way against all obstacles and under every discouragement, proves nothing as to the course which it is expedient for the generality of men to pursue. The safe path to excellence and success in every calling is that of appropriate preliminary education, diligent application to learn the art, and assiduity in practising it. I can perceive no reason why this course should not be followed in refer- ence to the mechanical as well as the professional callings. The instances of eminent men, like those named, and many others that might be named, such as Arkwright and Harrison, who have sprung from the depths of poverty to astonish and benefit mankind, no more prove that education is useless to the mechanic, than the corresponding examples prove that it is useless to the statesman, jurist, or divine. Besides, it 'will perhaps be found that the great men, like those I have named, instead of being instances to show that education is useless, prove only that occasionally men who commence their education late are as successful as those who commence it early. It follows from this, not that an early education is no benefit, but that the want of it may some- times be made up in later years. It might be so made up, no doubt, oftener than it is ; and it is in this country much more frequently than in any other. The foundation of a great improvement is, also, often a single conception, which suggests itself to a man of strong but uneducated mind, and who has the good fortune after- wards to receive from others that aid in executing his projects without which the most promising conception might have perished undeveloped. Thus Sir Richard Arkwright wanted education, but was endowed with a wonderful quickness of AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 251 mind. What particular circumstances awakened his mechan- ical taste we are not told. There is some reason to think that this, like other strongly-marked aptitudes, may partly depend on the peculiar organization of the body, which is exactly the same in no two men. The daily observation of the operation of the spinning-wheel, in the cottages of the peasantry of Lancashire, (England,) gave him a full knowl- edge of the existing state of the art, which it was his good fortune to improve, to a degree which is even yet the won- der of the world. He conceived, at length, the idea of an improved machine for spinning. In this conception not improbably a flash across the mind, the work of an instant lay all his original merit. But this is every thing. America was discovered, from the moment that Columbus firmly grasped the idea that, the earth being spherical, the Indies might be reached by sailing on a westerly course. If the actual discovery had not been made for ages after the death of Columbus, he would, nevertheless, in publishing this idea to the world, have been the pilot that led the way, whoever had followed his guidance. Sir Richard Arkwright, having formed the conception of his spinning machine, had recourse to a watchmaker to execute his idea. But how rarely could it happen, that circumstances would put it in the power of a person, himself ignorant and poor, to engage the coop- eration of an intelligent watchmaker ! Neither is it intended that the education which we recom- mend should extend to a minute acquaintance with the prac- tical application of science to the details of every art. This would be impossible, and does not belong to preparatory edu- cation. We wish only that the general laws and principles should be so taught, as greatly to multiply the number of persons competent to carry forward such casual suggestions of improvement as may present themselves, and to bring their art to that state of increasing excellence which all arts reach by long-continued, intelligent cultivation. It may further be observed, with respect to those great dis- coveries which seem to be produced by happy accidents and fortuitous suggestion, that such happy accidents are most 252 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLE1 GE, likely to fall in the way of those who are on the lookout for them those whose mental eyesight has been awakened and practised to behold them. The world is informed of all the cases in which such fortunate accidents have led to useful and brilliant results; but their number would probably appear smaller than it is now supposed to be, were such a thing possi- ble as the negative history of discovery and improvement. No one can tell us what might have been done, had every oppor- tunity been faithfully improved, every suggestion sagaciously caught up and followed out. No one can tell how often the uneducated or unobservant mind has approached to the very verge of a great discovery, has had some wonderful invention almost thrust upon it, but without effect. The ancients, as we learn from many passages in the Greek and Latin classics, were acquainted with convex lenses, but did not apply them to the construction of magnifying glasses or telescopes. They made use of seal-rings with inscriptions, and they marked their flocks with brands containing the owner's name. In each of these practices faint rudiments of the art of printing are concealed. Cicero, in one of his moral works, (De Natura Deorum,) in confuting the error of those philoso- phers who taught that the world is produced by the fortuitous concourse of wandering atoms, uses the following language, as curious, in connection with the point I would illustrate, as it is beautiful in expression and powerful in argument : " Here," says he, " must I not wonder if there should be a man who can persuade himself that certain solid and separate bodies are borne about by force or weight, and that this most beautiful and finished world is formed by their accidental meeting ? Whoever can think this possible, I do not see why he cannot also believe that, if a large number of forms of the one and twenty letters (of gold or any like substance) were thrown any where together, the Annals of Ennius might be made out from them, as tht y are cast on the ground, so as to be read in order ; a thing \vhich I know not if it be within the power of chance to effect, even in a single verse.' 5 How very near an approach is made, in this remark, to the inven- tion of the art of printing, fifteen hundred years before it too < AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 253 How slight and familiar was the occurrence which gave to Sir Isaac Newton the first suggestion of his system of the universe ! This great man had been driven, by the plague, from London to the country, and had left his library behind him. Obliged to find occupation in the activity of his own mind, he was led, in his meditations, to trace the extent of the principle which occasioned the fall of an apple from the tree, in the garden where he passed his solitary hours. Commen- cing with this familiar hint, he followed it out to that univer- sal law of gravity which binds the parts of the earth and ocean together, which draws the moon to the earth, the satel- lites to the planets, the planets to the sun, and the sun itself, with its attendant worlds, towards some grand and general point of attraction for that infinity of systems, of which the several stars are the centres. How many hundreds of thou- sands of men, since the creation of the world, had seen an apple fall from a tree ! How many philosophers had specu- lated profoundly on the system of the universe ! But it re- quired the talent of a man placed, by general consent, at the head of philosophers, to deduce from this familiar occur- rence on the surface of the earth, the operation of the pri- mordial law of nature, which governs the movements of the heavens, and holds the universe together. Nothing less than his sagacity could have made the deduction, and nothing less than a mathematical skill, and an acquaintance with the pre- viously ascertained principles of science, such as falls to the lot of very few, would have enabled Newton to demonstrate the truth of his system. Let us quote another example, to show that the most obvi- ous and familiar facts may be noticed for ages without effect, till they are observed by a sagacious eye, and scrutinized with patience and perseverance. The appearance of light- ning in the clouds is as old as the creation ; and certainly, no natural phenomenon forces itself more directly on the notice of men. The existence of the electric fluid, as excited by artificial means, was familiarly known to philosophers a hun- dred years before Franklin ; and there are a few vague sug- gestions, prior to his time, that lightning is ail electrical 254 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE appearance. But it was left for Franklin distinctly to con- ceive that proposition, and to institute an experiment by which it should be demonstrated. The process by which he reached this great conclusion is worth remembering. Dr Franklin had seen the most familiar electrical experiments performed at Boston, in 1745, by a certain Dr Spence, a Scotch lecturer. His curiosity being thus excited, he pur- chased the whole of Dr Spence's apparatus, and repeated, the experiments at Philadelphia. Pursuing his researches with his own instruments, and others which had been liberally presented to the province of Pennsylvania by the proprietor, Mr Penn, and by Dr Franklin's friend, Mr Collinson, our illustrious countryman rapidly enlarged the bounds of elec- trical science, and soon arrived at the undoubting conviction that the electrical fluid and lightning are identical. But he could not rest till he had brought this truth to the test of demonstration, and he boldly set about an experiment upon the most terrific element in nature. He at first proposed, by means of a spire which was erecting in Philadelphia, to form a connection between the region of the clouds and an elec- trical apparatus ; but the appearance of a boy's kite in the air suggested to him a readier method. Having prepared a kite, adapted for the purpose, he went out into a field, accompanied by his son, to whom alone he had imparted his design. The kite was raised, having a key attached to the lower end of the cord, and being insulated by means of a silken thread, by which it was fastened to a post. A heavy cloud, appa rently charged with lightning, passed over the kite ; but no signs of electricity were witnessed in the apparatus. Frank- lin was beginning to despair, when he saw the loose fibres bristling from the hempen cord. He immediately presented his knuckle to the key, and received the electrical spark. Overcome by his feelings at the consummation of this great discovery, "he heaved a deep sigh, and, conscious of an im- mortal name, felt that he could have been content, had that moment been his last." How easily it might have been his last was shown by the fact that when Professor Richman, a few months afterwards, was repeating this experiment at St AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 255 Petersburg, a globe of fire flashed from the conducting rod o his forehead, and killed him on the spot. Brilliant as Dr Franklin's discoveries in electricity were, and much as he advanced the science by his sagacious exper- iments and unwearied investigations, a rich harvest of further discoveries was left by him to the succeeding age. The most extraordinary of these is the discovery of a modification of electricity, which bears the name of the philosopher by whom it was made known to the world. I refer, of course, to galvanism. Lewis Galvani was an anatomist, in Bologna. On a table in his study lay some frogs, which had been pre- pared tor a broth for his wife, who was ill. An electrical machine stood on the table. A student of Galvani accident- ally touched the nerve on the inside of the leg of one of the frogs, and convulsions immediately took place in the body of the animal. Galvani himself was not present at the mo- ment, but this curious circumstance caught the attention of his wife, a lady of education and talent, who ascribed it to some influence of the electrical machine. She informed her husband of what had happened, and it was his opinion also, that the electrical machine was the origin of the convul- sions. A long-continued and patient course of investigation corrected this error, and established the science of galvanic electricity, nearly as it now exists, and which has proved, in the hands of Sir Humphry Davy and his successors, the agent of the most brilliant and astonishing discoveries. Frogs have been a common article of food in Europe for ages ; but it was only when they were brought into the study of the anatomist, and fell beneath the notice of a sagacious eye, that they became the occasion of this brilliant discovery. In all these examples we see, that, whatever be the first origin of a great discovery or improvement, science and study are requirad to perfect and illustrate it. The want of a knowledge of the principles of science has often led men to waste much time on pursuits which a better acquaintance with those principles would have taught them were hopeless. The patent office, in every country where such an institution exists, contains, perhaps, as many machines which show th 25G IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, want, as the possession, of sound scientific knowledge. Be- sides unsuccessful essays at machinery, holding forth a promise of feasibility, no little ingenuity, and much time and money, have been lavished on a project which seems, in modern times, to supply the place of the philosopher's stone of the alchemists ; I mean, a contrivance for perpetual motion ; a contrivance inconsistent with the law of gravity. A familiar icquaintance with the principles of science is useful, not only to guide the mind to the discovery of what is true and prac- tical, but to protect it from the delusions of an excited imagination, ready to waste itself, in the ardor of youth, enterprise, and conscious ingenuity, on that which the laws of Nature herself have made unattainable. Such are some of the considerations which show the gen- eral utility of scientific education for those engaged in the mechanical arts. Let us now advert to some of the circum- stances which ought, particularly in the United States of America, to encourage the young men of the country to apply themselves earnestly, and, as far as it can be done, systematically, to the attainment of such an education. I. And, first, it is beyond all question, that what are called the mechanical trades of this country are on a much more liberal footing than they are in Europe. This circumstance not only ought to encourage those who pursue them to take an honest pride in improvement, but it makes it their incumbent duty to do so. In almost every country of Europe, various restraints are imposed on the mechanics, which almost amount to slavery. Much censure has been lately thrown on the journeymen printers of Paris, for entering into combinations not to work for their employers, and for breaking up the power presses which were used by the great employing printers. I certainly shall not undertake to justify any acts of illegal violence, and the destruction of property. But, when you consider that no man can be a master printer in France without a license, and that only eighty licenses were granted in Paris, it is by no means wonderful that the jour- neymen, forbidden by law to set up for themselves, and pre- vented by the power presses from getting work from others AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 257 should be disposed, after having carried through one revolu- tion for the government, to undertake another for themselves. Of what consequence is it to a man, forbidden by the law to work for his living, whether Charles X. or Louis Philippe is king ? In England, it is exceedingly difficult for any person to obtain a settlement in any place except that in which he was born, or where he served his apprenticeship. The object of imposing these restrictions is, of course, to enforce on each parish the maintenance of its native poor ; and the resort of mechanics from place to place is permitted only on conditions with which few are able to comply. The consequence is, they are obliged to stay where they were born, where, perhaps, there are already more hands than can find work, and, from the decline of the place, even the established artisans want employment. Chained to such a spot by chance and necessity, the young man feels himself but half free. He is thwarted in his choice of a pursuit for life, and obliged to take up with an employment against his preference, because there is no opening in any other. He is depressed in his own estimation, because he finds himself unprotected in society. The least evil likely to befall him is, that he drags along a discouraged and unproductive existence. He more naturally falls into dissipation and vice, or enlists in the army or navy ; while, by the repetition of this operation, the place of his nativity constantly sinks still further into decay. In other countries, singular institutions exist, imposing oppressive burdens on the mechanical classes. I refer now more particularly to the corporations, guilds, or crafts, as they are called ; that is, to the companies formed by the members of a particular trade. These exist, with great privileges, in every part of Europe : in Germany, there are some features in the institution, as it seems to me, peculiarly oppressive. The different crafts in that country are incorporations, recog- nized by law, governed by usages of great antiquity, with funds to defray the corporate expenses ; and in each consider- able town a house of entertainment is selected, as the house VOL. i. 33 258 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, of call (or harbor, as it is styled*) of each particular craft. No one is allowed to set up as a master workman in any trade, unless he is admitted as a freeman, or member of the craft ; and such is the stationary condition of most parts ol Germany, that, as I understand, no person is admitted as a master workman in any trade, except to supply the place of some one deceased or retired from business. When such a vacancy occurs, all those desirous of being permitted to fill it present a piece of work, which is called their masterpiece, being offered as a test of fitness for the place of a master workman. Nominally, the best workman gets the place ; but you will easily conceive, that, in reality, some kind of favor- itism must generally decide the question. Thus is every man obliged to submit to all the chances of a popular election, whether he shall be allowed to work for his bread ; and that, too, in a country where the people are not permitted to have any agency in choosing their rulers. But the restraints on journeymen in that country are still more oppressive. As soon as the years of apprenticeship have expired, the young mechanic is obliged, in the phrase of the country, to wander, for three years. For this purpose, he is furnished, by the master of the craft in which he has served his apprenticeship, with a duly-authenticated wandering book, with which he goes forth to seek employment. In whatever city he arrives, on presenting himself with this credential at the house of call or harbor of the craft in which he has served his time, he is allowed, gratis, a day's food and a night's lodging. If he wishes to get employment in that place, he is assisted in procuring it. If he does not wish to get employment, or fails in the attempt, he must pursue his wandering ; and this lasts for three years, before he can be any where admitted as a master. I have heard it argued that this system had the advantage of circulating knowledge from place to place, and imparting to the young artisan the fruits of travel and intercourse with the world. But, however beneficial travelling may be, when undertaken by those who * Die Herberge. AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 259 have the character and capacity to profit by it, I cannot but think, that to compel every young man who has just served out his time to leave his home in the manner I have described, must bring his habits and morals into peril, and be regarded rather as a hardship than as an advantage. There is no sanctuary of virtue like home. You will see, from these few hints, the nature of some of the restraints and oppressions to which the mechanical indus- try of Europe is subjected. Wherever governments and corporations thus interfere with private industry, the spring of personal enterprise is broken. Men are depressed with a consciousness of living under control. They cease to feel a responsibility for themselves ; and, encountering obstacles whenever they step from the beaten path, they give up improvement as hopeless. I need not, in the presence of this audience, remark on the total difference of things in America. We are apt to think that the only thing in which we have improved on other countries is our political constitution, whereby we choose our rulers, instead of recognizing their hereditary right. But a much more important difference between us and most foreign countries is wrought into the very texture of our society ; it is that generally pervading freedom from restraint in matters like those I have just speci- fied. In England, it is said that forty days' undisturbed residence in a parish gives a journeyman mechanic a settle- ment, and consequently entitles him, should he need it, to support from the poor rates of that parish. To obviate this effect, the magistrates are on the alert, and instantly expel a 'new comer from their limits, who does not possess means of. giving security, such as few young mechanics command. A duress like this, environing the young man, on his entrance into life, upon every side, and condemning him to imprison- ment for life on the spot where he was born, converts the government of the country, whatever be its name, into a despotism.* * The settlement law of England has been altered of late years, but to what extent I am uninformed, (1850.) 260 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, II. There is another consideration which invites the arti- sans of this country to improve their minds ; it is the vastly wider field which is opened to them as the citizens of a new country, and the proportionate call which exists for labor and enterprise in every department. In the old world, society is full. In every country but England it has long been full. It was in that country not less crowded, till the vast improve- ments in machinery and manufacturing industry were made, which have rendered it, in reference to manufactures and commerce, what ours is still more remarkably in every thing. a new country ; a country of urgent and expansive demand, where new branches of employment are constantly opening, new kinds of talent called for, new arts struck out, and more hands employed in all the old ones. In different parts of our country, the demand is of a different kind, but it is active and stirring every where. It may not be without use to consider the various causes of this enlargement of the field of action in this country. The first and perhaps the main cause is, the great abun- dance of good land which lies open, on the easiest conditions, to every man who wishes to avail himself of it. Land of the first quality can be purchased at the rate of one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre. This circumstance alone acts like a safety valve to the great social steam engine. There can be no very great pressure any where in a com- munity where, by travelling a few hundred miles into the interior, a man can buy land at the rate of an acre for a day's work. This was the first stimulus brought to act upon the population of this country, after the revolutionary war, and it is still operating in full force. The next powerful spring to our industry was felt in the navigating interest. This languished greatly under the old 'confederation, being crushed by foreign competition. The adoption of the constitution breathed the breath of life into it. By the duty on foreign tonnage, and by the confinement of the privilege of an American vessel to an American built ship, our commercial marine sprang into existence almost with the rapidity of magic, and, under a peculiar state of AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 261 things in Europe, appropriated to itself the carrying trade of the world. Shortly after this stimulus was applied to the industry of the Northern and Middle States, the Southern States acquired an equally prolific source of wealth, unexpected and rapid beyond example in its operation, I mean the cultivation of cotton. In 1789, the hope was expressed, by southern members of Congress, that if good seed could be procured, cotton might be raised in the Southern States, where, before that time, and for several years after, not a pound had been raised for exportation. The culture of this beautiful staple was encouraged by a duty of three cents a pound on imported cotton ; but it languished for some time, on account of the difficulty of separating the seed from the fibre. At length, Eli Whitney, of Connecticut, invented the saw-gin ; and so prodigiously has this culture increased, that it is calculated that the cotton crop of last year amounted to one million of bales, of at least three hundred pounds each.* In 1807, the first successful essays were made with steam navigation, but the progress, for a long time, was slow. In 1817, there was not such a thing as a regular line of steam- boats on the western waters. Nearly four hundred f steam- boats now ply those waters, and half as many navigate the waters of the Atlantic coast. The embargo and war of 1812 created the manufactures of the United States. Before that period, nothing was done on a large scale in the way of manufactures. With some fluctua- tions in prosperity, they have succeeded in establishing them- selves on a firm basis. A laboring man can now buy two good shirts, well made, for a dollar. Fifteen years ago, they would have cost him three times that sum. Still more recently, a system of internal improvements has been commenced, which will have the effect, when a little further developed, of crowding within a few years the prog- ress of generations. Already, Lake Champlain from the * The annual crop of cotton now exceeds two million bales, (1850.) f Above eight hundred in 1850. 262 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, north, and Lake Erie from the west, have been connected with Albany. The Delaware and Chesapeake Bays have been united A canal is nearly finished in the upper part of New Jersey, from the Delaware to the Hudson, by which coal is already despatched to our market. Another route is laid out, across the same state, to connect New York by a railroad with Philadelphia. A water communication has been opened, by canals, half way from Philadelphia to Pitts- burg. Considerable progress is made, both on the railroad and the canal, which are to unite Baltimore and Washington with the Ohio River. A canal of sixty miles in length is open, from Cincinnati to Dayton, in the state of Ohio ; and another, of more than three hundred miles in extent, to con- nect Lake Erie with the Ohio, is two thirds completed.* I mention these facts which, though among the most considerable, are by no means all of the same character which might be quoted not merely as being in themselves curious and important ; though this they are in a high degree. My object is, to turn your attention to their natural effect, in keeping up a constant and high demand for labor, art, skill, and talent of all kinds, and their accumulated fruits, that is, capital, and thereby particularly inviting the young to exert themselves strenuously, to take an active, industrious, and honorable part in a community which has such a variety of employments and rewards for all its members. The rising generation beholds before it, not a crowded community, but one where labor, both of body and mind, is in greater request, and bears a higher relative price, than in any other country. When it is said that labor is dear in this country, this is not a mere commercial fact, like those which fill the pages of the price current ; but it is a great moral fact, speaking volumes, as to the state of society, and reminding the American citi- zen, particularly the young man who is beginning life, that he lives in a country where every man carries about with * Most of the works here mentioned as being in progress in 1827, are now (1850) completed, and innumerable others have since been un- dertaken or projected, among them the great system which centres in Boston. AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUITS 263 him the thing in greatest request ; where the labor and skill of the human hands, and every kind of talent and acquisition, possess a relative importance elsewhere unknown ; in other words, where an industrious man is of the greatest conse- quence. These considerations are well calculated to awaken enter- prise, to encourage effort, to support perseverance; and we behold, on every side, that such is their effect. I have al- ready alluded to the astonishing growth of our navigation, after the adoption of the federal constitution. It affords an example, which will bear dwelling upon, of American enter- prise, placed in honorable contrast with that of Europe. In Great Britain, and in other countries of Europe, the India and China trade was, and to a great degree still is, locked up by the monopoly enjoyed by affluent companies, protected and patronized by the state, and clothed, themselves, in some cases, with imperial power. The territories of the British East India Company are computed to embrace a population of one hundred and fifteen millions of souls. The conse- quence of this state of things was, not the activity, but the embarrassment, of the commercial intercourse with the East. Individual enterprise was not awakened. The companies sent out annually their unwieldy vessels, of twelve hundred tons burden, commanded by salaried captains, to carry on the commerce which was secured to them by a government mo- nopoly, and which, it was firmly believed, could not be carried on in any other way. Scarcely was American independence declared, when our moderate-sized merchant vessels, built with economy and navigated with frugality, doubled both the great capes of the world. The north-western coast of America began to be crowded. Not content with visiting old markets, our intelligent ship-masters explored the numer- ous islands of the Indian Archipelago. Vessels from Salem and Boston, of two and three hundred tons, went to ports in those seas that had not been visited by a foreign ship since the days of Alexander the Great. The intercourse between Boston and the Sandwich Islands was uninterrupted. A man would no more have thought of boasting that he had been 264 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, round the world, than that he had been to Liverpool. After Lord Anson and Captain Cook had, by order and at the ex- pense of the British government, made their laborious voyages of discovery and exploration in the Pacific Ocean and on the coast of America, it still remained for a merchant vessel, from Boston, to discover and enter the only considerable river that flows into the Pacific, from Behring's Strait to Cape Horn. Our townsman, Captain Gray, piloted the British admiral Vancouver into the Columbia River, over which the British government now claims jurisdiction, partly on the ground of prior discovery. This is a single instance of the propitious effect, on indi- vidual enterprise, of the condition of things under which we live. But the work is not all done ; it is, in fact, hardly begun. This vast continent is. as yet, nowhere fully stocked almost every where thinly peopled. There are yet mighty regions of it in which the settler's axe has never been heard. These remain, and portions of them will long remain, open for coming generations, a sure preservative against the evils of a redundant population on the seaboard. The older parts of the country, which have been settled by the husbandman, and reclaimed from the state of nature, are now to be settled again by the manufacturer, the engineer, and the mechanic. First settled by a civilized, they are now to be settled by a dense, population. Settled by the hard labor of the human hands, they are now to be settled by the labor-saving arts, by machinery, by the steam engine, and by internal improvements. Hitherto, the work to be done was that which nothing but the tough sinews of the arm of man could accomplish. This work, in most of the old states, and some of the new ones, has been done, and is finished. It was performed under incredible hardships, fearful dangers, with heart-sickening sacrifices, amidst the perils of savage tribes, and of the diseases incident to a soil on which deep forests for a thousand years had been laying their deposit, and which was now, for the first time, opened to the sun. The kind, the intensity, of the labor which has been performed by the men who settled this country, have, I am sure, no parallel AND ENCO ^rtAUEMEJSTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 265 in history. I believe, if a thrifty European farmer from Norfolk, in England, or from Flanders, a vine-dresser from Burgundy, an olive-gardener from Italy, under the influence of no stronger feelings than such as actuate the mass of the stationary population of those countries, were set down in a North American forest with an axe on his shoulder, and told to get his living, that his heart would fail him at the sight. What has been the slow work of two thousand years in Europe, has here been effected in two hundred, unquestion- ably under the moral influence of our political system. We have now, in some parts of the United States, reached a point in our progress, where, to a considerable degree, a new form of society will appear ; in which the wants of a settled coun- try and a comparatively dense population will succeed to those of a thin population, scattered over a soil as yet but partially reclaimed. We shall henceforth feel more and more the want of improved means of communication. We must, in every direction, have turnpike roads, unobstructed rivers, canals, railroads, and steamboats. The mineral treasures of the earth metals, coals, ochres, fine clay, limestone, gyp- sum, salt are to be brought to light, and applied to the purposes of the arts and the service of man. Another im- mense capital which Nature has invested for us, in the form of water power, (a natural capital, which I take to be fully equal to the steam capital of Great Britain,) is to be turned to account, by being made to give motion to machinery. Still another vast capital, lying unproductive, in the form of land, is to be realized, and no small part of it, for the first time, by improved cultivation. All the manufactures are to be intro- duced on a large scale ; the coarser, where it has not been done, without delay ; and the finer in rapid succession, and in proportion to the acquisition of skill, the accumulation of capital, and the improvement of machinery. With these will grow up, or increase, the demand for various institutions for education ; the call for every species of intellectual service ; the need for every kind of professional assistance, a demand rendered still more urgent by a political organization, of itself VOL. i. 34 266 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, in the highest degree favorable to the creation and diffusion of energy throughout the mass of the people. These are so many considerations which call on the rising generation of those destined for the active and mechanical arts to improve their minds. It is only in this manner that they can effectually ascertain the true bent of their own faculties ; and, having ascertained it, employ themselves \vith greatest success in the way for which Providence has fitted them. It is only in this manner that they can make them- selves highly respected in society, and secure to themselves the largest share of those blessings which are the common objects of desire. In most of the countries of the older world, the greatest part of the prizes of life are literally distributed by the lottery of birth. Men are born to wealth, in many cases inalienable ; to power, from which they cannot, without a convulsion of the body politic, be removed ; or to poverty and depression, from which, generally speaking, they cannot emerge. Here, it rarely happens, that, even for a single generation, an independence can be enjoyed, without labor and diligence bestowed on its acquisition and preserva- tion ; while, as a general rule, the place to which each indi- vidual shall rise in society is precisely graduated on the scale of capacity and exertion, in a word, of merit. Every thing, therefore, that shows the magnitude and growth of the country, its abundance and variety of resources, its increasing demand for all the arts, both of ornament and utility, is another reason, calling upon the emulous young men of the working classes to enter into the career of improvement, where there is the fullest scope for generous competition, and every talent of every kind is sure to be required and rewarded. There is another reflection which ought not to be omitted. The rapid growth and swift prosperity of the country have their peculiar attendant evils, in addition to those inseparable from humanity. To resist the progress of these evils, to pro- vide, seasonably and efficaciously, the remedy for those dis- orders of the social system to which it may be more particu- larly exposed, is a duty to be performed by the enlightened AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 267 and virtuous portion of the mass of the community, quite equal, in importance, to any other duty which they are calltd to discharge. In Europe, it is too much the case that the virtuous influences, which operate on the working classes, come down from the privileged orders, while the operatives, as they are called, are abandoned to most of the vices of the most prolific source of vice ignorance. It is of the utmost importance, in this country, that the active walks of life should be filled by an enlightened class of men. with a view to the security and order of society, and to protect it from those evils which have been thought, in Europe, to be insep- arable from the great increase of the laboring population. What is done in other 'countries by gens d'armes and horse- guards, must here be done by public sentiment, or not at all. An enlightened moral public sentiment must spread its wings over our dwellings, and plant a watchman at our doors. It is perfectly well known to all who hear me, that, as a class, the mechanic and manufacturing population of Europe is re- garded as grossly depraved ; while the agricultural population, with as little exception, is set down as incurably stupid. This conviction was so prevalent, that many persons of discernment and forecast were opposed to the introduction of manufactures among us, partly on the ground that factories are, in their nature, seminaries of vice and immorality. Thus far, this fear has been most happily relieved by experience ; and it is found that those establishments are as little open to reproach, on the score of morals, as any other in the commu- nity. Our mechanic and agricultural population will, in this part of the country, support the comparison, for general intel- ligence and morality, with any in the world. This state of things, if it can be rendered permanent, is a great social triumph, and will be to America a juster subject of self-grat- ulation, than any thing belonging merely to the political or material growth of the community. It deserves the consid- eration of every patriot, that the surest way of perpetuating and diffusing this most enviable state of things, this most desirable of all the advantages which we can have over the old world, is, to multiply the means of improving the 268 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, mind, and put them within the reach of all classes. An in- telligent class can scarce ever be, as a class, vicious; never, as a class, indolent. The excited mental activity operates as a counterpoise to the stimulus of sense and appetite. The new world of ideas; the new views of the relations of things ; the astonishing secrets of the physical properties and mechan- ical powers disclosed to the well-informed mind, present attractions which, unless the character is deeply sunk, are sufficient to counterbalance the taste for frivolous or corrupt pleasures ; and thus, in the end, a standard of character is created in the community, which, though it does not invaria- bly save each individual, protects the virtue of the mass. III. I am thus brought to the last consideration, which I shall mention as an encouragement to the mechanic classes to improve their minds ; and that is, the comparatively higher rank in the political system which they possess in this coun- try. One of the great causes, no doubt, of the enterprise and vigor which have already distinguished our countrymen in almost every pursuit, is the absence of those distinctions which are independent of personal merit and popular choice. It is the strongest motive that we can suggest for unremitted diligence in the acquisition of useful knowledge, on the part of the laborious classes, that they have a far more responsible duty to discharge to society than ever devolved on the same class in any other community. Every book of travels, not less than every opportunity of personal observation, informs us of the deplorable ignorance of a great part of those by whom the work of the community is done in foreign coun- tries. In some parts of England this class is more enlight- ened than it is on the continent of Europe ; and in that country great efforts are making at the present time and particularly through the instrumentality of institutions like that under the auspices of which we are now assembled to extend the means of education to those who have hitherto been deprived of them. But it is a party question among them, not how far it is right and proper, but how far it is prudent and safe, to enlighten the people ; and while one party in England is urgent for the diffusion of useful knowl- AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 269 edge, to prevent the people from breaking out into violence and revolution, the opposite party exclaims against a further diffusion of knowledge, as tending to make the people dis- contented with their condition. I remember to have seen, not long since, a charre to the grand jury by an English judge, in which the practice of boxing is commended, and the fear is expressed that popular education has been pushed too far ! The man who should in this country express the opinion that the education of the people foreboded ill to the state, would merely be regarded as wanting common judgment and sagacity. We are not only accustomed to that state of things to which the higher orders in Europe look forward as the fearful result of bloody revolutions, but we regard it as oiu great blessing and privilege. The representative system and our statute of distributions are considered by us not as horrors consequent upon a convulsion of society, but as the natural condition of the body politic. This condition of the country, however, is not to be looked upon merely as a topic of lofty political declamation. Its best effects are, and must be, those which are not immediately of a political character. If the mass of the people behold no privileged class, placed invidiously above them ; if they choose those who make and administer the laws ; if the ex- tent of public expenditure be determined by those who bear its burden, this, surely, is well ; but if the mass of the people here were what it is in most parts of Europe, it may be doubted whether such a system would riot be too good for them. Who would like to trust his life and fortune to a. Neapolitan jury ? Under the reign of Napoleon, an attempt was made to introduce the trial by jury, not only into France, but into some of the dependent kingdoms. It has been stated, that when the peasants of some of these countries were em- panelled in the jury-box, they not only considered it an excessively onerous and irksome duty, but showed them- selves utterly incapable of discharging it with sufficient dis- cretion and intelligence. The great use, then, to be made of popular rights should 270 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, be popular improvement. Let the young man who is to gain his living by his labor and skill, remember that he is a citizen of a free state ; that on him and his contemporaries it greatly depends whether he will be prosperous himself in his social condition, and whether a precious inheritance of social blessings shall descend unimpaired to those who come after him ; that there is no important difference in the situation of individuals but that which they themselves cause or permit to exist ; that if something of the inequality in the goods of fortune which is inseparable from human things exist in this country, it ought to be viewed only as another excitement to that industry, by which, nine times out of ten, wealth is acquired, and still more to that cultivation of the mind, which, next to the moral character, makes the great differ- ence between man and man. The means of education are already ample and accessible ; and it is in the power of the majority of the people by a tax, of which the smallest pro- portion falls on themselves, to increase these means to any desirable extent. These remarks apply with equal force to almost every indi- vidual. There are some considerations which address them- selves more exclusively to the ardent mind, emulous of the praise of distinguished excellence. Such cannot realize too soon that we live in an age of improvement ; an age in which investigation is active and successful in every quarter ; and in which what has been effected, however wonderful, is but the brilliant promise of what may further be done. The important discoveries which have been made in almost every department of human pursuit, speculative and practi- cal, within less than a century, are almost infinite. To speak only of those which minister most directly to the convenience of man, what changes have not been already wrought in the condition of society ! what addition has not been made to the wealth of nations and the means of private comfort by the inventions, discoveries, and improve- ments of the last hundred years ! High in importance among these are the increased facilities for transportation. By the use of the locomotive steam engine upon railroads, passengers AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 271 and merchandise may now be conveyed from place to place, at the rate of twenty and even thirty miles an hour. Al- though not to be compared with this, the plan of M'Adam is eminently useful, consisting, as it does, of a method by which a surface as hard as a rock can be carried along, over any foundation, at an expense not much greater, and under some circumstances not at all greater, than that of turnpike roads on the old construction. By the chemical process of bleach- ing, what was formerly done by exposure to the sun and air for weeks, is now done under cover in a few days. By the machinery for separating the seed from the staple of cotton, the value of every acre of land devoted to the culture of this most important product has, to say the least, been doubled. By the ma.chinery for carding, spinning, and weaving cotton, the price of a yard of durable cotton cloth has been reduced from half a dollar to a few cents. Lithography and stereo- type printing are destined to have a very important influence in enlarging the sphere of the operations of the press. By the invention of gas lights, an inflammable air, yielding the strongest and purest flame, is extracted in a laboratory, and conducted under ground all over a city, and brought up wher- ever it is required in the street, in the shop, in the dwelling- house. The safety lamp enables the miner to walk unharmed through an atmosphere of explosive gas. And last and chiefest, the application of steam, as a general moving power, is rapidly extending its effect from one branch of industry to another, and bids fair, within no distant period, to produce the most essential changes in the social condition of the world. All these beautiful, surprising, and most useful discoveries and improvements have been made within less than a century ; most of them within less than half that time. What must be the effect of this wonderful multiplication of ingenious and useful discoveries and improvements ? Undoubtedly this, that, in addition to all their immediate beneficial consequences, they will lead to further discoveries and still greater improvements. Of that vast system, which we call Nature, and of which none but its Author can com- prehend the whole, the laws and the properties that have as 272 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, yet been explored unquestionably form but a small portion, connected with a grand succession of parts, yet undiscovered, by an indissoluble although an unseen chain. Each new truth that is found out, besides its own significance and value, is a step to the knowledge of further truth, leading off the inquisitive mind on a new track, and upon some higher path, in the pursuit of which new discoveries are made, and the old are brought into new and unexpected connections. The history of human science is a collection of facts, which, while it proves the connection with each other of truths and arts, at first view remote and disconnected, encour- ages us to scrutinize every department of knowledge, how- ever trite and familiar it may seem, with a view to discovering its relation with the laws and properties of nature compre- hended within it, but not yet disclosed. The individual who first noticed the attractive power of magnetic substances was gratified, no doubt, with observing a singular and inexplicable property of matter, which he may have applied to some experiments rather curious than useful. The man, who afterwards observed the tendency of a magnetized body towards the poles of the earth, unfolded a far more curious and important law of nature, but one which, resting there, was productive of no practical consequences. Then came the sagacious individual, who, attaching the artificial magnet to a traversing card, contrived the means of steering a vessel, in the darkest night, across the high seas. By him we can- not suppose that the important consequences of his discovery were wholly unperceived ; but since, in point of history, near two centuries passed away before they were extensively developed, we can hardly suppose that the inventor of the mariner's compass caught more than a glimpse of the nature of his invention. The Chinese are supposed to have been acquainted with it, as also with the art of printing, from time immemorial, without having derived from either any of those results which have changed the aspect of modern Europe. Then came Columbus. Guided by the faithful pilot, which watches when the eye of man droops, the patient little steersman, which darkness does not blind, nor the storm AXU ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 273 drive from its post, Columbus discovered a new world a glorious discovery, as he no doubt felt it to be, both in anticipation and achievement. But it does not appear that even Columbus formed any thing but a wild vision of the consequences of his discovery a vision fulfilled in his own poverty and chains, and in the corruption and degeneracy of the Spanish monarchy. And yet, from his discovery of America, so disastrous to himself and country, have sprung, directly or indirectly, most of the great changes of the polit- ical, commercial, and social condition of man in modern times. It is curious also to reflect, that as the Chinese, from time immemorial, (as has just been remarked,) have possessed the mariner's compass and the art of printing, to little pur- pose, so they, or some people in their neighborhood on the north-eastern coast of Asia, either with the aid of the com- pass, or merely by coasting from island to island, appear to have made the discovery of America on the western side of the continent, ages before it was discovered by Columbus on the eastern side, without, however, deriving from this dis- covery any beneficial consequences to the old world or the new. It was left for the spirit of civilization, awakened in Western Europe towards the close of the fifteenth century, to develop and put in action the great elements of power and light latent in this discovery. Its first effect was the establishment of the colonial system, which, with the revolution in the financial state of Europe, occasioned by the opening of the American mines, gave, eventually, a new aspect to both hemispheres. What the sum total of all these consequences has been, may be partly judged from the fact that the colonization of the United States is but one of them. The further extension of adven- tures of discovery was facilitated by new scientific inventions and improvements. The telescope was contrived ; and, from the movements of the heavenly bodies, more accurately observed, tables of longitude were constructed, which gave new confidence to the navigator. He now visits new shores, lying in different climates, whose productions, transplanted to other regions, or introduced into the commerce of the world; VOL. i. 35 274 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, give new springs to industry, open new sources of wealth; and lead to the cultivation of new arts. It is unnecessary to dwell on particulars ; but who can estimate the full effect on social affairs of such products as sugar, coffee, tea, rice, tobacco, the potato, cotton, indigo, the spices, the dye-woods, the mineral and fossil substances, newly made to enter into general use and consumption ; the discovery, transportation, and preparation of which are so many unforeseen effects of former discoveries ? Each of these, directly or indirectly, furnished new materials for the mind to act upon ; new excitement to its energies. Navigation, already extended, receives new facilities from the use of the chronometer. The growing wealth of the community increases the demand for all the fabrics of industry ; the wonderful machinery for carding, spinning, and weaving, is contrived ; water and vapor are made to do the work of human hands, arid almost of human intellect : as the cost of the fabric decreases, the demand for it multiplies, geometrically, and furnishes an ever- growing reward for the exertions of the ever-active spirit of improvement. Thus a mechanical invention may lead to a geographical discovery ; a physical cause, to a political or an intellectual effect. A discovery results in an art ; an art produces a comfort ; a comfort, made cheaply accessible, adds family on family to the population ; and a family is a new creation of thinking, reasoning, inventing, and discovering beings. Thus, instead of arriving at the end, we are at the beginning of the series, and ready to start, with recruited numbers, on the great and beneficent career of useful knowl- edge. What, then, are these great and beneficial -discoveries, in their origin ? What is the process which has led to them ? They are the work of rational man, operating upon the ma- terials existing in nature, aj d observing the laws and proper- ties of the physical world. The Creator of the universe has furnished us the material : it is all around us, above us, and beneath us ; in the ground under our feet ; the air we breathe ; the waters of the ocean, and of the fountains of the earth ; in the various subjects of the kingdoms of nature. We AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 275 cannot open our eyes, nor stretch out our hands, nor take a step, but we see, and handle, and tread upon, the things from which the most wonderful and useful discoveries and inven- tions have been deduced. What is gunpowder, which has changed the character of modern warfare ? It is the mechan- ical mixture of some of the most common and least costly substances. What is the art of printing ? A contrivance less curious, as a piece of mechanism, than a musical box. What is the steam engine ? An apparatus for applying the vapor of boiling water. What is vaccination ? A trifling ail, communicated by a scratch of the lancet, and capable of protecting human life against one of the most dreadful mala- dies to which it is exposed. And are the properties of matter all discovered ? its laws all found out ? the uses to which they may be applied all detected ? I cannot believe it. We cannot doubt that truths, now unknown, are in reserve, to reward the patience and the labors of future lovers of truth, which will go as far beyond the brilliant discoveries of the last generation as these do beyond all that was known to the ancient world. The pages are infinite, in that great volume which was written by the hand divine ; and they are to be gradually turned, perused, and announced, to benefited and grateful generations, by genius and patience ; especially by patience ; by untiring, enthusiastic, self-devoting patience. The progress which has been made in art and science is, indeed, vast. We are ready to think a pause must follow ; that the goal must be at hand. But there is no goal ; and there can be no pause ; for art and science are, in themselves, progressive and infinite. They are moving powers, animated principles ; they are instinct with life ; they are themselves the intellectual life of man. Nothing can arrest them which does not plunge the entire order of society into barbarism. There is no end to truth, no bound to its discovery and application ; and a man might as well think to build a tower, from the top of which he could grasp Sirius in his hand, as prescribe a limit to discovery and invention. Never do we more evince our arrogant ignorance than when 276 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, we boast our knowledge. True Science is modest ; for hei keen, sagacious eye discerns that there are deep, undeveloped mysteries, where the vain sciolist sees all plain. We call this an age of improvement, as it is. But the Italians, in the age of Leo X., and with great reason, said the same of their age ; the Romans, in the time of Cicero, the same of tneirs ; the Greeks, in the time of Pericles, the same of theirs ; and the Assyrians and Egyptians, in the flourishing periods of their ancient monarchies, no doubt, the same of theirs. In passing from one of these periods to another, prodigious strides are often made ; and the vanity of the present age is apt to flatter itself that it has climbed to the very summit of invention and skill. A wiser posterity at length finds out that the discovery of one truth, the investigation of one law of nature, the contrivance of one machine, the perfection of one art, instead of narrowing, has widened the field of knowledge still to be acquired, and given to those who came after an ampler space, more numerous data, better instruments, a higher point of observation, and the encouragement of living and acting in the presence of a more intelligent age. It is not a century since the number of fixed stars was estimated at about three thousand. Newton had counted no more. When Dr Her- schel had completed his great telescope, and turned it to the heavens, he calculated that two hundred and fifty thousand stars passed through its field in a quarter of an hour ! It may not irreverently be conjectured to be the harmoni- ous plan of the universe, that its two grand elements of mind and matter should be accurately adjusted to each other ; that there should be full occupation, in the physical world, in its laws and properties, and in the moral and social relations connected with it, for the contemplative and active powers of every created intellect. The imperfection of human in- stitutions has, as far as man is concerned, disturbed the pure harmony of this great system. On the one hand, much truth, discoverable even at the present stage of human im- provement, as we have every reason to think, remains un- discovered. On the other hand, thousands and millions of rational minds, for want of education, opportunity, and encour- AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 277 agement, have remained dormant and inactive, though sur- rounded on every side by those qualities of things, whose action and combination, no doubt, still conceal the sublimest and most beneficial mysteries. But a portion of the intellect which has been placed on this goodly theatre, is wisely, intently, and successfully ac- tive; ripening, even on earth, into no mean similitude of higher natures. From time to time, a chosen hand, some- times directed by what is called chance, but more commonly guided by reflection, experiment, and research, teaches, as it were, a spring, until then unperceived; and, through what seemed a blank and impenetrable wall, the barrier to all far- ther progress, a door is thrown open, into some before unex- plored hall in the sacred temple of truth. The multitude rushes in, and wonders that the portals could have remained concealed so long. When a brilliant discovery or invention is proclaimed, men are astonished to think how long they have lived on its confines, without penetrating its nature. It is now a hundred years since it was found out that the vapor of boiling water is, as we now think it, the most power- ful mechanical agent within the control of man. And yet, even after the contrivance of the steam engine, on a most improved construction, and although the thoughts of numer- ous ingenious mechanicians were turned to the subject, and various experiments made, it was left for our fellow-citizen, Fulton, in a successful application of this agent, as brilliant as its first discovery, to produce another engine, the steam- boat, of incalculable utility and power. The entire con- sequences of this discovery cannot yet be predicted: but there is one prediction relative to it, and that among the first ever made, which has been most calamitously fulfilled. When the interests of Mr Fulton, under the laws of New York, were maintained by Mr Emmet, at the bar of the legis- lature of that state, at the close of his argument, he turned to his client, in an affecting apostrophe ; and, after commend- ing the disinterestedness with which he devoted his time, talents, and knowledge to enterprises and works of public utility, to the injury of his private fortunes, he added, "Let 278 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, me remind you, however, that you have other and closer ties. I know the pain I am about to give, and I see the tears I make you shed. But by that love, I speak, by that love which, like the light of heaven, is refracted in rays of dif- ferent strength upon your wife and children, which, when collected and combined, forms the sunshine of your soul ; by that love I do adjure you, provide in time for those dear- est objects of your care. Think not I would instil into your mind a mean or sordid feeling ; but now that wealth is pass- ing through your hands, let me entreat you to hoard it, while you have it." And then, after sketching the dangers which threatened his interests, as guarantied by the laws of the state, Mr Emmet prophetically added, " Yes, my friend, my heart bleeds while I utter it ; but I have fearful forebodings that you may hereafter find in public faith a broken staff for your support, and receive from public gratitude a broken heart for your reward." From the time this prediction was uttered, the stupendous consequences of the invention of Fulton have been every .day more and more amply devel- oped. It has brought into convenient* neighborhood with each other some of the remotest settlements on the waters of the United States. It has made the Mississippi navigable up stream as well as down, (which it hardly was before,) in- credibly accelerating, in time of peace, the settlement of its mighty valley, and making it henceforth safe from attack in time of war. It has added, beyond all estimate, to the value of the time, and to the amount of the capital, of a large por- tion of the population of the country ; and, without impair- ing the importance of these benefits to America, has as sig- nally imparted them, or similar benefits, to Europe, and the rest of the civilized world. While these grand developments of Fulton's invention have been taking place, the life, the estate, the family of the great inventor have, one after an- other, been sacrificed and crushed. Within a few months after the eloquent appeal just recited was made, Fulton actu- ally died of disease contracted by exposure in the gratuitous service of the public. In a few years, a decision of the Su- preme Court of the United States scattered the remains of AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 279 his property to the winds ; and twice or thrice, since that period, has an appeal been made to Congress, on behalf of his orphan children, for such a provision as would spare them from the alternative of charity or starvation, and it has been made in vain.* But it is time to return to the facts with which I was illus- trating the wonderful advances made from time to time in the cultivation or application of the most familiar arts. As far back as human history runs, the use of the distaff and loom is known ; but it is not yet one hundred years since Sir Richard Arkwright was born the poor journeyman barber, the youngest of thirteen children, who began and perfected the most important improvements in the machinery for manufacturing cotton ; which (as has been stated on the most respectable English authority) "bore the English nation triumphantly through the wars of the French revolu- tion," and are unquestionably of greater value to her than all her colonies, from Hindostan to Labrador. The ocean which lies between America and Europe may be crossed in a fortnight; but after the fleets of Tyre, of Carthage, of Rome, and of the maritime powers of the middle ages, had been for thousands of years accustomed to navigate the sea, it was reserved for a poor Genoese pilot, begging his way from court to court, to discover a new world, and by the simple process of sailing on one course as long as he had water to float his ship. Our geographical knowledge shows us that we do not, like so many generations of our predecessors, live within the reach of other undiscovered continents ; but we do unques- tionably live, act, and speculate within the reach of properties and powers of things, whose discovery and application (when they take place) will effect changes in society as great as those produced by the magnet, the discovery of America, the art of printing, or the steamboat. We do doubtless live * At the time this passage was pronounced, before the Columbian Insti- tute, in the hall of the House of Representatives, an application in favor of the family of Fulton was before Congress, on the report of a committee, of which the author was a member 280 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE, within the reach of undiscovered worlds of science, art, and improvement. No royal permission is requisite to launch forth on the broad sea of discovery that surrounds us. most full of novelty where most explored; and it may yet be reserved for the modest and secluded lover of truth and votary of science, in the solitude of his humble researches, or the in- telligent mechanic, in the discharge of his daily labors, to lay open such laws of matter as will affect the condition of the civilized world. This, then, is the encouragement we have to engage in any well-conceived enterprise for the diffusion of useful knowledge and the extension of general improvement. Wherever there is a human mind possessed of the common faculties, and placed in a body organized with the common senses, there is an active, intelligent being, competent, with proper cultivation, to the discovery of the highest truths in the natural, the social, and the political world. It is suscep- tible of demonstration, if demonstration were necessary, that the number of useful and distinguished men which are to benefit and adorn society around us will be exactly propor- tioned, upon the whole, to the means and encouragements to improvement existing in the community ; and every thing which multiplies these means and encouragements tends, in the same proportion, to the multiplication of inventions and discoveries useful and honorable to man. The mind, al- though it does not stand in need of high culture for the attainment of great excellence, does yet stand in need of some culture, and cannot thrive and act without it. When it is once awakened and inspired with a consciousness of its own powers, and nourished into vigor by the intercourse of kindred minds, either through books or living converse, it does not disdain, but it needs not, further extraneous aid. It ceases to be a pupil; it sets up for itself; it becomes a master of truth, and goes fearlessly onward, sounding its way, through the darkest regions of investigation. But it is almost indispensable that, in some way or other, the elements of truth should be imparted from kindred minds ; and if these are wholly withheld, the intellect which, if properly AND ENCOURAGEMENTS TO ITS PURSUIT. 281 cultivated, might have soared with Newton to the boundaries of the comet's orbit, is chained down to the wants and imper- fections of mere physical life, unconscious of its own capaci- ties, and unable to fulfil its higher destiny. Contemplate, at this season of the year,* one of the mag- nificent oak-trees of the forest, covered with thousands and thousands of acorns. There is not one of those acorns that does not carry within itself the germ of a perfect oak, as lofty and as wide-spreading as the parent stock ; the rudiments of a tree, that would strike its roots in the soil, and lift its branches towards the heavens, and brave the storms of three or four hundred winters. It needs for this but a handful of soil to receive the acorn as it falls, a little moisture to nour- ish it, and protection from violence till the root is struck. It needs but these ; and these it does need, and these it must have ; and for want of them, trifling as they seem, there is not one out of a thousand of those innumerable acorns which is destined to become a tree. Look abroad through the cities, the towns, the villages of our beloved country, and think of what materials their popu- lation, in many parts already dense, and every where rapidly growing, is for the most part made up. It is not made up of lifeless enginery, of animated machines, of brute beasts, trained to subdue the earth ; but of rational,- intellectual beings. There is not a mind, of the hundreds of thousands in our community, that is not capable of making large prog- ress in useful knowledge ; and no one can presume to tell or limit the number of those who are gifted with all the talent required for the noblest discoveries. They have naturally all the senses and all the faculties I do not say in as high a degree, but who shall say in no degree ? possessed by New- ton, or Franklin, or Fulton. It is but a little which is wanted to awaken every one of these rrh'nds to the conscious posses- sion and the active exercise of its wonderful powers. But this little, generally speaking, is indispensable. How much more wonderful an instrument is an eye than a telescoj>e ! * The month of November VOL. i. 36 282 IMPORTANCE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE Providence has furnished this eye ; but axt must contribute the telescope, or the wonders of the heavens remain unno- ticed. It is for want of the little that human means must add to the wonderful capacity for improvement born in man, that by far the greatest part of the intellect innate in om race perishes undeveloped and unknown. When an acorn falls upon an unfavorable spot, and decays there, we know the extent of the loss it is that of a tree, like the one from which it fell ; but when the mind of a rational being, for want of culture, is lost to the great ends for which it was created, it is a loss which no one can measure, either for time or for eternity. LECTURE ON THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY.* MAN is by nature an active being. He is made to labor. His whole organization, mental and physical, is that of a hard-working being. Of his mental powers we have no con- ception, but as certain capacities of intellectual action. His corporeal faculties are contrived for the same end, with as- tonishing variety of adaptation. Who can look only at the muscles of the hand, and doubt that man was made to work with the body ? Who can be conscious of judgment, mem- ory, and reflection, and doubt that man was made to act with the mind ? He requires rest, but it is in order to invigorate him for new efforts ; to recruit his exhausted powers. Nature is so ordered, as both to require and encourage man to work. He is created with wants, which cannot be satisfied without labor ; at the same time that ample provision is made by Providence to satisfy them with labor. The plant springs up and grows, on the spot where the seed was cast by acci- dent. It is fed by the moisture which saturates the earth, or is held suspended in the air; and it brings with it a sufficient covering to protect its delicate internal structure. It toils not, neither doth it spin, for clothing or food. But man is so cre- ated, that, let his wants be as simple as they will, he must labor to supply them. If, as is supposed to have been the case in primitive ages, he lives upon acorns and water, he must draw the water from the spring ; and in many places, he must dig a well in the soil ; and he must gather the acorns from beneath the oak, and lay up a store of them for winter. * Delivered before the Charlostown Lyceum, October, 1830. (283) 284 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. He must, in most climates, contrive himself some kind of clothing, of barks or skins ; must construct some rude shelter ; prepare some kind of bed, and keep up a fire. In short, it is well known that those tribes of our race which are the least advanced in civilization, and whose wants are the fewest, have to labor the hardest for their support ; but at the same time, it is equally true that in the most civilized countries, by far the greatest amount and variety of work are done ; so that the improvement which takes place in the condition of man consists, not in diminishing the amount of labor per- formed, but in enabling men to work more, or more efficiently, in the same time. A horde of savages will pass a week in the most laborious kinds of hunting ; following the chase day after day ; their women, if in company with them, carrying their tents and their infant children on their backs ; and all be worn down by fatigue and famine ; and in the end, they will perhaps kill a buffalo. The same number of civilized men and women would probably, on an average, have kept more steadily at work in their various trades and occupations, but with much less exhaustion, and the products of their in- dustry would have been vastly greater ; or, what is the same thing, much more work would have been done. It is true, as man rises in improvement, he would be ena- bled, by his arts and machinery, to satisfy the primary wants of life with less labor ; and this may be thought to show, at first glance, that man was not intended to be a working being ; because, in proportion as he advances in improvement, less work would be required to get a mere livelihood. But here we see a curious provision of nature. In proportion as our bare natural wants are satisfied, artificial wants, or civilized wants, show themselves. And, in the very highest state of improvement, it requires as constant an exertion to satisfy the new wants, which grow out of the habits and tastes of civil- ized life, as it requires, in savage life, to satisfy hunger and thirst, and keep from freezing. In other words, the innate desire of improving our condition keeps us all in a state of want. We cannot be so well off that we do not feel obliged to work, either to insure the continuance of what we now THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY 285 have, or to increase it. The man whose honest industry just gives him a competence, exerts himself that he may have something against a rainy day ; and how often do we hear an affectionate father say he is determined to spare no pains, to work in season and out of season, in order that his chil- dren may enjoy advantages denied to himself! In this way it is pretty plain that man, whether viewed in his primitive and savage state, or in a highly improved condi- tion, is a working being. It is his destiny, the law of his nature, to labor. He is made for it, and he cannot live with- out it; and the apostle Paul summed up the matter, with equal correctness and point, when he said, that " if any would not work, neither should he eat." It is a good test of principles, like these, to bring them to the standard of general approbation or disapprobation. There are, in all countries, too many persons who, from mistaken ideas of the nature of happiness, or other less reputable causes, pass their time in idleness or in indolent pleasures. But I believe no state of society ever existed in which the energy and capacity of labor were not commended and ad- mired, or in which a taste for indolent pleasure was com- mended or admired, by the intelligent part of the community. When we read the lives of distinguished men, in any depart- ment, we find them almost always celebrated for the amount of labor they could perform. Demosthenes, Julius Csesar, Henry the Fourth of France, Lord Bacon, Sir Isaac Newton, Franklin, Washington, Napoleon, different as they were in their intellectual and moral qualities, were all renowned as hard workers. We read how many days they could support the fatigues of a march ; how early they rose, how late they watched ; how many hours they spent in the field, in the cabinet, in the court, in the study ; how many secretaries they kept employed ; in short, how hard they worked. But who ever heard of its being said of a man, in commendation, that he could sleep fifteen hours out of the twenty-four ; that he could eat six meals a day ; and that he was never weary of his easy-chair ? It would be curious to estimate, by any safe standard, the 286 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. amount in value of the work of all kinds performed in a community. This, of course, cannot be done with any great accuracy. The pursuits of men are so various, and the dif- ferent kinds of labor are so different in the value of their products, that it is scarcely possible to bring the aggregate to any scale of calculation. But we may form a kind of general judgment of the value of the labor of a community, if we look about us. All the improvements which we behold on the face of the earth ; all the buildings of every kind in town and country ; all the vehicles employed on the land and water; the roads, the canals, the wharfs, the bridges; all the property of all kinds which is accumulated through- out the world ; and all that is consumed, from day to day and from hour to hour, to support those who live upon it, all this is the product of labor; and a proportionate share is the product of the labor of each generation. It is plain that this comprehensive view is one that would admit of being carried out into an infinity of details, which would fur- nish the materials rather for a volume than a lecture. But as it is the taste of the present day to bring every thing down to the standard of figures, I will suggest a calculation which will enable us to judge of the value of the labor performed in the community in which we live. Take the population of Massachusetts, for the sake of round numbers, at six hundred thousand souls.* I presume it will not be thought extravagant to assume that one in six performs, every day, a good day's work, or its equivalent. If we allow nothing for the labor of five out of six, (and /this certainly will cover the cases of those too young and too old to do any work, or who can do only a part of a day's work,) and if we also allow nothing ex- tra for those whose time is worth more than that of the day laborer, we may safely assume that the sixth person performs, daily, a vigorous, efficient day's work of body or mind, by hand or with tools, or partly with each, and that this day's work is worth one dollar. This will give us one hundred thousand dollars a day as the value of the work done in the * In 1830 ; at present, above eight hundred thousand. THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. 287 slate of Massachusetts. I have no doubt that it is much more ; for this would be very little more than it costs the population to support itself, and would allow scarce any thing for accumulation, which is constantly taking place to a great extent. It will, however, show sufficiently the great amount of the labor done in this state, to take it as coming up, at least, to one hundred thousand dollars per day. It appears, then, first, that man is, by his nature, a working being ; and, secondly, that the daily value of his work, esti- mated merely in money, is immensely great, in any civilized community. I have made these preliminary remarks, as an introduction to some observations which I propose to submit, in the re- mainder of this lecture, on the subject of " a workingmen's party." Towards the organization of such a party, steps have been taken, in various parts of the country. It is probable that a great diversity of views exists among those who have occupied themselves upon the subject, in different places. This circumstance, and the novelty of the subject in some of its aspects, and its importance in all, have led me to think that we might pass an hour profitably in considering it. I will observe, in the first place, then, that if, as I have endeavored to show, man is, by nature, a working being, it would follow that a workingmen's party is founded in the very principles of our nature. Most parties may be considered as artificial, in their very essence ; many are local, temporary, and personal. What will all our political parties be, a hun- dred years hence ? What are they now, in nine tenths of the habitable globe ? Mere nonentities. But the workingmen's party, however organized, is one that must subsist in every civilized country, to the end of time. In other words, its fi.'st principles are laid in our nature. The next question that presents itself is, What is the gen- eral object of a workingmen's party ? I do not now mean, what are the immediate steps which such a party proposes to take ; but, what are the main object and end which it would secure. To this, I suppose, I may safely answer, that it is not to carry this or that political election ; not to elevate this 288 THE WORKWOMEN'S PAR1T. or that candidate for office ; but to promote the prosperity and welfare of workingmen ; that is, to obtain for every man disposed to work the greatest freedom in the choice of his pursuit, the greatest encouragement and aid in pursuing it, the greatest security in enjoying its fruits ; in other words, to make work, in the greatest possible degree, produce happiness. The next inquiry seems to be, Who belong to the working- men's party ? The general answer here is obvious : All who do the work, or are actually willing and desirous to do it, and prevented only by absolute inability, such as sickness or natural infirmity. Let us try the correctness of this view, by seeing whom it would exclude and whom it would include. This rule, in the first place, would exclude all bad men ; that is, those who may work, indeed, but who work for immoral and unlawful ends. This is a very important dis- tinction ; and, if practically applied and vigorously enforced, it would make the workingmen's party the purest that ever existed since the time of the primitive Christians. It is greatly to be feared, that scarce any of the parties that divide the community are sufficiently jealous on this point ; and for the natural reason, that it does not lie in the very nature of those parties. Thus, at the polls, the vote of one man is as good as the vote of another. The vote of the drunkard counts one ; the vote of the temperate man counts but one. For this reason, the mere party politician, if he can secure the vote, is apt not to be very inquisitive about the temper- ance of the voter. He may even prefer the intemperate to the temperate ; for, to persuade the temperate man to vote with him, he must give him a good reason ; the other will do it for a good drink. But the true principles of the workingmen's party require not merely that a man should work, but that he should work in an honest way, and for a lawful object. The man who makes forged money probably works harder than the honest engraver who prepares the notes for those authorized by law to issue them. But the former would be repelled with scorn, if he presented himself as a member of the workingmen's party. The man who passes his life, and gains a wretched, THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. 289 precarious subsistence, by midnight trespasses on his neigh- bor's grounds ; by stealing horses from the stall, and wood from the pile ; by wrenching bars and bolts at night, or pick- ing pockets in a crowd, probably works harder (taking uncer- tainty and anxiety into the calculation, and adding, as the usual consequence, a term of years in the compulsory service of the state) than the average of men pursuing honest indus- try, even of the most laborious kind ; but this hard work would not entitle him to be regarded as a member of the workingmen's party. If it be inquired who is to be the judge what kind of work is not only no title, but an absolute disqualification, for ad- mission to the workingmen's party, on the score of dishonesty, we answer, that, for all practical purposes, this must be left to the law of the land. It is true, that, under cover and within the pale of the law, a man may do things morally dishonest, and such as ought to shut him out of the party. But it is dangerous to institute an inquisition into the motives of indi- viduals ; arid so long as a man does nothing which the law forbids, in a country where the people make the laws, he ought, if not otherwise disqualified, to be admitted as a member of the party. The next question regards idlers. If we exclude from the workingmen's party all dishonest and immoral workers, what are we to say to the case of the idlers ? In general terms, the answer to this question is plain : They, too, must be excluded. With what pretence of reason can an idler ask to be admitted into the association of workingmen, unless he is willing to qualify himself, by going to work ? and then he ceases to be an idler. In fact, the man who idles away his time acts against the law of his nature, as a working being. It must be observed, however, that there are few cases where a man is merely an idler. In almost every case, he must be some- thing worse, such as a spendthrift, a gamester, or an intem- perate person ; a bad son, a bad husband, and a bad father. If there are any persons dependent on him for support, if he idles away the time which he ought to devote to maintaining his wife and his children, or his aged parents, he then becomes VOL. i. 37 290 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. a robber ; a man that steals the bread out of the mouths of his own family, and rends the clothes off their backs. He is as much more criminal than the common highway robber who takes the stranger's purse on the turnpike road, as the ties of duty to our parents and children are beyond those of common justice between man and man. But I suppose it would not require much argument to show that the person who leaves to want those whom he ought to support, even if he does not pass his idle hours in any criminal pursuit, has no right to call himself a workingman. There is a third class of men, whose case deserves consid- eration, and who are commonly called busybodies. They are as different from real workingmen as light is from dark- ness. They cannot be called idlers, for they are never at rest ; nor yet workers, for they pursue no honest, creditable employment. So long as they are merely busybodies, and are prompted in their officious, fluttering, unproductive activ- ity by no bad motive and no malignant passion, they cannot, perhaps, be excluded from the party, though they have really no claim to be admitted into it. But here, too, the case of a mere busybody scarce ever occurs. This character is almost always something more a dangerous gossip ; a tattling mis- chief-maker ; a propagator, too frequently an inventor, of slan- der. He repeats at one fireside, with additions, what he had heard at another under the implied obligation of confidence ; he often takes the lead in uneasy and inconsiderate move- ments, safely intrenched behind his neighbor, whom he pushes into trouble. He is very fond of writing anonymous libels in the newspapers on men of whom he knows nothing. Such men and there are too many of them ought to be excluded from the party. Shutting out, then, all who work dishonestly and all who do net work at all, and admitting the busybodies with great caution, the workingmen's party comprehends all those by whom the work of the community is really done ; all those who, by any kind of honest industry, employ the talent which their Creator has given them. All these form one party, one great, comprehensive society, and this by the very law of our THE WORKINGMEN'S PAATY. 291 nature. Man is not only, as I observed in the beginning, a working being, but he is a being formed to work in society ; and if the matter be carefully analyzed, it will be found that civilization that is, the bringing men out of a savage into a cultivated state consists in multiplying the number of pursuits and occupations ; so that the most perfect society is one where the largest number of persons are prosperously employed in the greatest variety of ways. In such a society men help each other, instead of standing in each other's way. The further this division of labor is carried, the more persons must unite harmoniously to effect the common ends. The larger the number on which each depends, the larger the number to which each is useful. This union of different kinds of workmen in one harmo- nious society seems to be laid in the very structure and organization of man. Man is a being consisting of a body and a soul. These words are soon uttered, and they are so often uttered that the mighty truth which is embraced in them scarce ever engages our attention. But man is com- posed of body and soul. What is body ? It is material sub- stance ; it is clay, dust, ashes. Look at it, as you tread it, unorganized, beneath your feet ; contemplate it when, after having been organized and animated, it returns, by a process of corruption, to its original' state. Matter, in its appearance to us, is an unorganized, inanimate, cold, dull, and barren thing. What it is in its essence, no one but the Being who created it knows. The human mind can conceive of it but in a negative way. What is the soul ? Its essence is as little known to us as that of the body ; but its qualities are angelic, divine. It is the soul which thinks, reasons, invents, remembers, hopes, and loves. It is the soul which lives ; for when the soul departs from the body, all its vital powers cease, and it is dead : and what is the body then ? Now, the fact to which I wish to call your attention is, that these two elements, one of which is akin to the dust on which we tread, and the other of which is of the nature of angelic, and even of divine intelligence, are in every human being, without exception, brought into a most intimate union. 292 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. We can conceive that it might have been different. We believe in the existence of incorporeal beings of a nature higher than man ; and we behold beneath us, in brutes, plants, and stones, various orders of material nature, rising one above another in organization ; but none of them (as we suppose) possessing mind. We can imagine a world so con- stituted that all the intellect would have been by itself, pure and disembodied ; and all the material substance by itself, unmixed with mind ; and acted upon by mind, as inferior beings are supposed to be acted upon by angels. But in con- stituting our race, it pleased the Creator to bring the two elements into the closest union ; to take the body from the dust, the soul from the highest heaven, and mould them into one being. The consequence is, that the humblest laborer, who works with his hands, possesses within him a soul, endowed with precisely the same faculties as those which, in Franklin, in Newton, or Shakspeare, have been the light and the wonder of the world. On the other hand, the most gifted and ethe- real genius, whose mind has fathomed the depths of the heav- ens, and comprehended the whole circle of truth, is enclosed in a body, subject to the same passions, infirmities, and wants as the man whose life knows no alternation, but labor and rest, appetite and indulgence. Did it stop here, it would be merely an astonishing fact in the constitution of our natures. But it does not stop here. In consequence of the union of the two principles in the hu- man nature, every act that a man performs requires the agency both of body and mind. His mind cannot see, but through the optic eye-glass; nor hear, till the drum of his ear is af- fected by the vibrations of the air. If he would speak, he puts in action the complex machinery of the vocal organs ; if he writes, he employs the muscular system of the hands ; nor can he satisfactorily perform the operations of thought, except in a healthy state of the body. A fit of the tooth- ache, proceeding from the irritation of a nerve about as big as a cambric thread, is enough to drive an understanding capable of instructing the world, to the verge of insanity. On the THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. 293 other hand, there is no operation of manual labor so simple, so mechanical, which does not require the exercise of percep- tion, reflection, memory, and judgment ; the same intellectual powers by which the highest truths of science have been discovered and illustrated. The degree to which any particular action (or series of actions united into a pursuit) shall exeroise the intellectual powers, on the one hand, or the mechanical powers, on the other, of course depends on the nature of that action. The peasant, whose life, from childhood to the grave, is passed in the field ; the New Zealander, who goes to war when he is hungry, devours his prisoners, and leads a life of cannibal debauch till he has consumed them all, and then goes to war again ; the Greenlander, who warms himself with the frag- ments of wrecks and drift-wood thrown upon the glaciers, and feeds himself with blubber, seem all to lead lives requir- ing but little intellectual action ; and yet, as I have remarked, a careful reflection would show that there is not one, even of them, who does not, every moment of his life, call into exer- cise, though in an humble degree, all the powers of the mind. In like manner, the philosopher, who shuts himself up in his cell, and leads a contemplative existence among books or in- struments of science, seems to have no occasion to employ, in their ordinary exercise, many of the capacities of his nature for physical action ; although he also, as I have observed, cannot act, or even think, but with the aid of his body. The same Creator who made man a mixed being, com- posed of body and soul, having designed him for such a world as that in which we live, has so constituted the world, and man who inhabits it, as to afford scope for great variety of occupations, pursuits, and conditions, arising from the tastes, characters, habits, virtues, and even vices, of men and com- munities. Though all men are alike composed of body and soul, yet no two men, probably, are exactly the same in re- spect to either ; and provision has been made, by the Author of our being, for an infinity of pursuits and employments, calling out, in degrees as various, the peculiar powers of both principles. 294 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. But I have already endeavored to show, that there is no pursuit, and no action, that does not require the united opera- tion of both ; and this of itself is a broad, natural founda- tion for the union into one interest of all in the same commu- nity, who are employed in honest work of any kind ; namely, that however various their occupations, they are all working with the same instiuments the organs of the body and the powers of the mind. But we may go a step farther, to remark the beautiful pro- cess by which Providence has so interlaced and wrought up together the pursuits, interests, and wants, of our nature, that the philosopher, whose home seems less on earth than among the stars, requires, for the prosecution of his studies, the aid of numerous artificers in various branches of mechanical industry ; and, in return, furnishes the most important facili- ties to the humblest branches of manual labor. Let us take, as a single instance, that of astronomical science. It may be safely said, that the wonderful discoveries of modern astron- omy, and the philosophical system depending upon them, could not have existed, but for the telescope. The want of the telescope kept astronomical science in its infancy, among the ancients. Although Pythagoras, one of the earliest Greek philosophers, is supposed to have had some conception of the elements of the Copernican system, yet we find no general and practical improvement resulting from it. In fact, it sunk beneath the false theories of subsequent philosophers. It was only from the period of the discoveries made by the telescope that the science advanced with sure and rapid progress. Now, the astronomer does not make telescopes. I presume it would be impossible for a person, who employed in the abstract study of astronomical science time enough to comprehend its profound investigations, to learn and practise the trade of making glass. It is not less true, that those em- ployed in making the glass could not, in the nature of things, be expected to acquire the scientific knowledge requisite for carrying on those arduous calculations applied to bring into a system the discoveries made by the magnifying power of the telescope. I might extend the same remark to the other THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. 295 materials of which a telescope consists. It cannot be used to any purpose of nice observation, without being very carefully mounted on a frame of strong metal, which demands the united labors of the mathematical instrument maker and the brass founder. Here, then, in taking but one single step out of the philosopher's observatory, we find he needs an instru- ment, to be produced by the united labors of the mathemati- cal instrument maker, the brass founder, the glass polisher, and the maker of glass, four trades. He must, also, have an astronomical clock ; and it would be easy to count up half a dozen trades, which, directly or indirectly, are connected in making a clock. But let us go back to the object glass of the telescope. A glass factory requires a building and furnaces. The man who makes the glass does not make the building. But the stone and brick mason, the carpenter, and the blacksmith must fur- nish the greater part of the labor and skill required to construct the building. When it is built, a large quantity of fuel, wood and wood coal or mineral coal, of various kinds, or all together, must be provided ; and then the materials of which the glass is made, and with which it is colored, some of which are furnished by commerce from different and distant regions, and must be brought in ships across the sea. We cannot take up any one of these trades without immediately finding that it connects itself with numerous others. Take, for instance, the mason who builds the furnace. He does not make his own bricks, nor burn his own lime ; in common cases, the bricks come from one place, the lime from another, the sand from another. The brick-maker does not cut down his own wood ; it is carted or brought in boats to his brick- yard. The man who carts it does not make his own wagon ; nor does the person who brings it in boats build his own boat. The man who makes the wagon does not make its tire. The blacksmith who makes the tire does not smelt the ore ; and the forgeman who smelts the ore does not build his own fur- nace, (and there we get back to the point whence we started,) nor dig his own mine. The man who digs the mine does not make the pickaxe with which he digs it, nor the 296 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. pump with which he keeps out the water. The man who makes the pump did not discover the principle of atmospheric pressure, which led to pump making ; that was done by a mathematican at Florence, (Torricelli,) experimenting in his chamber on a glass tube. And here we come back again to our glass ; and to an instance of the close connection of sci- entific research with practical art. It is plain that this enu- meration might be pursued, till every art and every science were shown to run into every other. No one can doubt this who will go over the subject in his own mind, beginning with any one of the processes of mining and working metals, of ship-building and navigation, and the other branches of art and industry pursued in civilized communities. If, then, on the one hand, the astronomer depends for his telescope on the ultimate product of so many arts, in return, his observations are the basis of an astronomical system, and of calculations of the movements of the heavenly bodies, which furnish the mariner with his best guide across the ocean. The prudent shipmaster would no more think of sailing for India without his Practical Navigator, than he would without his compass ; and this Navigator contains ta- bles drawn from the highest walks of astronomical science. Every first mate of a vessel, who works a lunar observation to ascertain the ship's longitude, employs tables, in which the most wonderful discoveries and calculations of Newton, La Place, and Bowditch are interwoven. I mention this as but one of the cases in which astronomi- cal science promotes the service and convenience of common life ; and perhaps, when we consider the degree to which the modern extension of navigation connects itself with industry, in all its branches, this may be thought sufficient. I will only add, that the cheap convenience of an almanac, which enters into the comforts of every fireside in the country, could not be enjoyed, but for the labors and studies of the profound- est philosophers. Not that great learning or talent is now required to execute the astronomical calculations of an alma- nac, although no inconsiderable share of each is needed for this purpose ; but because, even to perform these calculations THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. 297 requires the aid of tables, which have been gradually formed on the basis of the profoundest investigations of the long line of philosophers who have devoted themselves to this branch of science. For, as we observed on the mechanical side of the illustration, it is not one trade alone which is required to furnish the philosopher with his instrument, but a great vari- ety ; so, on the other hand, it is not the philosopher, in one department, who creates a science out of nothing. The ob- serving astronomer furnishes materials to the calculating astronomer, and the calculator derives methods from the pure mathematician ; and a long succession of each, for ages, must unite their labors in a great result. Without the geometry of the Greeks and the algebra of the Arabs, the analysis of Newton and Leibnitz might never have been invented. Examples and illustrations equally instructive might be found in every other branch of industry. The man who will go into a cotton mill, and contemplate it, from the great water wheel that gives the first movement, (and still more, from the steam engine, should that be the moving power,) who will observe the parts of the machinery, and the various processes of the fabric, till he reaches the hydraulic press, with which it is made into a bale, and the canal or railroad by which it is sent to market, may find every branch of trade and every department of science literally crossed, intertwined, inter- woven with every other, like the woof and the warp of the article manufactured. Not a little of the spinning machinery is constructed on principles drawn from the demonstrations of transcendental mathematics ; and the processes of bleach- ing and dyeing, now practised, are the results of the most profound researches of modern chemistry. And if this does not satisfy the inquirer, let him trace the cotton to the planta- tion where it grew, in Georgia or Alabama ; the indigo to Ben- gal ; the oil to the olive gardens of Italy, or the fishing-grounds of the Pacific Ocean : let him consider Whitney's cotton gin, Whittemore's carding machine, the power loom, and the spin- ning apparatus, and all the arts, trades, and sciences, directly or indirectly connected with these, and I believe he will soon agree that one might start from a yard of coarse printed VOL. i. 38 298 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. cotton, which costs ten cents, and prove out of it, as out of a text, that every art and science under heaven had been con- cerned in its fabric. I ought here to allude also to some of those pursuits which require the ability to exercise, at the same time, on the par of the same individual, the faculties both of the intellectua* and physical nature, or which unite very high and low de- grees of mental power. I have no doubt that the talent for di awing and painting, possessed by some men to such an ad- mirable degree, depends partly on a peculiar organic structure of the eye, and of the muscles of the hand, which gives them their more delicate perceptions of color, and their greater skill in delineation. These, no doubt, are possessed by many individuals who want the intellectual talent, the poetic fire, required for a great painter. On the other hand, I can con- ceive of a man's possessing the invention and imagination of a painter, without the eye and the hand required to embody on the canvas the ideas and images in his mind. When the two unite, they make a Raphael or a Titian ; a Wilkie or an Allston. An accomplished statuary must, on the one hand, possess a soul filled with all grand and lovely images, and have a living conception of ideal beauty ; and on th other hand, he must be a good stonecutter, and able to take a hammer and a chisel in his hand, and go to work on a block of marble, and chip it down to the lip of Apollo or the eye- lid of Venus. The architect must be practically acquainted with all the materials of building wood, brick, mortar, and stone ; he must have the courage and skill to plant his moles against the heaving ocean, and to hang his ponderous domes and gigantic arches in the air ; while he must have taste to combine the rough and scattered blocks of the quarry into beautiful and majestic structures, and discern clearly, in his mind's eye, before a sledge has been lifted, the elevation and proportions of the temple. The poet must know, with a schoolmaster's precision, the weight of every word, and what vowel follows most smoothly on what consonant ; at the same time that his soul must be stored with images, feelings, and thoughts, beyond the power of the boldest and most glowing THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. 299 language to do more than faintly shadow out. The surgeon must at once have a mind naturally gifted, and diligently trained, to penetrate the dark recesses of organic life ; and a nerve and tact which will enable him to guide his knife among veins and arteries, out of sight, in the living body of an agonizing, shrieking fellow-creature ; or to take a lancet in his left hand, and cut into the apple of the eye. The lawyer must be able to reason from the noblest principles of human duty, and the most generous feelings of human nature ; he must fully comprehend the mighty maze of the social relations ; he must carry about with him a stock of learning almost boundless ; he must be a sort of god to men and com- munities, who look up to him in the hour of the dearest peril of their lives and fortunes ; and he must, at the same time, be conversant with a tissue of the most senseless fictions and arbitrary technicalities that ever disgraced a liberal science. The merchant must be able to look, at the same moment, at the markets and exchanges of distant countries and other hemispheres, and combine considerations of the political con- dition, the natural wants, the tastes and habits, of different parts of the world ; and he must be expert at figures, under- stand book-keeping by double entry, and know as well how to take care of a quarter chest of tea as a cargo of specie. The general-in-chief must be capable of calculating, for a twelvemonth in advance, the result of a contest in which all the power, resource, and spirit of two great empires enter and struggle, on land and by sea ; and he must have an eye that can tell at a glance, and on the responsibility of his life, how the stone walls, and trenched meadows, the barns, and the woods, and the cross-roads of a neighborhood, will favor or resist the motions of a hundred thousand men, scattered over a space of five miles, in the fury of the advance, the storm of battle, the agony of flight, covered with smoke, dust, and blood. It was my intention to subject the art of printing to an analysis of the trades, arts, and sciences connected with it ; but 1 have not time to do it full justice, and the bare general idea need not be repeated. 1 will only say, that 300 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. beginning with the invention which bears, in popular tradition, the name of Cadmus, I mean the invention of alphabetical signs, to express sounds, and proceeding to the discovery of convenient materials for writing, and the idea of written discourse ; thence to the preparation of man- uscript books ; and thence to the fabric, on a large scale, of linen and cotton paper, the invention of movable types and the printing press, the art of engraving on metal, of stereotype printing, and of the power press, we have a series of dis- coveries, branching out into others, in every department of human pursuit ; connecting the highest philosophical princi- ples with the results of mere manual labor, and producing, in the end, that system of diffusing and multiplying the expres- sion of thought, which is, perhaps, the glory of our human nature. Pliny said that the Egyptian reed was the support on which the immortal fame of man rests. He referred to its use in the manufacture of paper. We may, with greater justice, say as much of the manufacture of paper from rags, and of the printing press, neither of which was known to Pliny. But, with all the splendor of modern discoveries and improvements in science and art, I cannot but think that he, who, in the morning of the world, first conceived the idea of representing sounds by visible signs, took the most impor- tant step in the march of improvement. This sublime con- ception was struck out in the infancy of mankind. The name of its author, his native country, and the time when he lived, are known only by very uncertain tradition ; but, though all the intelligence of ancient and modern times, and in the most improved countries, has been concentred into a focus, burning and blazing upon this one spot, it has never been able to reduce it to any simpler elements, nor to im- prove, in the slightest degree, upon the original suggestion of Cadmus. In what I have thus far submitted to you, you will proba- bly have remarked that I have illustrated chiefly the connec- tion with each other of the various branches of science and art ; of the intellectual and physical principles. I have not listinctly shown the connection of the moral principle, in all THE WORKINGMEN'S PAKTY. 301 its great branches, with both. This subject would well form the matter of a separate essay. But its elementary ideas are few and plain. The arts and sciences, whose connection we have pointed out, it is plain, require for their cultivation a "vilized state of society. They cannot thrive in a commu- nity which is not in a state of regular political organization, under an orderly system of government, uniform administra- tion of laws, and a general observance of the dictates of public and social morality. Further, such a community cannot exist without institutions of various kinds for elemen- tary, professional, and moral education ; and, connected with these, are required the services of a large class of individuals, employed, in various ways, in the business of instruction ; from the meritorious schoolmistress, who teaches the little child its ABC, to the moralist, who lays down the great principles of social duty for men and nations, and the minis- ter of divine truth, who inculcates those sanctions by which God himself enforces the laws of reason. There must also be a class of men, competent, by their ability, education, and experience, to engage in the duty of making and administer- ing the law ; for, in a lawless society, it is impossible that any improvement should be permanent ; and there must be another class, skilled to afford relief to the sick, and thus pro- tect our frail natures from the power of the numerous foes that assail them. It needs no words to show that all these pursuits are, in reality, connected with the ordinary work of society, as directly as the mechanical trades by which it is carried on. For instance, nothing would so seriously impair the prosperity of a community as an unsound and uncertain administration of justice. This is the last and most fatal symptom of decline in a state. A community can bear a very considerable degree of political despotism, if justice is duly administered between man and man. But, where a man has no security that tho law will protect him in the enjoyment of his property ; where he cannot promise himself a righteous judgment, in the event of a controversy with his neighbor ; where he is not sure, when he lies down at night, that his slumbers are safe, there 302 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. he loses the great motives to industry and probity ; credit is shaken, enterprise disheartened, and the state declines. The profession, therefore, which is devoted to the administration of justice, renders a service to every citizen of the community, as important as to those whose immediate affairs require the aid of legal counsel. In a very improved and civilized community, there are also numerous individuals, who, without being employed in any of the common branches of industry or of professional pur- suit, connect themselves, nevertheless, with the prosperity and happiness of the public, and fill a useful and honorable place in its service. Take, for instance, a man like Sir Walter Scott, who, probably, never did a day's work in his life, in the ordinary acceptation of the term, and who has, for some years, retired from the subordinate station he filled in the profession of the law, as sheriff of the county and clerk of the court. He has written and published at least two hundred volumes, of wide circulation. What a vast amount of the industry of the community is thereby put in motion ! The booksellers, printers, paper makers, press makers, type makers, bookbinders, leather dressers, ink makers, and various other artisans required to print, publish, and circulate, the hundreds and thousands of volumes of the different works which he has written, must be almost numberless. I have not the least doubt, that, since the series of his publications began, if all, whose industry, directly or remotely, has been concerned in them, not only in Great Britain, but in America, and on the continent of Europe, could be brought together, and stationed side by side, as the inhabitants of the same place, they would form a town of very considerable size. Such a person may fairly be ranked as a workingman. And yet, I take this to be the ieast of Sir Walter Scott's deserts. I have said nothing of the service rendered to every class, and to every individual in every class, by the writer who beguiles of their tediousness the dull hours of life ; who ani- mates the principle of goodness within us by glowing pictures of struggling virtue ; who furnishes our young men and women with books which they may read with interest, and THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. 303 not have their morals poisoned as they read them. Our habits, our principles, our characters, whatever may be our pursuit in life, depend very much on the nature of our youth- ful pleasures, and on the mode in which we learn to pass our leisure hours. And he who, with the blessing of Providence, has been able, by his mental efforts, to present virtue in her strong attractions, and vice in her native deformity, to the rising generation, has rendered a service to the public greater even than his who invented the steam engine or the mariner's compass. I have thus endeavored to show, in a plain manner, that there is a close and cordial union between the various pur- suits and occupations which receive the attention of men* in a civilized community, that they are links of the same chain, every one of which is essential to its strength. It will follow, as a necessary consequence, as the dictate of reason, and as the law of nature, that every man in soci- ety, whatever his pursuit, who devotes himself to it with an honest purpose, and in the fulfilment of the social duty which Providence devolves upon him, is entitled to the good fellow- ship of each and every other member of the community ; that all are the parts of one whole, and that between those parts, as there is but one interest, so there should be but one feeling. Before I close this lecture, permit me to dwell for a short time on the principle which I have had occasion to advance, that the immortal element of our nature the reasoning mind is the inheritance of all our race. As it is this which makes man superior to the beasts that perish, so it is this which, in its moral and intellectual endowments, is the sole foundation for the only distinctions between man and man which have any real value. This reflection shows the im- portance of institutions for education and for the diffusion of knowledge. It was no magic, nor miracle, which made Newton, and Franklin, and Fulton. It was the patient, judi- cious, long-continued cultivation of powers of the under- standing, eminent, no doubt, in degree, but not differing iu 304 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. kind from those which are possessed by every individual in this assembly. Let every one, then, reflect, especially every person not yet past the forming period of his life, that he carries about in his frame, as in a casket, the most glorious thing which, this side heaven, God has been pleased to create an intelligent spirit. To describe its nature, to enumerate its faculties, to set forth what it has done, to estimate what it can do, would require the labor of a life devoted to the history of man. It would be vain, on this occasion and in these limits, to attempt it. But let any one compare his own nature with that of a plant, of a brute beast, of an idiot, of a savage ; and then consider that it is in mind alone, and the degree to which he improves it, that he differs essentially from any' of them. And let no one think he wants opportunity, encourage- ment, or means. I would not undervalue these, any or all of them ; but compared with what the man does for himself, they are of little account. Industry, temperance, and perse- verance are worth more than all the patrons that ever lived in all the Augustan ages. It is these that create patronage and opportunity. The cases of our Franklin and Fulton are too familiar to bear repetition. Consider that of Sir Hum- phry Davy, who died in 1829, and who was, in some de- partments of science, the first philosopher of the age.* He was born at Penzance, in Cornwall, one of the darkest corners of England ; his father was a carver of wooden images for signs, and figure-heads, and chimney-pieces. He himself was apprenticed to an apothecary, and made his first exper- iments in chemistry with his master's phials and gallipots, aided by an old syringe, which had been given him by the surgeon of a French vessel wrecked on the Land's End. From the shop of the apothecary he was transferred to the office of a surgeon ; and never appears to have had any other education than that of a Cornish school in his boyhood. * The sketch of Sir Humphry Davy which follows, to the end of the lecture, is abridged from the article in the Annual Biography for 1830. THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. 305 Such was the beginning of the career of the man who, at the age of twenty-two, was selected by our own countryman, Count Rumford, (himself a self-taught benefactor of man- kind,) to fill the chair of chemistry at the Royal Institution, in London ; such was the origin and education of the man who discovered the metallic basis of the alkalies and the earths ; invented the safety lamp ; and placed himself, in a few years, in the chair of the Royal Society of London, and at the head of the chemists of Europe. Sir Humphry Davy's most brilliant discoveries were effected by his skilful application of the galvanic electricity, a principle whose ex- istence had been detected, a few years before, by an Italian philosopher, from noticing the contractions of a frog's limb ; a fact which shows how near us, in every direction, the most curious facts lie scattered by nature. With an apparatus con- trived by himself to collect and condense this powerful agent, Sir Humphry succeeded in decomposing the earths and the alkalies; and in extracting from common potash the metal (before unknown) which forms its base ; possessing, at seventy degrees of the thermometer, the lustre and general appearance of mercury ; at fifty degrees, the appearance of polished silver and the softness of wax ; so light that it floats on water, and so inflammable that it takes fire when thrown on ice. These are, perhaps, but brilliant novelties ; though con- nected, no doubt, in the great chain of cause and effect, with principles of art and science conducive to the service of man. But the invention of the safety lamp, which enables the miner to walk with safety through an atmosphere of explo- sive gas, arid has already preserved the lives of hundreds of human beings, is a title to glory and the gratitude of his fellow-men which the most renowned destroyer of his race might envy. The counsels of such a man, in his retirement and seasons of meditation, are worth listening to. I am sure you will think I bring this lecture to the best conclusion by repeating a sentence from one of his moral works. VOL.. i 39 306 THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY. " I envy," says he, "no quality of the mind or intellect in others ; not genius, power, wit, nor fancy ; but if I could choose what would be most delightful, and I believe most useful to me, I should prefer A FIRM RELIGIOUS BELIEF to every other blessing." ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE TO WORKINGMEN.* NOTWITHSTANDING the numerous institutions for promoting useful knowledge in our community, it was still found that many were excluded from the benefit of them. The num- ber of persons that can be accommodated in any one hall is, of course, limited ; and it has been thought desirable to make the attempt to provide an additional course of lectures, for the benefit of those who have not had it in their power, for this or any other reason, to obtain access to the other institu- tions which have set so praiseworthy an example in this work of public utility. We are assembled this evening to make the beginning of this new course of popular instruction. The plan of this course of lectures was suggested at so late a period this year, that it may not, perhaps, be possible, the present season, to carry it fully into effect, in such a manner as is wished and designed, in reference to the choice and variety of subjects. It is intended, eventually, that it should extend to the various branches of natural science. It will impart useful information relative to the earth, the air, and the ocean ; the wonders of the heavens ; and the mineral treasures beneath the surface of the globe. It may extend to the different branches of natural history, and acquaint you with the boundless variety of the animated creation. The various properties of bodies will form a prominent subject of consideration, as the basis of so many of the arts and trades, and the sources from which so many of the wants of man * An address delivered as the introduction to the Franklin Lectures in Boston, November 14, 1831. (307) 308 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE are supplied. In like manner, the various natural powerSj the agency of fire, water, steam, and weight, which, in their various combinations, produce the wonders of improved ma- chinery by which industry is facilitated, and the most impor- tant fabrics are furnished cheaply and abundantly, will not be overlooked. It may be supposed that a due share of atten- tion will be paid to the geographical survey of the globe, to the history of our own race, the fortunes of the several nations into which mankind have been divided, and the characters of great and good men, who, long after they have departed from life, survive in the gratitude and admiration of their fellow-men. A general and intelligible view of the constitution and laws of the country in which we have the happiness to live, tending, as it will, to enlighten us in the discharge of our duties as citizens, will no doubt be presented to you by some who will take a part in these lectures. Nor will they, I venture to hope, be brought to a close without having occasionally directed your thoughts to those views of our nature which belong to man as a rational and immortal being, and to those duties and relations which appertain to us as accountable agents. The general plan of these lectures extends to these and all other branches of sound and useful knowledge ; to be treated in such order as circumstances may suggest, and with such variety and selection of subjects, and fulness of detail, as the convenience of the lecturers and the advantage of the audi- ence may dictate. They have been called the Franklin Lectures, in honor of our distinguished townsman, the im- mortal Franklin, the son of a tallow-chandler, and the appren- tice to a printer, in this city ; a man who passed all his early years, and a very considerable portion of his life, in manual industry ; and who was chiefly distinguished by his zealous and successful efforts for the promotion of useful knowledge. His name has given lustre to the highest walks of science, and adorns one of the proudest pages of the his- tory of our country and the world. But we have thought it was still more a name of hope and promise for an institution like this, which aims to promote useful knowledge (the great TO WORKINGMEN. 309 study of his life) among that class from which it was ever his pride himself to have sprung. It would seem, at the commencement of a course of public instruction of this kind, a pertinent inquiry, Why should we endeavor to cultivate and inform our minds, by the pursuit of knowledge ? This question, to which the good sense of every individual furnishes, without meditation, some general reply, demands a full and careful answer. I shall endeavor, in this address, to state some of the reasons which go to furnish such an answer. All men should seek to cultivate and inform their minds, by the pursuit of useful knowledge, as the great means of happiness and usefulness. All other things being equal, the pursuit and attainment of knowledge are, at the time, the surest source of happiness. I do not mean, that knowledge will make up for the want of the necessaries and comforts of life : it will not relieve pain, heal disease, nor bring back lost friends. But if knowledge will not do this, ignorance will do it still less. And it may even be affirmed, and all who have made the experiment themselves will testify to the truth of the remark, that noth- ing tends more to soothe the wounded feelings, to steal away the mind from its troubles, and to fill up the weariness of a sick chamber, than some intelligible, entertaining, good book, read or listened to. But knowledge is still more important, as the means of being useful ; and the best part of the happiness which it pro- cures us is of that purer and higher kind, which flows from the consciousness that, in some way or other, by example or positive service, we have done good to our fellow-men. One of the greatest modern philosophers said that knowledge is power ; but it is power because it is usefulness. It gives men influence over their fellow-men, because it enables its pos- sessors to instruct, to direct, to please, and to serve their fel- low-men. But little of this can be done, without the culti- vation and improvement of the mind. It is the mind which enables us to be useful, even with our bodily powers. What is strength, without knowledge to 310 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE apply it ? What are the curiously organized hands, without skill to direct their motion ? The idiot has commonly all the bodily organs and senses of the most intelligent and useful citizen. It is through mind that man has obtained the mastery of nature and all its elements, and subjected the inferior races of animals to himself. Take an uninformed savage, a bru- talized Hottentot, in short any human being, in whom the divine spark of reason has never been kindled to a name, and place him on the sea-shore in a furious storm, when the waves are rolling in as if the fountains of the deep were broken up. Did you not know, from certain experience, that man, by the cultivation of his mind, and the application of the useful arts, had actually constructed vessels in which he floats securely on the top of these angry waves, you would not think it pos- sible that a being like that we have mentioned could for one moment resist their fury. It is related of some of the North American Indians, a race of men who are trained from their infancy to the total suppression of their emotions of every kind, and who endure the most excruciating torments at the stake without signs of suffering, that when they witnessed for the first time, on the western waters of the United States, the spectacle of a steamer under way, moving along without sails or oars, and spouting fire and smoke, even they could not refrain from exclamations of wonder. Hold out a hand- ful of wheat or Indian corn to a person wholly uninformed of their nature, and ignorant of the mode of cultivating them, and tell him that by scattering these dry kernels abroad, and burying them in the cold, damp earth, you can cause a har- vest to spring up sufficient for a winter's supply of food, and he will think you are mocking him by vain and extravagant tales. But it is not the less true that, in these instances, as in all others, it is the mind of man, possessed of the necessary knowledge and skill, that brings into useful operation, for the supply of human want, and the support and comfort of hu- man life, the properties and treasures of the natural world, the aid of inferior animals, and our own physical powers. When, therefore, we improve our minds by the acquisition TO WORKINGMEN. 311 of useful knowledge, we appropriate to ourselves, and extend to others to whom we may impart our knowledge, a share of this natural control over all other things which Providence has granted to his rational children. It cannot, it is true, be expected to fall to the lot of many individuals, by extending their knowledge of the properties and laws of the natural world, to strike out new discoveries and inventions of the highest importance. It is as much as most men can hope and promise themselves, to be enabled to share the comfort and benefit of the unnumbered improve- ments which, from the beginning of time, have been made by others, and which, taken together, make up the civiliza- tion of man. Still there are examples, in almost every age, of men who, by the happy effects of their individual pursuit of useful knowledge, have conferred great benefits upon all mankind. I presume that, in consequence of three inven- tions, that of the machinery for spinning cotton, that of the power loom, and that of the mode of separating the seed of the cotton plant from the fibrous portion to which it ad- heres, the expense of necessary clothing is diminished twc thirds for every man in Europe and America. In other words*, the useful knowledge imparted to the world by the authors of these inventions, has enabled every man, woman, and child, in the civilized world, as far as clothing is concerned, to live at one third of the former cost. We are struck with aston- ishment when we behold these curious machines ; when we look, for instance, at a watch, and see a few brass wheels, put in motion by a small piece of elastic steel, counting out the hours and minutes, by night and by day, and even enabling the navigator to tell how many miles he has sailed upon the waste ocean, where there are no marks or monuments by which he can measure his progress. But how much more wonderful is the mind of man, which, in the silence of the closet, turned in upon itself, and deeply meditating upon the properties and laws of matter, has contrived this wonderful machine ! The invention of the power loom by Mr Cartwright beau- tifully illustrates the strength and reach of the intellectual 312 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE principle, resolutely applied to a given object. In conse- quence of the introduction of Arkwright's machinery for spinning, it was soon found that there would be a difficulty in weaving all the yarn that could be spun. It was remarked in a company where Mr Cartwright was present, in 1784, that, in order to remedy this evil, Mr Arkwright must exer- cise his ingenuity, and invent a weaving mill, in order to work up the yarn which should be spun in his spinning mills. The subject was discussed ; and it was pronounced by the gentlemen present, who were manufacturers from Manchester, in England, to be impossible. Mr Cartwright thought otherwise ; he said, there had been latefy exhibited, in London, a machine for playing chess ; and he felt quite sure that it could not be more difficult to construct a machine to weave cloth than a machine which could go through all the movements of such a complicated game. Mr Cartwright was a clergyman, forty years old, and had never given his attention to the subject of machinery. This subject, how- ever, was so strongly on his mind, that some time afterwards he resolved to make the attempt to invent a weaving machine. He had not at that time, it appears, ever seen even a common loom. But, reasoning upon the nature of the processes neces- sary to be gone through, to cross the threads in such a way as to make a piece of cloth, he hit upon the plan of a loom, and, with the assistance of a carpenter and blacksmith, he made one. It was a very rude machine. " The warp," says Mr Cartwright, " was laid perpendicularly ; the reed fell with a force of at least half a hundred weight, and the springs which threw the shuttle were strong enough to throw a Con- greve rocket." Besides this, it required the strength of two powerful men to work it, and that at a slow rate, and for a short time. But the principle was there. Mr Cartwright now went and examined the looms of common form, and soon succeeded in constructing one very nearly resembling the power looms which are now in use. In the account of this interesting invention which I am quoting,* it is said that * Library of Entertaining Knowledge, Vol. VIII., second American odition. TO WORKINGMEN. 313 " Dr Cartwright's children still remember often seeing their father, about this time, walking to and fro, apparently in deep meditation, and occasionally throwing his arms from side to side ; on which they used to be told that he was thinking of weaving and throwing the shuttle." Some time after he had brought his first loom to perfection, a manufacturer, who had called upon him to see it at work, after expressing his admi- ration at the ingenuity displayed in it, remarked that, won- derful as Mr Cartwright's mechanical skill was, there was one thing that would effectually baffle him ; and that was the weaving of patterns in checks, or, in other words, the com- bining in the same web of a pattern or fancy figure with the crossing colors that make the check. Mr Cartwright made no reply to this observation at the time ; but some weeks after, on receiving a second visit from the same person, he had the pleasure of showing him a piece of muslin, of the description mentioned, beautifully woven by machinery. The man was so much astonished that he declared that some- thing more than human agency must have been concerned in the fabric.* The wonderful results of the sagacity and perseverance of Fulton, in carrying into effect the conceptions of his mind on the subject of steam navigation, still more nobly illustrate the creative power of the human intellect ; but it is a matter too familiar to need comment. It must not, however, be supposed, from the instances I have chosen to show the amount of good which may be done by the exercise of the mental powers, that it is confined to the material comforts of life to steamboats, looms, or mar- chinery for spinning. Far from it. The true and most peculiar province of its efficacy is the moral condition. Think of the inestimable good conferred on all succeeding generations by the early settlers of America, who first estab- lished the system of public schools, where instruction should * The power loom was applied to the weaving of cotton, in the United States, in 1813, by Messrs Francis C. Lowell and Patrick T. Jackson, aided by Mr Paul Moody, without any acquaintance with the machinery applied to this purpose in England, except by general description. VOL. i. 40 314 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE be furnished gratis to all the children in the community No such thing was before known in the world. There were schools and colleges supported by funds which had been bequeathed by charitable individuals; and, in consequence, most of the common schools of this kind in Europe were regarded as establishments for the poor. So deep-rooted is this idea, that, when I have been applied to for information as to our public schools, from those parts of the United States where no such system exists, I have frequently found it hard to obtain credit, when I have declared that there was nothing disreputable, in the public opinion here, in sending children to schools supported at the public charge. The idea of free schools for the whole people, when it first crossed the minds of our forefathers, was entirely original ; but how much of the prosperity and happiness of their children and posterity has flowed from this living spring of public intelligence ! The same may be said of Sunday schools, which have proved a blessing of inestimable value in Europe and America, and particularly to thousands who are deprived of the advantages of other institutions. It is probable that instruction is now given, in the Sunday schools, to more than a million arid a half of pupils, by more than one hundred and fifty thousand teachers. This plan was the happy suggestion of an humble individual, a printer, who contemplated, at first, nothing but the education of the destitute and friendless children in his immediate neighborhood. After laboring in this noble Held of usefulness for twenty years, and among the class of population most exposed to the temptations to crime, he had the satisfaction of being able to say, that, out of three thou- sand scholars, he had heard of but one who had been sent to jail as a criminal.* Who would not be ashamed to compare * See a very interesting address, at the celebration of the Sunday school jubilee, or the fiftieth year from the institution of Sunday schools by Rob- ert Raikes; delivered at Charleston, South Carolina, September 14, 1831, by Thomas Smith Grimke. I find, however, the following statement in a public print, of the accuracy of which I have no means of judging : " The credit of originating these institutions has usually been given to Mr Raikes, a newspaper proprietor of Gloucester, who died some years TO WORKINGMEN. 315 the pure and happy renown of the man who had extended, by the suggestion of this simple but before untried plan of education, the blessings of instruction to a million and a half of his fellow-creatures, with the false and unmerited glory which has been awarded to conquerors, whose wars have hurried their millions of victims to cruel and untimely death ! This topic might be illustrated, perhaps, still more power- fully, by depicting the evils which flow from ignorance. These are deplorable enough in the case of the individual ; although, if he live surrounded by an intelligent community, the disastrous consequences are limited. But the general ignorance of large numbers and entire classes of men, acting under the unchastened stimulus of the passions, and excited by the various causes of discontent which occur in the prog- ress of human affairs, is often productive of scenes which make humanity shudder. I know not that I could produce a more pertinent illustration of this truth than may be found in the following extract from a foreign journal. It relates to the outrages committed by the peasantry, in a part of Hungary, in consequence of the ravages of the cholera in that region. " The suspicion that the cholera was caused by poisoning the wells was universal among the peasantry of the counties of Zips and Zemplin ; and every one was fully convinced of its truth. The first commotion arose in Kliicknow, where, it is said, some peasants died in consequence of taking the preservatives ; whether by an immoderate use of medicine, or whether they thought they were to take chlorate of lime internally, is not known. This story, with a sudden and violent breaking out of cholera at Kliicknow, led the peasants to a notion of the poisoning of the wells, which spread like ago. It now appears, however, from statements and documents of unques- tionable authenticity, that the plan of the first school of this description, which was established in Gloucester, in 1780, originated with the Rev. Thomas Stock, head master of the cathedral school of that city. Mr Stock, who was in narrow circumstances, communicated the details of his plan to Mr Raikes, when the latter assisted him with his purse ; and having taken a very active and zealous part in promoting the establishment of Sun- day schools, he ultimately obtained all the merit of being their founder. Mr Raikes, who is undoubtedly entitled to much credit for his benevolent exertions in the cause of education, lived to see two hundred and fifty thousand children enrolled in these schools." 316 ADVANTAGE OP KNOWLEDGE lightning. In the sequel, upon the attack of the estate of Count Czaki, a servant of the chief bailiff was on the point of being murdered, when, to save his life, he offered to disclose something important. He said that he received from his master two pounds of poisonous powder, with orders to throw it into the wells ; and, with an axe over his head, took oath publicly in the church to the truth of his statement. These circumstances, and the fact that the peasants, when they forcibly entered the houses of the land- owners, every where found chlorate of lime, which they took for the poison- ous powder, confirmed their suspicions, and drove the people to madness. In this state of excitement, they committed the most appalling excesses. Thus, for instance, when a detachment of thirty soldiers, headed by an ensign, attempted to restore order in Kliicknow, the peasants, who were ten times their number, fell upon them ; the soldiers were released, but the ensign was bound, tortured with scissors and knives, then beheaded, and his head fixed on a pike, as a trophy. A civil officer, in company with the military, was drowned, his carriage broken, and chlorate of lime being found in the carriage, one of the inmates was compelled to eat it, till he vomited blood, which again confirmed the notion of poison. On the attack of the house of the lord, at Kliicknow, the countess saved her life by piteous entreaties ; but the chief bailiff, in whose house chlorate of lime was un- happily found, was killed, together with his son, a little daughter, a clerk, a maid, and two students, who boarded with him. So the bands went from village to village ; wherever a nobleman or a physician was found, death was his lot ; and, in a short time, it was known that the high constable of the county of Zemplin, several counts, nobles, and parish priests, had been murdered. A clergyman was hanged, because he refused to take an oath that he had thrown poison into the well ; the eyes of a countess were put out, and innocent children cut to pieces. Count Czaki, having first ascertained that his family was safe, fled from his estate, at the risk of his life ; but was stopped at Kirchtrauf, pelted with stones, and wounded all over ; torn from his horse, and only saved by a worthy merchant, who fell on him, crying, ' Now I have got the rascal.' He drew the count into a neighboring con- vent, where his wounds were dressed, and a refuge afforded him. His secretary was struck from his horse with an axe, but saved in a similar manner, and, in the evening, conveyed with his master to Leutschau. But enough of these horrible scenes." It is by no means my purpose, on this occasion, to attempt even a sketch of what the judicious exercise of the intel- lectual principle has enabled men to do for the improvement of their fellow-men. Enough, I venture to hope, has been said, to put all who favor me with their attention upon the reflection, that it is only by its improvement that it is possible for a man to render himself useful to man ; and, consequent- ly, that it is in this way alone that he can taste the highest TO WORKINGMEN. 317 and purest pleasure which our natures can enjoy that which proceeds from the consciousness of having been useful to others. But it is time that I should make a few remarks on another subject, which would seem appropriately to belong to this occasion. An idea, I fear, prevails, that truths, such as I have now attempted to illustrate, are obvious enough in themselves, but that they apply only to men of literary education, to profes- sional characters, and persons of fortune and leisure ; and that it is out of the power of the other classes of society, and those who pass most of their time in manual labor and me- chanical industry, to engage in the pursuit of knowledge, with any hope of being useful to themselves and others. This I believe to be a great error. I trust we may regard the meeting of this numerous audience as a satisfactory proof that you consider it an error, and that you are persuaded that it is in your power to enjoy the pleasures and the benefits which flow from the pursuit of useful knowledge. What is it that we wish to improve ? The mind. Is this a thing monopolized by any class of society ? God forbid : it is the heritage with which he has endowed all the children of the great family of man. Is it a treasure belonging to the wealthy ? It is talent bestowed alike on rich and poor, high and low. But this is not all ; mind is, in all men, and in every man, the same active, living, and creative principle ; it is the man himself. One of the renowned philosophers of heathen antiquity beautifully said of the intellectual facul- ties, " I call them not mine, but we." It is these which make the man, which are the man. I do not say that opportuni- ties wealth, leisure, and great advantages for education are nothing ; but I dc say they are much less than is common- ly supposed ; I do say, as a general rule, that the amount of useful knowledge which men acquire, and the good they do with it, are by no means in direct proportion to the degrees to which they have enjoyed what are commonly called the great advantages of life. Wisdom does sometimes, but not most commonly, feed her children with a silver spoon. I 318 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE believe it is perfectly correct to say that a small proportion only of those who have been most distinguished for the improvement of their minds have enjoyed the best advantages for education. I do not mean to detract in the least from the usefulness of the various seminaries for learning which public and private liberality has founded in our country. They serve as places where a large number of persons are prepared for their employment in the various occupations which the public service requires. But, I repeat it, of the great bene- factors of our race, the men who, by wonderful inven- tions, remarkable discoveries, and extraordinary improve- ments, have conferred the most eminent service on their fellow-men, and gained the highest names in history, by far the greater part have been men of humble origin, narrow fortunes, small advantages, and self-taught. And this springs from the nature of the mind of man, which is not like a vessel, to be filled up from without ; into which you may pour a little or pour much, and then measure, as with a gauge, the degrees of knowledge imparted. The knowledge that can be so imparted is the least valuable kind of knowledge ; and the man who has nothing but this may be very learned, but cannot be very wise. We do not invite you to these lectures, as if their object would be attained when you have heard the weekly address. It is to kindle the understanding to the consciousness of its own powers ; tc make it feel within itself that it is a living, spiritual thing ; to feed it, in order that it may itself begin to act and operate, to compare, contrive, invent, improve, and perfect. This is our object ; an object as much within the reach of every man who hears me, as if he had taken a degree in the best college in Christendom. In this great respect, the most important that touches hu- man condition, we are all equal. It is not more true that all men possess the same natural senses and organs, than that their minds are endowed with the same capacities for improve- ment, though not, perhaps, all in the same degree. The con- dition in which they are placed is certainly not a matter of entire indifference. The child of a savage, born in the bosom TO WOKKINGMEN. 319 of a barbarous tribe, is of course shut out from all chance of sharing the improvements of civilized communities. So, in a community like our own, an infant condemned by adverse circumstances to a life of common street beggary, must be considered as wholly out of the reach of all improving influ- ences. But Shakspeare, whose productions have been the wonder and delight of all who speak the English language, for two hundred years, was a runaway youth, the son of a wool-comber, who obtained his living in London by holding horses at the door of the theatre, for those who went to the play ; and Sir Richard Arkwright, who invented the machin- ery for spinning cotton, of which I have already spoken, was the youngest of thirteen children of a poor peasant, and till he was thirty years of age, followed the business of a travel- ling barber. As men bring into the world with them an equal intellectual endowment, that is, minds equally susceptible of improve- ment, so, in a community like this, the means of improvement are much more equally enjoyed than might at first be sup- posed. Whoever has learned to read, possesses the keys of knowledge, and can, whenever he pleases, not only unlock the portals of her temple, but penetrate to the inmost halls and most secret cabinets. A few dollars, the surplus of the earnings of the humblest industry, are sufficient to purchase the use of books which contain the elements of the whole circle of useful knowledge. It may be thought that a considerable portion of the com- munity want time to attend to the cultivation of their minds. But it is only necessary to make the experiment, to find two things ; one, how much useful knowledge can be acquired in a very little time ; and the other, how much time can be ppared by good management, out of the busiest day. Gen- erally speaking, our duties leave us time enough, if our pas- sions would but spare us ; our labors are much less urgent in their calls upon us, than our indolence and our pleasures. There are very few pursuits in life whose duties are so inces- sant, that they do not leave a little time every day, to a man whose temperate and regular habits allow him the comfort of 320 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE a clear head and a cheerful temper, in the intervals of occupa- tion ; and then there is one day in seven which is redeemed to us by our blessed religion from the calls of life, and affords us all time enough for the improvement of our rational and immortal natures. It is a prevalent mistake to suppose that any class of men have much time to spend, or do spend much time, in mere contemplation and study. A small number of literary men may do this ; but the great majority of professional men lawyers, doctors, and ministers, men in public station, rich capitalists, merchants ; men, in short, who are supposed to possess eminent advantages and ample leisure to cultivate their minds are very much occupied with the duties of life, and constantly and actively employed in pursuits quite uncon- genial with the cultivation of the mind and the attainment of useful knowledge. Take the case of an eminent lawyer, in full practice. He passes his days in his office, giving ad- vice to clients, often about the most uninteresting and paltry details of private business, or in arguing over the same kind of business in court ; and when it comes night, and he gets home tired and harassed, instead of sitting down to rest or to read, he has to study out another perplexed cause for the next day ; or go before referees ; or attend a political meeting, and make a speech ; while every moment which can be regarded in any degree as leisure time, is consumed by a. burdensome correspondence. Besides this, he has his family to take care of. It is plain that he has no more leisure for the free and improving cultivation of his mind, independent of his imme- diate profession, than if he had been employed the same number of hours in mechanical or manual labor. One of the most common complaints of professional men, in all the pro- fessions, is, that they have no time to read ; and I have no doubt there are many such, of very respectable standing, who do not, in any branch of knowledge not connected with their immediate professions, read the amount of an octavo volume in the course of a season. There is also a time of leisure, which Providence, in this climate, has secured to almost every man, who has any thing TO WORKINGMEN. 321 which ca.a be called a home ; I mean our long winter even- ings. This season seems provided, as if expressly for the purpose of furnishing those who labor with ample opportunity for the improvement of their minds. The severity of the weather, and the shortness of the days, necessarily limit the portion of time which is devoted to industry out of doors, and there is little to tempt us abroad in search of amusement. Every thing seems to invite us to employ an hour or two of this calm and quiet season, in the acquisition of useful knowl- edge and the cultivation of the mind. The noise of life is hushed ; the pavement ceases to resound with the din of laden wheels and the tread of busy men ; the glaring sun has gone down, and the moon and the stars are left to watch, in the heavens, over the slumbers of the peaceful creation. The mind of man should keep its vigils with them ; and while his body is reposing from the labors of the day, and his feelings are at rest from its excitements, he should seek, in some amusing and instructive page, substantial food for the gener- ous appetite for knowledge. If we needed any encouragement to make these efforts to improve our minds, we might find it in every page of our country's history. Nowhere do we meet with examples more numerous and more brilliant, of men who have risen above poverty, and obscurity, and every disadvantage, to usefulness and an honorable name. Our whole vast continent was added to the geography of the world by the persevering efforts of an humble mariner, the great Columbus, who, by the steady pursuit of the enlightened conception which he had formed of the figure of the earth, before any navigator had acted upon the belief that it was round, effected the great discovery. He was the son of a Genoese pilot, a pilot and seaman himself; and at one period of his melancholy career, was reduced to beg his bread at the doors of the con- vents, in Spain. But he carried within himself, and beneath an humble exterior, a spirit for which there was not room in Spain, in Europe, nor in the then known world. The story of our Franklin cannot be repeated too often the poor Boston boy; the son of an humble tradesman; VOL. I. 41 322 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE brought up a mechanic himself; a stranger at colleges, till they showered their degrees upon him ; who rendered his country the most important services, in establishing her inde- pendence ; enlarged the bounds of philosophy by a new de- partment of science ; and lived to be pronounced by Lord Chatham, in the British House of Peers, an honor to Europe and the age in which he lived. Why should I speak of Greene, who left his blacksmith's furnace to command an army in the revolutionary war the chosen friend of Washington, and next to him, perhaps, the military leader who stood highest in the confidence of his country ? West, the famous painter, was the son of a Quaker in Pennsylvania. He was too poor, at the beginning of his career, to purchase canvas and colors ; and he rose eventually to be the President of the Royal Academy at London. Count Rumford was the son of a farmer at Woburn, Massachusetts ; he never had the advantage of a college education, but used to walk down to Cambridge, to hear the lectures on natural philosophy. He became one of the most eminent philoso- phers in Europe ; founded the Royal Institution in London, and had the merit of bringing forward Sir Humphry Davy, as the lecturer on chemistry, in that establishment. Robert Fulton was a portrait painter in Pennsylvania, without friends or fortune. By his successful labors in perfecting steam nav- igation, he has made himself one of the greatest benefactors of man. Whitney, the son of a Massachusetts farmer, was a machinist. His cotton-gin, according to Judge Johnson, of the Supreme Court of the United States, has trebled the value of all the cotton lands at the south, and has had an incal- culable influence on the agricultural and mechanical industry of the world. Whittemore, of West Cambridge, the person who invented the machinery for the manufacture of cards, possessed no other means of improvement than those which are within the reach of every temperate and industrious man. Several in this audience were probably acquainted with the modest and sterling merit of the late Paul Moody. To the efforts of his self-taught mind, the early prosperity of the TO WORKINGMEN. 323 great manufacturing establishments at Waltham and Lowell is, in no small degree, owing. I believe I may say, with truth, that not one of these individuals enjoyed, at the outset, opportunities for acquiring useful knowledge superior to those in the reach of every one who hears me. These are all departed ; but we have living among us illus- trious instances of men, who, without early advantages, but by the resolute improvement of the few opportunities thrown in their way, have rendered themselves, in like manner, useful to their fellow-men ; the objects of admiration to those who witness their attainments, and of gratitude to those who reap the fruit of their labors. On a late visit to New Haven, I saw exhibited a most pleasing work of art the meeting of Jephthah and his daughter, as described in the Bible. This pathetic scene is beautifully represented in two marble figures of exquisite taste and highly finished execution. They are the work of a self-taught artist, Mr Augur, of New Haven, who began life, I have been informed, as a retailer of liquors. This business he was obliged to give up, under a heavy load of debt. He then turned his attention to carving in wood ; and, by his skill arid thrift in that pursuit, succeeded in paying off the debts of his former establishment, to the amount of several thousand dollars. Thus honorably placed at liberty, he has since de- voted himself to the profession of a sculptor ; and, without education, without funds, without instruction, he has risen at once to extraordinary proficiency in this difficult and beautiful art, and bids fair to enroll his name among the distinguished sculptors of the day.* I scarce know if I may venture to adduce an instance, nearer home, of the most praiseworthy and successful culti- vation of useful knowledge on the part of an individual, without education, busily employed in mechanical industry. I have the pleasure to be acquainted, in one of the neighbor- ing towns, with a person who was brought up to the trade of * See New England Magazine, Vol. I. p. 41,'t 324 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE a leather dresser, and has all his life worked, and still works, at this business.* He has devoted his leisure hours, and a portion of his honorable earnings, to the cultivation of useful and elegant learning. Under the same roof which covers his workshop, he has the most excellent library of English books, for its size-, with which I am acquainted. The books have been selected with a good judgment, which would do credit to the most accomplished scholar, and have been imported from England by himself. What is more important than having the books, their proprietor is well acquainted with their contents. Among them are several volumes of the most costly and magnificent engravings. Connected with his library is an exceedingly interesting series of paintings, in water colors, copies of the principal works of the ancient masters in England, which a fortunate accident placed in his pos- session, and several valuable pictures, purchased by himself. The whole forms a treasure of taste and knowledge, not sur- passed, if equalled, by any thing of its kind in the country. I should leave this part of my address too unjustly defec- tive, did I not add that we possess within our own city an instance of merit, as eminent as it is unobtrusive, in the person of one who has raised himself from the humblest walks of life to the highest scientific reputation. Little, perhaps, is it known to the intelligent mariner, who resorts to his Practical Navigator for the calculations with which he finds his longitude in mid-ocean, that many of them are the original work of one who started at the same low point in life with himself. Still less is it known to him that this was but the commencement of a series of scientific productions, which have placed their author upon an equality with the most distinguished philosophers of Europe, and inscribed the name of Bowditch, with those of Newton and La Place, upon that list of great minds, to which scarcely one is added in a century.f But why should I dwell on particular instances ? Our * Mr Thomas Dowse, of Cambridgeport. t Nathaniel Bowditch, LL. D., died in Boston, March 16, 1838, aged sixty-five. TO WORKINGMEN. 326 whole country is a great and speaking illustration of what may be done by native force of mind, uneducated, without advantages, but starting up, under strong excitement, into new and successful action. The statesmen who conducted the revolution to its honorable issue were called, without experience, to the head of affairs. The generals who com- manded our armies were most of them taken, like Cincin- natus, from the plough ; and the forces which they led were gathered from the firesides of an orderly and peaceful popula- tion. They were arrayed against all the experience, talent, and resource of the elder world, and came off victorious. They have handed down to us a country, a constitution, and a national career, affording boundless scope to every citizen, and calling every individual to do for himself what our fathers unitedly did for us all. What man can start in life, with so few advantages as those with which our country started, in the race of independence ? Over whose private prospects can there hang a cloud as dark as that which brood- ed over the cause of America ? Who can have less to en- courage, and more to terrify and dishearten him. than the sages and chieftains of the revolution ? Let us, then, en- deavor to follow in their steps ; and each, according to his means and ability, try to imitate their glorious example ; despising difficulties, grasping at opportunities, and steadily pursuing some honest and manly aim. We shall soon find that the obstacles which oppose our progress sink into the dust before a firm and resolute step, and that the pleasures and benefits of knowledge are within the reach of all who seek it. There are a few considerations which I beg leave more particularly to address to the younger part of the audience, and which seem to call on them peculiarly, with a loud voice, to exert themselves, according to their opportunities, to store their minds with useful knowledge. The world is advanced to a high point of attainment in science and art. The progress of invention and improve- ment has been, especially of late years, prodigiously rapid ; 326 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE and now, whether we regard the science of nature or of art, of mind or of morals, of contemplation or of practice, it must be confessed that we live in a wonderfully improved period. Where is all this knowledge ? Where does it dwell ? In the minds of the present generation of men. It is, indeed, recorded in books, or embodied in the various works and structures of man. But these are only the manifestations of knowledge. The books are nothing, till they are read and understood ; and then they are only a sort of short-hand, an outline, which the mind fills up. The thing itself, the science, the art, the skill, are in the minds of living men, of that generation which is now upon the stage. That generation will die and pass away. This hour, which we have spent together, has been the last hour to many thou- sands throughout the world. About three thousand of our race have died since I began my lecture. Among them, of course, is a fair proportion of all the learned and the wise in all the nations. In thirty years, all now in active life will be gone or retired from the scene, and a new generation will have succeeded. This mighty process does not take place at once, either throughout the world or in any part of it ; but it is constantly going on, silently, effectually, inevitably ; and all the knowledge, art, and refinement, now in existence, must be either acquired by those who are coming on the stage, or perish with those who are going off, and be lost forever. There is no way by which knowledge can be handed down, but by being learned over again ; and of all the science, art, and skill in the world, so much only will survive, when those who possess it are gone, as shall be acquired by the succeed- ing generation. The rising generation is now called upon to take up this mighty weight ; to carry it along a little way ; and then hand it over, in turn, to their successors. The minds which, in their maturity, are to be the deposi- tories of all this knowledge, are coming into existence, every TO WOEKINGMEN. 327 day and every hour, in every rank and station of life ; all equally endowed with faculties ; all, at the commencement, equally destitute of ideas ; all starting with the ignorance and helplessness of nature ; all invited to run the noble race of improvement. In the cradle there is as little distinction of persons as in the grave. The great lesson which I would teach you is, that it depends, mainly, on each individual, what part he will bear in the accomplishment of this great work. It is to be done by somebody. In a quiet order of things, the stock of useful knowledge is not only preserved, but augmented ; and each generation improves on that which went before. It is true there have been periods in the history of the world when tyranny at home, or invasion from abroad, has so blighted and blasted the condition of society, that knowledge has perished with one generation faster than it could be learned by another ; and whole nations have sunk from a condition of improvement to one of ignorance and barbarity, some- times in a very few years. But no such dreadful catastrophe is now to be feared. Those who come after us will not only equal, but surpass their predecessors. The existing arts will be improved, science will be carried to new heights, and the great heritage of useful knowledge will go down unimpaired and augmented. But it is all to be shared out anew ; and it is for each man to say, what part he will gain in the glorious patrimony. When the rich man is called from the possession of his treasures, he divides them, as he will, among his children and heirs. But an equal Providence deals not so with the living treasures of the mind. There are children just growing up in the bosom of obscurity, in town and in country, who have inherited nothing but poverty and health, who will, in a few years, be striving in generous contention with the great intel- lects of the land. Our system of free schools has opened a straight way from the threshold of every abode, however humble, in the village or in the city, to the high places of usefulness, influence, and honor. And it is left for each, by 328 ADVANTAGE OF KNOWLEDGE the cultivation of every talent ; by watching, with an eagle's eye, for every chance of improvement ; by bounding forward, like a greyhound, at the most distant glimpse of honorable opportunity ; by redeeming time, defying temptation, and scorning sensual pleasure ; to make himself useful, honored, and happy. COLONIZATION AND CIVILIZATION OF AFRICA.* AT the annual meeting of the Colonization Society, on the IrJth of January, 1832, in the hall of the House of Repre- sentatives, at Washington, Mr Mercer, of Virginia, being in the chair, Mr Edward Everett offered the following resolu- tion : Resolved, That the colonization of the coast of Africa is the most effi- cient mode of suppressing the slave trade, and of civilizing the African continent. After submitting the foregoing resolution, Mr Everett ad- dressed the chair as follows : MR CHAIRMAN: In obtruding myself for a short time upon your notice this evening, I perform, in some sense, an official duty. The legislature of the state which I have the honor in part to represent in Congress, adopted, at its session last winter, a res- olution requesting its senators and representatives to lend their efforts in cooperation with the American Colonization Society. This instruction of course referred to official exer- tions on this floor, in another capacity. But I have regarded it also as a motive of an imperative nature, in reference to the objects of this meeting, by which it is proposed to con- centrate and apply the force, of public opinion, in furtherance of the same great design. * Speech before the American Colonization Society. VOL. i. 42 (329) 330 COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. In the part of the country in which I live, the rresence of a colored population, coexisting with the whites, is not felt as an evil. They are few in proportion to the rest of the community. They contain among their numbers many re- spectable and useful persons. At the same time, it is true, as a class, they are depressed to a low point in the social scale. A single fact will illustrate this remark. They form, in Mas- sachusetts, about one seventy-fifth part of the population ; but one sixth of the convicts in our prisons are of this class. Allowing for some exaggeration in this statement, it is still a painful disproportion. What do I infer from it ? Nothing, surely, as to any superior proneness of the colored population, as such, to crime. But I think it proves that as a class they are ignorant and needy ; ignorance and want being the parents of crime. Among the whites, I have no doubt that, of that portion who are born to hopeless want and hopeless ignorance, an inheritance of poverty, temptation, and absence of moral restraint, an equal proportion become the subjects of our penal laws. But though this population is not felt as an evil in New England, we are able to enter into those considerations which have led the venerable Chief Justice of the United States, in the letter just read to us, to speak of it as an evil of momen- tous character to the peace and welfare of the Union. That evil, however, we of the north have been for the most part willing to leave to those whom it more immediately concerns ; some of whom, I trust, speaking under the lights of observa- tion and experience, will favor this meeting with their views on this very important subject. There are, however, aspects of the influence and operations of this society universally interesting to the philanthropist and friend of humanity; prospects of discharging a moral duty of the most imperative character, and of achieving a work of great, comprehensive, and ever-during benevolence. In the resolution which I have had the honor to submit, I have alluded to these views of the operations and effects of the society. It is now somewhat more than half a century since the COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. 331 abolition of the slave trade began to be seriously agitated.* This work, I believe, sir, was begun by your native state if I mistake not, Virginia led the way, before the American revolution, in prohibiting the African slave trade. The acts of her colonial legislature to that effect were disallowed by the British crown a grievance set forth in the Declaration of Independence among the causes of the revolution. In 1776, Mr David Hartley laid upon the table of the House of Commons some of the fetters used in confining the unhappy victims of this traffic on board the slave ships, and moved a resolution, that it was contrary to the laws of God and the rights of man. The public sensibility had been strongly excited, about this time, by the atrocious circumstance that one hundred and thirty-two living slaves had been thrown overboard from a vessel engaged in the trade. In 1787, Mr Wilberforce made his first motion in the House of Commons on this subject. The same year, the constitution of the United States fixed the period for its abolition in the United States, which accordingly took place, by a law passed at the time prescribed 1808. In 1788, the slave trade was abol- ished in Massachusetts. In 1792, Mr Pitt made his great speech in Parliament, which continued from that time for fifteen years a grand arena, where this question was strenu- ously contested by the ablest statesmen of the day. Having carried the point at home, the British government, with praiseworthy zeal, directed its attention to procure from the continental powers an abolition of this guilty traffic. At the congress of Vienna, in 1815, the sovereigns there present, and the states represented, pledged themselves to its suppres- sion ; and at length, after a tedious succession of negotiations and conventions, not very creditable to some of the high parties concerned, on the twenty-third of March, 1830, the prosecution of the slave trade ceased to be lawful for the citizens or subjects of any Christian power in Europe or America. * See, on this subject, the very interesting tract, Judge Tucker's Queries respecting Slavery, with Dr Belknap's Answers, Collections of Mass. Hist Soc. Vol. IV. p. 191, First Series. 332 COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. And now, Mr Chairman, I must state the melancholy fact, that, notwithstanding all these exertions, and the success with which they seemed to be crowned, less has, at any period, been effected, than was hoped for and anticipated. Until the twenty-third of March, 1830, the Brazilians were allowed to carry on the trade south of the equator. There was but little difficulty thrown in the way of a very exten- sive prosecution of it. Slave ships of all countries, pursuing the traffic to every part of the coast, were provided with fabricated papers, to show that they were carrying on the permitted traffic, south of the equator. Dr Walsh, in his interesting work on Brazil, gives a very affecting account of the chase of a slave ship by the British frigate in which he was sailing for Europe. After a keen pursuit of three hun- dred miles, the slave ship was captured. She had taken in five hundred and sixty-two slaves on the coast of Africa, and had been out seventeen days, in which time fifty-five had died ! The wretched crew, over five hundred in number, were liberated from their horrid confinement between decks, and for a short time flattered with the hope of liberty. But on examining the papers of the commander of the ship, although there was the strongest reason to suspect their want of genuineness, there was nothing to prove it ; and it became necessary for the British officers to drive these unhappy beings back to their hold, and surrender them up to the wretch who was dragging them from their native country into perpetual slavery in Brazil. Although the traffic is now denounced and declared illegal or piratical by every Christian government, it is supposed that it is still very extensively carried on. The regulations of the British service forbid the capture of vessels, however appar- ently they are fitted out for the pursuit of this trade, unless they actually have slaves on board. The slave ships conse- quently hover about the coast, which is mostly low, sunken, and indented with numerous branching rivers, taking in their cargo in the night, escaping by one arm of a stream, while another is blockaded by a cruiser, and thus elude capture. In addition to this, the governments of France and America COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. 333 have not yet felt themselves authorized to admit a right of search by foreign cruisers.* These circumstances united, together with the enhanced value of slaves, occasioned by the obstacles thrown in the way of the accustomed pursuit of the slave trade, will, it is to be feared, for some time, have the effect of causing it to be conducted with greater keenness, ferocity, and waste of life. It will be carried on in swift- sailing vessels ; on board of which the wretched victims of the traffic will be more than ever crowded ; and barbarous expedients, in the event of search, will be resorted to, to escape detection. It has already happened that slaves have been enclosed in casks and thrown overboard in a chase, to be picked up when the danger of capture was over, f The want of a vigorous government and of an enlightened public sentiment in the Havana, the general growth of piracy, and the vicinity of Brazil to the coast of Africa, will, it is to be feared, under present circumstances, furnish but too many facilities for carrying on this wicked commerce. It is supposed that nearly one hundred thousand human beings are still annually taken by violence from the coast of Africa, and earned into slavery. If such be the facts of the case, and even with considera- ole allowance for exaggeration, it is plain that the methods * Since the foregoing remarks were made, it has been stated in the pa- cers that, by a recent convention between England and France, the French government has authorized the right of search on the coast of Africa, with a view to the suppression of the slave trade. t Shortly after these remarks were made, the following account appeared in the English papers : " The Fair Rosamond and the Black Joke, tenders to the Dryad frigate, have captured three slave vessels, which had originally eleven hundred slaves on board ; but of which they succeeded in taking only three hundred and six to Sierra Leone. It appears that the Fair Rosamond had captured a lugger with one hundred and sixty Africans, and shortly after saw the Black Joke in chase of two other luggers. She joined in the pursuit; but the vessels succeeded in getting into Bonny River, and landed six hundred slaves before the tenders could take possession of them. They found on board only two hundred, but ascertained that the rascals in command of the slavers had thrown overboard one hundred and eighty slaves, manacled together, of whom only four were picked up." 334 COLONIZATION OF AFKICA. hitherto pursued for the destruction of the slave trade pe- nal denunciation, enforced by armed cruisers have proved, in a high degree, ineffectual. Nor can it be hoped, that it will be found practicable to guard the coast of Africa (an extent all round of eighty degrees of latitude) by any force competent to the suppression of the trade. Another mode, then, must be adopted, or the attainment of the object must be abandoned in despair. Such another mode happily pre- sents itself, of efficacy already proved by experience ; and that is, the establishment of colonies on the African coast. In this way, a cordon is drawn along that continent, which the slave trader cannot penetrate. The experience already had in the British colony of Sierra Leone, and in our own Liberia, abundantly authorizes this conclusion. In reference to Liberia, I take great pleasure in quoting an honorable testimony from a recent British publication, entitled to additional credit, on the score of impartiality, from the source from which it pro- ceeds. After an exceedingly favorable account of the colony, in all its aspects, the writer to whom I allude continues : " Nothing has tended more to suppress the slave trade in this quarter, than the constant intercourse and communication of the natives with these industrious colonists. The American agent, Mr Ashmun, took every opportunity and means in his power to extinguish a traffic so injurious, in every way, to the fair trader." " Wherever the influence of this colony extends, the slave trade has been abandoned by the natives, and the peaceful pursuits of legitimate commerce established in its place." * Wherever a civilized jurisdiction is established on the Af- rican coast, the slave trade is destroyed, not merely by pre- venting and prohibiting the approach of the traders, but by instituting a lawful and lucrative commerce with the natives, and inducing them to seek the supply of their wants, in the exchange of the abundant products of their fertile soil for * Essay on the actual state of the slave trade on the coast of Africa, in the Amulet for 1832, said to be "extracted principally from the journal of a gallant and distinguished naval officer, who passed three years on the Afri- can coast, from which he has just returned." COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. 335 those articles of foreign product and manufacture, which are in request among them. Not only is this the most effectual, I may say the only effectual, mode of suppressing the trade, but it is unfortu- nately true, that the other method (the pursuit of the slave traders by armed cruisers in the seas most infested by them) is, even when successful in its operations, accompanied by some of the worst evils of the trade, in its undisturbed pros- ecution. A cruising ship of war perceives a suspicious ves- sel at a distance, and gives chase to her, for hours, perhaps days. It is evident, that in the crowded condition of such vessels, the sufferings of the wretched beings on board must be greatly heightened by the neglect, perhaps the cruelties, attendant on being chased. Some of the slave ships are pro- vided with false decks, below which the slaves are crowded, when about to fall into the hands of a cruiser, and casks and packages are piled above, to give the semblance of an ordi- nary trading voyage. Some of the slave ships are strongly armed, and an action often takes place with the cruiser. This must add, of course, immeasurably to the sufferings and sac- rifice of life of the miserable victims crowded between decks. When captured, what is their condition ? They are in the mid-ocean, perhaps. It is known to all, that the horrors of the middle passage form one of the most frightful features of the slave trade. When a slave ship is captured, that horrid voyage is yet to be performed, and with scarce any allevia- tion of its sufferings. The slaves still remain, of necessity, crowded to suffocation, on a scanty allowance of food, ex- posed to all the causes of disease and death. If captured by an American cruiser, they must be sent across the Atlantic, to be adjudicated in the United States. If captured by the cruisers of the other powers, they must be sent up to wind- ward, to the seat of the mixed commission on the African coast a voyage frequently of weeks, sometimes of months, during the whole of which they are suffering an amount of misery, and dying at a rate of mortality, probably without a parallel in any other condition of human nature. It would lead me too greatly into detail, to trace the situation of the 336 COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. captured Africans, after they are safely landed on the coast either of the United States or of Africa. As to the former, your memory, sir, can furnish you with facts which I will not grieve this audience by repeating. But this I will say, that the situation of the recaptured African is too often one that affords but little cause of congratulation, on the score of humanity. I do not go too far in saying (for the public doc- uments of this government bear me out in the assertion) that there have been cases of recaptured Africans, brought within the jurisdiction of the United States, who, for aught they have gained by their liberation, might as well have remained in the hands of the slave trader ! To all these evils, so far as the influence of the civilized colonies on the coast of Africa extends, they furnish a com- plete remedy. They purify from the contamination of the slave trade the entire extent of coast within their jurisdic- tion. That our colony has borne its part in this happy work, is manifest from the reports of the managers, which have in- formed us, that, short as the annals of the colony are, they already present instances of native tribes, who, harassed and exhausted by this all-destroying traffic, have placed them- selves under the American colony for protection. The same is true, and, of course, to a greater extent, of the more pow- erful British colony at Sierra Leone. By the same process, by which the colonization of the coast tends to the suppression of the slave trade, it promotes the civilization of the interior of the continent of Africa. This is a topic, which, as it seems to me, has not received its share of consideration. Of this mighty continent, four times as large as Europe, one third part, at least, is within the direct reach of influences from the west of Europe and Amer- ica influences which, for three hundred years, have been employed, through the agency of the slave trade, to depress and barbarize it ; to chain it down to the lowest point of social degradation. I trust these influences are now to be employed in repairing the wrongs, in healing the wounds, in gradually improving the condition of Africa. I trust that a great reaction is at hand. Can it be believed that this mighty COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. 337 region, most of it overflowing with tropical abundance, was created and destined for eternal barbarity ? Is it possible, in the present state of the public sentiment of the world, with the present rapid diffusion of knowledge, with the present reduction of antiquated errors to . the test of reason, that such a quarter of the world will be permitted to derive noth- ing but barbarism from intercourse with the countries which stand at the head of civilization ? It cannot be. I know it is said that it is impossible to civilize Africa. Why ? Why is it impossible to civilize man in one part of the earth more than in another? Consult history. Was Italy was Greece the cradle of civilization ? No. As far back as the lights of tradition reach, Africa was the cra- dle of science, while Syria, and Greece, and Italy were yet covered with darkness. As far back as we can trace the first rudiments of improvement, they came from the very head waters of the Nile, far in the interior of Africa ; and there are yet to be found, in shapeless ruins, the monuments of this primeval civilization. To come down to a much later period, while the west and north of Europe were yet barbarous, the Mediterranean coast of Africa was filled with cities, academies, museums, churches, and a highly civilized population. What has raised the Gaul, the Belgium, the Germany, the Scandinavia, the Britain, of ancient geography, to their present improved and improving condition ? Africa is not now sunk lower than most of those countries were eighteen centuries ago ; and the engines of social influence are increased a thousand fold in numbers and efficacy. It is not eighteen hundred years since Scotland, whose metropo- lis has been called the Athens of modern Europe, the country of Hume, of Smith, of Robertson, of Blair, of Stewart, of Brown, of Jeffrey, of Chalmers, of Scott, of Brougham, was a wilderness, infested by painted savages. It is not a thou- sand years since the north of Germany, now filled with beautiful cities, learned universities, and the best educated population in the world, was a dreary, pathless forest. Is it possible that, before an assembly like this, an as- sembly of Americans, it can be necessary to argue the VOL. i. 43 338 COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. possibility of civilizing Africa, through the instrumentality of a colonial establishment, and that in a comparatively short time ? It is but about ten years since the foundations of the colony of Liberia were laid ; and every one acquainted with the early history of New England knows that the colony at Liberia has made much greater progress than was made by the settlement at Plymouth in the same period. More than once were the first settlements in Virginia in a position vastly less encouraging than that of the American colony on the coast of Africa ; and yet from these feeble beginnings in New Eng- land and Virginia, what has not been brought about in two hundred years ? Two hundred years ago, and the continent of North America, for the barbarism of its native population, and its remoteness from the sources of improvement, was all that Africa is now. Impossible to civilize Africa ! Sir, the work is already, in no small part, accomplished. We form our ideas of Africa too much from the wasted and degraded state of the coast. There are numerous and powerful nations in the interior, who weave, and dye, and smelt, and forge, and who, above all, are familiar with the art of writing the great index and engine of civilization. You and I, sir, have seen a native African (Abdulrahman) carried into slavery in the West Indies in his youth, exposed, for more than forty years, to the labors and hardships of that condition, the greater part of the time in the field, and at the age of seventy years, writing his native Arabic with the elegance and fluency of a scribe ! I cannot but regard the colonizing of Africa, by a kindred race of African origin, as an enterprise in all respects as hope- ful, and in some respects far more promising, than that of settling and civilizing America by an alien and hostile people. In the settlement and civilization of the American continent, either from the fatality of circumstances, or the incurable im- perfection of man, the extermination of the native popula- tion has been the preliminary condition of the introduction of the civilized race. It has been found, or thought, impossi- ble that the red man and the white man should subsist side by side. COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. 339 In colonizing Africa, no such painful incongruity presents itself. The colored emigrants from this country will present themselves on the African shore, a people of kindred origin, bringing with them the arts of civilized life, unaccompanied with those fatal causes of separation which have driven the aborigines of America before the approach of the white man. The gentle hand of nature will draw towards them the affec- tions and confidence of the natives. The jealousies and sus- picions which diversity of race invariably produces, can have no foundation ; and it may reasonably be expected, if a vig- orous impulse can now be given to the colony, that the work of civilization will proceed from it, as from a centre, with a rapidity unexampled in the history of other colonies. I am aware that the partial failure of the establishment at Sierra Leone may be quoted, in opposition to these encour- aging views. But it must not be forgotten that Sierra Leone is an establishment totally different, in its origin and character, from Liberia. It is formed from the crews of the recaptured slave ships, helpless savages of a hundred different tribes, thrown without preparation upon the coast, and, without any principle of order or self-government, subjected to all the evils of a remote and neglected military establishment. The progress that has been made at Liberia is, on the contrary, all that could have been hoped. A tract of coast two hundred miles north and south, and twenty or thirty east and west ; a population of two thousand emigrants, and several thou- sands of the native tribes who have voluntarily sought the protection of the colony ; with schools and churches, and all the institutions of civilized life ; a great state of prosperity, and every encouraging prospect, this surely is not slow progress for ten years. And is there any thing in the nature of the case, which makes the restoration of the descendants of Africa to their native land necessarily more slow than the process of abduc- tion ? It is supposed that one hundred thousand slaves have been annually brought from Africa; and that, too, at times when the trade has been pursued under great obstacles, ille- gally, piratically, by stealth, and under the watch of ships of 340 COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. war stationed to intercept it. Can any man doubt that, if the governments of France, Great Britain, and the Netherlands, of the United States of America, and the several states, should apply their influence, their power, their resources to this great work, it might proceed with any desirable degree of rapid- ity? The gentleman who preceded me (Rev. Mr Bacon, of New Haven) alluded to the prodigious influx of emi- grants into this country. I have lately seen a statement that, within the past year, over forty thousand emigrants, from Great Britain alone, have arrived at the single port of Quebec. More than half as many more have arrived in the various ports of the United States, making an aggregate of sixty thousand persons, in the different ports of North America. It is by no means to be desired at present, that any thing like this number of emigrants should be annually set down on the African coast ; but I much mistake the public feeling in those parts of the United States most interested in this question, if a weight of influence and a supply of means are not shortly applied to this purpose, commensurate with the magnitude of the object to be effected. The age seems favorable to the movement ; it is in hai mony with the great incidents of the time. From the east of Europe to the north of Africa, surprising changes, favor- able to civilization, have taken place. Greece has been brought within the reach of the sympathies of the rest of Christendom. Temporary disorders, the natural fruit of revolution, will create but a brief delay in the advancement of that interesting country. The restoration of the northern coast of Africa to the domain of civilization has begun. The strongest of its barbarous regencies has been shaken ; and its power, which, for ages, seemed impregnable, the scandal and the dread of Christendom, has crumbled in a day. May we not hope that a still more auspicious era is about to commence that a bloodless triumph is to be achieved on the western coast of Africa ? Happy for America, if she shall take an honorable lead m this great and beneficent work ! Happy, if, having presented to the world, on her own soil, a great model of popular insti- COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. 341 tutions, she should now become an efficient agent in their diffusion over the ancient abodes of civilization, now relapsed into barbarity ! Happy, if she shall be forward to acquit her share of the mighty debt which is due to injured Africa from the civilized nations of the world ! Who that has contem- plated the infernal horrors of the slave trade ; that has seen, in his mind's eye, hundreds of men, women, and children, crowded between decks, into a space too low to stand up too short to lie down too narrow to turn chained, scourged, famished, parched, heaped together the old and the young, the languishing, the dying, and the dead who can dwell on this spectacle, and not turn with a throbbing heart to the sight of a company of emigrants, the children of Africa, wafted over the ocean to the land of their fathers, bound towards the great and genial home of their race, commissioned to trample the slave trade into the dust, return- ing from a civilized land to scatter the seeds of civilization over the mighty extent of Western Africa ! I know not but I may entertain an exaggerated impression of this matter that I may see it under lights too strong for practical life. But, I must confess, I think there is opened to the colored population of this country a career of broad and lasting usefulness, a destiny of honor and exaltation, unex- ampled in history. There seem to be peculiar circumstances in the work, of which they are the chosen agents, to be found in no other similar enterprise in the annals of the world. A mighty. con- tinent is to be civilized, that is not without example in history ; but the restoration of the descendants of those who were torn as slaves from this ill-fated region, going back the heralds and missionaries of civilization, with freedom, the arts, and Christianity in their train ; returning to regenerate a continent, to raise themselves from a depressed condition to one of the loftiest in which man can be placed, the condition of benefactors of an entire race, to the end of time ; this is the destiny of the colored population of the United States, who shall embark in the great enterprise of civilizing Africa ; a destiny, as it seems to me, without example in the history of mankind. 342 COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. This glorious era has begun to dawn. Over a line of coast, of nearly one thousand miles in extent, the purpl* streaks of the morning are beginning to appear ; and jocund day Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops." From the extreme north of the British territory of Sierra Leone, southward to the Cape of Palmas, the entire coast, with one or two exceptions, has thrown off the curse of the slave trade. Many, I know, who hear me, have seen the numbers of the Liberia Herald, a respectable newspaper, printed at Monrovia, and edited by a colored emigrant, regu- larly educated at one of the colleges of the United States.* You and I, sir, and many gentlemen around me, have listened, in the committee rooms of this Capitol, to the animated and intelligent accounts of the prosperity of this colony, the fertility of the soil, the salubrity of the climate, the freedom and happiness of the mode of life in Liberia, given by an emigrant from the United States, a descendant of African slaves, who had amassed a fortune, by honest and successful industry, in the land of his fathers. Sir, when men have a great, benevolent, arid holy object m view, of permanent interest, obstacles are nothing. If it fails in the hands of one, it will be taken up by another. If it exceeds the powers of an individual, society will unite towards the desired end. If the force of public opinion in one 'country is insufficient, the kindred spirits of foreign countries will lend their aid. If it remain unachieved by one generation, it goes down, as a heritage of duty and honor, to the next ; and, through the long chain of counsels and efforts, from the first conception of the benevolent mind that planned the great work, to its final and glorious accomplishment, there is a steady and unseen, but irresistible cooperation of that divine influence which orders all things for good. Am I told that the work we have in hand is too great to be done ? Too great, I ask. to be done when ? too great to be * At Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine. COLONIZATION OF AFRICA. 343 done by whom ? Too great, I admit, to be done at once ; too great to be done by this society ; too great to be done by this generation, perhaps ; but not too great to be done. Nothing is too great to be done, which is founded on truth and jus- tice, and which is pursued with the meek and gentle spirit of Christian love. When this objection was suggested, in the British House of Commons, to the measures proposed for the regeneration of the children of Africa, Mr Pitt, in reply to it, exclaimed, " We Britons were once as obscure among the nations of the earth, as savage in our manners, as debased in our morals, as degraded in our understandings, as these un- happy Africans are at present." The work is doubtless too great to be entirely effected by this society, by the most ardent and zealous of its friends, perhaps, for the present and the next succeeding generation. But is it too great for the enlightened public opinion of the world ? Is it too great for the joint efforts of the United States, of Great Britain, and of France, and the other Christian countries, already pledged to the cause ? Is it too great for the transmitted purpose, the perpetuated concert of generations succeeding generations, for centuries to come ? Sir, I may ask, without irreverence, in a case like this, though it be too great for man, is it too great for that AUGUST PROVIDENCE, whose counsels run along the line of ages, and to whom a thousand years are as one day ? EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES.* THE lucid exposition which has been made of the object of the meeting by the right reverend bishop (Mcllvaine) lightens the task of recommending it to an audience like this. I do not know but I should act more advisedly to leave his cogent and persuasive statement to produce its natural effect, without any attempt on my part to enforce it. But as we have assembled to communicate our mutual impressions on the subject, to consult with each other whether we can do any thing, and whether we will do any thing, to promote the object in view, (which, I own, seems to me one of high moment,) I will, with the indulgence of the meeting, and at the request of those by whom it is called, briefly state the aspect in which the matter presents itself to my mind. .1 understand the object of the meeting to be, to aid the funds of a rising seminary of learning in the interior of the state of Ohio, particularly with a view to the training up of a well-educated ministry of the gospel in that part of the United States ; and to consider the claims of such an object on this community. As to the general question of the establishment and support of places of education, there are principally two courses which have been pursued in the practice of nations. One is, to leave them, so to say, as an after-thought, the last thing provided for ; to let the community grow up, become pop- ulous, rich, powerful ; an immense body of unenlightened peasants, artisans, traders, soldiers, subjected to a small * Speech at a public meeting held in St Paul's Church, Boston, 21st May, 1833, on behalf of Kenyon College, Ohio. (344) EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES. H45 privileged class ; and then let learning creep in with luxury ; be itself esteemed a luxury, endowed out of the sur- plus of vast private fortunes, or endowed by the state ; and instead of diffusing a wholesome general influence, of which all partake, and by which the entire character of the people is softened and elevated, forming itself but another of those circumstances of disparity and jealous contrast of condition, of which too many were in existence before ; adding the aristoc- racy of learning, acquired at expensive seats of science, to that of rank and wealth. This is, in general, the course which has been pursued with respect to the establishment of places of edu- cation in some countries of Europe. The other method is that introduced by our forefathers, namely, to lay the foundations of the commonwealth on the corner-stone of religion and education ; to make the means of enlightening the community go hand in hand with the means for protecting it against its enemies, extending its commerce, and increasing its numbers ; to make the care of the mind, from the outset, a part of its public economy ; the growth of knowledge, a portion of its public wealth. This, sir, is the New England system. It is the system on which the colony of Massachusetts was led, in 1647, to order that a school should be supported in every town ; and in every town containing a hundred families, the school was required to be one where youth could " be fitted for the uni- versity." On the same system, eleven years earlier, the foun- dations of Harvard College were laid, by an appropriation out of the scanty means of the country, and at a period of great public distress, of a sum equal to the whole amount raised during the year for all the other public charges. I do not know in what words I can so well describe this system, as in those used by our fathers themselves. Quoted as they have been, times innumerable, they will bear quoting again, and seem to me peculiarly apposite to this occasion : " After God had carried us safe to New England, and we had builded our houses, provided necessaries for our livelihood, reared convenient places for God's worship, and settled the civil government, one of the next things we longed for and looked VOL. i. 44 346 EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES. after was to advance learning, and perpetuate it to posterity ; dreading to leave an illiterate ministry to the churches, when the present ministers shall be in the dust." Now, sir, it is proposed to assist our brethren in Ohio to lay the foundations of their commonwealth on this good old New England basis ; and if ever there was a region where it was peculiarly expedient that this should be done, most assuredly the western part of America and the state of Ohio as much as any other portion of it is that region. It is two centuries since New England was founded, and its population by the last census fell short of two millions. Forty years ago, Ohio was a wilderness, and, by the same enumeration, its population was little less than a million. At this moment, the population of Ohio (the settlement of which was commenced in 1788, by a small party from our counties of Essex and Middlesex) is almost twice as large as that of our ancient and venerable Massachusetts. I have seen this wonderful state, and the terraqueous globe does not contain a spot more favorably situated. Linked to New Orleans on one side by its own beautiful river and the father of waters, and united to New York on the other side by the lake and the Erie Canal, she has, by a stupendous exertion of her own youthful resources, completed the vast circuit of communica- tion between them. The face of the country is unusually favorable to settlement. There is little waste or broken land. The soil is fertile, the climate salubrious ; it is settled by as truehearted and substantial a race as ever founded a republic ; and there they now stand, a million of souls, gath- ered into a political community in a single generation ! Now, it is plain that this extraordinary rapidity of increase requires extraordinary means to keep the moral and intellec- tual growth of the people on an equality with their advance- ment in numbers and prosperity. These last take care of themselves. They require nothing but protection from for- eign countries, and security of property, under the ordinary administration of justice. But a system of institutions for education schools and colleges requires extra effort and means. The individual settler can fell the forest, build his EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES. 347 log-house, reap his crops, and raise up his family, in the round of occupations pursued by himself; but he cannot, of him- self, found or support a school, far less a college ; nor can he do as much towards it as a single individual in older states, where ampler resources and a denser population afford means, cooperation, and encouragement at every turn. The very fact, therefore, that the growth of the country in numbers has been unexampled, instead of suggesting reasons why efforts in the cause of education are superfluous, furnishes an increased and increasing claim on the sympathy and good offices of all the friends of learning and education. What, then, are the reasonable grounds of the claim, as made on us ? I think I perceive several. We live in a community comparatively ancient, possessed of an abundance of accumulated capital, the result of the smiles of Providence on the industry of the people. We profess to place a high value on intellectual improvement, on education, on religion, and on the institutions for its support. We habitually take credit that we do so. To whom should the infant community, destitute of these institutions, desir- ous of enjoying their benefits, and as yet not abounding in disposable means, to whom should they look ? Whither shall they go, but to their brethren, who are able to appreci- ate the want, and competent to relieve it ? Some one must do it. These institutions, struggling into existence, must be nurtured, or they sink. To what quarter can they address themselves, with any prospect of success, if they fail here ? Where will they find a community more likely to take an interest in the object, to feel a livelier sympathy in the warit, more liberal, more able to give, more accustomed to give ? It is not merely in the necessity of things, that young and rising communities, if assisted at all, should derive that as- sistance from the older and richer ; but the period is so short, since we ourselves stood in that relation to the mother coun- try, and derived, from her bounty, benefactions to our insti- tutions, that the obligation to requite these favors, in the only practicable way, is fresh and strong, and like that which requires a man to pay his debts. Dr Franklin was accus 348 EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES. tomcdj sometimes, to bestow a pecuniary favor on a young man, and, instead of requiring payment, to enjoin the object of his bounty, when advanced in life, and in prosperous circumstances, to give the same sum of money, with a like in- junction, to some other meritorious and needy young person, The early annals of our country contain many instances of liberality from beyond the ocean. Our own University and that of New Haven were largely indebted particularly ours to pious and benevolent individuals in England. I know no mode of requiting these favors (which we cannot repay to the country from which we received them ; she wants nothing we can give) more natural and more simple, than by imitating the liberality of which we have profited, and supplying the wants of others, at that stage of their social progress, at which our own were supplied. The inducements to such an exercise of liberality, on our part, towards our brethren in the west, are certainly strongei than those which could have influenced England to assist the rising institutions of America. The settlers of the western country are not the aggrieved and persecuted children of the older states. We have not driven them out from among us, by cruel Star Chamber edicts ; nor have they, in leaving us, shaken off from their feet the dust of an unfriendly soil. They have moved away from the paternal roof, to seek a new but not a foreign home. They have parted from their native land, neither in anger nor despair ; but full of buoyant hope and tender regret. They have gone to add to the Ameri- can family, not to dismember it. They are our brethren, not only after the flesh, but after the spirit also, in character and in feeling. We, in our place, regard them neither with indifference, jealousy, nor enmity, but with fraternal affection and true good will. Whom, in the name of Heaven, should we assist, if we refuse to assist them ? What, sir, can we minister to the intellectual and spiritual wants of Syria, and of Greece, of Burmah, of Ceylon, and of the remotest isles of the Pacific ? Have we enough, and to spare, for those remote nations and tribes, with whom we have no nearer kin- dred, than that Adam is our common parent, and Christ OUT EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES. 349 common Savior ; and shall we shut our hands on the call for the soul's food, which is addressed to us, by these our breth- ren, our schoolmates ; whose fathers stood side by side with ours, in the great crisis of the country's fortune ; whose fore- fathers rest side by side with ours, in the sacred soil of New England ? I say nothing, sir, in disparagement of the efforts made to carry the gospel to the farthest corners of the earth. I wish, with all my heart, entire success to those efforts. But, surely, the law of Christian love will not permit us, in our care for the distant heathen, to overlook the claims of our fellow-citizens at home. On a theme like this, I am unwilling to appeal to any thing like interest ; nor will I appeal to an interest of a low and narrow character ; but I cannot shut my eyes on those great considerations of an enlarged policy, which demand of us a reasonable liberality towards the improvement of these western communities. In the year 1800, the state of Ohio sent one member to Congress ; and Massachusetts not then separated from Maine sent twenty-one. Now, Ohio sends nineteen ; and Massachusetts recently, and I am con- strained to add, in my judgment, unfairly,* deprived of one of her members sends but twelve. Nor will it stop here. " They must increase," and we, in comparison, " must de- crease." At the next periodical enumeration Ohio will prob- ably be entitled to nearly thirty representatives, and Massa- chusetts to little more than a third of this number. Now, sir, I will not, on this occasion, and in this house of prayer, unnecessarily introduce topics and illustrations, better befjt- ting other resorts. I will not descant on interests and ques- tions, which, in the divided state of the public councils, will be decided, one way or the other, by a small majority of voices. I really wish to elevate my own mind, and, as far as lies in me, the minds of those I have the honor to address, to higher views. I would ask you, not in reference to this or that question, but in reference to the whole complexion * By adopting a ratio of representation which left Massachusetts with an unrepresented fraction, sufficient, within a few hundreds, for anothei member 350 EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES. of the destinies of the country, as depending on the action of the general government, I would ask you as to that mo- mentous future which lies before us and our children, By whom, by what influence, from what quarter is our common country, with all the rich treasure of its character, its hopes, its fortunes, to be controlled, to be sustained, and guided in the paths of wisdom, honor, and prosperity, or sunk into the depth of degeneracy and humiliation ? Sir, the response is in every man's mind, on every man's lips. The balance of the country's fortunes is in the west. There lie, wrapped up in the folds of an eventful futurity, the influences which will most powerfully affect our national weal and woe. We have, in the order of Providence, allied ourselves to a family of sister communities, springing into existence and increasing with unexampled rapidity. We have called them into a full partnership in the government ; the course of events has put crowns on their heads and sceptres in their hands ; and we must abide the result. But has the power indeed departed from us the efficient, ultimate power ? That, sir, is in a great measure as we will. The real government, in this country, is that of opinion. Towards the formation of the public opinion of the country, New England, while she continues true to herself, will, as in times past, contribute vastly beyond the proportion of her numerical strength. But besides the general ascendency which she will maintain through the influence of public opin- ion, we can do two things to secure a strong and abiding interest in the west, operating, I do not say in our favor, but in favor of principles and measures which we think sound and salutary. The first is, promptly to extend towards the west, on every fitting occasion which presents itself, con- sistently with public and private duty, either in the course of legislation or the current of affairs, those good offices which of right pertain to the relative condition of the two parts of the country ; to let the west know, by experience, both in the halls of Congress and the channels of commercial and social intercourse, that the east is truly, cordially, and effec- tively her friend, not her rival nor enemy. EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES. 351 The kindly influence thus produced will prove of great power and value, and will go far to secure a return of frater- nal feeling and political sympathy ; but it will not, of itself, on great and trying occasions of a supposed diversity of sectional interest, always prove strong enough to maintain a harmony of councils. But we can do another thing, of vastly greater moment. We can put in motion a principle of influ- ence, of a much higher and more generous character. We can furnish the means of building up institutions of educa- tion. We can, from our surplus, contribute towards the establishment and endowment of those seminaries, where the mind of the west shall be trained and enlightened. Yes, sir, we can do this ; and it is so far optional with us, whether the power to which we have subjected ourselves shall be a power of intelligence or of ignorance ; a reign of reflection and reason, or of reckless strength ; a reign of darkness, or of light. This, sir, is true statesmanship ; this is policy, of which Washington would not be ashamed. While the parti- san of the day plumes himself upon a little worthless popu larity, gained by bribing the interest of one quarter, and falling in with the prejudices of another ; it is truly worthy of a patriot, by contributing towards the means of steadily, diffusively, and permanently enlightening the public mind, as far as opportunity exists, in every part of the country, to secure it in a wise and liberal course of public policy. Let no Bostonian capitalist, then, let no man who has a large stake in New England, and who is called upon to aid this college in the centre of Ohio, think that he is called upon to exercise his liberality at a distance, towards those in whom he has no concern. Sir, it is his own interest he is called upon to promote. It is not their work he is called upon to do ; it is his own work. It is my opinion which, though it may sound extravagant, will, I believe, bear exami- nation that, if the question were propounded to us, this moment, whether it were most for the benefit of Massachu- setts to give fifty thousand dollars towards founding another college in Middlesex, Hampshire, or Berkshire, or for the 352 EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES. support of this college in Ohio, we should, if well ad- vised, decide for the latter. We have Harvard, Amherst, Williams ; we do not want another college. In the west is a vast and growing population, possessing a great and increas- ing influence in the political system of which we are members. Is it for our interest, strongly, vitally for our interest, that this population should be intelligent and well educated ; or ignorant, and enslaved to all the prejudices which beset an ignorant people ? When, then, the right reverend bishop and the friends of the west ask you, on this occasion, to help them, they ask you, in effect, to spare a part of your surplus means for an object, in which, to say the least, you have a common interest with them. They ask you to contribute to give security to your own property, by diffusing the means of light and truth throughout the region where so much of the power to pre- serve or to shake it resides. They ask you to contribute to perpetuate the Union, by training up a well-educated popula- tion in the quarter which may hereafter be exposed to strong centrifugal influences. They ask you to recruit your waning strength in the national councils, by enlisting on your side their swelling numbers, reared in the discipline of sound learning and sober wisdom ; so that, when your voice in the government shall become comparatively weak, instead of being drowned by a strange and unfriendly clamor, from this mighty region it may be reechoed, with increased strength and a sympathetic response, from the rising millions of the North-western States. Yes, sir, they do more. They ask you to make yourselves rich, in their respect, good will, and gratitude ; to make your name dear and venerable, in their distant shades. They ask you to give their young men cause to love you, now, in the spring-time of life, before the heart is chilled and hardened ; to make their old men, who, in the morning of their days, went out from your borders, lift up their hands for a blessing on you, and say, " Ah, this is the good old-fashioned liberality of the land where we were born ! " Yes, sir, we shall raise an altar in the remote EDUCATION IN THE WESTERN STATES. 353 wilderness. Our eyes will not behold the smoke of its in- cense, as it curls up to heaven. But there the altar will stand ; there the pure sacrifice of the spirit will be offered up ; and the worshipper who comes, in all future time, to pay his devo- tions before it, will turn his face to the eastward and think of the land vf his benefactors, VOL. i. 45 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT.' MR PRESIDENT, AND BRETHREN OF THE MASSACHUSETTS CHARITABLE MECHANIC ASSOCIATION, (FOR, by your favor, I enjoy the privilege of being an hon- orary member of that institution,) when I consider the aus- pices under which this meeting is assembled ; when I reflect upon the zeal evinced in this cause by the Mechanic Associa- tion, and the moral power with which that body moves to the accomplishment of any object which it takes in hand, I feel a satisfaction which I want words to express. It was my fortune to be one of those who took an early interest in the erection of a monument upon Bunker Hill. In the efforts made to bring forward and carry on this great work, I bore a very humble, but, I believe I may say, an assiduous and laborious part. I gave, sir, all I had to give a large portion of my time and my best efforts, in union with my valued associates, to recommend this object to the public favor. I shared with the friends of the enterprise the satisfaction of witnessing the first burst of enthusiasm with which the project was wel- comed, and their regret and mortification at finding that the popular excitement and interest which were to furnish the resources to carry on this expensive work did not hold out to its completion. If it affords satisfaction, or is deemed a duty, in any quarter, to indicate faults committed by the early boards of directors, to point out errors of judgment into which it is supposed they fell, (errors of intention will not, * Speech delivered in Faneuil Hall, 28th May, 1833, on the subject of the Bunker Hill Monument, at a meeting called by the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association, to take measures for its completion. (354) THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 355 I think, be imputed to them,) I, for one, will, with meek- ness, submit to the rebuke from any individual who has given more of his time, attention, labor and money even, in proportion to their means than the members of these much censured boards of directors. Nay, sir, even from any one who has not done this I will submit, for one, to any deserved rebuke, if he will now that the work is so far advanced that its completion is matter of calculation, and now that the state of the times admits and encourages a fresh appeal to the liberality of a prosperous community step forward and exert himself zealously and effectually in the cause. I do not rise to vindicate former boards of directors, nor former measures, but to congratulate you, sir, and my fellow-citizens, on the prospect which is now opening upon the work ; and cheerfully, for one, to transfer to those who shall now take it up and complete it the unshared and unqualified credit of the patriotic undertaking. The work, I am confident, will now be completed. It is taken in hand by those accustomed to finish what they undertake ; and, whatever we have done before, I am sure, sir, we are now hammering upon the nail that will go. Sir, I suppose there can be but one opinion on the ques- tion, when it is fairly stated. It is not whether the monu- ment shall be built, but whether it shall be left incomplete ; not whether it shall be begun, but whether it shall be finished. Nay, not even exactly this. The question is not whether it shall be finished at all, but whether it shall be finished by us, or, after remaining unfinished another half century, a me- morial, not to the renown of the great men we commem- orate, but to the discredit of this generation of their descend- ants, the honor of completing it shall be reserved to other times, when a more enduring patriotic sentiment shall be awakened in its favor. That it will be completed, whether by us or not, is certain. What is already done is as substantial as the great pyramid of Egypt. The foundations have been laid with such depth and solidity, that nothing but an earthquake can shake them. The part already constructed will stand to the 356 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. end of time ; and the real question which we have to settle is, will we leave it in its present state, an object unsightly to the eye and painful to the mind ; or will we, who assisted to lay the foundations, enjoy the satisfaction of beholding the noble shaft rising in simple majesty towards the heavens, where, in the language of that surpassing eloquence, which I would to Heaven, Mr President, could rouse and animate us this afternoon, " the earliest light of the morning shall gild it, and parting day linger and play on its summit."* But, sir, I wrong myself, and I wrong my fellow-citizens present, in treating this subject as if the strongest reason for completing the monument arose from mortification and regret, at leaving it in its present state. Far otherwise, I know, sir, do you view this question ; far otherwise do I view it myself. Those great patriotic and moral inducements which originally prompted the enterprise, remain in unimpaired force, and must gather strength with each succeeding year. The idea which lay at the basis of this undertaking was, to redeem from all desecrating uses, and devote to the eternal remembrance of the event of which it was the scene, the summit of Bunker Hill, and to erect upon its height a plain but majestic monu- mental structure, to identify the spot to the latest time. This idea was first conceived by an amiable and accomplished fellow-citizen, now no more, (the late William Tudor,) when the half century was near expiring, since the occurrence of the event. It was by him communicated to a circle of friends, and by them to the public, by whose favor the enter- prise was so far advanced that the corner stone was laid in the presence of such an assembly as was perhaps never before witnessed, on the jubilee anniversary of the battle, the seventeenth of June, 1825. It was my misfortune, sir, not to be present on that auspicious day. I was absent on the public service, at a distance. But I know too well the feelings which animated the mighty multitude gathered together on that hallowed spot, in the presence of the nation's guest, returning from his triumphant progress through the Union, in * Mr Webster's address, on occasion of the laying of the corner stone. THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 357 the presence of the time-worn remnants of the battle and of the revolutionary war, and within the hearing of that all-elo- quent voice, which poured forth its deepest and richest strains on the glorious occasion, not to appeal fearlessly to all who heard it, that they felt that it was good to be there. They felt that the event deserved to be commemorated ; that the spot ought, through all time, to be marked out and kept sa- cred ; and that this generation owed it to that which preceded us, and bought for us with its blood this great heritage of blessings, to erect upon this spot a monumental structure, which should last as long as our freedom shall last, as long as a happy posterity of Americans shall have cause to cherish the memory of their fathers. And do not these reasons still exist? Is the spot less precious, now that eight more seasons have wept their dews over the dear and sacred blood that has remained for eight more years uncommemorated beneath the sod? Are the valor, the self-devotion of the heroes of that day, of War- ren, and Prescott, and Putnam, and Stark, and their gallant associates, less deserving of celebration ? Is this mighty and eventful scene in the opening drama of the revolution less worthy of celebration, now that eight more years, in the prosperous enjoyment of our liberties, contrasted as they have been with disastrous struggles in other countries, have given us fresh cause for gratitude to our fathers ? But I am met with the great objection, What good will the monument do? I beg leave, sir, to exercise my birth- right as a Yankee, and answer this question by asking two or three more, to which I believe it will be quite as difficult to furnish a satisfactory reply. I am asked, What good will the monument do ? And I ask, What good does any thing do ? What is good ? Does any thing do any good ? The persons who suggest this objection of course think that there are some projects and undertakings that do good; and I should therefore like to have the idea of good explained, and analyzed, and run out to its elements. When this is done, if I do not demonstrate, in about two minutes, that the mon- ument does the same kind of good that any thing else does, 358 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. I will consent that the huge blocks of granite, already laid, should be reduced to gravel, and carted off to fill up the mill pond ; for that I suppose is one of the good things. Does a railroad or canal do good ? Answer, Yes. And how ? It, facilitates intercourse, opens markets, and increases the wealth of the country. But what is this good for ? Why, individuals prosper and get rich. And what good does that do ? Is mere wealth, as an ultimate end, gold and silver, without an inquiry as to their use, are these a good ? Cer- tainly not. I should insult this audience by attempting to prove that a rich man, as such, is neither better nor happier than a poor one. But as men grow rich, they live better. Is there any good in this, stopping here ? Is me*-e animal life feeding, working, and sleeping like an ox entitled to be called good? Certainly not. But these improvements increase the population. And what good does that do? Where is the good' in counting twelve millions, instead of six, of mere feeding, working, sleeping animals? There is then no good in the mere animal life, except that it is the physical basis of that higher moral existence, which resides in the soul, the heart, the mind, the conscience ; in good principles, good feelings, and the good actions (and the more disinter- ested, the more entitled to be called good) which flow from them. Now, sir, I say that generous and patriotic sentiments, sentiments which prepare us to serve our country, to live for our country, to die for our country, feelings like those which carried Prescott, and Warren, and Putnam to the battle- field, are good, good, humanly speaking, of the highest order. It is good to have them, good to encourage them, good to honor them, good to commemorate them; and whatever tends to animate and strengthen such feelings, does as much right down practical good as filling up low grounds and building railroads. This is my demonstration. I wish, sir, not to be misunderstood. I admit the connection between enterprises which promote the physical prosperity of the country and its intellectual and moral improvement ; but I maintain that it is only this connection that gives these enter- prises all their value ; and that the same connection gives a THE BUNKER HILL MONOMENT. 359 like value to every thing else which, through the channel of the senses, the taste, or the imagination, warms and elevates the heart. But we are told that books will do all this ; that history will record the exploits we would commemorate, and carry them, with the spot on which they were acted out, down to the latest posterity. Even my worthy friend who has just addressed us, although I am sure he agrees with me in sub- stance, and although I admit the superior efficacy of the art of printing over that of writing, in perpetuating the remem- brance of the past, yet seemed to me to give a little too much weight to this objection. I am inclined to doubt whether it be sound in any sense ; I am confident it is not to the extent to which it is made. That history will preserve the memory of the battle of Bunker Hill, I certainly do not doubt ; but that history alone, without sensible monuments, would preserve the knowledge of the identity of the spot, is not so certain. The fame of the immortal plain of Troy, commemorated by the first of bards in time and renown, is coeval with history, and embalmed in its earliest pages. But where the site of Troy is, I have the best reason to know, is very doubtful. Books have surely done here as much as they can ever do. A man may seek it with Strabo in his head and Homer in his heart, and he shall not find it. Even the still existing natural features of the scene are not sufficient to identify it. The " broad Hellespont " still rolls into the JEgean. Tenedos, that rich and most famous island city, which, when ^Eneas told his tale to Dido, had sunk into a treacherous port, still keeps its station in front of the Troad ; but if the spot where Troy stood can be settled at all, it is principally by the simple mound still standing, and, as is supposed, erected to Achilles. History tells us of the mem- orable pass of Thermopylae, where Leonidas and his brave associates encountered the barbarous invader. I have searched in vain for the narrow pass between the foot of the moun- tain and the sea. It is gone. Time, which changes all things, has changed the great natural features of the spot, in which not merely its geographical, but, if I may say so, its 360 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. moral identity resided, and has stretched out a broad plain in its place ; but a rude monumental pile still remains to designate the spot where the Spartan hero fell. History tells us of the field of Cannae, where Hannibal overthrew the Roman consuls, and slaughtered forty thousand of their troops, till the Aufidus ran blood. Why, sir, you cannot, with your Livy in your hand, retrace the locality. History has preserved us the story of the battle of Pharsalia, where the star of Caesar prevailed over the star of Pompey ; a battle which fixed the fortunes of the world for fifteen centuries. It is impossible, even with the Commentaries of Caesar for your guide, exactly to fix the spot where it was fought. History tells us of the battle of Philippi, where Brutus and Cassius, and with them the last hopes of Roman liberty, were cloven down ; but historians do not agree, within two or three hundred miles, as to the precise scene of the action. Now, sir, I trust that the memory of Bunker Hill will be preserved in history as long as that of Troy, of Thermopylae, of Cannae, of Pharsalia, or of Philippi ; but who is there that would not wish that the identity of this precious spot should be transmitted with its name to posterity ; so that when our children, in after times, shall visit these hallowed precincts, they may know and be assured that they stand upon the very sod that was moistened by the life-blood of the martyrs of that eventful day ? But I know and admit that History will perform her duty to those who fought and fell at Bunker Hill. Her duty, did I say ? It will belong to her most glorious prerogative to record their deeds, in letters of light, on one of the brightest pages in the annals of freedom. There, when the tongues we now speak are forgotten, they will be read, as long and as widely as though we " Could write their names on every star that shines ; Engrave their story on the living 1 sky, To be forever read by every eye." But history would do this, though Bunker Hill were sur- rendered to-morrow to the pickaxe and the spade, and were THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 361 levelled to its base ; though it were torn from its roots and cast into the sea. But, sir, though books will do what they can, they cannot do all things. There are some things which they cannot do ; no, not if the muse of history herself, in bodily presentment, should take her stand on Bunker Hill, to describe the scene. There are things not in the physical competence of books to effect. Can the dead letter of history present you the glowing lineaments of your Washington, as he looks down upon you from that wall, or reproduce to you his majestic form in the chiselled marble ? Who does not gaze with delight on the portrait or the statue of the father of his country, where Stuart, and Chantrey, and Canova have wrought up the silent canvas and the cold marble into life and beauty? History would transmit the record of what he was and what he did, though with sacrilegious hands we should tear his image from these walls, or grind his statue to powder. But shall we, for this reason, even while we stand within the light of his benignant countenance, find the heart to ask, What good does it do ? Sir, the man that asks such a question takes a partial and superficial view of his own nature ; he belies himself. There is an original element in our natures, a connection between the senses, the mind, and the heart, implanted by the Cre- ator for pure and noble purposes, which cannot be reasoned away. You cannot argue men out of their senses and feel- ings ; and after you have wearied yourself and others by talking about books and history, you cannot set your foot upon the spot where some great and memorable exploit wa achieved, especially by those with whom you claim kindred, but your heart swells within you. You do not now reason ; you feel the inspiration of the place. Your cold philosophy vanishes, and you are ready to put off the shoes from off your feet, for the place whereon you stand is holy ground. A language which letters cannot shape, which sounds can- not convey, speaks, not to the understanding, but to the heart. Such a spot is the field of battle on Bunker Hill, already rescued from impending desecration. It is now proposed to VOL. i. 46 362 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. enclose this memorable spot ; to restore it as near as possible to its condition on the seventeenth of June, 1775, so that all who shall make their pilgrimage to it may be able to retrace, as on a map, each incident of the eventful day ; to plant around its borders a few trees from our native forests ; and to complete the erection of the monumental shaft already begun, simple in its taste, grand in its dimensions and height, and of a solid- ity of structure which shall defy the power of time. And now I appeal to you, Mr Chairman and fellow-citizens, that such a work, on such a spot, is in accordance with the best principles and purest feelings of our nature. The Amer- ican who could gaze on it with indifference, does not deserve the name of American. I would say of such a one, if one could be found so cold and heartless, in the language of the great genius of the age, of a fancied being of kindred apa- thy, " Breathes there the man of soul so dead ? ..... If such there breathe, go, mark him well ; For him no minstrel raptures swell. Proud though his title, high his fame, Boundless his wealth, as wish could claim, In spite of title, power, and pelf, The wretch, concentred all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile earth, from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonored, and unsung." I think I can bring this to a practical issue in every man's mind. Is there any one who hears me, and will figure to himself the aspect of the work, as it will appear when it is completed; who will place himself, in imagination, on the summit of the beautiful hill where the battle was fought ; look out upon the prospect of unsurpassed loveliness that spreads before him, by land and by sea ; the united features of town and country ; the long rows of buildings and streets in the city, rising one above another upon the sides of her triple hills ; the surrounding sweep of country, checked with prosperous villages; on one side the towers of city churches, on the other the long succession of rural spires; the rivers THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 363 that flow on either side to the sea ; the broad expanse of the harbor and bay, spotted with verdant islands, with a hun- dred ships dancing in every direction over the waves; the vessels of war, keeping guard with their sleeping thunders, at the foot of the hill ; and on its top, within the shade of venerable trees, over the ashes of the great and good, the noble obelisk, rising to the heavens, and crowning the mag- nificent scene ; is there any one who will look at this pic- ture with his mind's eye, and not be willing to contribute, in proportion to his means, to do the little which remains to be done to realize it ? There have been times when I have desponded ; but I do so no longer. I am sure the work will be done. I hear good auguries and words of encouragement on all sides. I cannot mistake, when I think I perceive that the true spirit is awak ened. The time is well adapted to the deed. It is now eight years since the corner stone was laid, on the day that com- pleted the half century from the battle. Let us this year urge the work to the close, with the completion of the half century since the termination of the war. If we celebrated the grand commencement of hostilities in the foundation, let us bring forth the top stone, in happy commemoration of the return of peace. I believe, sir, as I have already said, that the work is in the proper hands. I mean no fulsome compliment ; I speak what history avouches, that the mechanics, as a class, were prime agents in all the measures of the revolution. It was with them that Warren, and Hancock, and Adams took counsel in dark and trying hours. As a class, they contributed their full quota to the armies that fought the battles of our freedom ; and when the war was over, and it remained to be seen whether we had reaped any substantial fruit from the con- test ; when the constitution was proposed, when it was laboring, when it was in imminent danger of miscarriage, the mechanics, as a class, put their shoulders to the wheel, and urged it into action. Who so fit to take an energetic and decisive lead in achieving this great work of commemo- ration ? 364 THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. I rejoice, above all, in this day's meeting ; and that the doors of Faneuil Hall have been thrown open to this great and patriotic assemblage ; a temple worthy the offering. The spirit of the revolution is enshrined within its columns ; and old Faneuil Hall seems to respond to old Bunker Hill ; this, with the ancient thunders of its eloquence, and that with the thunders of the battle ; as deep calleth unto deep with the noise of its waterspouts. It was beneath this roof that the spirits of our fathers were roused to that lofty enthusiasm, which led them up, calm and unresisting, to the flaming ter- rors of the mount of sacrifice ; and well does it become us, their children, to gather beneath the venerable arches, and resolve to discharge the debt of gratitude and duty to their memory. Two of the periods assigned to a generation of men have passed away, since the immortal Warren appeared before his fellow-citizens on the memorable anniversary of the fifth of March. He was, at that time, in the very dawn of man- hood, and as you behold him in yonder delineation of his person. Amiable, accomplished, prudent, energetic, eloquent, brave, he united the graces of a manly beauty to a lion heart, a sound mind, a safe judgment, and a firmness of pur- pose which nothing could shake. At the period to which I allude, he was but just thirty-two years of age ; so young, and already the acknowledged head of the cause ! He had never seen a battle-field ; but the veterans of Louisburg and Que- bec looked up to him as their leader ; and the hoary-headed sages who had guided the public councils for a generation, came to him for advice. Such he stood, the organ of the public sentiment on the occasion just mentioned. At the close of his impassioned address, after having depicted the labors, hardships, and sacrifices, endured by our ancestors in the cause of liberty, he broke forth in the thrilling words, " The voice of your fathers' blood cries to you from the ground ! " Three years only passed away; the solemn struggle came on ; foremost in council, he also was foremost in the battle- field, and offered himself a voluntary victim, the first great martyr in the cause. Upon the heights of Charlestown, the THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT. 365 last that was struck down, he fell with a numerous band of kindred spirits, the gray-haired veteran, the stripling in the flower of youth, who had stood side by side through that dreadful day, and fell together, like the beauty of Israel on their high places ! And now, sir, from the summit of Bunker Hill THE VOICE OF OUR FATHERS' BLOOD CRIES TO us FROM THE GROUND. It rings in my ears. It pleads with us, by the sharp agonies of their dying hour ; it adjures us to discharge the last debt to their memory. Let us hear that awful voice ; and resolve, before we quit these walls, that the long-delayed duty shall be performed; that the work SHALL BE DONE, SHALL BE DONE! TEMPERANCE/ MR EVERETT moved the following resolution : Resolved, That while we behold, with the highest satisfaction, the success of the efforts which have been made for the suppression of intemperance, we consider its continued prevalence as affording the str6ngest motives for persevering and increased exertion ; And then spoke substantially as follows : MR PRESIDENT : WHEN I look around me, and see how many persons there are in the assembly better entitled than myself to the privi- lege of addressing the audience, it is not without great diffi- dence that I present myself before you. But if there are occasions on which it is our duty to exert ourselves, in sea- son and out of season, there are also objects we should endeavor to promote, in place and out of place, if, indeed, a man can ever be out of place, who rises in a civilized and Christian community to speak in behalf of Temperance. Emboldened by this reflection, and in compliance with your request, I have ventured to submit the resolution which I have just read, and of which, with your permission, I will briefly enforce the purport. And most sincerely can I say that I never raised my voice with a clearer conviction of duty, nor a more cheerful hope of the ultimate success of the cause. I am not insensible to the force of the objection which * Speech delivered at a temperance meeting in Salem, on the 14th of June, 183& TEMPERANCE. 367 meets us on the threshold, I mean the objection taken to the multiplication of what are called self-created societies, and, in general, to the free development and application of the social influence which have been witnessed in our day. But though these objections have been urged in the most respec- table quarter, I have never been able to feel their force. I think it will be found, on full examination of the matter, that societies are liable to precisely the same objections as the action of individual men ; that is, they are liable to mis- application and abuse. But I believe it would be quite as easy for a powerful and ingenious mind to point out the abuses to which individual effort is liable, as those to which societies are exposed ; quite as easy to show the good that might have been and has not been done ; the reforms which might have been and have not been accomplished ; the hap- piness which might have been and has not been enjoyed, had the social principle been brought out in a still earlier, ampler, and more cordial development. In a word, sir, though I am not over-fond of abstract generalities on questions of this nature, I cannot but think that the individual principle, in its abuse, tends to selfishness, to weakness, to barbarism, to ignorance, and to vice ; and that the social principle, sub- ject also to its abuses, is the principle of benevolence, civili- zation, knowledge, genial power, and expansive goodness. On this point, however, it would be safer to leave theoretical axioms aside. It is, perhaps, enough to insist on good faith, good temper, and sound principle, on the part of societies and individuals. Where these prevail, there is little danger of abuse. Where they are absent, it little matters whether the public peace is disturbed, the cause of reform obstructed, and bad passion nourished by associations or individuals. In fact, in the complicated structure of modern society, it is impossible to draw a line between them. It is powerful indi- viduals that move societies ; it is organized multitudes which give power to individuals. If there is any cause in which it is right and proper to em- ploy the social principle, the promotion of temperance is that cause ; for intemperance, in its origin, is peculiarly a social 368 TEMPERANCE. vice. Although, in its progress, men may creep away, from shame, to indulge the depraved appetite in secret, yet no man. m a state of civilization, is born, I imagine, with a taste so unnatural, that he would, without the inducement of society, seek an intoxicating liquor, in the outset, for his ordinary or frequent drink. It is usually tasted for the first time as the pledge of hospitality, and the bond of good fellowship. Idle men, who meet casually together, with kind feelings towards each other, ask each other to step into the dram- shop and " take something to drink," for want of any thing else to say or do ; and there they swallow the liquid poison " to each other's health." The social circle, the stated club, the long-protracted sitting at the board, on public occasions, the midnight festivities of private assemblies, these, nine cases out of ten, teach men the fatal alphabet of intem- perance ; surprise them into their first excesses ; break down the sense of shame ; establish a sympathy of conscious frailty ; and thus lead them on, by degrees, to habitual, and at length craving, solitary, and fatal indulgence. The vice of intemperance, then, is social in its origin, progress, and aggravation ; and most assuredly authorizes us, by every rule of reason and justice, in exerting the whole strength of the social principle in the way of remedy. If it were possible to entertain a doubt on this point, as a matter of theory, that doubt would be removed by the safe test of experience. The maxims of temperance are not new ; they are as old as Christianity ; as old as any of the inculca- tions of personal and social duty. Every other instrument of moral censure had been tried, in the case of intemperance, as in that of other prevailing errors, vices, and crimes. The law had done something ; the press had done something ; the stated ministrations of religion had done something ; but all had done but little ; and intemperance had reached a most alarming degree of prevalence. At length the principle of association was applied ; societies were formed, meetings were held, public addresses made, information collected and communicated, pledges mutually given, the minds of men excited, and their hearts warmed, by comparison of opinions TEMPERANCE. 369 by concert and sympathy ; and within the space of twenty years, of which not more than ten have been devoted to stren- uous effort, a most signal and unexampled reform has been achieved. The bubbling, and, as it seemed, perennial foun- tains of this vice have, in many cases, been dried up. The example alluded to by the gentleman who has already ad- dressed us, (Dr Pierson,) of villages absolutely regenerated, is by no means a solitary one. The aspect of many entire communities has been changed, and an incalculable amount of vice and woe has been prevented. The statistical facts publicly brought out at the National Temperance Convention, lately held in Philadelphia, abundantly sustain this proposi- tion. But if we are encouraged to continued and persevering efforts by the success which has thus far crowned the cause, we ought to be still more so, by reflecting upon the extent to which the evil still rages. If we are to obey the injunction of the Roman moralist, and " think nothing done while aught remains to do," what new motives to zealous exertion ought we not to find in the fact, that though much has been done, much, very much, remains to be effected ? I have recently seen it stated, on the authority of the highly respectable warden of the state's prison in Maine, that " three fourths of all the convicts in that establishment were led to the commis- sion of the crimes for which they are now suffering imprison- ment, by intemperance," in most cases directly, in others more remotely. There are many gentlemen present, no doubt, able to form an opinion entitled to full confidence, whether this would be an over-estimate for the other states in the Union. I am inclined, myself, to think that it is not. If we carry the inquiry a little farther, from our state prisons to our county jails and houses of correction, I am disposed to believe that the same proportion also of their inmates is brought within their walls by intemperance. It is well known that a considerable portion of the small debts collected, or at- tempted to be collected, by the law, are for spirituous liquors ; and that the least evil this liquor has done its consumers, has been to bring them within the poor debtors' ward of a jail. VOL. i. 47 370 TEMPERANCE If we pass from vice to pauperism, we shall find a similar result. Pauperism is another of the greatest public burdens, and is at this moment tasking the ingenuity of statesmen and philanthropists in Europe and America, as a great and grow- ing public evil, which seems to derive a principle of increase from the measures necessary to its alleviation. I believe we may in like manner set down three fourths of the pauperism which prevails, to the direct or remote influence of intem- perance. In fact, intemperance is peculiarly a principle of pauperism ; more directly so than of crime, though it tends strongly enough to crime. But every man who depends upon his industry for his support and that of his family, by becom- ing intemperate unavoidably becomes a pauper. His strength and health are impaired, his energies stupefied, his earnings squandered, his credit and character sacrificed, all around him, except those who are unfortunately bound to him by ties that cannot be broken, are repelled, and the man sinks into pauperism almost as a matter of course. He cannot be rescued. But it must not be forgotten, that, in addition to the crimes which people our prisons, in addition to the poverty which seeks a refuge in the alms-house, there is an untold amount both of want and vice in the world, which, although not exposed to the public view, either in the prisons or poor- houses, exists, and inflicts the most cruel sufferings and sorrows on a large part of the human family ; and, of this vice and want, a very large proportion is produced by intem- perance. Take the case of a man in easy circumstances, in town or country, of intemperate habits, but yet retaining self- control enough to manage his property, and honesty enough to keep out of jail. This man, of course, will be neither a convict nor a pauper : on the contrary, he may fill what is called a respectable station in society ; and yet, under the influence of a daily indulgence in ardent spirits, he may be the ir ery tyrant of his household ; never pleased, never soothed, never gratified, when the utmost has been done by every body to gratify him ; often turbulent and outrageous ; sometimes cruel ; the terror of those whom he is bound by every law of TEMPERANCE. 371 God and man to protect ; the shame of those whom nature teaches to reverence and love him. Such a man does not fall into the clutches of the law ; but, in a moral point of view, I deem him much more criminal than the ignorant, weak- minded, needy, sorely tempted creature, who cannot resist the temptation of passing a forged bank note, for which he is sentenced for two or three years to the state's prison. Such a man does not take refuge in the alms-house, nor drive his family to it ; but the coarsest and hardest bread that is broken within its walls is a dainty, compared with the luxuries of his cheerless table. Then, as to poverty. I believe the poverty out of the alms-house, produced by intemperance, is greater, in the amount of suffering which it occasions, than the poverty in the alms-house. To the victims of drunkenness whom it has conducted to the alms-house, one bitter ingredient of the cup is spared. The sense of shame, and the struggles of honest pride, are at length over. But take the case of a person whose family is dependent on the joint labor of its heads. Suppose the man a hard-working mechanic or farmer, the woman an industrious housewife, and the family supported by their united labor, frugality, and diligence. The man, as the phrase is, " takes to drink." What happens ? The im- mediate consequence is, that the cost of the liquor which he consumes is taken from the fund which was before barely adequate for their support. They must, therefore, reduce some other part of their expenditure. They have no lux- uries ; and must, accordingly, pinch in the frugal comforts and necessaries of life, in wholesome food, in decent clothing, in fuel, in the education of the children. As the habit of excess increases, there must be more and more of this melan- choly retrenchment. The old clothes, already worn out, must be worn longer ; the daily fare, none too good at the beginning, becomes daily more meagre and scanty ; the leak in the roof, for want of a nail, a shingle, or a bit of board, grows wider every winter ; the number of panes of broken glass, whose place is poorly supplied with old hats and rags, daily increases ; but not so the size of the unreplenished TEMPEilANCB. wood-pile. Before long, the children are kept from school, for want of books and clothing ; and, at length, the wretched family are ashamed to show their sordid tatters in the church, on the Sabbath day. Meantime, the fund for the support of the family, the labor of its head, although burdened with a constantly growing charge for liquor, is diminished , in consequence of the decline of his health, strength, and energy. He is constantly earning less ; and, of what he earns, constantly consuming more unproductively destruc- tively. Let this process proceed a year or two, and see to what they are reduced, and how poverty passes into crime. Look into his hovel, for such, by this time, it is, when he comes home on Saturday evening ; the wages of his week's labor already squandered in excess. Not wholly in- toxicated, he is yet heated with liquor, and craves more. Listen to the brutal clamors, accompanied by threats and oaths, with which he demands of his family the food which they have been able to procure neither for themselves nor him. See the poor, grown-up children, boys and girls, perhaps young men and women, old enough to feel the shame as well as the misery of their heritage, without a tinge of health upon their cheeks,, without a spark of youthful cheer- fulness in their eyes, silent and terrified, creeping supperless, for the night, to their wretched garret, to escape outrage, curses, and blows, from the author of their being. Watch the heart-broken wife, as, with a countenance haggard with care arid woe, she seeks in vain to supply the wants of a half- starved, sickly, shrieking babe, out of the fountain which hunger, and ill-usage, and despair have exhausted ; and then return in the morning, and find her blood and the infant's wet upon the hearth-stone.* Do I paint from the imagination, or do I paint from nature ? Am I sporting with your feelings ; or might I heighten the picture, and yet spare you many a heart- sickening trait from real life ? In a word, sir, when we contemplate intemperance in all its bearings and effects on the condition and character of men, * Facts like those stated were disclosed in a criminal trial, a short time before the delivery of this address. TEMPERANCE. 373 I believe we shall come to the conclusion that it is the great- est evil which, as beings of a compound nature, we have to fear ; the greatest, because striking directly at the ultimate principle of the constitution of man. Let us contemplate this point a moment, for within it is comprehended, if I mistake not, the whole philosophy of this subject. Our life exists in a mysterious union of the corporeal and intellectual principles, an alliance of singular intimacy, as well as of strange contrast, between the two extremes of being. In their due relation to each other, and in the rightful discharge of their respective functions, I do not know whether the pure ethereal essence itself (at least as far as we can comprehend it, which is but faintly) ought more to excite our admiration than this most wondrous compound of spirit and matter. I do not know that it is extravagant to say that there is as signal a display of the divine skill in linking thoue intellec- tual powers, which are the best image of the Divinity, with the forms and properties of matter, as in the creation of orders of beings purely disembodied and spiritual. When I contrast the dull and senseless clod of the valley, in its unanimated state, with the curious hand, the glowing cheek, the beaming eye, the discriminating sense which dwells in a thousand nerves, I feel the force of that inspired exclamation "I am fearfully and wonderfully made ! " And when I consider the action and reaction of soul and body on each other, the impulse given to volition from the senses, and again to the organs by the will ; when I reflect how thoughts so exalted that, though they comprehend all else, the laws of their own existence are incomprehensible are yet able to take a shape in the material air, to issue and travel from one sense in one man to another sense in another man, so that, as the words drop from my lips, the secret chambers of the soul are thrown open, and its invisible ideas made manifest. I am lost in wonder. If to this I add the reflection, how the world and its affairs are governed, the face of nature changed, oceans crossed, continents settled, families of men gathered and kept together for generations, and monuments of power, wisdom, and taste erected, which last for ages after the hands 374 TEMPERANCE. that reared them have turned to dust, and all this by tho regency of that fine intellectual principle which sits modestly concealed behind its veil of clay, and moves its subject organs, I find no words to express my admiration of the union of mind and matter by which these miracles are wrought. Who can thus contemplate the wonder, the beauty, the vast utility, the benevolence, the indescribable fitness of this organization, and not feel that this vice of intemperance, which aims directly to destroy it, is the arch-abomination of our natures ; tending not merely to create a conflict between the nicely adjusted principles, but to assure the triumph of that which is low, base, sensual, and earthly, over the heavenly and pure ; to convert this so curiously organized frame into a dis- ordered, crazy machine, and to drag down the soul to the slavery of grovelling lusts ? In the first place, there is the shameful abuse of the boun- ties of Providence, which, after making the substantial provi- sion for the supply of our daily wants, after spreading out the earth, with its vegetable stores, as a great table for our nutriment, and appointing the inferior animals for our solid food, was pleased, as it would seem, of mere grace and favor, to add unnumbered cordial spirits to gratify and cheer us sweet waters and lively spices ; to fill the fibres of the cane with its luscious sirups, the clusters of the vine with its cooling juices, and a hundred aromatic leaves, berries, and fruits, with their refreshing and reviving essences ; and even to infuse into the poppy an anodyne against the sharpest pains our frail flesh is heir to, I say, it is the first aggravation of the sin of intemperance, that it seizes on all these kind and bountiful provisions, and turns them into a source, not of comfort and health, but of excess; indecently revelling at the modest banquet of nature, shamefully surfeiting at the sober table of Providence, and converting every thing that has a life and power, alike the exhilarating and the soothing, the stimulant and the opiate, into one accursed poison. Next come the ravages of this all-destroying vice on the health of its victims. You see them resolved, as it were, to anticipate the corruption of their natures. They cannot wait TEMPERANCE. 375 to get sick and die. They think the worm is slow in his approach and sluggish at his work. They wish to reconvert the dust, before their hour comes, into its primitive deformity and pollution. My friend, who spoke before me, (Dr Pierson,) called it a partial death. I would rather call it a double death, by which they drag about with them, above the grave, a mass of diseased, decaying, aching clay. They will not only commit suicide, but do it in such a way as to be the witnesses and conscious victims of the cruel process of self- murder ; doing it by degrees, by inches ; quenching the sight, benumbing the brain, laying down the arm of industry to be cut off; and changing a fair, healthy, robust frame for a shrinking, suffering, living corpse, with nothing of vitality but the power of suffering, and with every thing of death but its peace. Then follows the wreck of property, the great object of worldly pursuit ; the temporal ruin, which comes, like an avenging angel, to waste the substance of the intemperate ; which crosses their threshold, commissioned, as it were, to plague them with all the horrors of a ruined fortune and blasted prospect ; and passes before their astonished sight, in the dread array of affairs perplexed, debts accumulated, substance squandered, honor tainted, wife, children cast out upon the mercy of the world, and he who should have been their guardian and protector dependent for his unearned daily bread on those to whom he is a burden and a curse. Bad as all this is, much as it is, it is neither the greatest nor the worst part of the aggravations of the crime of intem- perance. It produces consequences of still more awful moment. It first exasperates the passions, and then takes off from them the restraints of the reason and will ; maddens and then unchains the tiger, ravening for blood ; tramples all the intellectual and moral man under the feet of the stimu- lated clay ; lays the understanding, the kind affections, and the conscience in the same grave with prosperity and health ; and having killed the body, kills the soul ! Such, faintly described, is the vice of intemperance. Such it still exists in our land ; checked, and, as we hope, declin- 376 TEMPERANCE. ing, but still prevailing to a degree which invites all our zeai for its effectual suppression. Such as I have described it, it exists, I fear, in every city, in every town, in every village in our country. Such and so formidable is its power. But I rejoice in the belief that an antagonist principle of equal power has been brought into the field. Public opinion, in all its strength, is enlisted against it. Men, that agree in nothing else, unite in this. Religious divisions are healed and party feuds forgotten in this good cause. Individuals and societies, private citizens and the government, have joined in waging war against intemperance ; and, above all, the press the great engine of reform is thundering, with all its artillery, against it. It is a moment of great interest, and also of considerable delicacy. That period in a moral reform in which a great evil, that has long passed comparatively un- questioned, is overtaken by a sudden bound of public opinion, is somewhat critical. Individuals, as honest as their neigh- bors, are surprised in pursuits and practices sanctioned by the former standard of moral sentiment, but below the mark of the reform. Tenderness and delicacy are necessary to prevent such persons, by mistaken pride of character, from being made enemies of the cause. In our denunciations of the evil, we must take care not to include those whom a little prudence might bring into cordial cooperation with us in its suppression. Let us, sir, mingle discretion with our zeal ; and the greater will be our success in this pure and noble enterprise THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION.* FELLOW-CITIZENS : I HAVE accepted, with great cheerfulness, the invitation with which you have honored me, to address you on this occasion. The citizens of Worcester did not wait to receive a second call, before they hastened to the relief of the citi- zens of Middlesex, in the times that tried men's souls. I should feel myself degenerate and unworthy, could I hesitate to come, and, in my humble measure, assist you in commem- orating those exploits which your fathers so promptly and so nobly aided our fathers in achieving. Apprised by your committee that the invitation which has brought me hither was given on behalf of the citizens of Worcester, without distinction of party, I can truly say that it is also, in this respect, most congenial to my feelings. I have several times had occasion to address my fellow-citizens on the fourth of July ; and sometimes at periods when the party excitement now so happily, in a great measure, al- layed has been at its height ; and when custom and publia sentiment would have borne me out in seizing the opportu- nity of inculcating the political views of those on whose behalf I spoke. But of no such opportunity have I ever availed myself. I have never failed, as far as it was in my power, to lead the minds of those whom I have had the honor to address to those common topics of grateful recollection which unite the patriotic feelings of every American. It has not been my fault, if ever, on this auspicious national anni- * Oration delivered at Worcester, on the 4th of July, 1833. VOL. I. 48 (377) 378 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR versary, a single individual has forgotten that he was a brothe r of one great family, while he has recollected that he was a member of a party. In fact, fellow-citizens, I deem it one of the happiest effects of the celebration of this anniversary, that, when undertaken in the spirit which has animated you on this occasion, it has a natural tendency to soften the harshness of party, which I cannot but regard as the great bane of our prosperity. It was pronounced by Washington, in his valedictory address to the people of the United States, " the worst enemy of popular governments ; " and the experience of almost every administra- tion, from his own down, has confirmed the truth of the remark. The spirit of party unquestionably has its source in some of the native passions of the heart ; and free governments natu- rally furnish more of its aliment than those under which the liberty of speech and of the press is restrained by the strong arm of power. But so naturally does party run into ex- tremes, so unjust, cruel, and remorseless is it in its ex- cess, so ruthless in the war which it wages against private character, so unscrupulous in the choice of means for the attainment of selfish ends, so sure is it, eventually, to dig the grave of those free institutions of which it pretends to be the necessary accompaniment, so inevitably does it end in military despotism and unmitigated tyranny, that I do not know how the voice and influence of a good man could, with more propriety, be exerted, than in the effort to assuage its violence. We must be strengthened in this conclusion, when we con- sider that party controversy is constantly showing itself as unreasonable and absurd as it is unamiable and pernicious. If we needed illustrations of the truth of this remark, we should not be obliged to go far to find them. In the unex- pected turns that continually occur in affairs, events arise, which put to shame the selfish adherence of resolute cham- pions to their party names. No election of president has ever been more strenuously contested than that which agitated the country the last year ; and I do not know that party spirit, in our time at least, has ever run higher, or the THE SCHOOL OF THE EEVOLUTION. 379 party press been more virulent on both sides. And what has followed ? The election was scarcely decided, the president thus chosen had not entered upon the second term of his office, before the state of things was so entirely changed, as to produce, in reference to the most important question which has engaged the attention of the country since the adoption of the constitution, a concert of opinion among those, who, two months before, had stood in hostile array against each other. The measures adopted by the president, for the pres- ervation of the Union, met with the most cordial support, in Congress and out of it, from those who had most strenuously opposed his election ; and he, in his turn, depended upon that support, not only as auxiliary, but as indispensable to his administration, in this great crisis. And what do we now behold ? The president of the United States traversing New England, under demonstrations of public respect, as cordial and as united as he would receive in Pennsylvania or Ten- nessee ; and the great head of his opponents in this part of the country, the illustrious champion of the Constitution in the Senate of the United States, welcomed with equal cor- diality and equal unanimity, by men of all names and parties, in the distant west. And what is the cause of this wonderful and auspicious change ; auspicious, however transitory its duration may un- fortunately prove ? That cause is to be sought in a princi- ple so vital, that it is almost worth the peril to which the country's best interests have been exposed, to see its existence and power made manifest and demonstrated. This principle is, that the union of the states which has been in danger must at all hazards be preserved ; that union, which, in the same parting language of Washington which I have already cited, " is the main pillar in the edifice of our real inde- pendence, the support of our tranquillity at home, our peace abroad, our safety, our prosperity ; of that very liberty which we so highly prize." Men have forgotten their little feuds in the perils of the constitution. The afflicted voice of the country, in its hour of danger, has charmed down with a sweet persuasion the angry passions of the day ; and men 380 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR have felt that they had no heart to ask themselves the ques- tion, whether their party were triumphant or prostrate ; when the infinitely more momentous question was pressing upon them, whether the Union was to be preserved or destroyed. In speaking, however, of the preservation of the Union as the great and prevailing principle in our political system, I would not have it understood that I suppose this portion of the country to be more interested in it than any other. The intimation which is sometimes made, and the belief which hi some quarters is avowed, that the Northern States have a peculiar and a selfish interest in the preservation of the Union, that they derive advantages from it at the uncom- pensated expense of other portions, I take to be one of the grossest delusions ever propagated by men, deceived them- selves, or willing to deceive others. I know, indeed, that the dissolution of the Union would be the source of incal- culable injury to every part of it ; as it would, in great like- lihood, lead to border and civil war, and eventually to military despotism. But not to us would the bitter chalice be first presented. This portion of the Union, erroneously sup- posed to have 'a peculiar interest in its preservation, would be sure to suffer, no doubt ; but it would also be among the last to suffer from that deplorable event ; while that portion which is constantly shaking over us the menace of separa- tion, would be swept with the besom of destruction from the moment an offended Providence should permit that purpose to reach its ill-starred maturity. Far distant be all these inauspicious calculations. It is the natural tendency of celebrating the fourth of July, to strengthen the sentiment of attachment to the Union. It carries us back to other days of yet greater peril to our beloved country, when a still stronger bond of feeling and action united the hearts of her children. It recalls to us the sacrifices of those who deserted all the walks of private industry, and abandoned the prospects of opening life, to engage in the service of their country. It reminds us of the fortitude of those who took upon themselves the perilous responsibility of leading the public councils in the paths of THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION. 381 levolution ; in the sure alternative of that success, which was all but desperate, and that scaffold, already menaced as their predestined fate .if they failed. It calls up, as it were, from the beds of glory and peace where they lie, from the heights of Charlestown to the southern plains. the vast and ven- erable congregation of those who bled in the sacred cause. They gather in saddened majesty around us, and adjure us, by their returning agonies and re-opening wounds, not to permit our feuds and dissensions to destroy the value of that birthright which they purchased with their precious lives. There seems to me a peculiar interest attached to the pres- ent anniversary celebration. It is just a half century since the close of the revolutionary war. It is the jubilee of the restoration of peace between the United States and Great Britain. It has been sometimes objected to these anniver- sary celebrations, that they are calculated, by the unavoidable train of remark in the public addresses which they call forth, to perpetuate an unfriendly feeling towards the land of our fathers, with which we, to our mutual benefit, are at peace. Without denying that this celebration may, like all other hu- man things, have been abused in injudicious hands for such a purpose, I cannot, nevertheless, admit that, either as philan- thropists or citizens of the world, we are required to renounce any of the sources of an honest national pride. A revolution like ours is a most momentous event in human affairs. His- tory does not furnish its parallel. Characters like those of our fathers services, sacrifices, and sufferings like theirs form a sacred legacy, transmitted to our veneration, to be cherished, to be preserved unimpaired, and to be handed down to after ages. Could we consent, on any ot casion, to deprive them of their just meed of praise, we should prove ourselves degenerate children ; and we should be guilty, as a people, of a sort of public and collective self-denial, unheard of among nations whose annals contain any thing of which their citi- zens have reason to be proud. Our brethren in Great Britain teach us no such lesson. In the zeal with which they nour- ish the boast of a brave ancestry, by the proud recollections of their history, they have, so to speak, consecrated their 382 , THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR gallant and accomplished neighbors, the French, (from whom they also are originally in part descended,) as a sort (f nat- ural enemy, an object of hereditary hostile .feeling, in peace and in war. That it could be thought ungenerous or unchristian to commemorate the exploits of the Wellingtons, the Nelsons, or the Marlboroughs, I believe is an idea that never entered into the head of an English statesman or patriot. But at the same time, I admit it to be not so much the duty as the privilege of an American citizen to acquit this obligation to the memory of his fathers with discretion and generosity. It is true, that the greatest incident of our his- tory, that which lies at the foundation of our most important and most cherished national traditions, is the revolutionary war. But it is not the less true, that there are many ties which ought to bind our feelings to the land of our fathers. It is characteristic of a magnanimous people to do justice to the merits of every other nation ; especially of a nation with whom we have been at variance and are now in amity ; and most especially of a nation of common blood. Where are the graves of our fathers ? In England. The school of the free principles, in which, as the last great lesson, the doctrine of our independence was learned, where did it sut sist ? In the hereditary love of liberty of the Anglo-Saxon race. The great names which, before America began to exist for civil- ization and humanity, immortalized the language which we speak, and made our mother tongue a heart-stirring dialect, which a man is proud to- take on his lips, whithersoever on the face of the earth he may wander, are English. If it be, in the language of Cowper, "praise enough To fill the ambition of a private man, That Chatham's language is his mother tongue, And Wolfe's great name compatriot with his own," let no American forget that Wolfe fell on the soil of this coun- try, with some of the best and bravest of New England by his side ; and that it was among the last of the thrilling excla- THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION. 383 mations, with which Chatham shook the House of Lords " Were I an American, as I am an Englishman, I never would lay down my arms ; never, never, never ! " There were, indeed, great and glorious achievements in America, before the revolution, in which the colonies and the mother country were intimately and honorably associated. There lived brave men before the Agamemnons of seventy- six ; and, thanks to the recording pen of history, their names are not, and never shall be, forgotten. Nothing but the noon- tide splendor of the revolutionary period could have sufficed to cast into comparative forgetfulness the heroes and the achievements of the old French war. and of that which pre- ceded it in 1744. If we wished an effective admonition of the unreasonableness of permitting the events of the revolu- tion to engender a feeling of permanent hostility in our minds towards the land of our fathers, we might find it in the fact that the war of independence was preceded by only twenty years by that mighty conflict of the Seven Years' war, in which the best blood of England and the colonies was shed beneath their united banners, displayed on the American soil, and in a cause which all the colonies, and especially those of New England, had greatly at heart. And this observation suggests the topic to which I beg leave to call your attention for the residue of the hour. It will not be expected of me, on this occasion, (which seems more appropriately to be devoted to the effusion of kind and patriotic feeling than to labored discussion,) to en- gage in a regular essay ; particularly as other urgent engage- ments have left me but a very brief period of preparation for my appearance before you. I shall aim only, out of the vast storehouse of the revolutionary theme, to select one or two topics, less frequently treated than some others, but not inappropriate to the day. Among these I think we may safely place the civil and military education which the country had received in the earlier fortunes of the colonies ; the great prcBparatio libertatis, which had fitted out our fathers to reap the harvest of independence on bloody fields, and to secure 384 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR and establish it by those wise institutions, in which the only safe enjoyment of freedom resides. This subject, in its full extent, would be greatly too com- prehensive for the present occasion, and the circumstances under which I address you. I shall confine myself chiefly to the Seven Years' war, as connected with the war of the revolution a subject which has not, perhaps, received all the attention which it merits. The influence on the revolu- tionary struggle of the long civil contest which had been kept up with the crown, and the effect of this contest in awakening the minds of men in the colonies, and forming them to the intelligent and skilful defence of their rights, have been often enough set forth. But the peculiar and extraordinary concurrence of facts in the military history of the colonies, the manner in which the moving causes of the revolution are interwoven with the great incidents of the previous wars, deserve a particular development. If I mis- take not, they disclose a systematic connection of events, which, for harmony, interest, and grandeur, are well worthy our contemplation. When America was first approached by the Europeans, it was in the occupancy of the Indian tribes ; an unhappy race of beings, not able, as the event has proved, to stand before the advance of civilization ; feeble, on the whole, compared with the colonists, when armed with the weapons and arts of Europe ; but yet capable of carrying on a most harassing and destructive warfare for several generations ; particularly after having learned the use of fire-arms, and provided themselves with steel tomahawks and scalping-knives from the French and English colonists. Between the two latter the continent was almost equally divided. From Nova Scotia to Florida the English possessed the sea-coast. From the St Lawrence to the Mississippi the French had established themselves in the interior. The Indian tribes, who occupied the whole line of the frontier, and the intermediate space between the settle- ments, were alternately stimulated by the two parties against each other ; but more extensively and effectively, along the THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION. 385 greater part of the line, by the French against the English, than by the English against the French. With every war in Europe, between England and France, the frontier was in flames, from the Savannah to the St Croix ; and down to so late a period did this state of things last, that I have noticed, within eighteen months, the death of an aged person who was tomahawked by the Canadian savages on their last incur- sion to the banks of the Connecticut River, as low down as Northampton. There were periods at vrhich the expulsion of the English from the continent seemed inevitable ; and at other times the French empire in America appeared equally insecure. But it was plain that no thought of independence could suggest itself, and no plan of throwing off the colonial yoke could prosper, while a hostile power of French and Canadian Indians, exasperated by the injuries inflicted and retaliated for a hundred years, was encamped along the fron- tier. On the contrary, the habit, so long kept up, of acting in concert with the mother country against their French and savage neighbors, was one of the strongest ties of interest which bound the colonies to the crown. At length, in the year 1754, the conflicting claims of the two crowns to the jurisdiction of various portions of the Indian territory, belonging, perhaps, by no very good title to either of them, led to the commencement of hostilities between the English and the French, in different parts of the colonies. Among the measures of strength which were adopted against the common foe, was the plan of uniting the colonies in a general confederation, not dissimilar to that which was actually formed in the revolutionary war. It is justly remarked by the historians, as a curious coincidence of dates and events, that, on the fourth of July, 1754, General Washington, then a colonel in the provincial service, in Virginia, should have been compelled to capitulate to the French, at Fort Necessity, and that Benjamin Franklin, as one of the commissioners assembled at Albany, should have put his name, on the same day, to the abortive plan of the confederation ; and that on the very same day, twenty-two years afterwards, General Washington should be found at the VOL. i. 49 386 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR head of the armies of independent and united America, and Franklin in the Congress at Philadelphia, among the authors and signers of the Declaration. It is obvious that the necessary elements of a Union could not subsist in a state of dependence on a foreign gov- ernment ; and the failure of the confederation of 1754 is another proof that our Union is but the form in which our independence was organized. One in their origin, there is little doubt that they will continue so in their preservation. The most natural event of a secession of a small part of the Union from the other states would be its re-colonization by Great Britain. It was only the United States which were acknowledged to be independent by Great Britain, or declared to be independent by themselves. Two years after the period last mentioned, namely, in 1756, the flames of the war spread from America to Europe, where it burst forth and raged to an extent and with a violence scarcely surpassed by the mighty contests of Napoleon. The Empress of Austria and Frederic the Great, France and Spain, not yet humbled, and united by the family compact in the closest alliance, and above all, England, then com- prehending within her dominions the colonies that now form the United States, and at last roused arid guided by the tow- ering genius and the lion heart of the elder Pitt, plunged, with all their resources, into the conflict. There were various subsidiary objects at heart with the different powers ; but the great prize of the contest between England and France was the possession of America. That prize, by the fortune of war, or rather by that Providence which, in this manner, was preparing the way for American independence, was adjudged to the arms of England. The great work was accomplished, and the decisive blow was struck, when Wolfe fell, in the arms of victory, on the Heights of Abraham ; furnishing in his fate no unapt similitude of the British empire in America, which that victory had seemed to consummate. As Wolfe died in the moment of triumph, so the power of England on this continent received its death-blow in the event that destroyed its rival. THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION. 387 It is curious to remark how instantly this effect began to manifest itself. Up to this time, the utmost political energy of the colonies, in conjunction with that of the mother coun- try, had been required to maintain a foothold on the continent. They were in constant apprehension of being swept away by the united strength of the French and Indians. Their thoughts had never wandered beyond the frontier line, marked as it was, in its whole extent, with fire and blood. But the power of the French once expelled from the country, as it was, with a trifling exception at New Orleans, and their long line of strongholds transferred to the British govern- ment, the minds of men immediately moved forward into the illimitable space that seemed opening to them. A polit- ical miracle was wrought ; the mountains sunk, the valleys rose, and the portals of the west were burst asunder. The native tribes of the forest still roamed the interior; but, in the imaginations of men, they had derived their chief terror from the alliance with the French. The idea did not immediately present itself to the minds of the Americans, that they might, in like manner, be armed and stimulated by the English against the colonies, whenever a movement towards independence should require such a check. Hutch- inson remarks an altered tone in the state papers of Massa- chusetts from this period, which he ascribes, less distinctly than he might, to the same cause. Governor Bernard, on occasion of the fall of Quebec, congratulates the General Court on " the blessings they derive from their subjection to Great Britain ; " and the council, in their echo to the speech, acknowledge that it is " to their relation to Great Britain that they owe their freedom ; " and the same historian traces the rise of a vague idea of " independency " to the same period and the same influence upon the imaginations of men of the removal of the barrier of the French power. The subversion of this power required, or was thought to require,. a new colonial system. Its principles were few and simple. An army was to be stationed, and a revenue raised, in America. The army was to enforce the collection of the revenue ; the revenue was to pay the cost of the army ; and 388 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR by this army, stationed in the colonies and paid by them, the colonists were to be kept down and the French kept out. The policy was ingenious and plausible ; it wanted but one thing for its successful operation ; but that want was fatal. It needed to be put to practice among men who would submit to it. It would have done exceedingly well in the new Cana- dian conquests ; but it was wholly out of place among the descendants of the Pilgrims and the Puritans. Up to this hour, although the legislative supremacy of England had not been contested in general terms, yet the home government had never attempted to enact laws simply for the collection of revenue. They had confined themselves to the indirect operation of the laws of trade, (which purported to be for the advantage of all parts of the empire, the colonies as well as the mother country,) and those not rigidly enforced. The reduction of the French possessions was the signal, not merely for the infusion of new vigor into the administration of the commercial system, but for the assertion of the naked right to tax America. When a great event is to be brought about, in the order of Providence, the first thing which arrests the attention of the student of its history, in after times, is the appearance of the fitting instruments for its accomplishment. They come for- ward, and take their places on the great stage of action. They know not themselves for what they are raised up ; but there they are. James Otis was then in the prime of man- hood, about thirty-seven years of age. He was fully per- suaded that the measures adopted by the British government were unconstitutional, and he was armed with the genius and learning, the wit and eloquence, the vehemence of temper, the loftiness of soul, the firmness of nerve, the purity of pur- pose, necessary to constitute a great popular leader in difficult times. The question was brought before a judicial tribunal, I must confess, in a small way, on the petition of the custom-house officers of Salem, for writs of assistance to en- force the acts of trade. Otis appeared as the counsel of the commercial interest, to oppose the granting of these writs. Large fees were tendered him ; but his language was, " In THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION. 389 such a cause, I despise all fees." His associate counsel, Mr Thacher, preceded him in the argument of the cause, with moderation and suavity ; " but Otis," in the language of the elder President Adams, who heard him, " was a flame of fire. With a promptitude of classical allusions, a depth of research, a rapid summary of historical events and dates, a profusion of legal authorities, a prophetic glance of his eye into futu- rity," (that glorious futurity which he lived not, alas ! to en- joy,) "and a deep torrent of impetuous eloquence, he carried all before him. American independence was then and there born. Every man, of an immense crowded audience, ap- peared to me to go away, as I did, ready to take arms against writs of assistance. Then and there was the first scene of the first act of opposition to the arbitrary claims of Great Britain." * It would be travelling over a beaten road to pursue the narrative of the parliamentary contest from this time to 1775. My object has merely been to point out the curious historical connection between the consolidation and the downfall of the British empire in America, consequent upon the successful issue of the Seven Years' war. One consequence only may deserve to be specified, of a different character, but springing from the same source, and tending to the same end, and more decisive of the fate of the revolution than any other merely political circumstance. The event which wrested her colo- nial possessions on this continent from France, gave to our fathers a friend in that power which had hitherto been their most dreaded enemy, and prepared France, by the gradual operation of public sentiment, and the influence of reasons of state, when the accepted time should arrive, to extend to them an efficient hand to aid them in establishing their inde- pendence. Next to a reconquest of her own possessions, or rather vastly more efficacious towards humbling Great Britain than a reconquest of the colonies of France, was the great policy of enabling the whole British empire in America. * Tudor'a Life of Otis, page 61. 390 1HE SEVEN YEARS' WAR alike the recent acquisitions and the ancient colonies along the coast, (for to this length the policy of France extended,) to throw off the English yoke. France played, in this respect, on a much grander scale, that game of state which gave Mr Canning so much eclat, a few years since, in refer- ence to the affairs of Spain. Perceiving Spain to be in the occupation of the French army, Mr Canning, with a policy, it must be owned, more effective as towards France than friendly towards Spain, determined, as he said, to redress the balance of power in the Spanish colonies ; and in order to render the acquisition of Spain comparatively worthless to France, to use his own language, "he called into being a new world in the west." Much more justly might the Count de Vergennes have boasted, that, England having wrested from France her American colonies, he had determined to redress the balance of power in the quarter where it was dis- turbed j to wrest from the victorious arms of England their new acquisitions, to strike their ancient foothold from beneath their feet, and call into being a new world in the west. On the score of generosity, the French minister had the advan- tage that his blow was one of retaliation, aimed at his enemy, while the British minister struck at a power with which he was at peace, through the sides of his ally. But all this wonderful conjunction of political causes does not sufficiently explain, in a practical way, the phenomenon of the revolution, nor furnish a satisfactory account of the promptitude with which the feeble colonies made the decisive appeal to arms against the colossal power of England, the boldness with which they plunged into the revolutionary struggle, and the success with which, through a thousand vicissitudes, they conducted it to a happy close. Fully to comprehend this, we must again cast our eyes on the war of 1744, and still more on that of 1756, as forming a great school of military conduct and discipline, in which the future lead- ers of the revolution were trained to the duties of the camp and the field. It was here that they became familiarized to the idea of great military movements, and accustomed to tha THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION. 391 direction of great military expeditions, conceived in the colo- nial councils, and often carried on, in the first instance, by the unaided colonial resources. In the extent of their military efforts, the numbers of men enlisted in the New England colonies, the boldness and com- prehension of the campaigns, the variety and hardship of the service, and the brilliancy of the achievements, I could almost venture to say that as much was effected in these two wars, as in that of the revolution. The military efforts of the colonies had indeed, from the first, been remarkable. It was calculated, near the commencement of the last century, that every fifth man in Massachusetts, capable of bearing arms, had been engaged in the service at one time. The more melancholy calculation was at the same time made, that in the period of thirty years from King Philip's war, from five to six thousand of the youth of the colony had perished in the wars. In the second year of the war of 1744, the fa- mous expedition against Louisburg was planned by the Gov- ernor of Massachusetts, and sanctioned by its General Court. Three thousand two hundred of her citizens, with ten armed ships, sailed against that place. This force, compared with the population of Massachusetts at that time, was equal to an army of twelve thousand men with our present numbers ; and the same immense force was kept up the following year. Louisburg, by an auspicious coincidence, fell on the seven- teenth of June, just thirty years before the battle of Bunker Hill. Colonel Gridley, who pointed the mortar which, on the third trial, threw a shell into the citadel at Louisburg, marked. out the lines of the redoubt on Bunker Hill ; * and old Colonel Frye, who hastened to join his regiment on Bunker Hill, after the fight had begun, recalling the surrender of Louisburg, at which he had been present thirty years before, declared that it was an auspicious day for America, and that he would take the risk of it. At the treaty of Aix-la-Cha- pelle, between the great powers of Europe, this poor little * For this and some other facts in this Address, I am indebted to Colonel Swett's interesting and valuable history of the battle of Bunker HUL $92 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR New England conquest was all that Great Britain had to give. as an equivalent for the restitution of all the conquests made by France in the course of the war. But in the war of 1756, the military efforts of the colonies were still more surprising. If it is said that they were up- held by the resources of the mother country, let it not be forgotten, in making the comparison of their exertions in this war with those in the revolution, that in the latter they had the powerful support of France. The Seven Years' war was carried on in America, at the same time, in the extreme south against the Cherokee Indians, then a formidable enemy, in the western part of Virginia and Pennsylvania, at Niagara, on the whole frontier line, from Albany to the St Lawrence and Quebec, in the extreme north-eastern corner of the country, where Nova Scotia and Cape Breton were retaken, in the West Indies, and on the Spanish Main. The regiments of New England and New York, in this war, fought on Lake Ontario and Lake George, at Quebec, in Nova Scotia, in Mar- tinico, Porto Bello, and at the Havana. From the year 1754 to 1762, there were raised, by the single province of Massa- chusetts, thirty-five thousand men ; and for three years suc- cessively, seven thousand men each year ! This was in addition to large numbers of the seafaring inhabitants, who enlisted or were impressed into the British navy ; and in ad- dition to those who enlisted in the regular British army, who amounted in one year to near a thousand. Napoleon, at the summit of his power, did not carry an equal number of the French people into the field. An army of seven thousand, compared with the population of Massachusetts in the middle of the last century, is considerably greater than an army of one million for France, in the time of Napoleon. If I were to repeat the names of all the distinguished pupils in this great school of war, I should have to run over the list of a large proportion of the officers of the revolution- ary army. Among them were Prescott, Putnam, Stark, Grid- ley, Pomroy, Gates, Montgomery, Mercer, Lee, and, above all, Washington. If I were to undertake to recount the heroic adventures, the incredible hardships, the privations and ex- THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION. 393 posures that were endured in the frontier wilderness, in the warfare with the savage foe, on the dreary scouting parties in midwinter, I should unfold a tale of human fortitude and human suffering, to which it would make the heart bleed to listen. I should speak of the gallant Colonel Williams, the founder of the important institution for education which bears his name, in the western part of the commonwealth, the accomplished, affable, and beloved commander, who fell at the head of his regiment, on the bloody eighth of Septem- ber, 1755. Nor would I forget the faithful Mohawk chief- tain, Hendrick, who fell at his side. I should speak of Putnam, tied to a tree by a party of savages who had surprised him at the commencement of an action in a subsequent cam- paign, and exposed, in this condition, to the fire of both parties ; afterwards bound again to the stake, and the piles kindled which were to burn him alive, but, by the inter- ference of an Indian warrior, rescued from this imminent peril, and preserved by Providence to be one of the thunder- bolts of the revolution. I should speak of Gridley, whom I have already mentioned, the engineer at Louisburg, the artillerist at Quebec, where his corps dragged up the only two field-pieces which were raised to the Heights of Abraham, in the momentous assault on that city, and who, as I have already said, planned the lines of the redoubt on Bunker Hill, with consummate ability. I should speak of Pomroy of Northampton, who, in the former war, wrote to his wife from Louisburg, that, " if it were the will of God, he hoped to see her pleasant face again ; but if God, in his holy and sovereign providence, has ordered it otherwise, he hoped to have a' glorious meeting with her in the kingdom of heaven, where there are no wars, nor fatiguing marches, nor roaring cannons, nor cracking bombshells, nor long campaigns, but an eternity to spend in perfect harmony and undisturbed peace ; " * and who did not only live to see his wife's pleasant face again, but to wound with his own hands, in the year 1755, the commander of the French army, the brave Baron Dieskau ; and who, on See the note at the end. 394 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR the 17th of June, 1775, dismounted and passed Charlestcwn Neck, on his way to Bunker Hill, on foot, in the midst of a shower of balls, because he did not think it conscionable to ride General Ward's horse, which he had borrowed, through the cross fire of the British ships of war and floating batter- ies. I should speak of Rogers, the New Hampshire partisan, who, in one of the sharp conflicts in which his corps of rangers was continually engaged, was shot through the wrist, and, having had his queue cut off by one of his men, to stop up the wound, went on with the fight. I should speak of the superhuman endurance and valor of Stark, a captain in the same corps of rangers, throughout the Seven Years' war, a colonel at Bunker Hill, and who, by the victory at Bennington, which he planned and achieved almost by the unaided resources of his own powerful mind and daring spirit, first turned the tide of disaster in the revolutionary war. I should speak of Frye, who was included, as com- mander of the Massachusetts forces, in the disastrous capitu- lation of Fbrt William Henry, in 1757, and escaping, stripped and mangled, from the tomahawk of the savages, who fell upon them the moment they were marched out of the fort, wandered about the woods several days, naked and starving, but who was one of the first to obey the summons that ran through the country, on the 19th of April, 1775, and who called to mind the 17th of June, 1745, as he hastened to join his regiment on Bunker Hill. I should speak of Lord Howe, the youthful, gallant, and favorite British general. On the eve of the fatal assault on Ticonderoga, in 1758, he sent for Stark to sup with him, on his bear-skin in his tent, and talk over the prospects of the ensuing day. He fell, the next morning, at the head of his advancing column, equally lament- ed by Britons and Americans. The General Court of Massa- chusetts erected a monument to his memory, in Westminster Abbey ; and Stark, who never spoke of him without emo- tion, used to rejoice, since he was to fall, that he fell before his distinguished talents could be employed against America. Above all, I should speak of Washington, the youthful Virgin- ian colonel, as modest as brave, who seemed to bear a charmed THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION. 395 life amidst the bullets of the French and Indians at Brad- dock's defeat, and who was shielded on that most bloody day by the arm of Providence, to become the earthly savior of his country. Such were some of the incidents which connect the Seven Years' war with that of the revolution. Such was the school in which, upon the then unexplored banks of the Ohio, by the roaring waters of Niagara, and in the pathless wilderness of the north-western frontier, the men of 1776 were trained in the strictest school of British military discipline and con- duct. And if there were wanted one instance more signal than all others of the infatuation which at that time swayed the councils of Great Britain, it would be the fact that the British ministry not only attempted to impose their unconsti- tutional laws upon men who had drawn in the whole great doctrine of English liberty with their mothers' milk, but who, a few years before, had for eight campaigns stood side by side with the veterans of the British army ; who had marched beneath the wings of the British eagle, and shared the prey of the British lion, from Louisiana to Quebec. At length the revolution, with all this grand civil and mil- itary preparation, came on ; and O that I could paint out in worthy colors the magnificent picture ! Such a subject as it presents, considered as the winding up of a great drama, of which the opening scene begins with the landing of our fathers, is nowhere else, I firmly believe, to be found in the annals of man. It is a great national Epos of real life unsurpassed in grandeur and attraction. It comprehends every kind of interest politics of the most subtle and expansive schools ; great concerns of state and humanity mingled up with personal intrigues ; the passions of ministers and the arts of cabinets, in strange contrast with the mighty developments of Providence, which seem to take in the fate of the civilized world for ages. On the one hand, the great sanctuary of the British power, the adytum imperii, is heard, as Tacitus says of the sanctuary at Jerusalem, to resound with the valediction of the departing gods. On the other hand 39(5 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR the fair temple of American independence is seen rising like an exhalation from the soil, " Not in the sunshine and the smile of heaven, But wrapped in whirlwinds and begirt with woes." The incidents, the characters, are worthy of the drama. What names, what men ! Chatham, Burke, Fox, Franklin, the Adamses, Washington, Jefferson, and all the chivalry and all the diplomacy of Europe and America. The voice of generous disaffection sounds beneath the arches of St. Stephen's ; and the hall of Congress rings with an eloquence like that which " Shook the arsenal, and fulmined over Greece, To Macedon and Artaxerxes' throne." Then contemplate the romantic groups that crowd the mil- itary scene ; all the races of men, and all the degrees of civ- ilization, brought upon the stage at once the English vet- eran ; the plaided Highlander ; the hireling peasantry of Hesse Cassel and Anspach ; the gallant chevaliers of Poland ; the well-appointed legions of France, led by her polished noblesse ; the hardy American yeoman, his leather apron not always thrown aside ; the mountain rifleman ; the painted savage. At one moment, we hear the mighty armadas of Europe thundering in the Antilles. Anon we behold the blue-eyed Brunswickers, whose banners told, in their tattered sheets, of the victory of Minden, threading the wilderness between the St Lawrence and Albany, under an accomplished British gentleman, and capitulating to the American forces, com- manded by a naturalized Virginian, who had been present at the capture of Martinico, and was shot through the body at Braddock's defeat. While the grand drama is closed, at Yorktown, with the storm of the British lines, by the emu- lous columns of the French and American army, the Amer- icans, led by the heroic La Fayette, a scion of the oldest French nobility ; a young New York lawyer, the gallant and lamented Hamilton, commanding the advanced guard. THE SCHOOjb OF 1HE REVOLUTION. 397 Nor let us turn from the picture without shedding a tear over the ashes of the devoted men who laid down their lives in the cause, from Lexington and Concord to the farthest sands of the south. Warren was the first conspicuous vic- tim. If ever a man went to an anticipated and certain death in obedience to the call of duty, he was that man. Though he had no military education, he knew, from the first, that to hold Bunker Hill, in the state of the American army, was impracticable. He was against fortifying it ; but, overruled in that, he resolved to assist in its defence. His associate in the Provincial Congress, Mr Gerry, besought him not to risk his life, for that its loss was inevitable. Warren thought it might be so, but replied, that he dwelt within the sound of the can- non, and that he should die beneath his roof if he remained at home while his countrymen were shedding their blood for him. Mr Gerry repeated, that if he went to the hill, he would surely be killed ; and Warren's rejoinder was, " Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori" Montgomery moved to the assault of Quebec in the depth of a Canadian winter, at the end of December, under a violent snow-storm. One gun only was fired from the batteries, but that proved fatal to the gallant commander and his aids, who fell where he had fought by the side of Wolfe, sixteen years before. Mercer passed through the seven years' war with Washington. On one occasion in that war, he wandered through the wilderness, wounded and faint with the loss of blood, for one hundred miles, subsisting on a rattlesnake which he killed by the way. He was pierced seven times through the body with a bayonet, at Princeton. Scammel, severely wounded at Sar- atoga, fell on the eve of the glorious success at Yorktown ; and Laurens, the youthful prodigy of valor and conduct, the last lamented victim of the war, paid the forfeit of his bril- liant prospects after those of the country were secured. These were all men who have gained a separate renown ; who have secured a place for their names in the annals of liberty. But let us not, while we pay a well-deserved tribute to their memory, forget the thousand gallant hearts which poured out their life-blood in the undistinguished ranks ; who 398 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR followed the call of duty up to the cannon's mouth; who could not promise themselves the meed of fame, and, Heaven knows, could have been prompted by no hope of money ; the thousands who pined in loathsome prison-ships, or lan- guished with the diseases of the camp ; and, returning from their country's service with broken fortunes and ruined con- stitutions, sunk into an early grave. " How sleep the brave, who sink to rest With all their country's wishes blest ! When Spring, with dewy fingers cold, Returns to deck their hallowed mould, She there shall dress a sweeter sod Than fancy's feet have ever trod. There Honor comes, a pilgrim gray, To bless the turf that wraps then* clay , And Freedom shall a while repair, To dwell a weeping hermit there." Still less let us forget, on this auspicious anniversary, the ven- erable survivors of the eventful contest. Let us rejoice that so many of them are spared to enjoy the fruits of their efforts and sacrifices. Let us behold in their gray locks and honor- able scars the strongest incentives to the discharge of every duty of the citizen and patriot ; and above all, let us listen to the strong appeal which the whole army of the revolution makes to us, through these its aged surviving members, to show our gratitude to those who fell, by smoothing the path- way to t? e grave of their brethren, whom years and the early hardships of the service yet spare for a short time among us. But it is time to turn, from all these mingled contempla- tions, to the practical lesson which it becomes us to draw from our reflections on this great subject. Momentous as the revolution was in its origin and causes, its incidents and characters, it derives a still greater interest from its results. Fifty years have elapsed since the termination of the war ; and in that half century we have been reaping fruits, most costly and peculiar, of the precious seed then sown. One general constitution of federal government has been framed ; 1HE SCHOOL OF THE EEVOLUTION. 399 and connected with it, in most harmonious relation, twenty- four constitutions of government for the separate states. These, in their respective spheres, operating each to its assigned end, have secured us in all the blessings of political independence and well-regulated liberty. The industry of the country has been protected and fostered, and carried to a wonderful point of skill ; the rights of the country have been triumphantly vindicated in a second war ; its boundaries pushed into the remote wilderness ; its population increased fivefold, and its wealth augmented in still greater ratio; avenues of communication, by land and by water, stretched across the plains and over the mountains in every direction ; the most astonishing improvements made in all the arts of life ; and literature and science not less successfully cultivated. Did time permit me to descend to particulars, I could point out five or six principles or institutions, each of the highest importance in civil society ; for some of which the best blood of Europe has, from time to time, been shed, and mighty revolutions have been attempted in vain ; and which have grown up, silently and unconsciously, in this country in the space of fifty years. I can but run over the names of the reforms which, in this connection, have been achieved or are in progress. The feudal accumulation of property in a few hands has been guarded against, and liberty has been founded on its only sure basis, equality ; and with this all-important change a multitude of minor reforms have been introduced into our system of law. The great question of the proper mode of disposing of crime has been solved, by the establish- ment of a penitentiary system, which combines the ends of penal justice with the interests of humanity ; divests impris- onment of its ancient cruelties, without making it cease to be an object of terror ; affords the best chance for the reform of the convict, and imposes little or no burden on the state. A like success seems to be promised in reference to the other great evil of pauperism, a burden of intolerable weight in every other country. Experiments have pretty satisfactorily shown that, by a judicious system, carefully administered, pauperism may be made to cease to be a school for crime 400 THE SEVEN YEARS' WAU and to a considerable degree, also, cease to ho a burden to the public. A plan of popular education has been introduced, by which the elements of useful knowledge have been carried to every door. Political equality has been established on the broadest footing, with no other evils than those which are inseparable from humanity evils infinitely less than those of despotic government. In fine, freedom of conscience has been carried to the highest point of practical enjoyment, without producing any diminution of the public respect due to the offices of religion. These I take to be the real substantial fruits of our free constitutions of government. They are matters each of the highest moment. Their importance would well occupy each a separate essay. Time only has been left me thus to indi- cate them. With these results of our happily organized liberty we are starting, fellow-citizens, on the second half century since the close of the revolutionary war. Let us hope that we are to move with a still accelerated pace on the path of improve- ment and happiness, of public and private virtue and honor. When we compare what our beloved country now is, or, to go no farther than our own state, when we compare what Massachusetts now is with what it was fifty years ago, what grounds for honest pride and boundless gratitude does not the comparison suggest ! And if we wished to find an example of a community as favored as any on earth with a salubrious climate ; a soil possessed of precisely that degree of fertility which is most likely to create a thrifty husbandry ; advan- tages for all the great branches of industry, commerce, agri- culture, the fisheries, manufactures, and the mechanic arts ; free institutions of government ; establishments for education, charity, and moral improvement ; a sound public sentiment, and general love of order ; a glorious tradition of ances- tral renown ; a pervading moral sense, and an hereditary respect for religion, if we wished to find a land where a man could desire to live, to educate and establish his chil- dren, to grow old and to die, where could we look, where need we wander, beyond the limits of our own ancient and venerable state ? THE SCHOOL OF THE REVOLUTION. 401 Fellow-citizens of Worcester, words, after all, are vain. Do you wish to learn how much you are indebted to those who laid the foundation of these your social blessings ? Do not listen to me, but look around you ; survey the face of the country, of the immediate neighborhood in which you live. Go up to the rising grounds that overlook this most beautiful village ; contemplate the scene of activity, prosperity, and thrift spread out before you. Pause on the feelings of satis- faction with which you dismiss your children in the morning to school, or receive them home at evening ; the assured tranquillity with which you lie down to repose at night, half of you, I doubt not, with unbolted doors, beneath the over- shadowing pinions of the public peace. Dwell upon the sacred calm of the Sabbath morn, when the repose of man and of nature is awakened by no sound but that of the village bell, calling you to go up and worship God, according to the dictates of your conscience ; and reflect that all these blessings were purchased for you by your high-souled fathers, at the cost of years of labor, trial, and hardship ; of banish- ment from their native land, of persecution and bloodshed, of tyranny and war. Think, then, of Greece and of Poland ; of Italy and of Spain ; aye, of France and of England ; of any and of every country but your own ; and you will know the weight of obligation you owe your fathers, and the reasons of gratitude which should prompt you to celebrate the fourth of July. VOL. I. 51 NOTE. I HAVE thought that the reader, who is curious in the earlier history of our country, would be gratified with the whole of the letter of General Pomroy, of which a characteristic sentence is quoted in the text. It has never been printed, and is here subjoined from a copy furnished me by iny much valued friend, Mr George Bancroft, of Northampton. From ye Grand Battre 5 mile & haf North From ye City Louisbourg. May ye 8, 1745. My dear Wife, Altho ye many Dangers & hazards I have been in since I left you, yet I have been through ye goodness of God Preserved, tho much worried with ye grate business I have upon my hands. But I go cherefully on with it. I have much to write, but little time Shall only give some hints Tuesday ye Last day of April, ye fleet landed on ye Island of Cape Breton about 5 miles from Louisbourg. ye French saw our vessels and came out with a company to prevent our landing But as Fast as ye boats could git on shore ye men were landed. A warm ingagement with them : They sone retreated, we followed them, & drove them into ye woods but few of them able to git into ye city yt day 4 we killed yt were found many taken we lost not one man : We have taken & killed since many more, ye number I do not know, but not less than eighty parsons what is since killed. The grand Battre is ours : but before we entered it the people were fled out of it, and gon over to ye town But had stopt up ye Tutchhols of ye cannon General Peppril gave me ye Charge and oversight of above twenty smiths in boaring of them out : Cannon boals & Bourns hundred of them were fired at us from ye city & ye Island Fort. Grate numbers of Them struck ye Fort : Some in ye parade among ye People But none of them hurt & as sone as we could git ye cannon clear we gave them Fire for Fire & Bombarded them on ye west side. Louis- bourg an exceeding strong handsom & well sittiated place with a fine harber it seams impregnable. But we have ben so succeeded heitherto yt I do not doubt But Providence will Deliver it into our hands. Sunday What we have lost of our men I do not certinly know, But I fear May ye near 20 men ye army in general have been in health : It looks as 12 from if our campane would last long But I am willing to stay till God's this time comes to deliver ye Citty Louisbourg into our hands, which below do not doubt but will in good time be done : we have shut them writ up on every side and still are making our works stronger against them. 42 pound shot they have fired in upon them every day; one very (402) NOTE. 403 large mortar we have with which we play upon them upon there houses often braks among them : there houses are compact, which ye bourns must do a grate deal of hirt & distress them in a grate degree Small mortars we have with which we fire in upon them. I have had my health since I landed. My dear wife I expect to be longer gon from home then I did when I left it : but I desire not to think of returning Till Louisbourg is taken : & I hope God will inable you to submit quietly to his will whatever it may be ; and inable you with courage & good conduct to go through ye grate business yt is now upon your hands & not think your time ill spent in teaching and govern- ing your family according to ye word of God. My company in general are well : Some few of them are HI, But hope none dangerous. The affairs at home I can order nothing But must wholly leave Hoping yt they will be well ordered & taken care of : My kind love to Mr SweetJand my duty to Mother Hunt & love to Brothers and sisters all My Dear wife If it be the will of God I hope to see your pleasant face again : But if God in his Holy and Sovereign Providence has ordered it others wise, I hope to have a glorious meeting with you in ye Kingdom of heaven where there is no wars nor Fatiguing marches, no roaring cannon nor cracking Bourn shells, nor long Campains ; But an eternity to spend in Perfect harmony and undisturbed peace. This is ye hartty Desire & Prayer of him yt is your loving Husband SETH POMBOY. To Mas MABY POMEOY at N srthampton in New-England. EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 1 MR PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN: IT has given me peculiar satisfaction to obey your call, and appear before you on this occasion. I take a sincere pleas- ure, as an affectionate and dutiful child of Harvard, and as an humble member of the branch of our fraternity which is there established, in presenting myself within the precincts of this ancient and distinguished seminary, for the discharge of the agreeable duty which you have assigned me. I re- joice in the confidence implied in your invitation, that I know neither sect nor party in the republic of letters ; arid that I enter your halls with as much assurance of a kind reception, as I would those of my own revered and ever- gracious alma mater. There are recollections of former times well calculated to form a bond of good feeling between our universities. We cannot forget that, in the early days of Harvard, when its existence almost depended on the precarious contributions of its friends, contributions not of munificent affluence, but of pious poverty, not poured into the academic coffers in splendid dotations, but spared from the scanty means of an infant and destitute country, and presented in their primitive form, a bushel of wheat, a cord of wood, and a string of Indian beads, (this last not a little to the annoyance of good old President Dunster, who, as the records of the com- missioners of the United Colonies tell us, was sorely per- plexed, in sifting out, from the mass of the genuine quahog * An Oration delivered before the 0. B. K. Society of Yale College, at New Haven, 20th of August, 1833. (404) EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 405 and periwinkle, bits of blue glass and colored stones, feloni- ously intermixed, without the least respect for the purity of the col ony's wampum,*) we cannot forget that, in that day of smr.ll things, the contributions of Connecticut and New Haven as the two infant colonies were distinguished flowed as liberally to the support of Cambridge, as those of Plymouth and Massachusetts. Still less would I forget, that of the first three generations of the fathers of Connecticut, those who were educated in America received their education at Cambridge ; that the first four presidents of Yale were graduates of Harvard; and that of all your distinguished men, in church and state, for nearly a hundred years, a goodly proportion were fitted for usefulness in life within her venera- ble walls. If the success of the child be the joy of the parent, and the honor of the pupil be the crown of the master, with what honest satisfaction may not our institutions reflect, that they stood to each other in so kindly a relation, in this early and critical state of the country's growth, when the direction taken, and the character impressed, were decisive of interminable consequences ! And while we claim the right of boasting of your character and establishments, as in some degree the fruit of a good old Massachusetts influence, we hope you will not have cause to feel ashamed of the auspices under which, to a certain extent, the foundation of those in- stitutions was laid, and their early progress encouraged. In choosing a topic on which to address you this morning, I should feel a greater embarrassment than I do, did I not suppose that your thoughts, like my own, would flow nat-. urally into such a channel of reflection as may be presumed at all times to be habitual and familiar, with men of liberal education and patriotic feeling. The great utility of occa- sions like this, and of the addresses they draw forth, is not to impart stores of information, laboriously collected ; not to broach new systems, requiring carefully-weighed arguments for their defence, or a multitude of well-arranged facts for their illustration. We meet at these literary festivals to pro- * Hazard's State Papers, Vol. II. page 124. 406 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. mote kind feeling ; to impart new strength to good purposes ; to enkindle and animate the spirit of improvement in our- selves and others. We leave our closets, our offices, and our studies, to meet and salute each other in these pleasant paths ; to prevent the diverging walks of life from wholly estranging those from each other, who were kind friends at its outset ; to pay our homage to the venerated fathers, who honor with their presence the return of these academic festivals ; and those of us who are no longer young, to make acquaintance with the ardent and ingenuous who are following after us. The preparation for an occasion like this is in the heart, not in the head ; it is in the attachments formed, and the feelings inspired, in the bright morning of life. Our preparation is in the classic atmosphere of the place, in the tranquillity of the academic grove, in the unoffending peace of the occasion, in the open countenance of long-parted associates, joyous at meeting, and in the kind and indulgent smile of the favoring throng, which bestows its animating attendance on our hum- ble exercises. When I look around upon the assembled audience, and reflect from how many different parts of the country the pro- fessional portion of it is gathered, and in what a variety of pursuits and duties it is there occupied ; and when I consider that this our literary festival is also honored with the presence of many from every other class of the community, all of whom have yet a common interest in one subject, at least, I feel as if the topic on which I am to ask your attention, were imperatively suggested to me. It is, the nature and efficacy of education, as the great human instrument of improving the condition of man. Education has been, at some former periods exclusively, and more or less at all former periods, the training of a learned class ; the mode in which men of letters or the members of the professions acquired that lore which enabled them to insulate themselves from the community, and gave them the monopoly of rendering the services, in church and state, which the wants or imaginations of men made necessary, and of the honors and rewards which, by the political EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 407 constitution of society, attached to the discharge of those services. I admit that there was something generous and liberal in education, even in this conception of its objects ; something popular, and, if I may so express it, republican, in the edu- cated class, even at the darkest period. Learning, even in its most futile and scholastic forms, was still an affair of the mind. It was not, like hereditary rank, mere physical acci- dent ; it was not, like military power, mere physical force. It gave an intellectual influence, derived from intellectual superiority ; and it enabled some minds, even in the darkest ages of European history, to rise from obscurity and poverty to be the lights and guides of mankind. Such was Beda, the great luminary of a dark period, a poor and studious monk, who, without birth or fortune, became the great teacher of science and letters to the age in which he lived. Such, still more eminently, was his illustrious pupil, Alcuin, who, by the simple force of mental energy, employed in intellectual pursuits, raised himself from the cloister to be the teacher, companion, and friend of Charlemagne ; arid to whom it has been said that France is indebted for all the polite literature of his own and the succeeding ages.* Such, at a later period, was another poor monk, Roger Bacon, the precursor, and, for the state of the times in which he lived, scarcely the inferior of his namesake, the immortal chancellor. But a few brilliant exceptions do not affect the general character of the education of former ages. It was a thing apart from the condition, the service, and the participation of the great mass of men. It was the training of a privileged class ; and was far too exclusively the instrument by which one of the favored orders of society was enabled to exercise a tyrannical and exclusive control over the millions which lay wrapped in ignorance and superstition. It is the great glory of the age in which we live, that learning, once the instru- ment of this bondage, has become the instrument of reform ; * Cave, Hist. Lit Ssec. VII., An. 780, cited in the Life of Alcuin, in the Biographia Britannica. 408 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. that, instead of an educated class, we have made some good approach to an educated community. That intellectual cul- ture which gave to a few the means of maintaining an ascend- ency over the fears and weaknesses of their age, has now become the medium of a grand and universal mental equality, and. humanly speaking, the great concern of man. It has become the school of all the arts, for all the pursuits, and the preparation of a very considerable portion of the mass of mankind for the duties, which, in the present state of the world, devolve upon them. Let us, then, dwell for a moment on what is to be effected by education, considered in its ultimate objects and most comprehensive sense, in which, of course, is included, as the most important element, the sound and enlightened influence of deep religious principle, to be cherished and applied through the institutions existing for that sacred purpose. . A great work is to be done. What is it, in its general out- line and first principles ? To answer this question, we must remember that, of the generation now on the stage, by which the business of the country, public and private, is carried on, not an individual, speaking in general terms, will be in a state of efficient activ- ity, and very few in existence, thirty years hence. Not merely those by whom the government is administered and the public service performed, in its various civil and military departments, will have passed away, but all who are doing the great, multifarious, never-ending work of social life, from the highest teacher of spiritual wisdom and the profoundest expositor of the law to the humblest artisan, will have ceased to exist. The work is to go on ; the government is to be administered, laws are to be enacted and executed, peace pre- served or war levied, the will of the people to be expressed by their suffrages, and the vast system of the industrious action of a great people, in all their thousand occupations, by sea and land, to be kept up and extended ; but those now employed in all this great work are to cease from it, and others are to take their places. Like most of the great phenomena of life, miracles, if I EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 409 may so say, of daily occurrence, this vast change, this sur- cease of a whole generation, loses, from its familiarity, almost all power of affecting the imagination. The political revo- lution which changes the royal succession from one family to another, which prostrates a king to elevate an emperor, and cements his throne with the blood of some hundreds, perhaps thousands, of the victims of his ambition, is the wonder of the age, the perpetual theme of discourse, the standing topic of admiration. But this great revolution, which prostrates, not one man, nor one family, in a single nation, but every man, in every family, throughout the world ; which bids an entire new congregation of men to start into existence and action ; which fills with new incumbents, not one blood- stained seat of royalty, but every post of active duty, and every retreat of private life, steals on us silently and grad- ually, like all the primordial operations of Providence, and must be made the topic of express disquisition, before its extent and magnitude are estimated, and the practical duties to be deduced from it are understood. Such a revolution, however, is impending, as decisive, as comprehensive, as real, as if, instead of being the gradual work of thirty years, it were to be accomplished in a day or an hour ; and so much the more momentous for the gradual nature of the process. Were the change to be effected at once, were this generation swept off and another brought for- ward by one great act of creative energy, it would concern us only as speculative philanthropists what might be the char- acter of our successors. Whether we transmitted them a heritage honored or impaired, whether they succeeded to it, well trained to preserve and increase, or ready to waste it, would import nothing to our interests or feelings. But, by the law of our nature, the generations of men are most close- ly interlaced with each other, and the decline of one and the accession of the other are gradual. One survives, and the other anticipates its activity. While, in the decline of life, we are permitted to reap, on the one hand, a rich reward for all that we have attempted patriotically and honestly, in pub- lic or private, for the good of our fellow-men, on the other VOL. i. 52 410 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. hand, retribution rarely fails to overtake us, as individuals or communities, for the neglect of public duties, or the violation of the social trust. " We still have judgment here ; that we but teach Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return To plague the inventor : this even-handed justice Commends the ingredients of the poisoned chalice To our own lips." By this law of our natures, the places which we fill in the world are to be taken from us ; we are to be dispossessed of our share in the honors and emoluments of life ; driven from our resorts of business and pleasure ; ousted from our tene- ments ; ejected from our estates ; banished from the soil we called our own, and interdicted fire and water in our native land ; and those who ward off this destiny the longest, after holding on a little while, with a convulsive grasp, making a few more efforts, exposing their thin gray hairs in another campaign or two, will gladly, of their own accord, before a great while, claim to be exempts in the service. But this revolution, growing out of the constitution of our nature, points out the business of education as the duty and calling of man, precisely because it is not the work of violent hands, but the law of our being. It is not an outraged pop- ulace, rising in their wrath and fury, to throw off the burden of centuries of oppression. Nor is it an inundation of strange barbarians, issuing, nation after nation, from some remote and inexhaustible " officina gentium," lashed forward to the work of destruction by the chosen scourges of God. These are the means by which, when corruption has attained a height beyond the reach of ordinary influences, a preparation for a great and radical revolution is made. But the revolution of which I speak, and which furnishes the principles of the great duty of education, all-comprehensive and unsparing as it is, is to be effected by a gentle race of beings, just step- ping over the threshold of childhood, many of them hardly crept into existence. They are to be found within the limits of our own country, of our own community, beneath our EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 411 own roofs, clinging about our necks. Father ! he whom you folded in your arms, and carried in your bosom ; whom, with unutterable anxiety, you watched through the perilous years of childhood ; whom you have brought to college this very commencement, and are dismissing from beneath your pater- nal guard with tearful eyes and an aching heart ; it is he who is destined (if your ardent prayers are heard) to out- thunder you at the forum and in the senate house. Fond mother ! the future rival of your not yet fading charms, the " matre pulchra filia pulchrior," is the rose-bud which is be- ginning to open and blush by your side. Destined to super- sede us in all we hold dear, they are the objects of our ten- derest cares. Soon to outnumber us, we spare no pains to protect and rear them ; and the strongest instinct of our hearts urges us, by every device and appliance, to bring forward those who are to fill our places, possess our fortunes, wear our honors, snatch the words from our lips, the truncheon of command from our hands, and, at last, gently crowd us, worn out and useless, from the scene. I have dwelt on this connection of nature and affection between the generations of men, because it is the foundation of the high philosophy of education. It places the duty of imparting it upon the broad, eternal basis of natural love. It is manifest that, in the provident constitution of an intellec- tual order of beings, the trust of preparing each generation, of which it was to consist, for the performance of its part on the great stage of life, was all-important, all-essential ; too vitally so to be put in charge with any but the most intimate principles of our being. It has, accordingly, been interwo- ven with the strongest and purest passions of the heart. Ma- ternal fondness ; a father's thoughtful care ; the unreasoning instincts of the family circle; the partialities, the prejudices of blood, are all made to operate, as efficient principles, by which the risen generation is urged to take care of its suc- cessor ; and, when the subject is pursued to its last analysis, we find that education, in its most comprehensive form, the general training and preparation of our successors, is the great errand which we have to execute in the world. We EDUCATION OF MANKIND. either assume it as our primary business, or depute it to others, because we think they will better perform it. Much of the practical and professional part we direct ourselves. We come back to it as a relaxation or a solace. We labor to pro- vide the means of supplying it to those we love. We retrench in our pleasures, that we may abound in this duty. It ani- mates our toils, dignifies our selfishness, makes our parsimo- ny generous, furnishes the theme for the efforts of the great- est minds, and, directly or indirectly, fills up no small part of our lives. In a word, then, we have before us, as the work to be done by this generation, to train up that which is to succeed us. This is a work of boundless compass, difficulty, and inter- est. Considered as brethren of the human family, it looks, of course, to the education of all mankind. If we confine ourselves to our duty as American citizens, the task is mo- mentous, almost beyond the power of description. Though the view which I would, at this time, take of the subject, does not confine itself to the fortunes of a single nation, I will dwell upon it, for a moment, exclusively in relation to this country. I will suppose that our Union is to remain unbroken for another generation a supposition which, I trust, I may safely make ; and if this should be the case, it is no violent presumption to suppose that, in all respects, the coun- try will continue to advance with a rapidity equal to that which has marked its progress for the last thirty years. On this supposition, the close of another generation will see our population swelled to above thirty millions ; all our public establishments increased in the same ratio ; four or five new states added to the Union ; towns and villages scattered over regions now lying in the unbroken solitude of nature ; roads cut across pathless mountains ; rivers, now unexplored, a ive with steamers ; and all those parts of the country, which, at this time, are partially settled, crowded with a much denser population, with all its attendant structures, establishments, and institutions. In other words, besides replacing the pres- ent numbers, a new nation, more than fifteen millions strong, will exist within the United States. The wealth of the EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 413 country will increase still more rapidly ; and all the springs of social life, which capital moves, will, of course, increase in power ; and a much more intense condition of existence will be the result. It is for this state of things that the present generation is to educate and train its successors ; and on the care and skill with which their education is conducted, on the liberality, magnanimity, and single-heartedness, with which we go about this great work, each in his proper sphere, and according to his opportunities and vocation, will, of course, depend the honor and success with which those who come after us will perform their parts on the stage of life. This reflection of itself would produce a deep impression of the importance of the great work of education, to be per- formed by the present generation of men. But we must further take into consideration, in order to the perfect under- standing of the subject, the quality of that principle which is to receive, and of that which is to impart, the education ; that is, of the mind of this age acting upon the mind of the next ; both of natures infinitely expansive in their ca- pacities of action and apprehension ; natures, whose pow- ers have never been defined ; whose depths have never been sounded ; whose orbit can be measured only by that superior intelligence which has assigned its limits, if limits it have. When we consider this, we gain a vastly extended and ele- vated notion of the duty which is to be performed. It is nothing less than to put in action the entire mental power of the present day, in its utmost stretch, consistent with happi- ness and virtue, and so as to develop and form the utmost amount of capacity, intelligence, and usefulness, of intellec- tual and moral power and happiness, in that which is to fol- low. We are not merely to transmit the world as we receive it ; to teach, in a stationary repetition, the arts which we have received ; as the dove builds, this year, just such a nest as was built by the dove that went out from the ark, when the waters had abated ; but we are to apply the innumerable discoveries, inventions, and improvements, which have been successively made in the world, and never more than of 414 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. late years, and combine and elaborate them into one grand system of condensed efficacy and quickened vitality, in form- ing and bringing forward our successors. These considerations naturally suggest the inquiry, How much can be done, by a proper exertion of our powers and capacities, to improve the condition of our successors ? Is there reason to hope that any great advances can be made ? that any considerable stride can be taken, by the moral and intellectual agency of this age, as exerted in influencing the character of the next ? I know of no way to deal practically with this great prob- lem, but to ask more particularly, What is effected in the ordinary course of intellectual action and reaction ? What is the average amount of the phenomena of education, in their final result, which the inspection of society presents to us? How much is effected, so frequently and certainly as to authorize a safe inference, as to what may be done, in the ordinary progress of the mind, and conjectures as to its pos- sible strides, bounds, and flights ? We can make this inquiry on no other assumed basis but that of the natural average equality of all men, as rational and improvable beings. I do not mean that all men are created with a physical and intellectual constitution capable of attaining, with the same opportunities, the same degree of improvement. I cannot assert that, nor would I willingly undertake to disprove it. I leave it aside ; and suppose, that, on an average, men are born with equal capacities. What, then, do we behold, as regards the difference resulting from education and training ? Let us take examples in the two extremes. On the one hand, we have the most degraded savage ; but little better, in appearance, than the orang outang, his fellow-tenant of the woods, which afford much the same shelter for both ; almost destitute of arts, except that of horribly disfiguring the features by the painful and disgusting process of tattooing, and that of preparing a rude war-club, with which he destroys his fellow-savage of the neighboring tribe, his natural enemy while he lives, his food if he can conquer or kidnap him ; laying up no store of provision, but EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 415 one which I scarce dare describe, which consists in plung- ing a stick into the water, where it is soon eaten to honey- comb by the worms that abound in tropical climates, and which, when taken out, furnishes, in these worms, a supply of their most favorite food to these forlorn children of nature. Such is this creature, from youth to age, from father to son, a savage, a cannibal, a brute ; a human being, a fellow-man, a rational and immortal soul ; carrying about, under that squalid, loathsome exterior, hidden under those brutal man- ners and vices, at once disgusting and abominable, a portion of the intellectual principle which likens man to his Maker. This is one specimen of humanity : how shall we bring another into immediate contrast with it ? How better, than by contemplating what may be witnessed on board the vessel which carries the enlightened European or American to the dark and dreary corners of the earth inhabited by these unhappy fellow-beings ? You there behold a majestic vessel bounding over the billows, from the other side of the globe ; easily fashioned to float in safety over the bottomless sea ; to spread out her broad wings, and catch the midnight breeze, guided by a single watchful sailor at the helm, with two or three companions reclining listlessly on the deck, gazing into the depths of the starry heavens. The commander of this vessel, not surpassing thousands of his brethren in intelligence and skill, knows how, by pointing his glass at the heavens, and taking an observation of the stars, and turning over the leaves of his " Practical Navigator," and making a few figures on his slate, to tell the spot which his vessel has reached on the trackless sea ; and he can also tell it by means of a steel spring and a few brass wheels, put together in the shape of a chronometer. The glass with which he brings the heavens down to the earth, and by which he measures the twenty-one thousand six hundredth part of their circuit, is made of a quantity of silex and alkali, coarse, opaque substances, which he has melted together into the beautiful medium which excludes the air and the rain, and admits the light, by means of which he can count the orders of animated nature in a dew-drop, and measure the depth of the 416 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. valleys in the moon. He has running up and down his main- mast an iron chain, fabricated, by a wonderful succession of mechanical contrivances, out of a rock brought from deep caverns in the earth, and which has the power of conducting the lightning harmlessly down the sides of the vessel into the sea. He does not creep timidly along from headland to head- land, nor guide his course across a narrow sea, by the north star ; but he launches bravely on the pathless and bottomless deep, and carries about with him, in a box, a faithful little pilot, which points from the other side of the globe, through the convex earth, to the steady pole. If he falls in with a pirate, he does not wait to repel him, hand to hand ; but he puts into a mighty engine a handful of dark powder, in which is condensed an immense quantity of elastic air, and which, when it is touched by a spark of fire, will immeasurably expand its volume, and drive an artificial thunderbolt before it. against the distant enemy. When he meets another simi- lar vessel on the sea, homeward bound from an excursion like his own, he makes a few black marks on a piece of paper, and sends it home, a distance of ten thousand miles ; and thereby speaks to his employer, to his family, and his friends, as distinctly and significantly as if they were seated by his side. At the cost of half the labor with which the savage procures himself the skin of a wild beast, to cover his naked- ness, this child of civilized life has provided himself with the most substantial, curious, and convenient clothing, textures and tissues of wool, cotton, linen, and silk, the contributions of the four quarters of the globe, and of every kingdom of nature. To fill a vacant hour, or dispel a gathering cloud from his spirits, he has curious instruments of music, which speak another language, of new and strange significance, to his heart ; which make his veins thrill, and his eyes overflow with tears, without the utterance of a word ; and, with a sweet succession of harmonious sounds, send his heart back, over the waste of waters, to the distant home, where his wife and his children are gathered around the fireside, trembling at the thought that the storm which beats upon the windows may, perhaps, overtake their beloved voyager on the distant EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 417 seas. And in his cabin he has a library of volumes, the strange production of a machine of almost magical powers, which, as he turns over their leaves, wiable him to converse with the great and good of every clime and age, and which even repeat to him, in audible notes, the laws of his God and the promises of his Savior, and point out to him that happy land which he hopes to reach, when his flag is struck and his sails are furled, and the voyage of life is over. The imaginations of those whom I have the honor to ad- dress, will be able to heighten this contrast, by a hundred traits on either side, for which I have not time ; but even as I have presented it, will it be deemed extravagant, if I say that there is a greater difference between the educated child of civilized life and the most degraded savage, than between that savage and the orang outang ? And yet the savage was born a rational being, like the civilized European and Amer- ican ; and the civilized European and American entered life, like the savage, a helpless, wailing babe. This, then, is the difference made by education. I do not mean, that if a school were set up in New Zealand, you could convert the rising generation of savage children, in eight or ten years, into a civilized, well-educated, orderly society. I will not undertake to say what could be done with an indi- vidual of that race, taken at birth, and brought to a Christian country, and there reared under the most favorable circum- stances ; nor do I know into what sort of a being one of our children would grow up, supposing it could survive the exper- iment, were it taken from the nurse's arms, and put in charge to a tribe of New Zealanders. But it is, upon the whole, education, in the most comprehensive sense, which, in the lapse of time, makes the vast difference which I have endeav- ored to illustrate, and which actually, in the case of a civilized person, transforms his intellect from what it is at birth, into what it becomes in the mature, consummate man. These reflections teach us what education ordinarily ac- complishes. They illustrate its power, as measured by its effects. Let us now make a single remark on its prodigious efficacy, measured by the shortness of the time within which VOL. i. 53 418 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. it produces its wonders. When we contemplate the vast amount of the arts, useful and mechanical, elegant and liter- ary; the sciences, pure and mixed, and of the knowledge, practical and speculative, belonging to them ; a portion of which sometimes a very large portion is within the command of any well-educated person ; the wonder we should naturally feel, may be a little abated by the consideration that this is the accumulated product of several thousand years of study, the fruits of which have been recorded, or transmitted by tradition from age to age. But when we reflect again upon the subject, we find that, though this knowledge has been for four or five thousand years in the process of accumula- tion, and consists of the condensed contributions of great and gifted minds, or of the mass of average intellect transmitted from race to race, since the dawn of letters and arts in Phce- nicia and Egypt, it is nevertheless mastered by each individ- ual, if at all, in the compass of a few years. It is in the world, but it is not inherited by any one. Men are born rich, but not learned. The La Place of this generation did not come into life with the knowledge possessed and recorded by the Newtons, the Kepplers, and the Pythagorases of other days. It is doubtful whether, at three years old, he could count much beyond ten ; and if. at six, he was acquainted with any other cycloidal curves than those generated by the trundling of his hoop, he was a prodigy indeed. But by the time he was twenty-one, he had mastered all the discoveries of all the philosophers who preceded him, and was prepared to build upon them the splendid superstructure of his own. In like manner, the whole race of men who, thirty years hence, are to be the active members of society, and some of them its guides and leaders, its Mansfields and Burkes, its Ellsworths, Marshalls, and Websters, the entire educated and intelligent population, which will have prepared itself with the knowledge requisite for carrying on the business of life, is, at this moment, enacting the part of -"the whining school boy, with his satchel And shining morning face, creeping, like snail, Unwillingly to school." EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 419 Our future Ciceros are mewling infants ; and our Arkwrights and Fultons, who are hereafter to unfold to our children new properties of matter, new forces of the elements, new appli- cations of the mechanical powers, which may change the con- dition of things, are now, under the tuition of a careful nurse, with the safeguard of a pair of leading-strings, attempting the perilous experiment of putting one foot before the other. Yes, the ashes that now moulder in yonder graveyard, the sole remains on earth of what was Whitney,* are not more unconscious of the stretch of the mighty mind which they once enclosed, than the infant understandings of those now springing into life, who are destined to follow in the luminous track of his genius, to new and still more brilliant results in the service of man ! When we consider, in this way, how much is effected by education, and in how short a time, for the individual and the community, and thence deduce some not inadequate concep- tion of its prodigious efficiency and power, we are irresistibly led to another reflection upon its true nature. We feel that it cannot be so much an act of the teacher as an act of the pupil. It is not, that the master, possessing this knowledge, has poured it out of his own mind into that of the learner ; but the learner, by the native power of apprehension, judi- ciously trained and wisely disciplined, beholds, comprehends and appropriates what is set before him, in form and order : and not only so, but, with the first quickenings of the intel- lect, commences himself the creative and inventive processes. There is not the least doubt that the active mind, judiciously trained, in reality sometimes invents for itself not a little oi that which, being already previously known and recorded, is regarded as a part of the existing stock of knowledge. From this principle, also, we are led to an easy explanation of those curious appearances of simultaneous discoveries in art and science, of which literary history records many examples, such as the rival pretensions of Newton and Leibnitz, of Eli Whitney, the inventor of the cotton-gin, died January 8, md was buried at New Haven. 420 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. Priestley and Lavoisier, of Bell and Lancaster, of Young and Champollion, which show that at any given period, es- pecially in a state of society favorable to the rapid diffusion of knowledge, the laws of the human mind are so sure and regular, that it is not an uncommon thing for different per- sons, in different countries, to fall into the same train of re- flection and thought, and to come to results and discoveries which, injuriously limiting the creative powers of the intel- lect, we are ready to ascribe to imitation or plagiarism. It is, indeed, true, that one of the great secrets of the power of education, in its application to large numbers, is, that it is a mutual work. Man has three teachers the schoolmaster, himself, his neighbor. The instructions of the first two commence together ; and long after the functions of the schoolmaster have been discharged, the duties of the last two go on together ; and what they effect is vastly more important than the work of the teacher, if estimated by the amount of knowledge self-acquired, or caught from the col- lision or sympathy of other minds, compared with that which is directly imparted by the schoolmaster, in the morning of life. In fact, what we learn at school and in college is but the foundation of the great work of self-instruction and mutual instruction, with which the real education of life begins, when what is commonly called the education is fin- ished. The daily intercourse of cultivated minds ; the emulous exertions of the fellow-votaries of knowledge ; con- troversy ; the inspiring sympathy of a curious and intelligent public, unite in putting each individual intellect to the stretch of its capacity. A hint, a proposition, an inquiry, proceeding from one mind, awakens new trains of thought in a kindred mind, surveying the subject from other points of view, and with other habits and resources of illustration ; and thus truth is constantly multiplied and propagated by the mutual action and reaction of the thousands engaged in its pursuit. Hence the phenomena of Periclean, Augustan, and Medicean ages, and golden eras of improvement ; and hence the education of each individual mind, instead of being merely the addition of one to the well-instructed and well-informed EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 421 members of the community, is the introduction of another member into the great family of intellects, each of which is a point, not only bright, but radiant, and competent to throw off the beams of light and truth in every direction. Mechan- ical forces, from the moment they are put in action, by the laws of matter grow fainter and fainter till they are exhausted. With each new application, something of their intensity is consumed. It can only be kept up by a continued or repeated resort to the source of power. Could Archimedes have found his place to stand upon, and a lever with which he could heave the earth from its orbit, the utmost he could have ef- fected would have been to make it fall, a dead weight, into the sun. Not so the intellectual energy. If wisely exerted, its exercise, instead of exhausting, increases its strength ; and not only this, but, as it moves onward from mind to mind, it awakens each to the same sympathetic, self-propagating action. The circle spreads in every direction. Diversity of language does not check the progress of the great instructor, for he speaks in other tongues, and gathers new powers from the response of other schools of civilization. The pathless ocean does not impede, it accelerates his progress. Space imposes no barrier, time no period to his efforts ; and ages on ages after the poor clay in which the creative intellect was en- shrined has mouldered back to its kindred dust, the truths which it has unfolded, moral or intellectual, are holding on their pathway of light and glory, awakening other minds to the same heavenly career. But it is more than time to apply these principles to the condition of the world, as it now exists, and to inquire what hope there is, in the operation of this mighty engine, of a great and beneficial progress in the work of civilization. We certainly live in an enlightened age ; one in which civilization has reached a high point of advancement and extension, in this and several other countries. There are several nations besides our own where the Christian religion, civil government, the usual branches of industry, the diffu- sion of knowledge, useful and ornamental, and of the fine arts, have done and are doing great things for the happiness 422 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. of man. But when we look a little more nearly, it mast be confessed that, with all that has been done in this cause, the work which still remains to be accomplished is very great. The population of the globe is assumed, in the more moderate estimates, to be seven hundred millions. Of these, two hun- dred and fifty millions are set down for America and Europe, and the residue for Asia and Africa. Two hundred and fifty millions, again, are assumed to be Christians ; and of the res- idue three fourths are pagans. There is certainly a consid- erable diversity of condition among the various Asiatic and African, who are also the unchristianized races, as there is also among the European and American, who belong to the family of civilization and Christianity. But upon the whole, it must be admitted, that about two thirds of mankind are without the pale of civilization, as we understand it ; and of these a large majority are pagan savages, or the slaves of the most odious and oppressive despotisms. The Chinese and Hindoos, who make up two thirds of this division of man- kind, contain within their vast masses perhaps the most favor- able specimens of this portion of the human family ; and if we turn from them to the Turks, the Tartars, the Persians, the native races of the interior of Africa, the wretched tribes on the coast, or the degraded population of Australia or Poly- nesia, we shall find but little (except in the recent successful attempts at civilization) on which the eye of the philanthro- pist can rest with satisfaction. Almost all is dark, cheerless, and wretched. Nor when we look into what is called the civilized portion of the globe is the prospect as much improved as we could wish. The broad mantle of civilization, like that of charity, covers much which, separately viewed, could claim no title to the name. Not to speak of the native tribes of America, or the nomadic races of the Russian empire, how vast and perilous is the inequality of mental condition among the members of the civilized states of the earth ! Contemplate the peasan- try of the greater part of the north of Europe, attached, as property, to the soil on which they were born. The same class, in some parts of the Austrian dominions, in Spuir 1 , ir. EDUCATION OF MANKIND. Portugal, if not held in precisely the same state of political disability, are probably to a very slight degree more improved in their mental condition. In the middle and western states of Europe, France, Holland. Germany, and Great Britain, although the laboring population is certainly in a more elevated and happier state than in the countries just named, yet how little opportunity for mental improvement do even they possess ! We know that they pass their lives in labors of the most unremitted character, from which they derive nothing but the means of a most scanty support ; constantly relapsing into want at the slightest reverse of fortune, or on the occurrence of the first severe casualty. Then consider the character of a large portion of the pop- ulation of the great cities of all countries, London, Paris, St Petersburg, Vienna, where the extremes of human condi- tion stand in painful juxtaposition ; and by the side of some specimens of all that adorns and exalts humanity, the glory of our species, we find the large mass of the population profoundly ignorant and miserably poor, and no small part of it sunk to the depths of want and vice. It is painful to reflect, in this age of refinement, how near the two opposite conditions of our nature may be brought, without the least communication of a direct genial influence from one to the other. If any thing were necessary, beyond the slightest inspection of obvious facts, to show the artificial structure of the society in which we live, and the need of some great and generous process of renovation, it would be the reflection, that, if a man wished to explore the very abyss of human degradation, to find how low one could get in the scale of nature without going beneath the human race ; if he wished to find every want, every pang, every vice which can unite to convert a human being into a suffering, loathsome brute ; he would not have to wander to the cannibal tribes of Austra- lia, already described, nor to the dens of the Bushmen of the Cape of Good Hope. He would need only to take a ten steps' walk from Westminster Abbey or the Tuileries, to strike off for half a quarter of a mile in almost any direction 124 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. from the very focus of all that is elegant and refined, the pride and happiness of life, in London or Paris. The painful impressions produced by these melancholy truths are increased by the consideration, that, in some parts of the world, civilization has gone backward. Who can think of the former condition of the coasts of the Mediterra- nean, and not feel a momentary anxiety for the fortunes of the race ? In ancient times, the shores of the Mediterranean, all around, were civilized, after the type of that day, flourish- ing and happy. In this favored region, the human mind was developed, in many of its faculties, to an extent and with a beauty never surpassed, and scarcely ever equalled. Greece was the metropolis of this great intellectual republic ; and, through her letters and her arts, extended the domain of civ- ilization to Asia Minor and Syria, to Egypt and Africa, to Italy and Sicily, and even to Gallia and Iberia. What a state of the world it was, when all around this wide circuit, whithersoever the traveller directed his steps, he found cities filled with the beautiful creations of the architect and the sculptor ; marble temples, in the grandest dimensions and finest proportions ; statues, whose poor and mutilated frag- ments are the models of modern art ! Wheresoever he sojourned, he found the schools of philosophy crowded with disciples, and heard the theatres ringing with the inspirations of the Attic muse, and the forum eloquent with orators of consummate skill and classic renown. We are too apt, in forming our notions of the height of Grecian civilization, to confine our thoughts to a few renowned cities, or to Athens alone. But not only Greece, but the islands, Sicily and Magna Graecia, round all their coasts, the Ionian shore, the remote interior of Asia Minor and Syria almost to the Eu- phrates, the entire course of the Nile up to its cataracts, and Libya far into the desert, were filled with populous and culti- vated cities. Places whose names can scarcely be traced but in an index of ancient geography, abounded in all the stores of art, and all the resources of instruction., in the time of Cicero. He makes one of the chief sneakers in the Orator EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 425 say, " At the present day, all Asia imitates Menecles of Ala- banda, and his brother," orator, brother, and place, now alike forgotten ! Cicero himself studied, not only under Philo the Athenian, but Milo the Rhodian, Menippus of Stratonice, Dionysius of Magnesia, JEschylus of Cnidus, and Xenocles of Adramyttium. These were the masters, the schools, of Cicero ! Forgotten names, perished cities, abodes of art and eloquence, of which the memory is scarcely pre- served ! What, then, is the hope, that much can be effected, in the promotion of the great object of the improvement of man, by the instrumentality of education, as we have described it ? And here I am willing to own myself an enthusiast ; and all I ask is, that men will have the courage to follow the light of general principles, and patience for great effects to flow from mighty causes. If, after establishing the great truths of the prodigious power of the principles by which the education of the world is to be achieved, men suffer themselves to be perplexed by apparent exceptions ; and, especially, if they will insist upon beginning, carrying on, and completing, them- selves, every thing which they propose or conceive for human improvement, forgetful that humanity, religion, national char- acter, literature, and the influence of the arts, are great con- cerns, spreading out over a lapse of ages, and infinite in their perfectibility ; then, indeed, the experience of one short life can teach nothing but despair. But, if we will do justice to the power of the great princi- ples which I have attempted to develop, that are at work for the education of man ; if we will study the causes, which, in other times, have retarded his progress, which seem, in some large portions of the globe, to doom him, even now, to hope- less barbarity ; and if we will duly reflect, that what seems to be a retrograde step in the march of civilization, is some- times (as most memorably in the downfall of the Roman empire) the peculiar instrumentality with which a still more comprehensive work of reform is carried on, we shall have ample reason to conceive the brightest hopes for the progress of our race ; for the introduction within th< pale of civiliza- VOL. i. 54 426 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. tion of its benighted regions, and the effective regeneration of all. We have now in our possession three instruments of civ- 'lization unknown to antiquity, of power separately to work almost any miracle of improvement, and the united force of which is adequate to the achievement of any thing not mor- ally and physically impossible. These are, the art of print- ing, a sort of mechanical magic for the diffusion of knowl- edge ; free representative government, a perpetual regulator and equalizer of human condition, the inequalities of which are the great scourge of society ; and, lastly, a pure and spir- itual religion, the deep fountain of generous enthusiasm, the mighty spring of bold and lofty designs, the great sanctuary of moral power. The want of one or all of these satisfac- torily explains the vicissitudes of the ancient civilization ; and the possession of them all as satisfactorily assures the permanence of that which has been for some centuries, and is now, going on, and warrants the success of the great work of educating the world. Does any one suppose that, if knowledge among the Greeks, instead of being confined to the cities, and, in them, to a few professional sophists and rich slaveholders, had pervaded the entire population, in that and the neighboring countries, as it is made to do in modern times by the press ; if, instead of their anomalous, ill-balanced, tumultuary democracies and petty military tyrannies, they had been united in a well-digested system of representative government, they and the states around them, Persia, Mace- donia, and Rome ; and if, to all these principles of political stability, they had, instead of their corrupting and degrading superstitions, been blessed with the light of a pure and spir- itual faith, does any one suppose that Greece and Ionia, under circumstances like these, would have relapsed into bar- barism ? Impossible. The PhoBnicians invented letters ; but what did they do with them ? Apply them to the record, the diffusion, transmission, and preservation of knowledge ? Unhappily for them, that was the acquisition of a far subse- quent period. The wonderful invention of alphabetical writ- ing, was, as far as we are informed, probably applied by its EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 427 authors to no other purpose, than to carve the name of a king on his rude statue, or perhaps to record some simple catalogue of titles on the walls of a temple. So it was with the Egyptians, whose hieroglyphics have recently been discov- ered to be an alphabetical character, but which were far toe cumbrous to be employed for an extensive and popular diffu- sion of knowledge ; and which, with all the wisdom of theii inventors, are not certainly known to have been used foi the composition of books. It was the freer use of this flex- ible instrument of knowledge, which gave to Greece hei eminence ; which created so many of the objects of her na- tional pride ; and redeemed the memory of her distinguished sons from that forgetfulness, which has thrown its vast pall over the great and brave men and noble deeds of the mighty but unlettered states of antiquity. No one thinks that the powerful and prosperous nations which flourished for two thousand years, on the Nile and the Euphrates, were destitute of heroes, patriots, and statesmen. But, for want of a pop- ular literature, their merits and fame did not, at the time, incorporate themselves with the popular character ; and for all after times their memory lies crushed, with their ashes, beneath their mausoleums and pyramids. The mighty cities they built, the seats of their power, are as desolate as the cities they wasted. The races of men whom they ruled and arrayed in battle, bound in an iron servitude, degraded by mean superstitions, sunk before the first invader ; and now, the very languages on whose breath their glory was wafted from Atlas to the Indus, are lost and forgotten, because they were never impressed on the undying page of a written lit- srature. The more popular nature of the Grecian literature was evidently the cause of the preservation of the national spirit of the Greeks, and with it of their political existence. Greece, it is true, fell, and with it the civilization of the ancient world. In this, it may seem to present us rather an illustration of the inefficiency, than of the power, of the pre- servative principle of letters. But let us bear in mind, in the first place, that, greatly as the Greeks excelled the Eastern 428 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. nations in the diffusion of knowledge, they yet fell infinitely below the modern world, furnished as it is with the all-effi- cacious art of printing. Still more, let us recollect that, if Greece, in her fall, affords an example of the insufficiency of the ancient civilization, her long, glorious, and never wholly unsuccessful struggles, and her recent recovery from barba- rism, furnish the most pleasing proof, that there is a life-spring of immortality in the combined influence of letters, freedom, and religion. What but the ever-living power of literature and religion preserved the light of civilization and the intellectual stores of the past, undiminished in Greece, during the long and dreary ages of the decline and downfall of the Roman em- pire ? What preserved these sterile provinces and petty islets from sinking, beyond redemption, in the gulf of barbarity iri which Gyrene, and Egypt, and Syria, were swallowed up? It was Christianity and letters, retreating to their fastnesses on mountain tops, and in secluded valleys, the heights of Athos, the peaks of Meteora, the caverns of Arcadia, the secluded cells of Patmos. Here, while all else in the world seemed swept away by one general flood of barbarism, civil discord, and military oppression, the Greek monks of the dark ages preserved and transcribed their Homers, their Platos, and their Plutarchs. There never was, strictly speaking, a dark age in Greece. Eustathius wrote his commentaries on Homer in the middle of the twelfth century. That surely, if ever, was the midnight of the mind ; but it was clear and serene day in his learned cell ; and Italy, proud already of her Dante, her Boccaccio, and Petrarch, her Medicean pat- ronage and her reviving arts, did not think it beneath her to sit at the feet of the poor fugitives from the final downfall of Constantinople. What but the same causes, enforced by the power of the press, and by the sympathy with Greece, which pervaded the educated community of the modern world, has accomplished ,he political restoration of that country ? Thirteen years ago> it lay under a hopeless despotism ; its native inhabitants, as such, marked out for oppression and plunder: tolerated in EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 429 their religion for the sake of the exactions of which it fur- nished the occasion ; shut out from the hopes and honors of social life ; agriculture, and all the visible and tangible means of acquisition, discountenanced ; commerce, instead of lifting her honored front like an ocean queen, as she does here, creeping furtively from islet to islet, and concealing her pre- carious gains ; the seas infested with pirates, and the land with robbers ; the inhabitants exhibiting a strange mixture of the virtues of the bandit and the vices of the slave, but possessing, in generous transmission from better days, some elements of a free and enlightened people. Such was Greece thirteen years ago ; and the prospect of throwing off the Turkish yoke, in every respect but this last, was as wild and chimerical, as the effort to throw off the Cordilleras from this continent. In all respects but one, it would have been as reasonable to expect to raise a harvest of grain from the bar- ren rock of Hydra, as to found a free and prosperous state in this abject Turkish province. But the standard of liberty was raised on the soil of Greece by the young men who returned from the universities of Western Europe, and the civilized world was cheered at the tidings. It was the birth- place of the arts, the cradle of letters. Reasons of state held back the governments of Europe and of America from an interference in their favor ; but intellectual sympathy, religious and moral feeling, and the public opinion of the age, rose in their might, and swept all the barriers of state logic away. They were feeble, unarmed, without organization, distracted by feuds ; an adamantine wall of neutrality on the west ; an incensed barbarian empire, horde after horde, from the con- fines of Anatolia to the cataracts of the Nile, pouring down upon them on the east. Their armies and their navies were a mockery of military power ; their resources calculated to inspire rather commiseration than fear. But their spirits were sustained, and their wearied hands upheld, by the benedic- tions and the succors of the friends of freedom. The mem- ory of their great men of old went before them to battle, and scattered dismay in the ranks of the barbarous foe, as he moved with uneasy steps over the burning soil of freedom 430 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. The sympathy of all considerate and humane persons wa enlisted in behalf of the posterity, however degenerate, of those who had taught letters and humanity to the world. Men could not bear with patience that Christian people, strik- ing for liberty, should be trampled down by barbarian infidels, on the soil of Attica and Sparta. The public opinion of the world was enlisted on their side ; and Liberty herself, person- ified, seemed touched with compassion as she heard the cry of her venerated parent, the guardian genius of Greece. She hastened to realize the holy legend of the Roman daughter, and send back from her pure bosom the tide of life to the wasting form of her parent : " The milk of his own gift ; it is her sire To whom she renders back the debt of blood, Born with her birth ; no, he shall not expire." Greece did not expire. The sons of Greece caught new life from desperation ; the plague of the Turkish arms was stayed ; till the governments followed where the people had led the way, and the war, which was sustained by the literary and religious sympathies of the friends of art and science, was brought to a triumphant close by the armies and navies of Europe : and there they now stand, the first great recon- quest of modern civilization. Some, I doubt not, who hear me, have had the pleasure, within a few weeks, of receiving a Greek oration, pronounced in the temple of Theseus, on the reception, at Athens, of the first official act of the young Christian prince, under whom the government of this interesting country is organized. What contemplations does it not awaken, to behold a youth- ful Bavarian prince deputed by the great powers of Europe to go, with the guaranties of letters, religion, and the arts, to the city of Minerva, which had reached the summit of human civilization, ages before Bavaria had emerged from the depths of the Black Forest ! One can almost imagine the shades of the great of other days, the patriots and warriors, the philos- ophers and poets, the historians and orators, rising from their renowned graves, to greet the herald of their country's EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 431 restoration. One can almost fancy that the sacred dust of the Ceramicus must kindle into life as he draws near ; that the sides of Delphi and Parnassus, and the banks of the Ilis- sus, must swarm with the returning spirits of ancient times. Yes ! Marathon and Thermopylae are moved to meet him at his coming. Martyrs of liberty, names that shall never die, Solon and Pericles, Socrates and Phocion, not now with their cups of hemlock in their hands, but with the deep lines of their living cares effaced from their serene brows, at the head of that glorious company of poets, sages, artists, and heroes, which the world has never equalled, descend the famous road from the Acropolis to the sea, to bid the deliv- erer welcome to the land of glory and the arts. " Remem- ber," they cry, " O prince ! the land thou art set to rule ; it is the soil of freedom. Remember the great and wise of old, in whose place thou art called to stand, the fathers of lib- erty ; remember the precious blood which has wet these sacred fields ; pity the bleeding remnants of what was once so grand and fair ; respect these time-worn and venerable ruins ; raise up the fallen columns of these beautiful fanes, and consecrate them to the Heavenly Wisdom ; restore the banished Muses to their native seat ; be the happy instrument, in the hand of Heaven, of enthroning letters, and liberty, and religion, on the summits of our ancient hills ; and pay back the debt of the civilized world to reviving, regenerated Greece. So shall the blessing of those ready to perish come upon thee, and ages after the vulgar train of conquerors and princes is forgotten, thou shalt be remembered as the youth- ful restorer of Greece ! " This is a most important step in the extension of civiliza- tion ; what is to hinder its further rapid progress, I own I do not perceive. On the contrary, it seems to me that political causes are in operation, destined at no very distant period to ihrow open the whole domain of ancient improvement to the great modern instruments of national education the press, free government, and the Christian faith. The Ottoman power a government which, till lately, has shown itself hostile to all improvement is already dislodged from its 432 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. main positions in Europe, and may before long be removed from that which it still retains. The Turk, who, four centu- ries ago, threatened Italy, and, long since that period, carried terror to the gates of Vienna, will soon find it no easy matter to sustain himself in Constantinople. His empire is already, as it were, encircled by that of Russia, a government despotic indeed, but belonging to the school of European civilization, acknowledging the same law of nations, connected with the intellectual family of Western Europe and America, and mak- ing most rapid advances in the education of the various races which fill her vast domain. It is true that prejudices exist against that government, at the present time, in the minds of the friends of liberal institutions. But let it not be forgotten that, within the last century, as great a work of improvement has been carried on in the Russian empire, as was ever accomplished, in an equal period, in the history of man ; and that it is doubtful whether, in any other way than through the medium of such a government, civilization could be made to penetrate to a tenth part of the heterogeneous mate- rials of which that empire is composed. It is quite within the range of political probability, that the extended dominion of the czar will be the immediate agent of regenerating Western Asia. If so, I care not how soon the Russian banner is planted on the walls of Constanti- nople. No man can suppose that an instantaneous transition can be made, in Asiatic Turkey, from the present condition of those regions to one of republican liberty. The process must be gradual, and may be slow. If the Russian power be extended over them, it will be a civilized and a Christian sway. Letters, law, and religion will follow in the train ; and the foundation will be laid for further progress, in the advancing intelligence of the people. On the African coast, the great centre of barbarism has fallen ; and the opportunity seems to present itself of bring- ing much of that interesting region within the pale of civili- zation, 'under the auspices of one of the politest nations in Europe. The man, who, but fifteen years ago, should have predicted, that, within so short a period of time, Greece would EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 433 be united into an independent state, under a European prince ; that a Russian alliance should be sought, to sustain the totter- ing power of the Ottoman Porte ; that Algiers, which had so long bid defiance to Christendom, would be subjected ; that a flourishing colony of the descendants of Africa should be planted on its western coast ; and that the mystery of the Niger would be solved, and steamboats be found upon its waters, would have been deemed a wild enthusiast. And now, when we reflect, that, at so many different points, the power of modern civilization is turned upon Western Asia and Africa ; that our printing presses, benevolent institutions, missionary associations, and governments, are exerting their energies to push the empire of improvement into the waste places ; when we consider that the generation coming forward in these regions will live under new influences, and, instead of the Mussulman barbarism, repressing every movement towards liberty and refinement, that the influence and interest of the leading powers of Europe will be exerted to promote the great end, is it too sanguine to think that a grand and most extensive work of national education is begun, not destined to stand still, or go backward ? Go backward, did I say ? What is to hinder its indefinite progress ? Why should these regions be doomed to perpetual barbarity ? Hitherto, they have been kept barbarous by the influence of anti- Christian, despotic, illiterate governments. At present, vast regions, both of Eastern and Western Asia, and portions of Africa, on the Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts, are under the protection of enlightened, civilized, and Christian govern- ments, whose interest and character are alike pledged to promote the improvement of their subjects. Why should they not improve, and improve with rapidity ? They occupy a soil which once bore an intelligent population. They breathe a climate beneath which the arts and letters once flourished. They inhabit the coasts of that renowned sea, whose opposite shores, of old, seemed to respond to each other, in grand intellectual concert, like the emulous choirs of some mighty cathedral. They are still inhabited by men, rational, immortal men, men of no mean descent, VOL. i. 55 134 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. whose progenitors enrolled their names high on the lists of renown. For myself, I see nothing to put this great work beyond hope. The causes are adequate to its achievement, the times are propitious, the indications are significant ; and the work to be done, though great, indeed, is not, in itself, chimerical or extravagant. What is it ? To teach those who have eyes to sec ; to pour instruction into ears open to receive it ; to aid rational minds to think ; to kindle immortal souls to a con- sciousness of their faculties ; to cooperate with the strong and irrepressible tendency of our natures ; to raise out of barbarity and stupidity men who belong to the same race of beings as Newton and Locke, as Shakspeare and Milton, as Franklin and Washington. Let others doubt the possibility of doing it ; I cannot conceive the possibility of its remaining eventually undone. The difficulty of civilizing Asia and Africa ? I am more struck with the difficulty of keeping them barbarous. When I think what man is, in his powers and improvable capacities ; when I reflect on the principles of education, as I have already attempted, in this address, to develop them, my wonder is at the condition to which man is sunk, and with which he is content, and not at any project or prophecy of his elevation. On the contrary, I see a thousand causes at work to hasten the civilization of the world. I see the interest of the com- mercial nations enlisted in the cause of humanity and reli- gion. I see refinement, and the arts, and Christianity, borne on the white wings of trade to the farthest shores, and pen- etrating, by mysterious rivers, the hidden recesses of mighty continents. I behold a private company, beginning with commercial adventure, ending in a mighty association of merchant princes, and extending a government of Christian men over a hundred millions of benighted heathens in the barbarous East ; and thus opening a direct channel of com- munication between the very centre of European civiliza- tion and the heart of India. I see the ambition of extended sway carrying the eagles of a prosperous empire, and with them the fruitful rudiments of a civilized rule, over the feeble EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 435 provinces of a neighboring despotism. I see the great work of African colonization auspiciously commenced, promising no scanty indemnity for the cruel wrongs which that much- injured continent has endured from the civilized world, and sending home to the shores of their fathers an intelligent, well-educated colored population, going back with all the arts of life to this long-oppressed land ; and I can see the soldiers of the cross beneath the missionary banner, penetrat- ing the most inaccessible regions, reaching the most distant islands, and achieving, in a few years, a work of moral and spiritual education, for which centuries might have seemed too short. When I behold all these active causes, backed by all the power of public sentiment, Christian benevolence, the social principle, and the very spirit of the age, I can believe almost any thing of hope and promise. I can believe every thing, sooner than that all this mighty moral enginery can remain powerless and ineffectual. It is against the law of our natures, fallen though they be, which tend not down- wards, but upwards. To those who doubt the eventual regeneration of mankind I would say, in the language which the wise and pious poet has put into the mouth of the fallen angel, "Let such bethink them, That, in our proper motion, we ascend Up to our native seat. Descent and fall To us are adverse." Let him who is inclined to distrust the efficiency of the social and moral causes which are quietly at work for the improvement of the nations, reflect on the phenomena of the natural world. Whence come the waters which swell the vast currents of the great rivers, and fill up the gulfs of the bottomless deep ? Have they not all gone up to the clouds, in a most thin and unseen vapor, from the wide sur- face of land and sea? Have not these future billows, on which navies are soon to be tossed, in which the great mon- sters of the deep will disport themselves, been borne aloft on the bosom of a ^eecy cloud, chased by a breeze, with scarce 436 EDUCATION OF MANKIND. enough of substance to catch the hues of a sunbeam? and have they not descended, sometimes, indeed, in drenching rains, but far more diffusively in dew-drops, and gentle showers, and feathery snows, over the expanse of a conti- nent, and been gathered successively into the slender rill, the brook, the placid stream, till they grew, at last, into the mighty river, pouring down his tributary floods into the unfathomed ocean ? Yes ! let him who wishes to understand the power of the principles at work for the improvement of our race, if he cannot comprehend their vigor in the schools of learning ; if he cannot see the promise of their efficiency in the very character of the human mind ; if in the page of history, sacred and profane, checkered with vicissitude as it is, he cannot, nevertheless, behold the clear indications of a pro- gressive nature, -let him accompany the missionary bark to the Sandwich Islands. He will there behold a people, sunk, till within fifteen years, in the depths of savage and of heathen barbarity ; indebted to the intercourse of the civil- ized world for nothing but wasting diseases and degrading vices ; placed by Providence in a garden of fertility and plenty, but, by revolting systems of tyranny and supersti- tion, kept in a state of want, corruption, war, and misery. The Christian benevolence of a private American association casts its eyes upon them. Three or four individuals with- out power, without arms, without funds, except such as the frugal resources of private benevolence could furnish them ; strong only in pious resolutions, and the strength of a right- eous cause land on these remote islands, and commence the task of moral and spiritual reform. If ever there was a chimerical project, in the eyes of worldly wisdom, this was one. If this enterprise is feasible, tell me what is not ! Within less than half the time usually assigned to a genera- tion of men, sixty thousands of individuals, in a population of one hundred and fifty thousand, have been taught the elements of human learning. Whole tribes of savages have demolished their idols, abandoned their ancient superstitious and barbarous laws, and adopted some of the best institutions EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 437 of civilization and Christianity. It would, I think, be diffi- cult to find, in the pages of history, the record of a moral improvement, of equal extent, effected in a space of time so inconsiderable, and furnishing so striking an exemplification of the power of the means at work, at the present day, for the education and improvement of jnan. If I mistake not, we behold, in the British empire in the East, another most auspicious agency for the extension of moral influences over that vast region. It is true, that, hith- erto, commercial profit and territorial aggrandizement have seemed to be the only objects which have been pursued by the government. But when we look at home, at the charac- ter of the British people, an enlightened, benevolent, and liberal community ; when we consider the power of the press, and the force of public sentiment in that country, and the disposition to grapple with the most arduous questions evinced by its rulers, we may hope, without extravagance, that a glorious day of improvement is destined to dawn on India, under the patronage and auspices of Great Britain. The thoughts of her public-spirited and benevolent men have long been bent on this great object. Some of the finest minds that have adorned our nature have labored in this field. I need not recall to you the boundless learning, the taste, and the eloquence of Sir William Jones ; nor the clas- sical elegance, the ardent philanthropy, the religious self- devotion of Heber ; nor repeat a long list of distinguished names, who, for fifty years, have labored for the diffusion of knowledge in the East. Nor labored in vain. Cheering indications are given, in various quarters, of a great moral change in the condition of these, vast and interesting regions, once the abode of philosophy and the arts. The bloodiest and most revolting of the superstitions of the Hindoo pagan- ism has been suppressed by the British government. The widow is no longer compelled, by a . despotic fanaticism, to sacrifice herself on the funeral pile of her husband. The whole system of the castes is barely tolerated by the govern- ment ; and, being at war with the fundamental principles of the British law, as it is with the interest of the greatest part EDUCATION OF MANKIND. of the population, must, at no distant period, crumble away. The consolidation of the British empire in India promises a respite from the wars hitherto perpetually raging among the native states of that country, and forming, of themselves, an effectual barrier to every advance out of barbarism. The field seems now open to genial influences. It is impossible to repress the hope, that, out of the deep and living foun- tains of benevolence, in the land of our fathers, a broad and fertilizing current will be poured over the thirsty plains of India, the abodes of great geniuses in the morning of the world ; and that letters, arts, and religion will be extended to a hundred millions of these mild and oppressed fellow- beings. But it is time to relieve your patience. I will do it, after a reflection on the relation which this country bears to the work of general education ; and all I wish to say will be comprised in one word of encouragement, and one of warning. The recent agitations of the country have a bearing on the great moral questions we have been discussing, more impor- tant, as it seems to me, than their immediate political aspect. In its present united condition, that of a state already large and powerful, and rapidly increasing ; its population more generally well educated than that of any other country, and imbued with an unusual spirit of personal, social, and moral enterprise, it presents, in itself, the most effective organiza- tion imaginable, for the extension of the domain of improve- ment, at home and abroad. The vital principle of this organization is the union of its members. In this they enjoy an exemption from the heavy burden of great local establish- ments of government, and, still more, from the curse of neighboring states eternal border war. In virtue of this principle, they are enabled to devote all their energies, in peace and tranquillity, to the cultivation of the arts of private life, and the pursuit of every great work of public utility, benevolence, and improvement. To attack the principle of union, is to attack the prosperity of the whole and of every part of the country ; it is to check the outward development EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 439 of our national activity ; to turn our resources and energies, now exerted in every conceivable manner for public and private benefit, into new channels of mutual injury and ruin. Instead of roads and canals to unite distant states, the hill tops of those which adjoin each other would be crowned with fortresses ; and our means would be strained to the utmost in the support of as many armies and navies as there were rival sovereignties. Nor would the evil rest with the waste of treasure. The thoughts and feelings of men would assume a new direction ; and military renown, and rank, plunder, and revenge, be the ruling principles of the day. Destroy the union of the states, and you destroy their character, change their occupations, blast their prospects. You shut the annals of the republic, and open the book of kings. You shut the book of peace, and open the book of war. You unbar the gates of hell to the legions of civil discord, ambition, havoc, and ruin ! Let these considerations never be absent from our minds. But, if the question is asked, What encouragement is there that a vast deal can be done, in a short time, for the improve- ment of man ? I would say to him who puts the question, Look around you. In what country do you live ? Under what state of things has it grown up ? Do you bear in mind, that, in a space of time one half of which has been covered by the lives of some yet in existence, in two hundred years, these wide-spread settlements, with so many millions of inhabitants, abounding in all the blessings of life, more lib- erally and equally bestowed than in any other country, have been built up in a remote and savage wilderness ? Do you recollect that it is not half a century, since, with a population comparatively insignificant, she vindicated her independence, in a war against the oldest and strongest government on earth ? Do you consider that the foundations of these power- ful and prosperous states were laid by a few persecuted and aggrieved private citizens, of moderate fortune, unsupported, scarcely tolerated, by the government ? If you will go back to the very origin, do you not perceive, that, as if to conse- crate this country, from the outset, as a most illustrious 440 EDUCATION OF MANKIND." example of what a man can do, it was owing to the fixed impression on the heart of one friendless mariner, pursued through long years of fruitless solicitation and fainting hope, that these vast American continents are made a part of the heritage of civilized men ? Look around you again at the institutions which are the pride and blessing of the country. See our entire religious establishments, unendowed by the state, supported by the united efforts of the individual citi- zens. See the great literary institutions of our country, especially those in New England, Dartmouth, Williams, Bowdoin, Brown, Amherst, and others, founded by the liberality of citizens of moderate fortune, or by the small, combined contributions of public-spirited benefactors, aided, at the most, by moderate endowments from the public treas- ury ; and " the two twins of learning," if I may, without arrogance, name them apart from the rest ; this most efficient and respected seminary, within whose walls we are now con- vened, and my own ancient and beloved Harvard ; to whom, and what, do they trace their origin ? Yale, to the ten worthy fathers who assembled at Branford in 1700, and, laying each a few volumes on the table, said, " I give these books for the founding of a college in this colony ; " and Harvard, to the dying munificence of an humble minister of the gospel, who landed on the shores of America but to lay his dust in its soil ; but who did not finish his brief sojourn till he had accomplished a work of usefulness, which, we trust, will never die. Whence originated the great reform in our prisons, which has accomplished its wonders of philan- thropy and mercy in the short space of eight years, and made the penitentiaries of America the model of the penal institu- tions of the world ? It had its origin in the visit of a mis- sionary, with his Bible, to the convict's cell. Whence sprang the mighty temperance reform, which has already done so much to wipe off a great blot from the character of the country ? It was commenced on so small a scale, that it is not easy to assign its effective origin to a precise source. And counsels and efforts, as humble and inconsiderable at the out- set, gave the impulse to the missionary cause of modern times, EDUCATION OF MANKIND. 441 which, going forth with its devoted champions, conquering and to conquer, beneath " the great ensign of Messiah, Aloft by angels borne, their sign in heaven," has already gained a peaceful triumph over the farthest islands, and added a new kingdom to the realms of civiliza- tion and Christianity. VOL. i. 56 AGRICULTURE.* IT is generally admitted, that since the establishment of cuttle shows in this country, the condition of our agriculture has been manifestly improved. Before that time, our hus- bandmen seemed to want those means of improvement, and encouragements to action, which are enjoyed by their fellow- citizens engaged in several other pursuits. Instead of living together in large towns, they are scattered over the surface of the country. Instead of having two thirds of every news- paper filled with advertisements or information relative to their occupation, as is the case with the merchants, the most they could promise themselves was, that the weight of an enormous vegetable should be faithfully recorded ; and the memory of some calf with two heads or six legs be handed to posterity. They held no conventions and assemblies, like the clergy and physicians ; were not brought together, like the lawyers, at the periodical terms of court, to take counsel with each other for the public good ; and seemed not to pos- sess, in any way, the means of a rapid comparison and inter- change of opinion and feeling. Since the establishment of the cattle show of the Massa- chusetts Agricultural Society, and those of the several county societies, this state of things has been greatly amended ; and to a considerable degree, I imagine, through the agency of these institutions. The cultivators of the soil are now brought together. Their agricultural improvements, their superior animals, their implements of husbandry, the products * Address delivered at Brighton, before the Massachusetts Agricultu- ral Society, 16th October, 1833. (442) AGRICULTOBE. 443 ot their farms, their methods of cultivation, are all subjects of inquiry, comparison, and excitement. The premiums proposed have given a spring to the enterprise of the cultiva- tors ; not on account of the trifling pecuniary reward which is held out, but through the influence of a generous spirit of emulation. The agricultural magazines and newspapers take up the matter in this stage, and give all desirable notoriety to what is done and doing. The knowledge of every im- provement is widely diffused. Increased prosperity begins to show itself, as the reward of increased skill and knowl- edge ; and thus the condition of the husbandman is rendered more comfortable and more honorable. A word of exhortation has become, by usage, a part of the ceremonial on these occasions ; and it has been thought not unseasonable, that the husbandmen's festival should afford some brief opportunity for the expression of opinions on important interests connected with their pursuits, and for the inculcation of the sentiments which belong to the vocation, standing, and usefulness of the farmer. But you have just left the exhibition grounds, where you have been eye-witnesses of the dexterity of our ploughmen ; where you have admired the display of the strength and docility of the well-trained draught cattle ; where you have examined the animals brought forward as specimens of the improvement of their various races. You have not, of course, retired from this animated and interesting scene, thronged as it is by the assembled yeomanry of the commonwealth, the living masters of the great art of agriculture, to come together here with the view of gaining additional knowledge of matters of practical husbandry. This, I am well persuaded, at all events, is not expected from me, and I shall have fulfilled the object for which I have been invited to appear before you on this occa- sion, if I shall succeed, in any degree, in bringing home to the minds of those whom I have the honor to address, the importance and respectability of the occupation of the farmer, and especially in this country. In the first place, then, let us say a word of the importance of the pursuit of the husbandman. What rank does agricul- 444 AGRICULTURE. ture hold, in the scale of usefulness among the pursuits of men in civilized communities ? We shall arrive at a practical answer to this question, by considering that it is agriculture which spreads the great and bountiful table, at which the mighty family of civilized man receives its daily bread. Something is yielded by the chase, and much more by the fisheries ; but the produce of the soil constitutes the great mass of the food of a civilized community, either directly in its native state, or through the medium of the animals fed by it, which become, in their turn, the food of man. In like manner, agriculture furnishes the material for our clothing. Wool, cotton, flax, silk, leather, are the materials of which nearly all our clothing is composed ; and these are furnished by agriculture. In producing the various articles of clothing, the manufacturing arts are largely concerned, and commerce, in the exchange of raw materials and fabrics. These, there- fore, to a considerable degree, rest on agriculture as their ulti- mate foundation ; especially as it feeds all the other branches of industry. If we suppose the population of this state to consume in food and clothing, on an average, half a dollar a week each, it will give nearly fifty-two millions of agricultural produce consumed in Massachusetts in a year. In addition to this, is all that is consumed by the domestic animals, and all that is raised and not consumed, but exported, or otherwise given in exchange for articles of value, which are preserved and accu- mulated. Agriculture seems to be the first pursuit of civilized man. It enables him to escape from the life of the savage, and the wandering shepherd, into that of social man, gathered into fixed communities, and surrounding himself with the comforts and blessings of neighborhood, country, and home. The savage lives by the chase a precarious and wretched independence. The Arab and the Tartar roam with their flocks and herds over a vast region, destitute of all those refinements which require for their growth a permanent resi- dence, and a community organized into the various profes- sions, arts, and trades. They are found now, after a lapse of AGRICULTURE. 445 four thousand years, precisely in the same condition in which they existed in the days of Abraham. It is agriculture alone that fixes men in stationary dwellings, in villages, towns, and cities, and enables the work of civilization, in all its branches to go on. Agriculture was held in honorable estimation by the most enlightened nations of antiquity. In the infancy of com- merce and manufactures, its relative rank among the occupa- tions of men was necessarily higher than now. The patri- archs of the ancient Scripture times cultivated the soil. Abraham was very rich in cattle, in gold, and in silver. Job farmed on a very large scale ; he had seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she-asses. In Greece, the various improvements in husbandry, the introduction of the nutritive grains, and the invention of convenient instruments for tilling the soil, were regarded as the immediate bounties of the gods. At a later period, land was almost the only article of property ; and those who cultivated it, if they were freemen, were deemed a more respectable class than manufacturers and mechanics, who were mostly slaves. Among the Romans, agriculture was still more respected than among the Greeks. In the best and purest times of the republic, the most distinguished citi- zens, the proudest patricians, lived on their farms, and labored with their own hands. Cato the Censor was both a practical and scientific farmer, arid wrote a treatise on the art ; and who has not heard of Cincinnatus ? When the Sabines had advanced with a superior army to the walls of the city, the people, although at that period greatly disaffected towards the patricians, demanded that Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, one of that unpopular class, should be created dictator ; that is, that all the laws, and the power of all the magistrates, should be suspended, and despotic authority vested in his hands. Livy, in relating the occurrence, cannot help breaking out in the exclamation, that " it is well worth the attention of those who despise every thing on earth but money, and think that there is no place for honor or virtue except where wealth abounds. The sole hope of the Roman empire, (adds he,) 446 AGRICULTURE. in this the day of her extremity, L. Q,uinctius, was cultivating, at this time, a farm beyond the Tiber, which still bears his name, and which consisted of four acres. There he was found by the messengers who were sent to hail him as dicta- tor, leaning on his spade, or holding his plough. After hav- ing raised an army and defeated the enemy, he laid down, in sixteen days, the dictatorship, which he was authorized to hold for six months, and on the seventeenth day, got back to his farm." * In the progress of wealth and luxury in the Roman empire, the class of husbandmen sunk from their original estimation. in consequence of the employment of vast numbers of slaves on the estates of the great landholders. Still, however, there was a large and respectable class of rural tenantry, who cul- tivated at the halves the lands of the rich proprietors ; and the free and independent citizens who tilled their own small farms, like the great men of better days, never wholly disap- peared till the overthrow of the Roman empire by the inva- sion of the barbarous tribes. On the destruction of the Roman empire, the feudal system arose in Europe ; a singularly complicated plan of military despotism. In this system, the possession of the land was made the basis of the military defence of the country. The king was the ultimate proprietor, and apportioned the ter- ritory among the great lords, his retainers. Those who cultivated the soil were serfs, the property of their lord, and were bought and sold with the cattle which they tended. Sir Walter Scott, in describing, with his graphic pen, one of this class of the former population of England, after depict- ing the other peculiarities of his costume, adds a trait which speaks volumes as to their condition " One part of his dress only remains, but it is too remarkable to be suppressed ; it was a brass ring, resembling a dog's collar, but without any opening, and soldered fast round his neck ; so loose as to form no impediment to his breathing ; yet so tight as to be incapable of being removed, excepting by the use of the file. Liv. Lib. III. 26. AGRICULTURE. 447 On this singular gorget was engraved, in Saxon characters, 1 Gurth, the son of Beowulph, is the born thrall of Cedric.' " There is but one reflection wanting, to give us the full con- ception of the degradation of the peasantry of this period, which is. that these " born thralls " were the original rightful masters of the soil, subjected to foreign conquerors. If the estimate of Dr Lingard can be trusted, two thirds of the population of England, under the Anglo-Saxons, were of this class. They were either the native race, enslaved by their conquerors, or free-born Anglo-Saxons, reduced to slavery for debt, (a crime still punished by imprisonment,) for offences against the laws, or by a voluntary surrender of their liberty, as a refuge from want. Their occupations were, of course, as various as the wants or will of their masters might dictate ; but their persons, families, and goods of every description, were the property of their lord. He could dispose of them as he pleased, by gift or sale ; he could annex them to the soil, or remove them from it ; he could transfer them with it to a new proprietor, or leave them by will to his heirs. Many such devises are still on record. Even the slave trade existed in all its horrors, and in a form scarcely less abominable than in modern times. Slaves were sold openly in the market, during the whole of the Anglo-Saxon period, and it is supposed that the value of a slave was four- fold that of an ox. The importation of foreign slaves was unrestrained, but the exportation of natives was strictly for- bidden. The Northumbrians, however, in their eager pursuit of gain, despised the prohibition, and are said to have carried off not merely their countrymen, but their friends and rela- tives, and sold them as slaves in the ports of the continent. Bristol, as in modern times, was infamous for the zeal with which her merchants prosecuted this detestable traffic. It was abandoned at length, with slavery itself, under the mild and humanizing influence of Christianity.* What reflections are not awakened by the fact, that, ten centuries ago, two thirds of the population of England, the * Lingard's History of England, Vol. I. p. 502. 448 AGRICULTURE. land of our forefathers, were born slaves, who wore dogs collars soldered round their necks, and were bought and sold in the market ! But these are times long since past. Let us proceed to the next topic which invites our attention, the condition of the cultivators of the soil, at the present day, and espe- cially their comparative condition in Europe and America. I do not know in what way so effectually the New England yeoman can be made proud of his calling, and happy in its pursuit, as by instituting this comparison. There are, then, four principal states or conditions in which the agricultural population of modern Europe and America is found ; and among these four states I do not include that of the West Indian and North American slaves. First and lowest in the scale of those by whom the soil is cultivated in Europe, are the serfs of Russia. In the differ- ent provinces of this vast empire, about thirty millions of souls (nearly the entire population employed in husbandry) are found almost exactly in the state which has already been described, under the feudal system. Some ameliorations have been introduced in some provinces, and not in others ; and in the south-western portions of the empire, as Courland and Livonia, principally settled by Germans, the system of actual slavery has been abolished by law. But with these local exceptions, the Russian peasantry continue the property of the land owner, and may be sold by him with or without the land, as he pleases. He has power to give or to sell them their freedom, and power to keep them in slavery ; the power to chastise them, and to imprison them ; and in all respects to dispose of them, with the exception of taking life, or preventing their being enlisted into the army. But when a draught is ordered by the government, the landlord directs who shall march. The wealth of a great landholder is estimated by the number of his peasants; and individuals in the Rus- sian empire are named, who possess a hundred thousand, and even a hundred and twenty thousand serfs. Each individual peasant, of either sex, is bound, from the age of fifteen, to pay the avrock, or capitation tax, of about four dollars per AGRICULTURE. 449 annum. This is taken in lieu of performing three days' labor in each week, to which the landlord is entitled by the law. In addition to this, the serf has to account to his lord for a certain part of all his produce ; and besides all, he is subject to the government taxes. If the peasant chooses to make an effort to rise above his condition, he must apply to his lord for permission to leave the spot where he was born, and pursue some other trade. If this occupation be a more lucrative one, his annual tax is proportionably increased.* Such is the condition of the entire civilized portion of the Russian empire ; and it is needless to state, that it places this portion far below the wild Tartars, who own a nominal sub- jection to the Russian sceptre, and pay a trifling tribute for the privilege of roaming their remote steppes unmolested and free. I have already remarked that the condition in which the agricultural population exists in Russia is but little, if any, better than that of the vassals under the feudal system. When this system was undermined, the character of the peasantry assumed a new form, in which it still exists, in a considerable part of Europe. The sovereigns found it for their interest to weaken the power of the great barons by granting privi- leges to their small retainers ; and either from the same motives of policy, or from higher considerations of Christian charity, the church of Rome united with the kings in elevat- ing the condition of the peasantry. Pope Alexander III., in the twelfth century, published a bull for the general emanci- pation of slaves.f By degrees the villains (for such was the ill-omened name given by our forefathers to the cultivators of the soil) rose to the possession of some of the rights of freemen ; but it was not till the reign of Charles II. that vil- * Clarke's Travels in Russia, Vol. I. p. 218, where will be found, in a note, a very interesting extract on this subject, from Bishop Heber's MS. Journal. I believe that since this Address was written, important steps have been taken in Russia towards the emancipation of the serfs of the crown. t Smith's Wealth of Nations, Vol. II. p. 91. London, 1822. VOL i. 57 450 AGRICULTURE. lanage was virtually suppressed by statute.* On the conti- nent of Europe, when the abject servitude of the feudal system was broken up, the peasants became tenants at the halves ; and such are a considerable portion of the cultivators of the soil at the present day. It was calculated that in France, before the revolution, seven eighths of the agricul- tural population were Metayers, that is, tenants at the halves. The revolution has greatly increased the number of small proprietors, in consequence of the sale of the estates of emi- grants, and of the public domain ; but one half of the culti- vators of the soil, it is supposed, are still tenants at the halves. Such a tenancy is not wholly unheard of in this country. The estates in Lombardy, and in some other parts of Italy, are cultivated in this way. The terms of the contract be- tween the landlord and the tenant are not uniform ; in some cases a third, and in others a half, of the produce belongs to the landlord. In some cases the landlord finds the whole of the stock and the seed, in others the half. In some cases, the tenant has a property in the lease, which descends to his children ; in others, he is a tenant at will ; in others, the leases are periodically renewed at short intervals. But, how- ever the details may vary, the system resolves itself, in the main, into a general system of tenancy at the halves. It is considered highly unfavorable to the improvement of agricul- ture. There is a constant struggle, on the side of each party, to get as much as possible out of the land, with the least possible outlay. The tenant has no interest in using the stock with care and prudence, as this is to be replaced by the landlord. In France, the effect of this system is acknowledged by the best writers in that country to be per- nicious, f A better account of it is given in Lombardy. * 2 Blackstone, 96. f Say, Tom. II. p. 174. See also Arthur Young's Tour. The views taken in this Address of all the subjects alluded to are necessarily super- ficial. A very instructive discussion of the condition of the cultivators of the soil in the different states of modern Europe maybe found in Sismondi'a NouveauT Principes (fEconomie poliiique,, Tom. I. p. 186. AGRICULTURE. 45l There the tenant has the whole of the clover, and divides only the wheat, Indian corn, flax, wine, and silk. The land- lord advances nothing but the taxes. This mode of occupying the land was formerly common in England, but is little known there at the present day. The great majority of farms are there the property of large landholders; and are cultivated by tenants, who take them on leases, the terms of which vary according to circum- stances, both as to the amount of the rent and the duration of the lease. It has been a question much debated in England, whether a system of this kind, by which the land is principally held in large farms belonging to the aristocracy of the country, and cultivated by tenants on lease, is more favorable to the improvement of agriculture than the multiplication of small farms, belonging to those who till them. It has been urged that great and expensive improvements in farming cannot take place without great capital, which can only be furnished by large proprietors. It is they alone who can reclaim wastes, convert sandy plains into fertile fields, drain extensive fens, or shut out the sea from large tracts of meadow. All this is true ; but where great improvements are made by the application of large amounts of capital, the return is not to the tenant, but to the capitalist. A judicious operation upon a poor soil, may turn it into a good one ; the soil may pro- duce twice as much as it did before ; but the rent, in that case, will be doubled. The landlord has doubled his capital, but it will depend on other circumstances whether any ben- eficial change is produced in the condition of the tenant. The neighborhood, it is true, will be improved by the new creation of property ; the population will increase ; and, indi- rectly, every individual's condition will be improved, by liv- ing in a larger community ; but directly, I cannot perceive that the tenant is benefited ; inasmuch as it is plain that pre- cisely as the land is rendered more productive, the rent in- creases. As the landed interest in England is the main interest of the country, and the accumulation of large estates in land is the most important element in their system, every thing is 152 AGRICULTURE. made to favor this mode of cultivating the land, and the small proprietor labors under great disadvantages. Wherever he moves, he has a wealthy rival to contend with, able to over- bid and to undersell him ; and as things now are in England, it is very possible that the condition of the tenant in that country is more desirable than that of the small farmer. But this, I conceive, proves nothing in the argument whether the condition of the tenant or the proprietor of a small farm is to be preferred. It is, in fact, justly made a leading objection to the English system of tenancy, by the learned French writer already quoted, (M. de Sismondi,*) that it tends to the extermination of the small proprietors, and to reduce the cot- tagers, peasants, and all those by whom, under whatever name, the labor of cultivation is performed, to a state of abject and servile dependence. This brings me to the consideration of the fourth and last state in which the cultivator of the soil is found ; and that is, the condition which almost universally obtains in the non- slaveholding states of this country, and especially in New England, in which the farmer is the proprietor of the soil and I cannot but express my decided conviction that this con- dition is the most favorable to the prosperity of the state and the happiness of the individual. It will immediately be per- ceived that it is not inconsistent with the possession of some very ample landed estates by individuals. In a country like ours, where every man's capacity, industry, and good fortune are left free to work their way without prejudice, as far as possible, there will be among the agricultural, as well as among the commercial population, fortunes of all sizes ; from that of the man who owns his thousand acres, his droves of cattle, his flocks of sheep, his range of pastures, his broad fields of mowing and tillage, down to the poor cottager, who can scarce keep his cow over winter. There will always be, in a population like ours, opportunities enough for those who cannot own a farm, to hire one ; and for those who cannot hire one, to labor in the employment of their neighbors, who * Nouveaux Principes, Tom. I. p. 217 AGRICULTURE. 453 need their services ; and when we maintain that it is for the welfare of the society, that the land should be cultivated by an independent yeomanry, who own the soil they till, we mean only that this should be the general state and condition of things, and not that there should be no such thing as a wealthy proprietor, whose lands, in whole or in part, are cultivated by a tenant ; no such thing as a prudent hus- bandman taking a farm on a lease ; or an industrious young man, without any capital but his hands, laboring in the em- ploy of his neighbor. These all are parts of the system as it exists among us. And we maintain that it is a better system than the division of the country into a few vast domains, cultivated by a dependent tenantry, to the almost total exclusion of the class of small independent farmers. Am I asked, Why is it better ? This is a question riot easy to bring down to a dry argument. It involves political and moral considerations; it trenches on the province of the feel- ings ; it concerns the whole character of a people. In a pecuniary point of view, it is not, of course, main- tained that, because it is desirable that the cultivator should own a farm, it is therefore expedient that he should, in all cases, attempt to purchase one. It cannot, as a general rule, be assumed that it is better for a young man to buy a farm than to hire one, supposing him to have no more capital than is necessary to stock his farm, and purchase implements of husbandry. If he buys, he must mortgage his farm for the payment ; and the interest on the purchase money will per- haps be greater than the rent he would have to pay for a farm equally good. Whether it is good policy for a man not having capital enough at once to pay for his farm, to buy one, depends upon his energy and talent, the situation and quality of the farm, and the prospect that, within a reasonable period of time, and the enjoyment of an average success, he can pay for it. If he cannot do this, he can in no sense become the owner of a farm ; he can only encumber himself with the responsibility of it, paying more in the shape of interest than he would have to pay in that of rent. But, supposing a young man at the commencement of life, and desirous of passing 454 AGRICULTURE. his da^s on the soil which gave h:m birth, having so much capital, that, besides stocking a farm, he can do something towards its purchase at the outset, with a reasonable expecta- tion that, in the course of time, with industry, perseverance, and temperance, he can make it his own, then it is better that he should purchase than hire. He has then the strongest inducements to be industrious, frugal, and temperate ; for every dollar he can save passes silently into investment, in paying off his debt. The earnings of the tenant are in dan- ger of being needlessly spent or lost, for want of a safe and ready investment. The owner makes improvements with zeal and spirit, for he makes them on his own soil, in the assurance that he or his children will reap the benefit of them ; and every new improvement furnishes a new stimulus to those efforts which are necessary to pay off the debt. But no person takes a genuine pleasure in improving another man's property. It is the interest of the tenant to get as much out of the soil as he can, and to give as little back to it. When he has exhausted one farm, he can take another. Thus the land, as far as it is cultivated in this way, is under- going a gradual decay ; but not more surely than the generous principle in the heart of him who thus occupies it, and who is perpetually, though perhaps unconsciously, under the influ- ence of his interest, engaged in deteriorating his neighbor's property. The owner is under precisely the opposite influ- ence, and especially while it is necessary to make his farm as productive as possible. He strives to render back to it as much as possible, in return for what he takes from it. For he feels that he is making it the depository of ail that his youth and manhood can lay up for the decline of life, for his family, and his children. Whatever, in this way, is true with respect to the young farmer who has purchased his farm on credit, is still more applicable to him who happily begins life the proprietor of the soil which he cultivates. It is particularly in reference to him that the subject presents itself in other relations than those of pecuniary calculation, and assumes the aspect not merely of an economical, but also of a political question AGRICULTURE. 456 In general, the inquiry how the land is cultivated derives great consequence from its connection with the political con- dition of the cultivators. A very considerable portion of the political power of every country must be vested in the land- holders; for they hold a large part of the property of the country. They do so even in England, where there is such a vast amount of commercial and manufacturing wealth. Although the land is to a considerable degree, in England, monopolized by rich proprietors, yet attempts have been made, and with success, to give political privileges and conse- quence to the tenantry. Still, however, the greatest land- holder, in most of the countries, is generally able to carry the elections as he pleases. I have read, and that, too, since the passage of the reform bill, in the English newspapers, of voters being refused a renewal of leases, which had been in the family two generations, in consequence of voting against their landlord's candidate. There is no way in which a calm, orderly, and intelligent exercise and control of political power can be assured to the people, but by a distribution among them, as equally as possible, of the property of the country ; and I know no manner in which such a distribution can be permanently and peacefully effected, but by keeping the land in smaH farms, suitable to be cultivated by their owners. Under such a system, and under no other, the people will exercise their rights with independence. The assumption of a right to dictate will be frowned at, if attempted ; and even the small portion of the population who may be tenants will possess the spirit and freedom of the proprietors. But when the great mass of the land is parcelled out into a few immense estates, cultivated by a dependent tenantry, the unavoidable consequence is a sort of revival of the state of things which existed in the feudal ages, when the great barons took the field against each other at the head of their vassals.* But I own it is not even on political grounds that I think our system of independent rural freeholders is most strongly * Story's Commentaries, I. pp. 160 166L 456 AGRICULTURE. entitled to the preference. Its moral aspects, its connection with the character and feelings of the yeomanry, give it, after all, its greatest value. The man who stands upon his own soil, who feels that by the laws of the land in which he lives, by the law of civilized nations, he is the rightful and exclusive owner of the land which he tills, is. by the constitution of our nature, under a wholesome influence, not easily imbibed from any other source. He feels, other things being equal, more strongly than another the character of man as the lord of the inanimate world. Of this great and wonderful sphere, which, fashioned by the hand of God, and upheld by his power, is rolling through the heavens, a portion is his, his, from the centre to the sky. It is the space on which the generations before him moved in their round of duties ; and he feels himself connected, by a visible link, with those who preceded him, as he is, also, with those who will follow him, and to whom he is to transmit a home. Perhaps his farm has come down to him from his fathers. They have gone to their last home ; but he can trace their footsteps over the daily scene of his labors. The roof which shelters him was reared by those to whom he owes his being. Some inter- esting domestic tradition is connected with every enclosure. The favorite fruit tree was planted by his father's' hand. He sported in his boyhood by the side of the brookj which still winds through his meadow. Through that field lies the path to the village school of his earliest days. He still hears from his window the voice of the Sabbath bell, which called his fathers and his forefathers to the house of God ; and near at hand is the spot where he laid his parents down to rest, and where he trusts, when his hour is come, he shall be duti- fully laid by his children. These are the feelings of the owner of the soil. Words cannot paint them ; gold cannot buy them ; they flow out of the deepest fountains of the heart ; they are the life-spring of a fresh, healthy, generous, national character. The history and experience of the world illustrate their power. Who ever heard of an enlightened race of serfs AGRICULTURE. 457 slaves, or vassals ? How can we wonder at the forms of government which prevail in Europe, with such a system of monopoly in the land as there exists? Nothing but this explains our own history, clears up the mystery of the revo- lution, and makes us fully comprehend the secret of our own strength. Austria or France must fall, whenever Vienna or Paris is seized by a powerful army. But what was the loss of Boston or New York, in the revolutionary war, to the people of New England ? The moment the enemy set his foot in the country, he was like the hunter going to the thicket to rob the tigress of her young. The officers and soldiers of the revolution were farmers and sons of farmers, who owned the soil for which they fought ; and many of them, like the veteran Putnam, literally left their ploughs in the furrow to hasten to the field. The attempt to conquer such a population is as chimerical as it would be to march an army down to the sea-shore, in the Bay of Fundy, when the tide is rolling in seventy feet high, in order to beat back the waves with their bucklers. But it is time to conclude. When the civil wars of Rome were over, Virgil was requested by the Emperor Augustus to write a poem on agriculture, in order to encourage the Italian husbandmen to return to the culture of their wasted fields. The farmers in Italy at that time were mostly tenants at the halves ;* but the philosophic poet could not help pronoun- cing even them too happy, did they but know their blessings, After having compared, with some attention, the various con- ditions in which man is found, in the principal countries of Europe and in America, I have come to the undoubting con- clusion, that there is not a population on earth, taken as a whole, so highly favored in the substantial blessings of life, as the yeomanry of New England. There are other coun- tries that surpass us in wealth and power ; in military strength ; in magnificence, and the display of the expensive arts ; but none which can so justly lay claim to the character of a free and happy commonwealth, none in which the * Colon! partiarii. VOL. i. 58 458 AGRICULTURE. image of a state, sketched by the philosophic poet, is sc beautifully realized " What constitutes a state ? Not high-raised battlement, and labored mound, Thick wall or moated gate ; Not cities proud, with spires and turrets crowned ; Not bays and broad-armed ports, Where, laughing at the storm, proud navies ride; Not starred and spangled courts, Where low-browed baseness wafts perfumes to pride. No ! men ! high-minded men, Men who their duties know, But know their rights, and knowing, dare maintain, Prevent the long-aimed blow, And crush the tyrant, while they rend the chain; These constitute a state, And sovereign law, that state's collected will, O'er thrones and globes elate, Sits empress, crowning good, repressing UL" EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE.* PREFATORY NOTE, FROM THE ORIGINAL EDITION. To avoid the necessity of frequent marginal references, I would observe, that the account of Lafayette's first visit to America is chiefly taken from a very interesting article on that subject, communicated by Mr Sparks to the Boston Daily Advertiser, of 26th June, 183-t, from his edition of Washing- ton's Works, now in the press. Among the other authorities which I have consulted are the well-known works of Sarrans, the Memoirs of Lafayette and the Constitutional Assembly, by Regnault-Warin, Montgaillard's History of France, from the close of the reign of Louis XVI. to the year 1825, and Mr Ticknor's beautiful sketch of the life of Lafayette, originally published in the North American Review. But I owe a more particular acknowledgment to Mr Sparks, who not only furnished me with the sheets of those parts of the unpublished volumes of Washington's Works which throw light on the mili- tary services of Lafayette in the war of the American revolution, but placed in my hands a great mass of original papers, of the highest interest and value, relating to the career of Lafayette, and furnished to Mr Sparks by the general himself, from his own collections and the public offices at Paris. These papers contain the Correspondence of Lafayette with Washington, from the ynar 1778 to his death ; his Correspondence and Notes of his Conferences with the Count de Vergennes and other French ministers ; his Correspond- ence with his family and friends, from America and from his prisons in Ger- many ; Notes and Commentaries on the most important incidents of his life ; his Correspondence with the Governor of Virginia and officers of the army, especial- ly during the campaign of 1781, and miscellaneous papers bearing on the main subject. They form altogether ample materials for a history of the life and services of Lafayette ; a work which no one is so well qualified as Mr Sparks to execute, and which, it is greatly to be wished, he might be induced to undertake. * Delivered in Faneuil Hall, at the request of the young men of Boston, on the Cth uf Sep- tember 1834 (459) EULOGY. WHEN I look round upon this vast audience, and reflect upon the deep interest manifested by so many intelligent persons in the occasion which has called us together, when I consider the variety, the importance, and singularity of the events which must pass in review before us, and the extraor- dinary character of the man whom we commemorate, his connection with Europe and America, in the most critical periods of their history, his intercourse in both hemispheres with the master spirits of the age, his auspicious, long pro- tracted, and glorious career, alternating with fearful rapidity from one extreme of fortune to the other, and when I feel that I am expected, by the great multitude I have the honor to address, the flower of this metropolis, to say some- thing not inappropriate to such an occasion, nor wholly beneath the theme, I am oppressed with the weight of the duty I am to perform. I know not how, in the brief space allotted to me, to take up and dispose of a subject so vast and comprehensive. I would even now, were it possible, retire from the undertaking ; and leave to your own hearts, borne upwards with the swelling strains of yonder choir, whose pious and plaintive melody is just dying on the ear, to muse, in expressive silence, the praise of him we celebrate. But since this may not be, since the duty devolved upon me must, however feebly, be discharged, let me, like the illustrious subject of our contemplation, gather strength from the magnitude of the task. Let me calmly trace him through those lofty and perilous paths of duty which he trod with serenity while empires were toppling round him ; and, (460) EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 461 trampling under foot the arts of the rhetorician, as he tram- pled under foot all the bribes of vanity, avarice, and ambition, and all the delights of life, let me, in the plainness of history and the boldness of truth, not wholly uncongenial to the character of the man I would reproduce to your admiration and love, discharge as I may the great duty which you have assigned to me. There is, at every great era of the history of the world, a leading principle, which gives direction to the fortunes of nations and the characters of distinguished men. This prin- ciple, in our own time, is that of the action and reaction upon each other of Europe and America, for the advancement of free institutions and the promotion of rational liberty. Ever since the discovery of America, this principle has been in operation, but naturally and necessarily with vastly increased energy, since the growth of a civilized population this side the water. For the formation of a man of truly great char- acter, it is necessary that he should be endowed with qualities to win respect and love ; that he should be placed in cir- cumstances favorable to a powerful action on society ; and then, that, with a pure affection, a strong, disinterested, glow- ing zeal, a holy ambition of philanthropy, he should devote himself to the governing principle of the age. Such a combination, humanly speaking, produces the nearest ap- proach to perfection which the sphere of man admits. Of such characters the American revolution was more than commonly fertile, for it was the very crisis of that action and reaction which is the vocation of the age. Such a character was Washington ; such was Lafayette. He was born at Chavaniac, in the ancient province of Auvergne, in France, on the sixth day of September, 1757 seventy-seven years ago, this day. His family was one of the most ancient in the country, and of the highest rank in the French nobility. As far back as the fifteenth century, one of his ancestors, a marshal of France, was distinguished for his military achievements ; his uncle fell in the wars of Italy, in the middle of the last century ; and his father lost his life in the Seven Years' war, at the battle of Minden. 462 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. His mother died soon after ; and he was thus left an orphan at an early age, heir to an immense estate, and exposed to all the dangers incident to youth, rank, and fortune, in the gayest and most luxurious city on earth, at the period of its greatest corruption. He escaped unhurt. Having completed the usual academical course, at the college of Duplessis, in Paris, he married, at the age of sixteen, the daughter of the Duke D'Ayen, of the family of Noailles, somewhat younger than himself, and at all times the noble encourager of his virtues, the heroic partner of his sufferings, of his great name, and of his honorable grave. The family to which he thus became allied was then, and for fifty years had been, in the highest favor at the French court. Himself the youthful heir of one of the oldest and richest houses in France, the path of advancement was open before him. He was offered a brilliant place in the royal household. At an age and in a situation most likely to be caught by the attraction, he declined the proffered distinction, impatient of the attendance at court which it required. He felt, from his earliest years, that he was not born to loiter in an ante-chamber. The sentiment of liberty was already awakened in his bosom. Having, while yet at college, been required, as an exercise in composition, to describe the well-trained charger, obedient even to the shadow of the whip, he represented the noble animal, on the con- trary, as rearing at the sight of it, and throwing his rider. With this feeling, the profession of arms was, of course, the most congenial to him ; and was, in fact, with the exception of that of courtier, the only one open to a young French nobleman before the revolution. In the summer of 1776, and just after the American decla- ration of independence, Lafayette was stationed at Metz, a garrisoned town on the road from Paris to the German fron- tier, with the regiment to which he was attached as a captain of dragoons, not then nineteen years of age. The Duke of Gloucester, the brother of the King of England, happened to be on a visit to Metz, and a dinner was given to him by the commandant of the garrison. Lafayette was invited, with EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 463 other officers, to the entertainment. Despatches had just been received by the duke, from England, relating to Ameri- can affairs the resistance of the colonists, and the strong measures adopted by the ministers to crush the rebellion. Among the details stated by the Duke of Gloucester was the extraordinary fact, that these remote, scattered, and unprotect- ed settlers of the wilderness had solemnly declared themselves an independent people. That word decided the fortunes of the enthusiastic listener ; and not more distinctly was the great Declaration a charter of political liberty to the rising states, than it was a commission to their youthful champion to devote his life to the same cause. The details which he heard were new to him. The Amer- ican contest was known to him before but as a rebellion, a tumultuary affair in a remote transatlantic colony. He now, with a promptness of perception which, even at this distance of time, strikes us as little less than miraculous, addressed a multitude of inquiries to the Duke of Gloucester on the sub- ject of the contest. His imagination was kindled at the idea of a civilized people struggling for political liberty. His heart was warmed with the possibility of drawing his sword in a good cause. Before he left the table, his course was mentally resolved on ; and the brother of the King of Eng- land (unconsciously, no doubt) had the singular fortune to enlist, from the French court and the French army, this gal- lant and fortunate champion in the then unpromising cause of the colonial congress. He immediately repaired to Paris, to make further inquiries and arrangements, towards the execution of his great plan. He confided it to two young friends, officers like himself, the Count de Segur and Viscount de Noailles, and proposed to them to join him. They shared his enthusiasm, and determined to accompany him, but, on consulting their families, they were refused permission. But they faithfully kept Lafay- ette's secret. Happily shall I say he was an orphan, in- dependent of control, and master of his own fortune, amount- ing to near forty thousand dollars per annum. He next opened his heart to the Count de Broglie, a mar- 464 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. shal in the French army. To the experienced warrior, accus- tomed to the regular campaigns of European service, the project seemed rash and quixotic, and one that he could not countenance. Lafayette begged the count at least not to betray him ; as he was resolved (notwithstanding his disap- proval of the project) to go to America. This the count promised, adding, however, " I saw your uncle fall in Italy, and I witnessed your father's death at the battle of Minden, and I will not be accessory to the ruin of the only remaining branch of the family." He then used all the powers of argu- ment which his age and experience suggested to him, to dis- suade Lafayette from the enterprise, but in vain. Finding his determination unalterable, he made him acquainted with the Baron de Kalb, who, the count knew, was about to em- bark for America ; an officer of experience and merit, who, as is well known, fell at the battle of Camden. The Baron de Kalb introduced Lafayette to Silas Deane, then agent of the United States in France, who explained to him the state of affairs in America, and encouraged him in his project. Deane was but imperfectly acquainted with the French language, and of manners somewhat repulsive. A less enthusiastic temper than that of Lafayette might, per- haps, have been chilled by the reception which he met with from Deane. He had, as yet, not been acknowledged in any public capacity ; and was beset by the spies of the British ambassador. For these reasons, it was judged expedient that the visit of Lafayette should not be repeated ; and their fur- ther negotiations were conducted through the intervention of Mr Carmichael, an American gentleman, at that time in Paris. The arrangement was at length concluded, in virtue of which, Deane took upon himself, without authority, but by a happy exercise of discretion, to engage Lafayette to enter the Amer- ican service, with the rank of major-general. A vessel was about to be despatched with arms and other supplies for the American army, and in this vessel it was settled that he should take passage. At this juncture, the news reached France of the evacua- tion of New York, the loss of Fort Washington, the calami- EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 465 tous retreat through New Jersey, and the other disasters of the campaign of 1776. The friends of America in France were in despair. The tidings, bad in themselves, were greatly exaggerated in the British gazettes. The plan of sending an armed vessel with munitions was abandoned. The cause, always doubtful, was now pronounced desperate ; and Lafay- ette was urged by all who were privy to his project, to give up an enterprise so wild and hopeless. Even our commis- sioners (for Deane had been joined by Dr Franklin and Arthur Lee) told him they could not in conscience urge him to proceed. His answer was, " My zeal and love of liberty have perhaps hitherto been the prevailing motive with me ; but now I see a chance of usefulness which I had not antici- pated. These supplies I know are greatly wanted by Con- gress. I have money ; I will purchase a vessel to convey them to America, and in this vessel my companions and my- self will take passage." Yes, fellow-citizens, that I may repeat an exclamation uttered ten years ago by him who has now the honor to address you, in the presence of an immense multitude, who welcomed " the nation's guest " to the academic shades of Harvard, and by them received with acclamations of approval and tears of gratitude ; when he was told by our commis- sioners, " that they did not possess the means nor the credit to provide a single vessel in all the ports of France," " Then," exclaimed the gallant and generous youth, " I will provide my own." And it is a literal fact, that when our beloved country was too poor to offer him so much as a passage to her shores, he left, in his tender youth, the bosom of home, of happiness, of wealth, and of rank, to plunge in the dust and blood of our inauspicious struggle. In pursuance of the generous purpose thus conceived, the secretary of the Count de Broglie was employed by Lafay- ette to purchase and fit out a vessel at Bordeaux ; and while these preparations were in train, with a view of averting suspicion from his movements, and passing the tedious inter- val, he made a visit with a relative to his kinsman, the Mar- quis de Noailles, then the French ambassador in London. VOL. L 59 466 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE During their stay in Great Britain, they were treated with kindness by the king and persons of rank ; but having, after a lapse of three weeks, learned that his vessel was ready at Bordeaux, Lafayette suddenly returned to France. This visit was of service to the youthful adventurer, in furnishing him an opportunity to improve himself in the English lan- guage ; but a nice sense of honor forbade him to make use of the opportunity which it afforded for obtaining military information, that could be of utility to the American army. So far did he carry this scruple, that he declined visiting the naval establishment at Portsmouth. On his return to France, he did not even visit Paris ; but after three days passed at Passy, the residence of Dr Frank- lin, he hastened to Bordeaux. Arrived at this place, he found that his vessel was not yet ready ; and had the still greater mortification to learn that the spies of the British ambas- sador had penetrated his designs, and made them known to the family of Lafayette, and to the king, from whom an order for his arrest was daily expected. Unprepared as his ship was, he instantly sailed in her to Passage, the nearest port in Spain, where he proposed to wait for the vessel's papers. Scarcely had he arrived in that harbor, when he was encountered by two officers, with letters from his family and from the ministers, and a royal order, directing him to join his father-in-law at Marseilles. The letters from the ministers reprimanded him for violating his oath of allegi- ance and failing in his duty to his king. Lafayette, in some of his letters to his friends about court, replied to this remark, that the ministers might chide him with failing in his duty to the king, when they learned to discharge theirs to the people. His family censured him for his desertion of his domestic duties ; but his heroic wife, instead of joining in the reproach, shared his enthusiasm, and encouraged his enterprise. He was obliged to return with the officers to Bordeaux, and report himself to the commandant. While there, and engaged in communicating with his family and the court, in explanation and defence of his conduct, he learned from a friend at Paris that a positive prohibition of his EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 467 departure might be expected from the king. No further time was to be lost, and no middle course pursued. He feigned a willingness to yield to the wishes of his family, and started as for Marseilles, with one of the officers who was to accom- pany him to America. Scarcely had they left the city of Bordeaux, when he assumed the dress of a courier, mounted a horse, and rode forward to procure relays. They soon quitted the road to Marseilles, and struck into that which leads to Spain. On reaching Bayonne, they were detained two or three hours. While the companion of Lafayette was employed in some important commission in the city, he himself lay on the straw in the stable. At St Jean de Luz he was recognized by the daughter of the person who kept, the post-house ; she had observed him a few days before, a? he passed from Spain to Bordeaux. Perceiving that he wae discovered, and not daring to speak to her, he made her a signal to keep silence. She complied with the intimation ; and when, shortly after he had passed on, his pursuers came up, she gave them an answer which baffled their penetration, and enabled Lafayette to escape into Spain. He was in- stantly on board his ship and at sea, with eleven officers in his train. It would take me beyond the limits of the occasion to repeat the various casualties and exposures of his passage, which lasted sixty days. His vessel had cleared for the West Indies ; but Lafayette directed the captain to steer for the United States, which, especially as he had a large pecuniary adventure of his own on board, he declined doing. By threats to remove him from his command, and promises to indemnify him for the loss of his property, should they be captured, La- fayette prevailed upon the captain to steer his course for the American coast, where at last they happily arrived, having narrowly escaped two British vessels of war, which were cruising in that quarter. They made the coast near George- town, South Carolina. It was late in the day before they could approach so near land as to leave the vessel. Anx- ious to tread the American soil, Lafayette, with some of his fellow-officers, got into the ship's boat, and were ro'ved at 468 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. nightfall to shore. A distant light guided them in their land- ing and advance into the country. Arriving near the house from which the light proceeded, an alarm was given by the watch-dogs, and they were mistaken by those within for a marauding party from the enemy's vessels, hovering on the coast. The Baron de Kalb, however, had a good knowledge of the English language, acquired on a previous visit to America, and was soon able to make known who they were and what was their errand. On this, they were of course- readily admitted, and cordially welcomed. The house in which they found themselves was that of Major Huger, a citizen of worth, hospitality, and patriotism, by whom every good office was performed to the adventurous strangers. He provided the next day the means of conveying Lafayette and his companions to Charleston, where they were received with enthusiasm by the magistrates and the people. As soon as possible, they proceeded by land to Philadel- phia. On his arrival there, with the eagerness of a youth anxious to be employed upon his errand, he sent his letters to our townsman, Mr Lovell, chairman of the committee of foreign relations. He called the next day at the hall of Con- gress, and asked to see this gentleman. Mr Lovell came out to him ; stated that so many foreigners offered themselves for employment in the American army that Congress was greatly embarrassed to find them commands ; that the finances of the country required the most rigid economy ; and that he feared, in the present case, there was little hope of success. Lafayette perceived that the worthy chairman had made up his report without looking at the papers ; he explained to him that his application, if granted, would lay no burden upon the finances of Congress, and addressed a letter to the President, in which he expressed a wish to enter the Amer- ican army, on the condition of serving without pay or emol- ument, and on the footing of a volunteer. These conditions removed the chief obstacles alluded to, in reference to the appointment of foreign officers ; the letters brought by La- fayette made known to Congress his high connections, and his large means of usefulness, and without an hour's delay EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 469 he received from them a commission of major-general in the American army, a month before he was twenty years of age. A month before he is twenty years of age he is thought worthy by that august body, the revolutionary Congress, to be placed in the highest rank of those to whom the conduct of their arms was intrusted in this hour of their extremes! peril. What a commencement of life ! None of the golden hours of youth wasted on its worthless but tempting vanities, none of those precious opportunities are lost for him, which, once lost, neither gold, nor tears, nor blood can buy back, and which, for the mass of men, are lost, irretrievably, and forever ! None of the joyous days of youthful vigor exhausted even in the praiseworthy but cheerless vigils with which, in the present artificial state of society, it is too often the lot of advancing merit to work its way toilsomely up the steeps of usefulness and fame ! It pleased a gracious Provi- dence, in disposing the strange and various agency by which the American independence was to be established, to place in the company of its defenders a youthful champion from the highest circle of the gayest court of Europe. By the side of Washington, from his broad plantations, of Greene, from his forge, of Stark, from his almost pathless forests and granite hills, of Putnam, from his humble farm, there is a place, at the war council of the revolution, for a young noble- man from France. He is raised at once above the feverish appetite for advancement, the pest of affairs, for he is born to the highest station society can bestow. He comes from the bosom of the domestic endearments, with which he has surrounded himself, before any of the accursed poisons of pleasure have been poured into his heart ; and youth as he is-, he brings the chaste and manly virtues of the husband and the father to the virtuous cause which he has embraced. The possessor of an immense estate, he is beyond the reach of mercenary motives, and is enabled even to confer favors on the Congress whose confidence he receives. But though his enterprise is one which requires, for its very conception, a rare enthusiasm, although, considering his 470 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. position at home, he must be all but a madman to persevere in such an adventure, yet the nature of the cause to which he consecrates himself, and of the duties which he under- takes to perform, implies a gravity of character, and sound judgment, belonging to mature years and long experience ; and that gravity and good judgment, young and inexperi- enced as he is, he possesses in an eminent degree. To suc- ceed in the undertaking, he seems to need qualities of char- acter not merely different from those which alone could prompt him to embark in it ; but he must have the opposite and contradictory qualities. He must be cool, prudent, and considerate, at the very moment that he enters a career, from which every cool, prudent, and considerate man would have dissuaded him ; and arduous as it is, he enters it, without preparation or training. But let him enter it, the noble and fortunate youth ; let him enter it, without preparation or training ! Great as the work is, and completely as he is to succeed in it, it is itself but a work of preparation. This is not yet the province of duty assigned him. He comes without training, for this is the school in which he is to be trained. He comes unprepared, because he comes to a great preparation of liberty. Destined, when, with full success and spotless honor, he shall have gone through the American revolution, to take the lead in a mighty work of political reform in his native land, he comes, in his youth, to the great monitorial school of Free- dom ; to imbibe its holy doctrines from an authentic source, before his heart is hardened and his mind perverted : to catch its pure spirit, living and uncorrupted, from the lips of a pure master. Before that master he is yet to appear. The youthful ad- venturer has a test of character at hand more severe than any to which he has yet been subjected. He has stood from his youth before princes and kings, and felt that his clay is as good as theirs. But he has yet to stand before that face, where, more than ever yet in the face of mere man the awful majesty of virtue abode, in visible personation ; the serene but melancholy countenance which now looks down 'ipon us EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 471 from that canvas, which no smile of light-hearted gladness illuminated, from the commencement to the close of his country's struggle. Washington was at head-quarters when Lafayette reached Philadelphia, but he was daily expected in the city. The introduction of the youthful stranger to the man on whom his career depended, was therefore delayed a few days. It took place, in a manner peculiarly marked with the circumspection of Washington, at a dinner party, where Lafayette was one among several guests of consideration. Washington was not uninformed of the circumstances con- nected with his arrival in the country. He knew what ben- efits it promised the cause, if his character and talents were adapted to the course he had so boldly struck out ; and he knew, also, how much it was to be feared, that the very qual- ities which had prompted him to embark in it, would make him a useless and even a dangerous auxiliary. We may. well suppose that the piercing eye of the Father of his Country was not idle during the repast. But that searching glance, before which pretence or fraud never stood undetected, was completely satisfied. When they were about to separate, Washington took Lafayette aside, spoke to him with kind- ness, paid a just tribute to the noble spirit which he had shown, and the sacrifices he had made in the American cause ; invited him to make the head-quarters of the army his home, and to regard himself, at all times, as one of the family of the commander-in-chief. Such was the reception given to Lafayette by the most sagacious and observant of men ; and the personal acquaint- ance thus commenced ripened into an intimacy, a confi- dence, and an affection without bounds, and never for one moment interrupted. If there lived a man whom Washing- ton loved, it was Lafayette. The proofs of this are not wanted by those who have read the history of the revolution ; but the private correspondence of these two great men, hith- erto unpublished, discloses the full extent of the mutual regard and affection which united them. It not only shows that Washington entertained the highest opinion of the mil- itary talent, the personal probity, and the general prudence 472 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. and energy of Lafayette, but that he regarded him with the tenderness of a father ; and found in the affection which Lafayette bore to him, in return, one of the greatest com- forts and blessings of his own life. Whenever the corre- spondence of Washington and Lafayette shall be published, the publication will do what perhaps nothing else can raise them both in the esteem and admiration of mankind. On the thirty-first of July, 1777, Lafayette received, by a resolution of Congress, his commission as a major-general in tho American army. Not having at first a separate command, he attached himself to the army of the commander-in-chief, as a volunteer. On the eleventh of the following September, he was present at the unfortunate battle of Brandywine. He there plunged, with a rashness pardonable in a very youthful commander, into the hottest of the battle, exposed himself to all its dangers, and exhibited a conspicuous example of coolness and courage. When the troops began to retreat in disorder, he threw himself from his horse, entered the ranks, and endeavored to rally them. While thus employed, he was shot by a musket-ball through the leg. The wound was not perceived by himself, till he was told by his aid that the blood was running from his boot. He fell in with a surgeon, who placed a slight bandage on his limb, with which he rode to Chester. Regardless of his situation, he thought only of rallying the troops, who were retreating in disorder through the village ; and it was not till this duty was performed, that the wound was dressed. It was two months before it was sufficiently healed to enable him to rejoin the army. This was the first battle in which he was ever engaged, and such was his entrance into the active service of America. It would obviously be impossible to do more than glance at the military services of Lafayette during the revolution- ary war ; but it seems to belong to a proper treatment of the subject, that they should not be wholly omitted. In the winter of 1778, he was designated to the command of an expedition into Canada a project formed without con- sulting Washington, by the members of Congress and the cabal in the army opposed to the commander-in-chief. La- EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 473 fayette was placed at the head of it, partly, no doubt, with a view of detaching him from the support, and thereby impair- ing the influence, of Washington. But his veneration for Washington, his good feeling, his sound military judgment, and, above all, his correct perception of the character of the great man aimed at, enabled him to escape the snare. On repairing to Albany, he found no preparations made to cany the expedition into effect. He perceived its impracticability, and it was abandoned. His retreat at Barren Hill from a very critical and dangerous situation, into which he was thrown by the abandonment of their post on the part of a detach- ment of militia stationed to protect his position, received the highest commendations of Washington. On General Lee's declining the command of the advance of the army at Mon- mouth, it was given to Lafayette. Lee, perceiving the im- portance of the command, and the unfavorable appearance which his waiver of it might wear, prevailed with great dif- ficulty on Lafayette, the day before the battle, to allow him to assume it. The conduct of Lafayette on that important day was marked with bravery and skill. On the very day that the British effected their entrance into New York, the French fleet, under the Count d'Estaing, appeared in the American waters. Rhode Island having been fixed upon as the theatre of operations, Lafayette was detached with two brigades, to join the army under General Sullivan. During all the perilous incidents of this critical and unsuccessful campaign, the most important services were rendered by La- fayette. He exerted the happiest influence in restoring har- mony between the officers and soldiers of the French and American armies, which had been seriously interrupted, in consequence of the unfortunate issue of the expedition. This was of infinite importance to the cause, as a permanent disgust on the part of the French troops, in this the first ex- pedition sent out in virtue of the alliance, might have effec- tually damped the further efforts of France. His services on the occasion were acknowledged by express resolutions of Congress. France being now in a state of declared hostility against VOL i. 60 474 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. England, and Lafayette being still an officer in the French army, he deemed it his duty, at the close of the campaign, to return to his native country, and place himself at the dis- posal of his government. He united with this object that of exerting his influence in favor of America, by his personal conferences with the French ministry. He accordingly applied to Congress for a furlough, which, on the particular recommendation of Gen- eral Washington, was granted. This permission was accom- panied by resolutions expressing, in flattering terms, the sense which was entertained by Congress, of the importance of his services, and by a letter recommending him to the good of- fices of the American minister in France. At the same time also, Congress ordered that a sword should be presented to him, adorned with emblematic devices, appropriate to its object. Lafayette embarked for France at Boston, in January, 1779, on board an American frigate. Just before arriving on the coasts of France, he happily discovered and assisted in subduing a mutiny on the part of some British prisoners of war, whom he had been induced to admit as a portion of the crew of the frigate, from his aversion to impressment, which must otherwise have been resorted to, in order to make up the ship's complement of men. He was now twenty-two years of age, and returned, after two years of absence, marked with honorable scars, and signalized by the thanks of -Congress, the admiration of America, and the friendship of Washington. He was received with enthusiasm by the people, and even at court. As he had left the country in dis- obedience to a royal mandate, etiquette demanded that he should for a few days be required to keep his house, and to see no persons but the members of his family. This, how- ever, embraced within its circle nearly every person of dis- tinction about the court. His name had already been intro- duced into several dramatic performances, and hailed with acclamations in the theatres ; and a beautiful apostrophe to him, in one of these performances, was copied by the queen, and long preserved in her handwriting, by her confi- EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 475 dential attendant, Madame Campan. On a journey to one of his estates in the south of France, the whole population came out to meet him, and the fetes of the city of Orleans, in honor of his return, were prolonged for a week. The entire effect of the enthusiasm of which he was thus the object, was turned by Lafayette to the advantage of America. He was the confidential adviser of Dr Franklin ; he was in constant correspondence with Washington ; and he was sure to be approached by every American arriving in France, and by every European repairing to America. A major-general in her armies, he was clothed with an official right to interfere in her cause ; and his country being now at war with England, no reasons of state interposed to check his activity. He was, as a French officer, attached to the staff of the Marshal Vaux, at that time commander-in-chief of the French army. In this capacity, having direct access to the court, the personal and warmly-devoted friend of the Count de Vergennes, and the popular favorite, he did for America what no other man could have done, and rendered services to the cause not yet sufficiently appreciated, and worthy a moment's reflection. The alliance with France was the great turning-point in the fortunes of the revolution. I do not of course say, that without it our independence could not have been established. Had this failed, other means would, no doubt, in some wholly different train of affairs, have been disclosed. I would not say of any thing, not even of the character of Washington, that without it, the country could not have been carried through the war. But, in looking back upon the history of the times, I cannot now perceive that in the series of events by which the independence of the United States was achieved, the alliance with France could have been dispensed with. Her recognition of our independence inspirited our own councils and disheartened England. The loans of money and military supplies derived from France, were a vital re- source, for which I know not what substitute could have been found ; and finally, the cooperation of her fleets and armies, involving, as it did eventually, that of the Spanish forces 476 EULOGY ON LA.FAYETTE. brought down upon the British ministry a burden which they could not bear, and compelled them to abandon the struggle. At the same time, the greatest difficulties opposed them- selves to the practical development of the benefits of the treaty of alliance. In the first place, it required of an old European monarchy to countenance a colonial revolt. France had colonies. Spain, the kindred sovereignty, had a colonial world in America, where the formidable and all but successful revolt of Tupac- Amaru was already in secret preparation. It was the last moment which France or Spain would have voluntarily chosen, to sanction an example of transatlantic independence. The finances of France were any thing but prosperous, and she had to support, unaided, the expense of the fleets and armies which she sent to our assistance. Great difficulties, it was supposed, would attend the cooperation of a French army with American forces on land. Congress was jealous of the introduction of a foreign soldiery into the interior of the country, and Washington himself gave but a reluctant consent to the measure. Considerable discontent had arisen in connection with Count d'Estaing's movements in Rhode Island, which, had it not been allayed by the pru- dent and effectual mediation of Lafayette, would, as has been already stated, probably have prevented a French army from being sent over to the United States. Such were the feelings on both sides of the ocean, when Lafayette went back to France, in 1779; and during the whole of that year, he exerted himself unceasingly, in his correspondence and conferences with the French ministry, to induce them to send out an army. The difficulties to be overcome were all but insurmountable, acting, as he was, not only without the instructions, but against the sense of Congress, and scarcely sanctioned by Washington. He, however, knew that success would attend the measure. He had that interior conviction, which no argument or authority can subdue, that the proposed expedition was practicable and expedient, and he succeeded in imparting his enthusiasm to the ministers. He knew that the anticipated difficulties could be overcome. He had proved, in his own experience, that cooperation was practica- EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE 477 ble. Military subordination made it impossible to put him, a young man of twenty-two, holding in the king's army only the commission of a subaltern, in the command of a large force ; but he relied, with a just confidence, on the services which his standing in America, and his possession of the con- fidence of Washington, would enable him to render. He accordingly pursued the object with an ardor, an industry, and an adroitness, which nothing could surpass. When his correspondence with the French ministers, particularly the Count de Vergennes, shall be published, it will appear that it was mainly the personal efforts and personal influence of La- fayette idol of the French people as he had made him- self which caused the army of Rochambeau to be sent to America. It was pleasantly remarked by the old Count de Maurepas, who, at the age of seventy-nine, still stood at the head of the French ministry, that " it was fortunate for the king, that Lafayette did not take it into his head to strip Versailles of its furniture to send to his dear Americans, as his majesty would have been unable to refuse it." In addition to his efforts to obtain the army of Rochambeau, Lafayette was actively employed, during the year 1779, in conjunction with our ministers, in procuring a large pecuniary subsidy for the United States. Having thus contributed to the accomplishment of these great objects, he returned to America in the spring of 1780. He landed at Boston, where, though nothing was as yet known of the all-important services he had rendered to the country, he was received with every mark of attachment and admiration. He immediately repaired to the head-quar- ters of the army ; but soon left them to arrange with Count Rochambeau the interview between him and the commander- in-chief, in which the future operations of the campaign were concerted, at which also he was present. He was at West Point at the period of the ever-memorable scene of the treachery of Arnold. The following winter he marched at the head of his division to Portsmouth, in Virginia, to coop- erate in an attack on the British forces, by the combined French and American troops. This plan failed, in conse- 478 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. quence of the reverses experienced by the French squadron under Destouches. On his march backward to the north, La- fayette received a courier from Washington, informing him of the concentration of the troops under Lord Cornwallis, Phillips, and Arnold, in Virginia, and directing him to watch their movements, and prevent this great state, whose fortunes involved that of the whole southern country, from falling into their hands. This order found him at the head of Elk, in Maryland. He instantly put in train the requisite meas- ures of preparation. His scanty force was in a state of per- fect destitution. In all his army, there was not a pair of shoes fit for service. But the love and confidence which the country bore him, supplied the place of credit ; and he was able, in his own name, to raise a loan in Baltimore, sufficient to supply the most urgent wants of his little command. Thus furnished, he hastened into Virginia, and during the whole summer of 1781, he conducted the campaign with a vigor, discretion, and success, which saved the state of Virginia, and proved himself to be endowed with the highest qualities of generalship. While" Lord Cornwallis, to whom he was opposed, a person not less eminent for talent and experi- ence, than for rank and political influence, was boasting, in derision of his youthful adversary, that " the boy should not escape him," the boy was preparing a pit, into which the veteran plunged, with all his forces. My limits do not allow me to sketch the history of this great campaign, nor even its final glorious consummation, the closing scene of the war. But I may with propriety pause to say, that it evinced on the part of our venerable Washing- ton, now at length favored with an opportunity of acting with ample means on a broad scale, a power of combination and a reach of mind, with a promptitude and vigor of exe- cution, which, exhibited at the head of mighty armies, gave to Napoleon his reputation as the greatest captain of the age. I cannot but think, that in the manreuvres by which Lord Cornwallis was detained in Virginia ; by which Sir Henry Clinton was persuaded, in New York, that a siege of that city was the great object of Washington; by ivhich the EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 479 French forces were brought up from Rhode Island ; the armies of Washington and Rochambeau moved, by a forced march, across the country to Yorktovvn, at the moment that the French squadron from Newport, under the Count de Bar- ras, and the great fleet under the Count de Grasse, effected their junction in the Chesapeake, there is displayed as much generalship, as in any series of movements in the wars of the last thirty years. The operations of Lafayette in Vir- ginia, in the preceding summer, were the basis of them all ; as his untiring efforts in France the preceding season had mainly occasioned the despatch of the army of Count Ro- chambeau, without which the great exploit at Yorktown could not have been achieved. And who, that has a sense for all that is beautiful in mili- tary display, grand and eventful in political combinations, and auspicious to the cause of liberty, but must linger a moment on the plain of Yorktown ! Before you stretches the broad expanse of York River, an arm of Chesapeake Bay. Beyond it, to the north, the British general has left a force at Glouces- ter Point for his support, should he be compelled to retreat across the river : and there the Duke de Lauzun, his legion being united with the Virginia militia, effectually encloses the hostile force within their lines. The intervening expanse of water is covered with the British vessels of war. But it is around the lines of Yorktown that the interest of the scene is concentrated. Above the town are stationed the French ; below, the Americans ; the royal regiments of Deux Fonts, of Touraine, and Saintonge, on the one side ; and the troops of Pennsylvania and Virginia, of New Jersey and New Eng- land, on the other. The Marquis de St Simon commanded on the extreme left, and General Lincoln on the extreme right. Before the former, we behold the position of the two Viomenils ; and, near the latter, the post of Lafayette. At the point of junction between the two lines, the head-quarters of Count Rochambeau and those of Washington are placed, in harmony of council and of action, side by side. Two redoubts are to be carried. To excite the generous emulation of the combined forces, one is committed to the French, and 480 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. the other to the Americans. Lafayette, with Hamilton at his side, commands the latter, and both redoubts are carried at the point of the bayonet. Cornwallis attempts, but without success, to escape. He is reduced, after a siege of thirteen flays, to enter into capitulation ; and the last British army of the revolutionary war surrenders to the united forces of Amer- ica and France. At the close of the campaign, to the successful issue of which he had so essentially contributed, Lafayette again asked the permission of Congress to return to France. Well might they permit him ; for he went to rouse France and Spain, with all their fleets, armies, and treasures, to strike a last and an overwhelming blow. A committee of Congress, of which Charles Carroll was chairman, and James Madison was a member, reported a series of resolutions of the most honorable character, which were adopted by that body. They directed all the ministers of the United States in Europe to confer and correspond with Lafayette ; they invited him to correspond with Congress ; and they recommended him, in the most affectionate terms, to the especial favor of his sovereign. He returned to his native country with these new laurels and new titles to admiration, and France rose up as one man to receive him. His welcome, before enthusiastic, was now rapturous : it was prompted before by admiration of a chival- rous adventure ; but the national pride and patriotic spirit of Frenchmen were now aroused. The heavy reproach of the Seven Years' war was rolled away, and the stains of Quebec washed white at Yorktown. The government, as well as the people of France, was elated at the success of the campaign ; all doubts as to the possibility of a combined action were removed ; and to Lafayette, as the prime mover of the enterprise, proportionate credit was justly given for his fore- sight and sagacity. He could now ask for nothing that was deemed extravagant ; or, however extravagant, he could ask for nothing which could be refused. The enthusiasm caught from France to Spain. The Castilian coldness was melted ; and although the mountains of Peru were bristling with the EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 481 bayonets of the last of the Incas, King Charles HI. could not resist the temptation of humbling Great Britain ; and resolved, at last, that Spain and the Indies should go, with all their resources, for the Congress. A mighty plan of campaign was resolved on. An expedition, such as Europe has rarely wit- nessed, was projected. The old armada seemed almost to rise from the depths of the ocean, in mightily augmented array, to avenge the ancient disasters of Spain. The preparations commenced at Cadiz. Count d'Estaing, as generalissimo, with sixty vessels of the line, and smaller ships in proportion, and with twenty-four thousand troops, was to make a descent on Jamaica, and thence strike at New York. Lafayette was the first at the rendezvous : he had already proceeded with eight thousand men from Brest tc- Cadiz. He was placed at the head of the staff of the com- bined armies ; and, after New York had fallen, was to have moved with his division into Canada. But these magnificent and formidable preparations effected their object at a cheaper cost than that of rivers of blood. The British government learned wisdom before it was too late, and the peace was concluded. It was the wish of Lafayette to bear in person the joyous tidings to America. Just as he was about step- ping on board a frigate for that purpose, he returned to Madrid, to render an important service to our minister there. But his despatches were sent by the frigate, and conveyed to Congress the first intelligence of the peace. In the course of the following year, he yielded to the invi- tation of Washington and his other friends, and revisited America. He was received with acclamations of joy and gratitude from one end of the country to the other ; but nowhere with a more cordial welcome than in this ancient metropolis. On the nineteenth of October, 1784, in the hall in which we are now assembled to pay the last tribute to his memory, surrounded by his fellow-soldiers, by the authorities of the commonwealth, the magistracy of the town, and the grateful and admiring citizens of Boston, he celebrated the third anniversary of the capture of Cornwallis, in which he VOL. i. 61 ' 482 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. had himself so efficiently cooperated. Fifty years have passed away. The pillars of this venerable hall, then twined with garlands, are hung with mourning. The cypress has taken the place of the rose-bud ; the songs of patriotic rejoicing are hushed, and the funeral anthem is heard in their stead ; but the memory of the beloved champion, the friend of America and of freedom, shall bloom in eternal remembrance.* The year after his return to France, Lafayette made a tour in Germany. He was received throughout that country with the attention due to his rank arid the eclat of his services in America. At Vienna, he met the Duke of York at the table of the Emperor Joseph, and employed the opportunities which such an interview afforded him to inculcate the policy of a liberal course on the part of the powers of Europe, and par- ticularly Great Britain, towards the rising states of America. He was received with distinction by Frederic the Great, and accompanied him on a tour of inspection and review of his armies. On this occasion, he became acquainted with the flying artillery which Frederic had just organized, and formed the purpose of introducing it into the service of France, on the first opportunity an intention which he carried into effect, when, at the commencement of the French revolution, he was placed at the head of an army. On his return to Paris, he united with M. de Malesherbes in endeavoring to ameliorate the political condition of the Protestants. In concert with the minister of the marine, the Marshal de Castries, he expended a large sum from his private fortune, in an experiment towards the education and eventual emancipation of slaves. To this end, he purchased a planta- tion in Cayenne, intending to give freedom to the laborers, as soon as they should be in a condition to enjoy it without abuse. In the progress of the revolution, this plantation, with the other estates of Lafayette, was confiscated, and the * The incidents of Lafayette's visit to America in 1784 are succinctly related in the " Letters of an American Farmer." The narrative is highly interesting, and but for the more recent and still more extraordinary events of 1824, would well merit a more detailed reference. EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 483 slaves sold back to perpetual bondage, by the faction which was drenching France in blood, under the motto of liberty and equality. On the breaking out of the troubles in Holland, in 1787, the patriotic party made overtures to Lafayette to place him- self at the head of a popular government in that quarter ; but the progress of the revolution was arrested by the invasion of Prussia, and the policy of England and France. Besides this, greater events were preparing at home. As far as the United States were concerned, during all the period which intervened from the peace of 1783 to the organization of the federal government, Lafayette per- formed, in substance, the functions of their minister. He was engaged with indefatigable industry, and a zeal that knew no bounds, in promoting the interests of America at the courts of France and Spain. The published works of Mr Jefferson, and the diplomatic correspondence of our foreign ministers during this period, abundantly show that not one of the accredited ministers of the United States abroad, able and faithful as they were, was more assiduously devoted to the service of the country and the promotion of its political and commercial interests than Lafayette. New and most convincing proofs of this have recently come before the public.* At length the mighty crisis came on. The French revo- lution draws near, that stupendous event of which it is impossible to be silent, next to impossible to speak. Louis XV. once said to a courtier. " This French monarchy is fourteen hundred years old ; it cannot last long." Such was the terrific sentiment which, even in the bosom of his base pleasures, stole into the conscience of the modern Sardana- palus. But in that mysterious and bewildering chain of con- nection which binds together the fortunes of states and of men, the last convulsive effort of this worn-out and decrepit * In the two collections published under the authority of Congress, the Diplomatic Correspondence of the Revolution ; and its Continuation from the Peace of 1783 to 1789. 484 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE monarchy, in which the spasmodic remains of her strength were exhausted, and her crazy finances plunged into irre- trievable confusion, was the American alliance. This cor- rupt and feeble despotism, trembling on the verge of an abyss, towards which time and events were urging it, is made to hold out a strong and helping hand to assist the rising repub- lic into the family of nations. The generous spirits whom she sent to lead her armies to the triumphs of republicanism in America, came back to demand for their own country, and to assert on their own soil, those political privileges for which they had been contending in America. The process of argument was short. If this plan of government, admin- istered by responsible agents, is good for America, it is good for France. If our brethren in the United States will not submit to power assumed by men not accountable for its abuse, why should we ? If we have done wisely and well in going to shed our blood for this constitutional liberty beyond the Atlantic, let us be ready to shed it in the same great cause, for our fathers, for our friends, for ourselves, in our native land. Is it possible to find, I will not say a sound and sufficient answer to this argument, but an answer which would be thought sound and sufficient by the majority of ardent tempers and inquisitive minds ? The atrocious, the unexampled, the ungodly abuses of the reign of terror have made the very name of the French revolution hateful to mankind. The blood chills, the flesh creeps, the hair stands on end, at the recital of its horrors ; and no slight degree of the odium they occasion is unavoid- ably reflected on all who had any agency in bringing it on. The subsequent events in Europe have also involved the French revolution in a deep political unpopularity. It is unpopular in Great Britain, in the rest of Europe, in America, in France itself; and not a little of this unpopularity falls on every one whose name is prominently connected with it. All this is prejudice, natural prejudice, if you please, but still prejudice. The French revolution was the work of sheer necessity. It began in the act of the court, casting EULOGY ON LA.FAYETTE. 485 about in despair for the means of facing the frightful dilapi- dation of the finances. Louis XV. was right ; the monarchy could not go on. The revolution was as inevitable as fate. I go farther. Penetrated as I am to heart-sickness when I peruse the tale of its atrocities, I do not scruple to declare, that the French revolution, as it existed in the purposes of Lafayette and his associates, and while it obeyed their impulse, and so long as it was controlled by them, was, notwithstand- ing the melancholy excesses which stained even its early stages, a work of righteous reform ; that justice, humanity, and religion demanded it. I maintain this with some reluc- tance, because it is a matter in respect to which all are not of one mind, and I would not willingly say any thing on this occasion which could awaken a single discordant feeling. But I speak from a sense of duty ; and, standing as I do over the grave of Lafayette, I may not, if my feeble voice can prevent it, allow the fame of one of the purest men that ever lived to be sacrificed to a prejudice ; to be overwhelmed with the odium of abuses which he did not foresee, which, if he had foreseen, he could not have averted, and with which he had himself no personal connection, but as their victim. It is for this reason I maintain that the French revolution, as conceived by Lafayette, was a work of righteous reform. Read the history of France, from the revocation of the edict of Nantes downwards. Reflect upon the scandalous influence which dictated that inhuman decree to the dotage of Louis XIV., a decree which cost France as much blood as flowed under the guillotine. Trace the shameful annals of the regency, and the annals, not less shameful, of Louis XV. Consider the overgrown wealth and dissoluteness of the clergy, and the arrogance and corruption of the nobility, possessing together a vast proportion of the property, and bearing no part of the burdens of the state. Recollect the abuses of the law, high judicial places venal in the market, warrants of arrest issued to the number of one hundred and fifty thousand in the single reign of Louis XV., often- times in blank, to court favorites, to be filled up with what names, for what prisons, for what times they pleased. Add 486 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. to this the oppression of the peasantry by iniquitous taxes that have become proverbial in the history of misgovern- ment, and the outlawry of one twenty-fourth part of the population as Protestants, who were forbidden to leave the kingdom, subject to be shot if they crossed the frontier, but deprived of the protection of the government at home, their contracts annulled, their children declared illegitimate, and their ministers who might venture in dark forests and dreary caverns, to conduct their prohibited devotions doomed to the scaffold. As late as 1745, two Protestant ministers were executed in France for performing their sacred functions. Could men bear these things in a country like France, a reading, inquiring country, with the success of the American revolution before their eyes, and at the close of the eighteenth century? Can any man who has Anglo-Saxon blood in his veins hesitate for an answer ? Did not England shake off less abuses than these a century and a half before ? Had not a paltry unconstitutional tax, neither in amount nor in principle to be named with the faille or the gabelle, just put the continent of America in a flame ? and was it possible that the young officers of the French army should come back to their native land, from the war of political emancipation waged on this continent, and sit down contented under the old abuses at home ? It was not possible. The revolution was as inevitable as fate, and the only question was, by whose agency it should be brought on. The first step in the French revolution was, as is well known, the Assembly of Notables, meeting of the 22d of Feb- ruary, 1787. Its last convocation had been in 1626, under the Cardinal Richelieu. It was now convoked by the minister Calonne, the controller-general of the finances, from the utter impossibility, without some unusual resources, of providing for the deficiency in the finances, which had, for the preced- ing year, amounted to 181,000,000 livres, and was estimated at the annual average of 140,000,000. This assembly con- sisted of one hundred and thirty-seven persons, of whom scarcely ten were in any sense the representatives of the people. Lafayette was of course a distinguished member, EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 487 then just completing his thirtieth year. In an assembly called by direction of the king, and consisting almost exclusively of the high aristocracy, he stepped forth, at once, the champion of the people. It was the intention of the government to confine the action of the assembly to the discussion of the state of the finances, and the contrivance of means to repair their disorder. It was not so that Lafayette understood his commission. He rose to denounce the abuses of the govern- ment. The Count d'Artois, since Charles X., the brother of the king, attempted to call him to order, as acting on a subject not before the assembly. " We are summoned," said Lafayette, "to make the truth known to his majesty. I must discharge my duty." He accordingly, after an animated harangue on the abuses of the government, proposed the abolition of private arrests and of the state prisons, in which any one might be confined on the warrant of the minister , the restoration of Protestants to the equal privileges of citi- zenship, and the convocation of the States General, or repre- sentatives of the people. " What ! " said the Count d'Artois, " do you demand the States General ? " " Yes," replied La- fayette, -'and something better than that." The Assembly of Notables was convoked a second time in 1788, and Lafayette was again found in his place, pleading for the representation of the people. As a member of the provincial assemblies of Auvergne and Brittany, he also took the lead in all the measures of reform that were proposed by those patriotic bodies. But palliatives were vain : it became impossible to resist the impulse of public opinion, and the States General were convened. This body assembled at Versailles, on the third of May, 1789. According to Mr Jefferson, writing from per- sonal observation on the spot, its initiatory movements were concerted by Lafayette and a small circle of friends, at the hotel of Mr Jefferson himself, who calls Lafayette, at this momentous period of its progress, the Atlas of the revolution.* He proposed and carried through the assembly, of which he * Jefferson's Correspondence, Vcl. I., pp. 75, 84. 488 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. was vice-president, a declaration of rights similar to those contained in the American constitutions. He repeated the demand which he had made in the Assembly of the Notables, for the suppression of lettres de cachet, and the admission of Protestants to all the privileges of citizens. For the three years that he sustained the command of the National Guard, he kept the peace of the capital, rent as it was by the intrigues of the parties, the fury of a debased populace, and the agita- tions encouraged by foreign powers ; and so long as he remained at the head of the revolution, with much to con- demn arid more to lament, and which no one resisted more strenuously than Lafayette, it was a work of just reform, after ages of frightful corruption and abuse. Before the National Guard was organized, but while he filled the place of commander of the city guard of Paris,, he was the great bulwark of the public peace, at the critical period of the destruction of the Bastile. From his position at the head of the embodied militia of the capital and its environs, Lafayette was clothed in substance with the con- centrated powers of the state. These, it is unnecessary to say, were exercised by him for the preservation of order and the repression of violence. Hundreds of those threatened, at this unsettled period, as victims of popular violence, were saved by his intervention. But when at length he found him- self unable to rescue the unfortunate Foul on and Berthier from the hands of the infuriated populace, he refused to retain a power which he could not make effective, and resigned his post. The earnest entreaties of the friends of order, assuring him that they deemed the public peace to be safe in no hands but his, persuaded him to resume it ; but not till the electoral districts of Paris had confirmed the appointment, and promised to support him in the discharge of his duty. It was not long after this event, that Lafayette pro- posed the organization of the National Guard of France, The ancient colors of the city of Paris were blue and red. To indicate the union, which he wished to promote between a king governing by a constitution, and a people protected by laws, he proposed to add the white, the royal color of EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. 489 France ; and to form of the three the new ensign of the nation. " I bring you, gentlemen," said he, " a badge which will go round the world, and an institution at once civil and military ; which will change the system of European tactics, and reduce the absolute governments to the alternative of being conquered if they do not imitate it, and overturned if they do." The example of Paris was followed in the provinces, and the National Guard, three millions seven hundred thou- sand strong, was organized throughout France, with Lafay- ette at its head. These are occurrences which arrest the attention, as the eye runs down the crowded page of the chronicles of the time. But we are too apt to pass over unnoticed the hum- bler efforts, by which Lafayette endeavored, from the first moment of the revolution, to make it produce the fruits of practical reform in the institutions of the country. Under his influence, and against strong opposition, a deputation was sent by the city of Paris to the National Assembly, demanding an immediate reform in criminal jurisprudence, the pub- licity of trials, the confrontation of witnesses, the privi- lege of counsel for the accused, and free intercourse between the prisoner and his family. These privileges were enjoyed by the accused in the only three state trials which took place while Lafayette retained his popularity ; and the credit of having obtained them was justly ascribed to him by the counsel of one of the individuals by whom they were en- joyed. On the fifth of October, 1789, occurred the only incident in the life of Lafayette, upon which calumny has ventured to rely, as having affixed a blot upon his fair fame. Even Sir Walter Scott, in relating the history of this occurrence, has afforded some countenance to the imputations against La- fayette. I trust, therefore, I shall not seem to descend too much into particulars, if I briefly repeat the incidents of that night of terror. Paris, during the whole of this memorable season, was in a state of the greatest excitement. All the elements of con- fusion were in the highest action. A great political revolu- i. 62 490 EULOGY ON LAFAYETTE. tion in progress, the king feeble and irresolute, but already subdued by the magnitude of the events, his family and court divided, corrupt, and laboring, by intrigue and treachery, to arrest the progress of the revolution, the Duke of Or- leans lavishing immense sums to sow dissension, and urge the revolution to a point at which, as he hoped, it would transfer the crown from the head of his unhappy kinsman to his own, the fiercest conflicts among the different orders of the state, and a wild consciousness of power in the mass of the people, late awakened for the recovery of long lost rights, and the revenge of centuries of oppression; these were some of the elements of disorder. The match was laid to the train at a festival at the palace of Versailles, at which the national cockade was trampled under foot by the body guard, in presence of the queen and her infant son, and the revolu- tion denounced in terms of menace and contumely. The news spread to Paris, already convulsed by the intrigues of the Duke of Orleans, and exasperated by a want of bread. The hungry populace were told that the famine which they suffered was intentionally produced by the king and his ministry, for the purpose of starving them back to slavery. Riots broke out at .an early hour on the fifth of October, around the city hall. For eight hours, Lafayette exerted himself, and not without success, to restrain the fran- tic crowds which constantly reassembled as soon as dispersed, with cries, " To Versailles for bread !" Hearing at length that, from other points of the capital, infuriated mobs were mov- ing towards Versailles with muskets and cannons, he asked the orders of the municipality to hasten himself, with a de- tachment of the National Guard, to the defence of the royal family. On his arrival at Versailles, he administered to the troops the oath of fidelity to the nation, the law, and the king. He entered the court of the palace, accompanied only by two commissioners of the city. It was filled with Swiss guards and the terrified inmates of the palace ; and as he advanced, the gloomy silence was broken by the exclamation of some person present, " Here comes Cromwell." " Crom- well," replied Lafayette, "would not have come here and brought them safely to Fort Cumberland. Heaven had in reserve for him a recompense for the disasters of this mournful fourth of July, when, on the return of that day, after a lapse of twenty-two years, it found him the com- mander-in-chief of the armies of independent and United America ! These incidents aroused the attention of France and Eng- land, who yet stood glaring at each other, in an attitude of defiance ; reluctant to plunge again into the horrors of a gen- eral war, but deeply conscious that peace could not be pre- served. No formal declaration of war was made in Europe, but both governments prepared for vigorous action in Amer- ica. Two veteran regiments were sent from Great Britain, destined to dislodge the French from Ohio. They were placed under the command of the brave, headstrong, self- sufficient, and unfortunate Braddock. By an extraordinary fatality of the British councils, and as if to sow the seeds of THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON. 59J division and weakness, at a moment when every nerve of strength required to be strained, an ordinance for settling the rank of the army was promulgated, in virtue of which, all officers holding British commissions were to take rank of all holding provincial commissions ; and provincial general and field officers were to lose their commands, when serving with those commissioned by the crown. Colonel Washington, on the promulgation of this ill-conceived order, resigned his commission in disdain ; but to show that no unworthy mo- tive had prompted that step, and happily resolved to perse- vere in the arduous school of dear-bought experience, he offered his services to General Braddock, as an aid, and they were gladly accepted. Washington fell dangerously sick on the march towards the field of slaughter, beyond the moun- tains ; but consented to be left behind, at the positive in- stances of the surgeon, only on the solemn pledge of the general, that he should be sent for before an action. Time would fail me to recount the horrors of the ninth of July, 1755. Washington, emaciated by fatigue and fever, had joined the army. He implored the ill-starred general to send forward the Virginia Rangers to scour the forest in advance ; he besought him to conciliate the Indians. His counsels were unheeded ; the wretched commander moved forward to his fate. Washington was often heard to say, in the course of his lifetime, that the most beautiful spectacle he had ever witnessed was that of the British troops on this eventful morning. The whole detachment was clad in uni- form, and moved as in a review, in regular columns, to the sound of martial music. The sun gleamed upon their bur- nished arms, the placid Monongahela flowed upon their right, and the deep native forest overshadowed them, with solemn grandeur, on their left.* It was a bright midsummer's day, and every bosom swelled with the confident expectation of victory. A few hours pass, and the forest rings with the yell of the savage enemy ; the advance of the British army, under Colonel Gage, afterwards the governor of Massachusetts, is Sparks's Writings of Washington, Vol. II. p. 469. 592 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON. driven back on the main body ; the whole force, panic-struck confounded, and disorganized, after a wild and murderous conflict of three hours, falls a prey to the invisible foe. They ran before the French and Indians " like sheep before the dogs." Of eighty-six officers, sixty-one were killed and wounded. The wretched general had four horses shot under him, and received at last his mortal wound, according to a prevalent tradition, from one of his own men. The Virginia Rangers were the only part of the force that behaved with firmness ; and the disordered retreat of the British veterans was actually covered by these American militiamen.* Washington was the guardian angel of the day. He was every where, in the hottest of the fight. " I expected every moment," said Dr Craik, his friend, " to see him fall." His voice was the only one which commanded obedience. Two horses were killed under him, and four bullets passed through his garments. No common fortune preserved his life. Fif- teen years after the battle, Washington made a journey to the Great Kenhawa, accompanied by Dr Craik. While exploring the wilderness, a band of Indians approached them, headed by a venerable chief. He told them, by an interpreter, the errand on which he came. " I come," said he, " to behold my great father Washington. I have come a long way to see him. I was with the French in the battle of the Monon- gahela. I saw my great father on horseback, in the hottest of the battle. I fired my rifle at him many times, and bade my young men also fire their rifles at him. But the Great Spirit turned away the bullets, and I saw that my great father could not be killed in battle." This anecdote rests on the authority of Dr Craik, the comrade and friend of Washing- ton, the physician who closed his eyes. Who needs doubt, it ? Six balls took effect on his horses and in his garments. Who does not feel the substantial truth of the tradition? Who, that has a spark of patriotic or pious sentiment in his bosom, but feels an inward assurance that a heavenly pres- ence overshadowed that field of blood, and preserved the * See note at the end. THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON. 593 great instrument of future mercies ? Yes, gallant and beloved youth, ride safely as fearlessly through that shower of death ! Thou art not destined to fall in the morning of life, in this distant wilderness. That wan and wasted countenance shall yet be lighted up with the sunshine of victory and peace ! The days are coming and the years draw nigh, when thy heart, now bleeding for thy afflicted country, shall swell with joy, as thou leadest forth her triumphant hosts from a war of independence ! From this period, the relation of Washington to his coun- try was sealed. It is evident that his character, conduct, arid preservation, though he was scarcely twenty-three years of age, had arrested the public attention, and awakened thoughtful anticipations of his career. I confess, there is something which I am unable to fathom, in the hold which he seems already to have gained over the minds and imagin- ations of men. Never did victorious consul return to repub- lican Rome, loaded with the spoils of conquered provinces, with captive thousands at his chariot wheels, an object of greater confidence and respect, than Washington, at the close of two disastrous campaigns, from one of which he was able to save his regiment only by a painful capitulation ; in the other, barely escaping with his life and the wrecks of the army. He had formed to himself, on fields of defeat and disaster, a reputation for consummate bravery, conduct, and patriotism. A sermon was preached to the volunteers of Hanover county, in Virginia, by the Rev. Samuel Davies, afterwards president of Princeton College, in which he uses this memorable language : " As a remarkable instance of patriotism, I may point out to the public that heroic youth, Colonel Washington, whom I cannot but hope Providence has hitherto preserved, in so signal a manner, for some im- portant service to his country." The entire completion of this extraordinary prediction was, of course, reserved for a future day ; but from the moment of its utterance, its fulfilment began. Terror and havoc followed at the heels of Braddock's defeat. The fron- tier settlements were broken up ; the log cabins were burned ; VOL. i. 75 594 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON. their inmates massacred, or driven in dismay across the mountains. A considerable force was raised in Virginia 3 and Washington was appointed its commander-in-chief. But the councils of England were weak and irresolute, and no effi- cient general head as yet controlled those of the colonies. The day star of Pitt was near, but had not yet ascended above the horizon. Disaster followed disaster on the fron- tiers of Virginia, and Washington, for two years and a half, was placed in precisely the position which he was afterwards to fill in the revolutionary war. A reluctant and undisciplined militia was to be kept embodied by personal influence, without pay, without clothes, without arms. Sent to defend an extensive mountain frontier, with forces wholly inadequate to the object ; the sport of contradictory orders from a civil governor, inexperienced in war ; defrauded by contractors ; tormented with arrogant pretensions of subaltern officers in the royal army ; weakened by wholesale desertions in the hour of danger ; misrepresented by jealous competitors ; tra- duced ; maligned, the youthful commander-in-chief was obliged to foresee every thing, to create every thing, to endure every thing, to effect every thing, without encourage- ment, without means, without cooperation. His correspond- ence during the years 1756 and 1757 is, with due allow- ances for the difference of the field of operations, the precise counterpart of that of the revolutionary war, twenty years later. You see it all you see the whole man in a letter to Governor Dinwiddie, of April twenty-second, 1756: "Your honor may see to what unhappy straits the inhabitants and myself are reduced. I am too little acquainted, sir, with pathetic language, to attempt a description of the people's distresses, though I have a generous soul, sensible of wrongs, and swelling for redress. But what can I do ? I see their situation, know their danger, and participate their sufferings, without having it in my power to give them further relief than uncertain promises. In short, I see inevitable destruction, in so clear a light, that unless vigorous measures are taken by the Assembly, and speedy assist- ance sent from below, the poor inhabitants that are now in forts must una- voidably fall, while the remainder are flying before a barbarous foe. In fine, the melancholy situation of the people ; the little prospect of assist- ance ; the gross and scandalous abuse cast upon the officers in general ; which is reflecting on me in particular, for suffering misconduct of such THE YOU1H OF WASHINGTON. 595 extraordinary kinds ; and the distant prospect, if any, of gaining honor or reputation in the service, cause me to lament the hour tuat gave me a commission, and would induce me, at any other time than this of imminent danger, to resign, without one hesitating moment, a command from which I never expect to reap either honor or benefit ; but on the contrary, have an almost absolute certainty of incurring displeasure below, while the murder of helpless families may be laid to my account here ! The supplicating tears of the women, the moving petitions of the men, melt me into such deadly sorrow, that I solemnly declare, if I know my own mind, I could offer myself a willing sacrifice to the butchering enemy, provided that would contribute to the people's ease ! " And here I close the detail. You behold in this one ex- tract your Washington, complete, mature, ready for the salva- tion of his country. The occasion that calls him out may come soon, or it may come late, or it may come both soon and late ; whenever it comes, he is ready for the work. A miguided ministry may accelerate, or measures of conciliation retard, the struggle ; but its hero is prepared. His bow of might is strung, and his quiver hangs from his shoulders, stored with three-bolted thunders. The summons to the mighty conflict may come the next year, the next day; it will find the rose of youth on his cheek, but it will find him wise, cautious, prudent, and grave : it may come after the lapse of time, and find his noble countenance marked with the lines of manhood, but it will find him alert, vigorous, unexhausted. It may reach him the next day, on the fron- tiers, in arms for the protection of the settlement ; it may reach him at the meridian of life, in the retirement of Mount Vernon ; it may reach him as he draws near to the grave ; but it will never take him by surprise. It may summon him to the first Congress at Philadelphia ; it will find him brief of speech, in matter weighty, pertinent, and full ; in resolution firm as the perpetual hills, in personal influence absolute. It may call him to the command of armies ; the generous rash- ness of youth alone will be chastened by the responsibility of his great trust, but in all else he will exhibit unchanged that serene courage, with which he rode unharmed through the iron sleet of Braddock's field. It may call him to take part in the convention, assembled to give a constitution to 596 THE YOUTH OF WASHINGTON. the rescued and distracted country. The soldier has disap- peared ; the statesman, the patriot is at the post of duty ; he sits down in the humblest seat of the civilian, till in the assembly of all that is wisest in the land, he, by one accord, is felt the presiding mind. It may call him to the highest trust of the new-formed government ; he will conciliate the affections of the country in the dubious trial of the constitu- tion ; and he will organize, administer, and lay down the arduous duties of a chief magistracy unparalleled in its char- acter, without even the suspicion of swerving in a single instance from the path of rectitude. Lastly, the voice of a beloved country may call him for a third time, on the verge of threescore years and ten, to the field. The often sacri- ficed desire for repose, the number and variety of services already performed, and his declining years, might well exempt him ; but he will obey the sacred call of his country in his age, as he obeyed it in his youth. As he gave to his fellow- citizens the morning, he will give them the evening, of his existence ; he will exhaust the last hour of his being, and breathe his dying breath, in the service of his country. NOTE. SEE PAGE 592. THE tradition that General Braddock was shot by one of his own men has been, according to Mr Sparks, long current in Pennsylvania, and rests upon the declaration of a provincial soldier who was in the action. It is not unlikely that the contemptuous light in which the provincials were regarded by the unfortunate general, may have made him enemies among them. But as he was in the thickest of the battle, it is not necessary to resort to the supposition of treachery to account for his death. The following letter from Colonel Orme, aid of General Braddock, and written to the governor of Pennsylvania a few days after the action, will be read with interest, as an authentic document for the history of this important event: FOBT CUMBERLAND, July 18, 1755. MY BEAR SIR : I am so extremely ill in bed with the wound I have received in my thigh, that I am under the necessity of employing my friend, Captain Dobson, to write for me. I conclude you have had some account of the action near the banks of the Monongahela, about seven miles from the French fort: as the reports spread are very imperfect, what you have heard must be so too. You should have had more early accounts of it, but every officer whose business it was to have informed you was either killed or wounded, and our distressful situa- tion puts it out of our power to attend to it so much as we would otherwise have done. The 9th instant we passed and repassed the Monongahela, by advancing first a party of three hundred men, which was immediately followed by another of two hundred. The general, with the column of artillery, bag- gage, and the main body of the army, passed the river the last time about one o'clock. As soon as the whole had got on the fort side of the Mononga- hela, we heard a very heavy and quick fire in our front. We immediately advanced in order to sustain them ; but the detachment of the two hundred and three hundred men gave way, and fell back on us, which caused such confusion and struck so great a panic among our men, that afterwards no military expedient could be made use of that had any effect on them. The men were so extremely deaf to the exhortations of the general and the offi- cers, that they fired away in the most irregular manner all their ammunition, and then ran off, leaving to the enemy the artillery, ammunition, provisions, and baggage ; nor could they be persuaded to stop till they got as far as (597) 598 NOTE. Gist's plantation, nor there only a part, many of them proceeding as far as Colonel Dunbar's party, who lay six miles on this side. The officers were absolutely sacrificed by their unparalleled good behavior, advancing some- times in bodies and sometimes separately, hoping by such examples to engage the soldiers to follow them, but to no purpose. The general had five horses shot under him, and at last received a wound through his right arm into his lungs, of which he died the 18th inst. Poor Shirley was shot through the head ; Captain Morris wounded. Mr Wash- ington had two horses shot under him, and his clothes shot through in several places, behaving the whole time with the greatest courage and resolu- tion. Sir Peter Racket was killed on the spot ; Colonel Burton and Sir John St Clair wounded ; and enclosed I have sent you a list of the killed and wounded, according to as exact an account as we are able to get. Upon our proceeding with the whole convoy to the Little Meadows, it was found impracticable to advance in that manner ; the general therefore ad- vanced with twelve hundred men, with the necessary artillery, ammunition, and provision, leaving the main body of the convoy under the command of Colonel Dunbar, with orders to join him as soon as possible. In this man- ner we proceeded with safety and expedition till the fatal day I have just related ; and happy it was that this disposition was made ; otherwise the whole must have either starved or fallen into the hands of the enemy, as numbers would have been of no service to us, and our provision was all lost. As our number of horses was so much reduced, and those extremely weak, and many carriages being wanted for the wounded men, occasioned our destroying the ammunition and superfluous part of the provisions left in Colonel Dunbar's convoy, to prevent its falling into the hands of the enemy. As the whole of the artillery is lost, and the troops are so extremely weak- ened by deaths, wounds, and sickness, it is judged impossible to make any further attempts ; therefore Colonel Dunbar is returning to Fort Cumberland, with every thing he is able to bring with him. I propose remaining here until my wound will suffer me to remove to Phil- adelphia ; from thence I shall make all possible despatch to England. What- ever commands you may have for me, you will do me the favor to direct to me here. I am, with the greatest sincerity, your most obedient and most humble servant, ROBERT ORME. By the particular disposition of the French and Indians, it is impossible to judge of the numbers they had that day in the field. As the general's chariot is to be disposed of, I should be glad to know if you would have it again. It has been at this place since our departure from hence. If you propose taking it again, I will send it to you, and bring the general's coach back. Captain Winn's compliments attend you, with Mr Washington's. P. S. Writing to you as a friend, I flatter myself you will excuse the hurry in which this is wrote. To the Hon. Gov. SHARPS. EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS.* THE place of our meeting, the season of the year, and the occasion which has called us together, seem to prescribe to us the general topics of our discourse. We are assembled within the precincts of a place of education. It is the sea- son of the year at which the seminaries of learning through- out the country are dismissing to the duties of life that class of their students whose collegiate course is run. The im- mediate call which has brought us together at this time is the invitation of the members of the literary societies of this highly respectable and fast rising institution. Agreeably to academical usage, on the eve of their departure from a spot endeared to them by all the pleasant associations of col- legiate life, they are desirous, by one more act of literary com- munion, to strengthen the bond of intellectual fellowship and alleviate the regrets of separation. In the entire uncertainty of all that is before us, for good or for evil, there is nothing more nearly certain than that we, who are here assembled to-day, shall never, in the providence of God, be all brought together again in this world. Such an event is scarcely more within the range of probability than that the individual drops, which, at this moment, make up the rushing stream of yonder queen of the valley,-)- mounting in vapor to the, clouds, and scattered to the four winds, will, at some future period, be driven together and fall in rains upon the hills, and * Address delivered before the literary societies of Amherst College. August 25, 1835. f The Connecticut River. (599) 600 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO flow down and recompose the identical river that is now spreading abundance and beauty before our eyes. To say nothing of the dread summons which comes to all when least expected, you will scarce step out of this sanctuary of your intellectual worship before you will find how widely the paths of life diverge, not more so in the literal sense of the word than in the estrangement which results from variety of pursuit, opinion, party, and success. Influenced by the feel- ings which this reflection inspires, it is natural that we should pause ; that we should give our minds up to the meditations which belong to the place, to the occasion, and the day ; that we should inquire into the character of that general process in which you are now taking so important a step ; that we should put our thoughts in harmony with the objects that surround us, and thus seek, from the hour as it flies, to extract some abiding good impression, and to carry away some memorial that will survive the moment. The multiplication of the means of education and the general diffusion of knowledge, at the present day, are topics of universal remark. There are twelve collegiate institutions in New England, whose commencement is observed during the months of August and September, and which will send forth, the present year, on an average estimate, about four hundred graduates. There are more than fifty other institu- tions, of the same general character, in other parts of the United States. The greater portion of them are in the infancy of their existence and usefulness, but some of them compare advantageously with our older New England insti- tutions. Besides the colleges, there are the schools for theo- logical, medical, and legal education, on the one hand, and on the other, the innumerable institutions for preparatory or elementary instruction, from the infant schools, to which the fond and careful mother sends her darling lisper, not yet quite able to articulate, but with the laudable purpose of getting him out of the way, up to the high schools and endowed academies, which furnish a competent education for all the active duties of life. Besides these establishments for edu- cation of various character and name, societies for the pro- LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 601 motion of useful knowledge, mechanics' institutes, lyceums, and voluntary courses of lectures, abound in many parts of the country, and perform a very important office in carrying on the great work of -instruction. Lastly, the press, by the cheap multiplication of books, and especially by the circula- tion of periodical works of every form and description, has furnished an important auxiliary to every other instrument of education, and turned the whole community, so to say, into one great monitorial school. There is probably not a newspaper of any character, published in the United States, which does not, in the course of the year, convey more use- ful information to its readers than is to be found in the twenty-one folios of Albertus Magnus, light as he was of the thirteenth century. I class all these agencies under the gen- eral name of the means of education, because they form one grand system by which knowledge is imparted to the mass of the community, and the mind of the age with the most various success, according to circumstances is instructed, disciplined, and furnished with its materials for action and thought. These remarks are made in reference to this country ; but, in some countries of Europe, all the means of education enumerated, with an exception perhaps in the number of newspapers, exist to as great an extent as in our own. Although there are portions of Europe where the starless midnight of the mind still covers society with a pall as dreary and impervious as in the middle ages, yet it may be safely said, upon the whole, that not only in America, but in the elder world, a wonderfully extensive diffusion of knowledge has taken place. In Great Britain, in France, in Germany, in Holland, in Sweden, in Denmark, the press is active, schools are numerous, higher institutions for education abound, asso- ciations for the diffusion of knowledge flourish, and literature and science, in almost every form, are daily rendered more cheap and accessible. There is, in fact, no country in Europe from which the means of light are wholly shut out. There are universities in Austria and 'Russia, and newspapers at Naples and Constantinople. VOL. i. 76 602 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO It is the impulse of the liberal mind to rejtice in this manifest progress of improvement, and we are daily ex- changing congratulations with each other on the multiplica- tion, throughout the world, of the means of education. There are not wanting, however, those who find a dark side even to such an object as this. We ought not, therefore, either to leave a matter so important exposed to vague prejudicial sur- mises, on the one hand ; nor, on the other, should we rest merely in the impulses of liberal feeling and unreflecting enthusiasm. We should fortify ourselves, in a case of such magnitude, in an enlightened conviction. We should seek to reduce to an exact analysis the great doctrine, that the extension of the means of education and the general diffusion of knowledge are beneficial to society. It is the object of the present address to touch briefly and in the somewhat desultory manner required on such an occasion on some of the prominent points involved in this great subject ; and to endeavor to show that the diffusion of knowledge, of which we have spoken, is favorable to liberty, to science, and vir- tue j to social, intellectual, and spiritual improvement, the only three things which deserve a name below. I. Although liberty, strictly speaking, is only one of the objects for which men have united themselves in civil societies, it is so intimately connected with all the others, and every thing else is so worthless when liberty is taken away, that its preservation may be considered, humanly speaking, the great object of life in civilized communities. It is so essential to the prosperous existence of nations, that even where the theory of the government as in many absolute monarchies seems to subvert its very principle, by making it depend on the will of the ruler ; yet usage, pre- scription, and a kind of beneficent instinct of the body politic, secure to the people some portion of practical liberty. Where political interests and passions do not interfere, (which they rarely do in respect to the private rights of the mass of the community,) the subjects of the absolute monarchies of the north and east of Europe are safe in the enjoyment of life and property. Where this is not the case, where a des- LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 603 potic theory of the government is carried out into a despotic administration, and life, rights, and property are habitually sacrificed to the caprice and passions of men in power, as in all the despotisms which stretch across Asia, from the Euxine to the Pacific, there the population is kept permanently degenerate, barbarous, and wretched. Whenever we speak of liberty, in this connection, we com- prehend under it legal security for life, personal freedom, and property. As these are equally dear to all men, as all feel, with equal keenness and bitterness, the pang which extin- guishes existence, the chain which binds the body, the coer- cion which makes one toil for another's benefit, it follows, as a necessary consequence, that all governments which are hostile to liberty are founded on force ; that all despotisms are, what some by emphasis are occasionally called, military despotisms. The degree of force required to hold a popula- tion in subjection, other things being equal, is in direct ratio to its intelligence and skill ; its acquaintance with the arts of life ; its sense of the worth of existence ; in fine, to its spirit and character. There is a point, indeed, beyond which this rule fails, and at which even the most thoroughly organ- ized military despotism cannot be extended over the least intellectual race of subjects, serfs, or slaves. History presents us with the record of numerous servile wars, and peasants* wars, from the days of Spartacus to those of Tupac- Amaru and Pugatschef ; in which, at the first outbreak, all the ad- vantages of authority, arms, concert, discipline, skill, have availed the oppressor nothing against humanity's last refuge, the counsel of madness, and the resources of despair. There are two ways in which liberty is promoted by the general diffusion of knowledge. The first is by disabusing the minds of men of the theoretical frauds, by which arbi- trary governments are upheld. It is a remark almost, if not quite, without exception, that all governments unfriendly to well-regulated liberty are founded on the basis of some reli- gious imposture ; the arm of military violence is clothed with the enervating terrors of superstition. The Oriental nations, as far back as our accounts run, worshipped their despots 604 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO as divinities, and taught this monstrous adulation to the successors of Alexander. The Roman emperors, from the time of Julius Csesar, were deified ; and the absolutism of modern times rests on a basis a little more refined, but not more rational. The divine right of Henry VIII. or of Charles V. was no better, in the eye of an intelligent Christian, than that of their contemporary, Solyman the Magnificent. Superstitions like these, resting, like all other superstitions, on ignorance, vanish with the diffusion of knowledge, like the morning mists on yonder river before the rising sun ; and governments are brought down to their only safe and just basis the welfare and consent of the governed. The entire cause of modern political reform has started with the establishment of this principle, and no example is more con- spicuous than that which, for the magnitude of the revolu- tion, and the immensity of its consequences, is called The Reformation ; a change which, on account of the temporal usurpations of the Church of Rome, the intrusion of its power into the affairs of foreign countries, and the right claimed by the pope to command the obedience of subject and sovereign, was not less a political than a religious revo- lution. Throughout this great work, the course and conduct of Luther present a most illustrious example of the efficacy of a diffusion of knowledge, of an appeal to the popular mind, in breaking the yoke of the oppressor, and establishing a rational freedom. When he commenced the great enter- prise, he stood alone. The governments acknowledged the supremacy of the Roman pontiff. The teachers of the universities and schools were, for the most part, regular priests, bound not only by the common tie of spiritual alle- giance, but by the rules of the monastic orders to which they belonged. The books of authority were exclusively those of the schoolmen, implicitly devoted to the church, filled with fantastical abstractions, with a meagre and unprofitable logic, and written in a dead language. " In this state of things," says Lord Bacon, "Martin Luther, conducted, no doubt, by a higher Providence, but in a discourse of reason, LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 605 finding what a province he had undertaken against the bishop of Rome and the degenerate traditions of the church, and finding his own solitude, being no ways aided by the opin- ions of his own time, was enforced to awake all antiquity, and to call former times to his succor, to make a party against the present time. So that the ancient authors, both in divin- ity and humanity, which had long time slept in libraries, began generally to be read and revolved. This, by conse- quence, did draw on a necessity of a more exquisite travel in the languages original, wherein those authors did write, for a better understanding of those authors, and the better advan- tages of pressing and applying their words. And thereof grew again a delight in their manner and style of phrase, and an admiration of that kind of writing ; which was much furthered and precipitated by the enmity and opposition that the propounders of those primitive, but seeming new, opin- ions had against the schoolmen, who were generally of the contrary part, and whose writings were altogether in a differ- ent style and form, taking liberty to coin and frame new terms of art, to express their own sense, and to avoid circuit of speech, without regard to the pureness, pleasantness, and, as I may call it, lawfulness of the phrase or word. And again, because the great labor then was with the people, of whom the Pharisees were wont to say, Execrabilis ista turba, qua non novit legem. For the winning and persuading them, there grew, of necessity, in chief price and request, eloquence and variety of discourse, as the fittest and forciblest access into the capacity of the vulgar sort."* With the highest reverence for the authority of Lord Bacon, I would say, that he seems to me to have somewhat mistaken the relative importance of the great instruments of the reformation. In the solemn loneliness in which Luther found himself, he called around him not so much the masters of the Greek and Latin wisdom, through the study of the ancient languages, as he did the mass of his own country- men, by his translation of the Bible. It would have been a * Ijord Bacon's Works, VoL I. p. 14, quarto ed. 606 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO matter of tardy impression and remote efficacy, had he done no more than awake from the dusty alcoves of the libraries the venerable shades of the classic teachers. He roused up a population of living, thinking men, his countrymen, hi? breth- ren. He might have written and disputed in Latin to his dying day, and the elegant Italian scholars, champions of the church, would have answered him in Latin better than his own ; and with the mass of the people, the whole affair would have been a contest between angry and loquacious priests. " Awake all antiquity from the sleep of the libra- ries?" He awoke all Germany and half Europe from the scholastic sleep of an ignorance worse than death. He took into his hands not the oaten pipe of the classic muse ; he moved to his great work not "to the Dorian mood Of flutes, and soft recorders;" he grasped the iron trumpet of his mother tongue, the good old Saxon from which our own is descended, the lan- guage of noble thought and high resolve, and blew a blast that shook the nations from Rome to the Orkneys. Sover- eign, citizen, and peasant, started at the sound ; and, in a few short years, the poor monk, who had begged his bread, for a pious canticle, in the streets of Eisenach,* no longer friendless, no longer solitary, was sustained by victorious armies, countenanced by princes, and, what was a thousand times more important than the support of the brightest crown in Christendom, revered as a sage, a benefactor, and a spirit- ual parent, at the firesides of millions of his humble and grateful countrymen. Nor do we less plainly see in this, as in numerous other examples in the modern history of liberty, the more general operation of the influences by which the diffusion of knowl- edge promotes rational freedom. Simply to overturn the theoretical sophisms upon which any particular form of despotism may rest, is but to achieve a temporary work * Luther's Werke, Th. X. 524. LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MOEALS. 607 While the mass of the people remain ignorant, to under- mine the system of oppression, political or ecclesiastical, un- der which, at any time, they may labor, is but to stagger dark- ling from one tyranny to another. It is for this reason, a truth too sadly exemplified in the history of the world for the last fifty years^ that countries in which the majority of the people have grown up without knowledge, stung to mad- ness by intolerable oppression, may make a series of plunges, through scenes of successive revolution and anarchy, and come out at last drenched in blood, and loaded with chains. We must therefore trace the cause of political slavery be- yond the force which is the immediate instrument, beyond the superstition which is its puissant ally, beyond the habit and usage, the second nature of governments as of men, and we shall find it in that fatal inequality which results from hereditary ignorance. This is the ultimate and solid founda- tion of despotism. A few are wise, skilful, learned, wealthy ; millions are uninformed, and consequently unconscious of their rights. For a few are accumulated the delights, the honors, and the excitements of life ; for all the rest remains a heritage of unenlightened subjection and unrewarded toil. Such is the division of the human race in all the Oriental despotisms, at the present day. Such it was in all Europe, in the middle ages. Such, in some parts of Europe, it still is : such it naturally must be every where, under institutions which keep the mass of the people ignorant. A nation is numerically reckoned at its millions of souls. But they are not souls ; the greater part are but bodies. God has given them souls, but man has done all but annihilate the immor- tal principle : its life-spring, its vigor, its conscious power, are broken down, and the people lie buried in subjection, till, through the medium of the understanding, a new creation takes place. The physical creation began with light ; the intellectual and moral creation begins with light also. Chosen servants of Providence are raised up to speak the word ; power is given to political or religious reformers to pronounce the decree ; it spreads like the elemental beam, by the thou- sand channels of intelligence, from mind to mind, and a new 608 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO race is created. Let there be light ; let those rational intel- lects begin to think. Let them but look in upon themselves, and see that they are men, and look upon their oppressors, and see if they are more. Let them look round upon nature : " It is my Father's domain ; shall not my patient labor be rewarded with its share ? " Let them look up to the heavens : " Has He that upholds their glorious orbs, and who has given me the capacity to trace and comprehend their motions, designed me to grovel, without redemption, in the dust be- neath my feet, and exhaust my life for a fellow-man no better than myself? " These are the truths, which in all ages shoot through the understandings to the hearts of men : they are what our rev- olutionary fathers called " first principles ; " and they prepared the way for the revolution. All that was good in the French revolution was built upon them. They are the corner stone of modern English liberty ; they emancipated the Nether- lands and the Swiss cantons ; and they gave to republican Greece and Rome that all but miraculous influence in human affairs, which succeeding ages of civil discord, of abuse, and degeneracy have not yet been able wholly to countervail. They redress the inequalities of society. When, penetrated with these great conceptions, the people assert their native worth and inherent rights, it is wonderful to behold how the petty badges of social inequality, the emblems of rank and of wealth, are contemned. Cincinnatus, who saved Rome from the Sabines, was found ploughing his own land, a farm of four acres, when created dictator. Epaminondas, who rescued his country from the domination of Sparta, and was implored by the emissaries of the king of Persia to do their master the honor to take his bribes, possessed no other prop- erty, when he fell gloriously at Mantinaea, than the humble utensils for cooking his daily food. A single bold word, he- roic exploit, or generous sacrifice, at the fortunate crisis, kin- dles the latent faculties of a whole population, and turns them from beasts of burden into men ; excites to intense action and sympathetic counsel millions of awakened minds, and leads them forth to the contest. When such a development LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 609 of mental energy has fairly taken place, the battle is fought and won. It may be long and deadly, it may be brief and bloodless. Freedom may come quickly in robes of peace, or after ages of conflict and war ; but come it will, and abide it will, so long as the principles by which it was acquired are held sacred. Nor let us forget, that the dangers to which liberty is ex- posed are not all on the side of arbitrary power. That pop- ular intelligence, by which the acquisition of rational freedom is to be made, is still more necessary to protect it against anarchy. Here is the great test of a people, who deserve their freedom. Under a parental despotism, the order of the state is preserved, and life and property are protected, by the strong arm of the government. A measure of liberty that is, safety from irregular violence is secured by the constant presence of that military power, which is the great engine of subjection. But under a free government, there is nothing but the intelligence of the people to keep the people's peace. Order must be preserved, not by a military police or regiments of horse-guards ; but by the spontaneous concert of a well- informed population, resolved that the rights which have been rescued from despotism shall not be subverted by anarchy. As the disorder of a delicate system and the degeneracy of a noble nature are spectacles more grievous than the corruption of meaner things, so, if we permit the principle of our gov- ernment to be subverted, havoc, terror, and destruction, beyond the measure of ordinary political catastrophes, will be our lot. This is a subject of intense interest to the people of the United States at the present time. To no people, since the world began, was such an amount of blessings and privileges ever given in trust. No people was ever so eminently made the guardians of their own rights; and if this great experiment of rational liberty should here be permitted to fail, I know not where or when among the sons of Adam it will ever be resumed. II. But it is more than time to proceed to the second point, which I proposed briefly to illustrate, the favorable influ- ence of the extension of the means of education, and the VOL. i. 77 610 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO diffusion of knowledge, on the progress of sound science. It is a pretty common suggestion, that while the more abundant means of popular education existing at the present day, may have occasioned the diffusion of a considerable amount of superficial knowledge, the effect has been unfavorable to the growth of profound science. I am inclined to think this view of the subject entirely erroneous an inference by no means warranted by the premises from which it is drawn. It is no doubt true, that, in consequence of the increased facilities for education, the number of students of all descrip- tions, both readers and writers, is almost indefinitely multi- plied ; and with this increase in the entire number of persons who have enjoyed, in a greater or less degree, advantages for improving their minds, the number of half-taught and super- ficial pretenders has become proportionably greater. Educa- tion, which, at some periods of the world, has been a very rare accomplishment of a highly gifted and fortunate few, at other times, an attainment attended with considerable diffi- culty, and almost confined to professed scholars, has be- come, in this country at least, one of the public birthrights of freemen, and like every other birthright, is subject to be abused. In this state of things, those who habitually look at the dark side of affairs, often witnessing the arrogant displays of superficial learning, books of great pretension and little value, multiplied and circulated by all the arts and machinery of an enterprising and prosperous age, and in all things much forwardness and show, often unaccompanied by worth and substance, are apt to infer a decline of sound learning, and look back, with a sigh, to what they imagine to have been the more solid erudition of former days. But I deem this opinion without real foundation in truth. It is an age, I grant, of cheap fame. A sort of literary machinery exists, of which the patent paper-mill, the power- press, the newspapers, magazines, and reviews, the reading clubs and circulating libraries, are some of the principal springs and levers, by means of which almost any thing, in the shape of a book, is thrown into a sort of notoriety, miscalled repu- tation. The want of these appliances was no doubt one LIBERTY KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 611 cause of the severer revision and higher finish which char- acterize the literature of Greece and Rome ; and it is certain that cheapness of printing and facility of circulation have led to the composition and publication of many worthless books, which otherwise would never have seen the light. But nothing is to be inferred from this state of things, in dispar- agement of the learning and scholarship of the age. All that it proves is, that with a vast diffusion of useful knowledge, with an astonishing multiplication of the means of education, and, as I firmly believe, with a prodigious growth of true science, there has sprung up, by natural association, a host of triflers and pretenders, like a growth of rank weeds, with a rich crop, on a fertile soil. But there were surely always pretenders in science and literature, in every age of the world ; nor must we suppose, because their works and their names have perished, that they existed in a smaller proportion formerly than now. Solomon intimates a complaint of the number of books in his day, which he probably would not have done, if they had been all good books. The sophists in Greece were s\vorn pretenders and dealers in words, the most completely organized body of learned quacks that ever existed. Bavius and Msevius were certainly not the only worthless poets in Rome ; and from the age of the grammarians and critics of the Alexan- drian school, through that of the monkish chroniclers and the schoolmen of the middle ages, and the mystics of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the kingdom of learned dulness and empty profession has been kept up, under an unbroken succession of leaden or brazen potentates. If the subjects at the present day seem more numerous than for- merly, it is only in proportion to the increase in the entire numbers of the reading and writing world ; and because the sagacious hand of time brushes away the false pretensions of former days, leaving real scholarship and sound learning the more conspicuous for standing alone. But, as in elder days, notwithstanding this unbroken sway of false lore and vain philosophy, the Jine of the truly wise and soundly learned was also preserved entire, as the lights 612 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO of the world have in all former ages successively risen, illu- minating the deep darkness, and outshining the delusive me- teors, so, at the present day, I am firmly convinced that there is more patient learning, true philosophy, fruitful science, and various knowledge, than at any former time. By the side of the hosts of superficial, arrogant, and often unprincipled pre- tenders, in every department, there is a multitude innumera- ble of the devoted lovers of truth, whom no labor can exhaust, no obstacles can discourage, no height of attainment dazzle ; and who, in every branch of knowledge, sacred and profane, moral, physical, exact, and critical, have carried, and are car- rying, the glorious banner of true science into regions of investigation wholly unexplored in elder times. Let me not be mistaken. I mean not arrogantly to detract from the fame of the few great masters of the mind, the gifted few, who, from age to age, after long centuries have intervened, have appeared, and have risen, as all are ready to allow, above all rivalry. Aftertime alone can pronounce whether this age has produced minds worthy to be classed in their select circle. But, this aside, I cannot comprehend the philosophy by which we assume as probable nor do I see the state of facts by which we must admit as actually exist- ing an intellectual degeneracy at the present day, either in Europe or in this country. I see not why the multiplication of popular guides to partial attainments, why the facilities that abound for the acquisition of superficial scholarship, should, in the natural operation of things, either diminish the number of powerful and original minds, or satisfy their ardent thirst for acquisition, by a limited progress. There is no doubt that many of these improvements in the methods of learning many of the aids to the acquisition of knowledge, which are the product of the present time are, in their very nature, calculated to help the early studies even of minds of the highest order. It is a familiar anecdote of James Otis, that, when he first obtained a copy of Black- stone's Commentaries, he observed, with emphasis, that if he had possessed that book when commencing his studies of the law, it would have saved him seven years' labor. Would LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 613 those seven years have borne no fruit to a mind like that of James Otis ? Though the use of elementary treatises of this kind may have the effect to make many superficial jurists, who would otherwise have been no jurists at all, I deem it mere popular prejudice to suppose that the march of original genius to the heights of learning has been impeded by the possession of these modern facilities to aid its progress. To maintain this seems to be little else than to condemn as worthless the wisdom of the ages which have gone before us. It is surely absurd to suppose that we can do no more with the assistance of our predecessors than without it ; that the teachings of one generation, instead of enlightening, con- found and stupefy that which succeeds ; and that " when we stand on the shoulders of our ancestors we cannot see so far as from the ground." On the contrary, it is unquestionably one of the happiest laws of intellectual progress, that the judicious labors, the profound reasonings, the sublime discoveries, the generous sentiments, of great intellects rapidly work their way into the common channel of public opinion, find access to the general mind, raise the universal standard of attainment, cor- rect popular errors, promote arts of daily application, and come home at last to the fireside, in the shape of increased intelligence, skill, comfort, and virtue, which, in their turn, by an instantaneous reaction, multiply the numbers and facilitate the efforts of those who engage in the further investigation and discovery of truth. In this way, a constant circulation, like that of the life-blood, takes place in the intel- lectual world. Truth travels down from the heights of phi- losophy to the humblest walks of life, and up from the simplest perceptions of an awakened intellect to the discov- eries which almost change the face of the world. At every stage of its progress it is genial, luminous, creative. When first struck out by some distinguished and fortunate genius, it may address itself only to a few minds of kindred power. It exists, then, only in the highest forms of science ; it cor- rects former systems, and authorizes new generalizations. Discussion and controversy begin ; more truth is elicited, more 614 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO errors exploded, more doubts cleared up, more phenomena drawn into the circle, unexpected connections of kindred sciences are traced, and, in each step of the progress, the number rapidly grows of those who are prepared to compre- hend and carry on some branches of the investigation, till, in the lapse of time, every order of intellect has been kindled, from that of the sublime discoverer to the practical machinist ; and every department of knowledge been enlarged, from the most abstruse and transcendental theory to the daily arts of life. I presume it would not be difficult to deduce, from the discovery and demonstration of the law of gravity, attain- ments in useful knowledge, which come home every day to the business and bosoms of men, enlightening the mass of the community who have received a common education, on points. concerning which the greatest philosophers of former times were at fault. Bold as the remark sounds, there is not a young man who will to-morrow receive his degree on this stage who could not correct Lord Bacon in many a grave point of natural science. This great man doubted the rota- tion of the earth on its axis, after it had been affirmed by Copernicus, Keppler, and Galileo. He states positively that he judges the work of making gold possible,* and even goes so far, after condemning the procedure of the alchemists, as to propound his own. Finally, he says, it " is not impossible, and I have heard it verified, that upon cutting down of an old timber tree, the stub hath put out sometimes a tree of another kind, as that beech hath put forth birch;" "which, if it be true," the illustrious chancellor discreetly adds, " the cause may be, for that the old stub is too scanty of juice to put forth the former tree, and therefore putteth forth a tree of a smaller kind, that needeth less nourishment."! Surely no man can doubt that the cause of true science has been pro- * The world hath been much abused by the opinion of making gold. The work itself I judge to be possible, but the means hitherto propounded to effect it are, in the practice, full of error and imposture ; and, in the theory, full of unsound imaginations." Lord Bacon's Works, Vol. I. p. 204. t Lord Bacon's Works, Vol. I. p. 241. LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 615 moted by .such a diffusion of knowledge as has eradicated even from the common mind such enormous errors as these, from which, notwithstanding their enormity, the greatest minds of other times could not emancipate themselves. It is extremely difficult, even for the greatest intellects, to work themselves free of all those popular errors which form a part, as it were, of the intellectual atmosphere in which they have passed their lives. Copernicus was one of the boldest theorists that ever lived, but was so enslaved by the existing popular errors as, even while proposing his own simple and magnificently beautiful theory of the heavens, to retain some of the most absurd and complicated contrivances of the Ptolemaic scheme.* Kepler was one of the most sagacious and original of philosophers, and the laws which bear his name have been declared, on respectable authority, "the foundations of the whole theory of Newton;" but he believed that the planets were monstrous animals, swimming in the ethereal fluid, and speaks of storms and tempests as the pulmonary heavings of the great Leviathan, the earth, breathing out hurricanes from its secret spiracles in the val- leys and among the hills. It may raise our admiration of this extraordinary man, that with notions so confused and irrational he should, by a life of indefatigable research, dis- cover some of the sublimest laws of nature ; but no one can so superstitiously reverence the past no one so blindly undervalue the utility of the diffusion of knowledge as not to feel that these absurdities must have hung like a mill- stone about the necks of the strongest minds of former ages, and dragged them, in the midst of their boldest flights, to the dust. When I behold minds like these, fitted to range with the boldest step in the paths of investigation, bound down by subjection to gross prevailing errors, but at length, by a happy effort of native sense or successful study, grasping ai rhe discovery of some noble truth, it brings to my mind Milton's somewhat fantastical description of the creation of * Dr Small's Account of the Astronomical Discoveries of Kepler, Chap UI. and VIIL 616 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO the animals, in which the great beasts of the .forest, not wholly formed, are striving to be released from their native earth : " now half appeared The tawny lion, struggling to get free His hinder parts ; then springs, as burst from bonds, And rampant shakes his brinded mane." In short, when we consider the laws of the human mind, and the path by which the understanding marches to the dis- covery of truth, we must see that it is the necessary conse- quence of the general extension of education that it should promote the progress of science. Since the time of Lord Bacon, it has been more and more generally admitted, that the only path to true knowledge is the study and observation of nature, either in the phenomena of the external creation, or in the powers and operations of the human mind. This does not exclude the judicious use of books which record the observations and the discoveries of others, and are of inesti- mable value in guiding the mind in its own independent researches. They are, in fact, not its necessary, .but its most usual, instruments ; and as the book of nature is never so well perused as with the assistance of the learned and pru- dent who have studied it before us, so the true and profitable use of books is to furnish materials on which other minds can act, and to facilitate their observation of nature. I know not where I could find a better illustration of their value, and of their peculiar aptitude to further the progress of knowledge, than in the admirable report on the geology of Massachusetts, which has recently emanated from this place.* Under the enlightened patronage of the commonwealth, a member of the faculty of this institution has set before the citizens of the state such a survey of its territory such an inventory of its natural wealth, such a catalogue of its pro- ductions in the animal, the vegetable, and, still more, in the mineral world as cannot be contemplated without gratifi- * Report on the geology, mineralogy, botany, and zoology ot Massa chusette, by Professor Hitchcock. LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 617 cation and pride. By one noble effort of learned industry and vigorous intellectual labor, the whole science of geology one of the great mental creations of modern times has been brought home and applied to the illustration of our native state. There is not a citizen who has learned to read, in the humblest village of Massachusetts, from the hills of Berkshire to the sands of Nantucket, who has not now placed within his reach the means of beholding, with a well- informed eye, either in his immediate neighborhood, or in any part of the state to which he may turn his attention, the hills and the vales, the rocks and the rivers, the soil and the quarries, and the mines. Who can doubt, that out of the hundreds the thousands of liberal minds, in every part of the commonwealth, which must thus be awakened to the intelligent observation of nature, thus helped over the elementary difficulties of the science, not a few will be effec- tually put upon the track of independent inquiries and origi- nal attainments in science ! We are confirmed in the conclusion that the popular diffu- sion of knowledge is favorable to the growth of science by the reflection, that, vast as the domain of learning is, and extraordinary as is the progress which has been made in almost every branch, it may be assumed as certain, I will not say that we are in its infancy, but as truth is as various as nature, and as boundless as creation, that the discoveries already made, wonderful as they are, bear but a small propor- tion to those that will hereafter be effected. In -the yet unex- plored wonders and yet unascertained laws of the heavens, in the affinities of the natural properties of bodies; in mag- netism, galvanism, and electricity ; in light and heat ; in the combination and application of the mechanical powers ; the use of steam ; the analysis of mineral products, of liquid and aeriform fluids ; in the application of the arts and sciences to improvements in husbandry, to manufactures, to navigation, to letters, and to education ; in the great department of the philosophy of the mind, and the realm of morals ; and, in short, to every thing .that belongs to the improvement of man, there is yet a field of investigation broad enough to VOL. i. 78 618 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO satisfy the most eager thirst for knowledge, and diversified enough to suit every variety of taste and order of intellect. For the peaceful victories of the mind, that unknown and unconquered world, for which Alexander wept, is forever near at hand, hidden indeed, as yet, behind the veil with which nature shrouds her undiscovered mysteries, but stretch- ing all along the confines of the domain of knowledge, some- times nearest when least suspected. The foot has not yet pressed, nor the eye beheld, it ; but the mind, in its deepest musings, in its widest excursions, will sometimes catch a glimpse of the hidden realm, a gleam of light from the Hesperian island a fresh and fragrant breeze from off the undiscovered land, "Sabsean odors from the spicy shore," which happier voyagers in aftertimes shall approach, explore, and inhabit. Who has not felt, when, with his very soul concentred in his eyes, while the world around him is wrapped in sleep, he gazes into the holy depths of the midnight heavens, or wan- ders in contemplation among the worlds and systems that sweep through the immensity of space, who has not felt as if their mystery must yet more fully yield to the ardent, unwearied, imploring research of patient science ? Who does not, in those choice and blessed moments in which the world and its interests are forgotten, and the spirit retires into the inmost sanctuary of its own meditations, and there, uncon- scious of every thing but itself and the Infinite Perfection, of which it is the earthly type, and kindling the flame of thought on the altar of prayer, who does not feel, in mo- ments like these, as if it must at last be given to man to fathom the great secret of his own being ; to solve the mighty problems u Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate ! " When I think in what slight elements the great discov- eries, that have changed the condition of the world, have LIBE11TY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 619 oftentimes had their origin ; on the entire revolution in polit- ical and social affairs, which has resulted from the use of the magnetic needle ; on the world of wonders, teeming with the most important scientific discoveries, which has been opened by the telescope ; on the all-controlling influence of the in- vention of movable metallic types; on the effects of the invention of gunpowder, no doubt the casual result of some idle experiment in alchemy ; on the consequences that have resulted, and are likely to result, from the application of the vapor of boiling water to the manufacturing arts, to naviga- tion, and transportation by land ; on the results of a single sublime conception in the mind of Newton, on which he erected, as on a foundation, the glorious temple of the system of the heavens, in fine, when I consider how. from the great master principle of the philosophy of Bacon, the induction of truth from the observation of fact, has flowed, as from a living fountain, the fresh and still swelling stream of modern science, I am almost oppressed with the idea of the probable connection of the truths already known with great principles which remain undiscovered, of the prox- imity, in which we may unconsciously stand, to the most astonishing though yet unrevealed mysteries of the material and intellectual world. If, after thus considering the seemingly obvious sources from which the most important discoveries and improvements have sprung, we inquire into the extent of the field in which further discoveries are to be made, which is no other and no less than the entire natural and spiritual creation of God, a grand and lovely system, even as we imperfectly apprehend it : but no doubt most grand, lovely, and harmonious, beyond all that we now conceive or imagine, when we reflect that the most insulated, seemingly disconnected, and even contra- dictory parts of the system are, no doubt, bound together as portions of one stupendous whole, and that those which are at present the least explicable, and which most completely defy the penetration hitherto bestowed upon them, are as intelligible, in reality, as that which seems most plain and clear ; that as every atom in the universe attracts every other 620 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO atom, and is attracted by it, so every truth stands in harmo- nious connection with every other truth, we are brought directly to the conclusion, that every portion of knowledge now possessed, every observed fact, every demonstrated prin- ciple, is a clew, which we hold by one end in the hand, and which is capable of guiding the faithful inquirer farther and farther into the inmost recesses of the labyrinth of nature. Ages on ages may elapse, before it conduct the patient intel- lect to the wonders of science to which it will eventually lead him ; and, perhaps, with the next step he takes, he will reach the goal, and truths de&tined to affect the condition of millions will beam in characters of light upon his understand- ing. What was at once more unexpected and more obvious than Newton's discovery of the nature of light ? Every living being, since the creation of the world, had gazed on the rain- bow ; to none had the beautiful mystery revealed itself. And even the great philosopher himself, while dissecting the solar beam, while actually untwisting the golden and silver threads that compose the ray of light, laid open but half its wonders. And who shall say that to us, to whom, as we think, modern science has disclosed the residue, truths more wonderful than those now known will not yet be revealed ? It is, therefore, by no means to be inferred, because the human mind has seemed to linger for a long time around certain results, as ultimate principles, that they, and the prin- ciples closely connected with them, are not likely to be pushed much farther ; nor, on the other hand, does the intel- lect always require much time to bring its noblest fruits to seeming perfection. It was, I suppose, about two thousand years from the time when the peculiar properties of the mag- net were first observed, before it became, through the means of those qualities, the pilot which guided Columbus to the American continent. Before the invention of the compass could take full effect, it was necessary that some navigator should practically and boldly grasp the idea that the globe is round. The two truths are apparently without connection ; but in their application to practice they are intimately asso- ciated. Hobbes says that Dr Harvey, the illustrious discov- LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 621 erer of the circulation of the blood, is the only author of a great discovery who ever lived to see it universally adopted. To the honor of subsequent science, this remark could not now, with equal truth, be made. Nor was Harvey himself without some painful experience of the obstacles arising from popular ignorance, against which truth sometimes forces its way to general acceptance. When he first proposed the beautiful doctrine, his practice fell off; people would not continue to trust their lives in the hands of such a dreamer. When it was firmly established, and generally received, one of his opponents published a tract de drculo sanguinis Salo- moneo, and proved from the twelfth chapter of Ecclesiastes, that the circulation of the blood was no secret in the time of Solomon. The whole doctrine of the reformation may be found in the writings of Wiclif ; but neither he nor his age felt the importance of his principles, nor the consequences to which they led. Huss had studied the writings of Wiclif in manuscript, and was in no degree behind him in the bold- ness with which he denounced the papal usurpations. But his voice was not heard beyond the mountains of Bohemia : he expired in agony at the stake, and his ashes were scattered upon the Rhine. A hundred years passed away. Luther, like an avenging angel, burst upon the world, and denounced the corruptions of the church, and rallied the host of the faithful, with a voice which might almost call up those ashes from their watery grave, and form and kindle them again into a living witness to the truth. Thus Providence, which has ends innumerable to answer, in the conduct of the physical and intellectual, as of the moral world, sometimes permits the great discoverers fully to enjoy their fame, sometimes to catch but a glimpse of the extent of their achievements, and sometimes sends them, de- jected and heart-broken, to the grave, unconscious of the importance of their own discoveries, and not merely under- valued by their contemporaries, but by themselves. It is plain that Copernicus, like his great contemporary, Columbus, though fully conscious of the boldness and the novelty of his doctrine, saw but a part of the changes it was to effect in 622 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO science. After harboring in his bosom for long, long years, that pernicious heresy, the solar system, he died on the day of the appearance of his book from the press. The closing scene of his life, with a little help from the imagination, would furnish a noble subject for an artist. For thirty-five years, he has revolved and matured in his mind his system of the heavens. A natural mildness of disposition, bordering on timidity, a reluctance to encounter controversy, and a dread of persecution, have led him to withhold his work from the press, and to make known his system but to a few confi- dential disciples and friends. At length he draws near his end ; he is seventy-three years of age, and he yields his work on "the revolutions of the heavenly orbs" to his friends for publication. The day at last has come, on which it is to be ushered into the world. It is the twenty-fourth of May, 1543. On that day, the effect, no doubt, of the intense excitement of his mind, operating upon an exhausted frame, an effusion of blood brings him to the gates of the grave. His last hour has come ; he lies stretched upon the couch, from which he never will rise, in his apartment, at the Canonry at Frauenberg, in East Prussia. The beams of the setting sun glance through the Gothic windows of his cham- ber ; near his bedside is the armillary sphere, which he has contrived, to represent his theory of the heavens ; his portrait, painted by himself, the amusement of his earlier years, hangs before him ; beneath it, his astrolabe, and other imperfect astronomical instruments ; and around him are gathered his sorrowing disciples. The door of the apartment opens ; the eye of the departing sage is turned to see who enters : it is a friend, who brings him the first printed copy of his immortal treatise. He knows that in that book he contradicts all that had ever been distinctly taught by former philosophers ; he knows that he has rebelled against the sway of Ptolemy, which the scientific world had acknowledged for a thousand years ; he knows that the popular mind will be shocked by his innovations ; he knows that the attempt will be made to press even religion into the service against him ; but he Knows that his book is true. He is dying, but he leaves a LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 623 glorious truth, as his dying bequest, to the world. He bids the friend who has brought it place himself between the window and his bedside, that the sun's rays may fall upon the precious volume, and he may behold it once before his eye grows dim. He looks upon it, takes it in his hands, presses it to his breast, and expires. But no, he is not wholly gone ! A smile lights up his dying countenance ; a beam of returning intelligence kindles in his eye ; his lips move ; and the friend who leans over him can hear him faintly murmur the beautiful sentiments, which the Christian lyrist of a later age has so finely expressed in verse " Ye golden lamps of heaven, farewell, with all your feeble light ! Farewell, thou ever-changing moon, pale empress of the night ! And thou, refulgent orb of day, in brighter flames arrayed, My soul, which springs beyond thy sphere, no more demands thy aid ! Ye stars are but the shining dust of my divine abode, The pavement of those heavenly courts, where I shall reign with God ! " So died the great Columbus of the heavens.* His doc- trine, at first, for want of a general diffusion of knowledge, forced its way with difficulty against the deep-rooted preju- dices of the age. Tycho Brahe attempted to restore the absurdities of the Ptolemaic system ; but Keppler, with a sagacity which more than atones for all his strange fancies, laid hold of the theory of Copernicus, with a grasp of iron, and dragged it into repute. Galileo turned his telescope to the heavens, and observed the phases of Venus, which Co- * " Ceterum editio jam perfecta erat, illiusque exemplum Rheticus ad ipsum mittebat, cum ecce, (ut optimus Gysius ad ipsum Rheticum rescrip- eit,) qui vir fuerat toti state valetudine satis firma, laborare cepit sanguinis profluvio et insequuta ex improviso paralysi ad dextrum latus. Per hoc tempus memoria illi vigorque mentis debilitatus. Habuit nihilominus, unde ad hanc vitam et dimittendam et cum meliore commutandam se compararet. Contigit autem, ut eodem die ac horis non multis priusquam animam efflaret, operis exemplum, ad se destinatum sibique oblatum, et viderit quidem et contigerit ; sed erant jam turn alia ipsi cura. Quare ad hoc compositus, animam Deoreddidit, die Maii xxiv. anno MDXLIII. cum foret tribus jam mensibus et diebus quinque septuagenario major. Atque hujusmodi quidem vita, hujusmodi mors Copernici fuit" Nicolai Copemid Vita, Overa Petrl Gassendi, Tom. V. p. 451 624 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO pernicus boldly predicted must be discovered, as his theory required their appearance ; and lastly Newton arose, like a glorious sun, scattering the mists of doubt and opposition, and ascended the heavens full-orbed and cloudless, establish- ing at once his own renown and that of his predecessors, and crowned with the applauses of the world ; but declaring, with that angelic modesty which marked his character, " I do not know what I may appear to the world ; but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy, playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself in finding now and then a pebble, or a prettier shell than ordinary, while the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me."* But whether the progress of any particular discovery to- wards a general reception be prompt or tardy, it is one of the laws of intellectual influence, as it is one of the great prin- ciples on which we maintain that the general diffusion of knowledge is favorable to the growth of science, that what- soever be the fortune of inventors and discoverers, the invention and discovery are immortal ; the teacher dies in honor or neglect, but his doctrine survives. Fagots may consume his frame, but the truths he taught, like the spirit it enclosed, can never die. Partial and erroneous views may even retard his own mind in the pursuit of a fruitful thought ; but the errors of one age are the guides of the next ; and the failure of one great mind but puts its successor on a dif- ferent track, and teaches him to approach the object from a new point of observation. In estimating the effect of a popular system of education upon the growth of science, it is necessary to bear in mind a circumstance, in which the present age and that which preceded 't are strongly discriminated from former periods ; and that is the vastly greater extent to which science exists among men, who do not desire to be known to the world as authors. Since the dawn of civilization on Egypt and Asia Minor, there never have been wanting individuals, some- times many flourishing at the same time, who have made the * Brewster's Life of Sir Isaac Newton, p. 301. LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 625 most distinguished attainments in knowledge. Such, how- ever, has been the condition of the world, that they formed a class by themselves. Their knowledge was transmitted in schools, often under strict injunctions of secrecy ; or if re- corded in books, for want of the press, and owing to the constitution of society, it made but little impression on the mass of the community and the business of life. As far as there is any striking exception to this remark, it is in the free states of antiquity, in which, through the medium of the popular organization of the governments, and the neces- sity of constant appeals to the people, the cultivated intellect was brought into close association with the understandings of the majority of men. This fact may perhaps go far to explain the astonishing energy and enduring power of the Grecian civilization, which remains to this day, after all that has been said to explain it, one of the most extraordinary facts in the history of the human mind. But from the period of the downfall of the Roman republic, and more especially after the establishment of the feudal system, the division of the community into four classes, namely, the landed aristoc- racy, or nobles and gentry ; the spiritual aristocracy, or priesthood ; the inhabitants of the cities ; and the peasantry, (a division which has in modern Europe been considerably modified, in some countries more, and in some less, but in none wholly obliterated,) the possession and manifestation of knowledge were, till a comparatively recent period, almost monopolized by the two higher classes ; and in their hands it assumed in a great degree a literary, by which I mean a book form. Such, of course, must ever, with reasonable qualifications, continue to be the case ; and books will always be, in a great degree, the vehicle by which knowledge is to be communicated, preserved, and transmitted. But it is impossible to overlook the fact, it is one of the most characteristic features of the civilization of the age that this is far less exclusively the case than at any former period. The community is filled with an incalculable amount of unwritten knowledge ; of science which never will be committed to paper by the active men who possess it, and VOL. i. 79 626 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO which has been acquired on the basis of a good education, by observation, experience, and the action of the mind itself. A hundred and fifty years ago, it is doubtful whether, out of the observatories and universities, there were ten men in Europe who could ascertain the longitude by lunar observa- tion. At the present day, scarce a vessel sails to foreign lands, in the public or mercantile service, in which the process is not understood. In like manner, in our manufacturing establishments, in the workshops of our intelligent mechan- ics, in the construction arid direction of railroads and canals, on the improved farms throughout the country, there is pos- sessed, embodied, and brought into action, a vast deal of useful knowledge, of which its possessors will never make a literary use, for the composition of a book, but which is daily employed to the signal advantage of the country. Much of it is directly derived from a study of the great book of nature, whose pages are written by the hand of God ; and which in no part of the civilized world has been more faithfully or profitably studied than in New England. The intelligent population of the country, furnished with the keys of knowledge at our common schools, have addressed themselves to the further acquisition of useful science, to its acquisition at once and application, with a vigor, a dil- igence, a versatility, and a success, truly admirable. Let it not be supposed that I wish to disconnect this diffu- sive science from that which is recorded and propagated in books : to do this would be to reverse the error of former ages. It is the signal improvement of the present day, that the action and reaction of book-learning and general intelli- gence are so prompt, intense, and all-pervading. The moment a discovery is made, a principle demonstrated, a proposition advanced through the medium of the press, in any part of the world, it finds immediately a host, numberless as the sands of the sea, prepared to take it up, to canvass, con- firm, refute, or pursue it. At every waterfall, on the line of every canal and railroad, in the counting-room of every fac- tory and mercantile establishment, on the quarter-deck of every ship which navigates the high seas, on the farm of LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 627 every intelligent husbandman, in the workshop of every skilful mechanic, at the desk of the schoolmaster, in the office of the lawyer, the study of the physician and clergy- man, at the fireside of every man who has had the elements of a good education, not less than in the professed retreats of learning, there is an intellect to seize, to weigh, and ap- propriate the suggestion, whether it belong to the world of science, of taste, or of morals. In some countries there may be more, and in some less, of this latent intellectual power : latent, I call it, in reference not to its action on life, but to its display in books. In some countries, the books are in advance of the people, in others greatly behind them. In Europe, as compared with America, the advantage is in favor of the books. The restraint im- posed upon the mind, in reference to all political questions, has had the effect of driving more than a proportion of the intellect of that part of the world into the cultivation of science and literature, as a profession ; and if we were to judge merely from the character of a few great works published at the expense of the government, and the attain- ments of a few individuals, Italy and Austria would stand on a level with Great Britain and France. The great differ- ence between nation and nation, in reference to knowledge, is in fact, in no small degree, in this very distinction. In reference to the attainments of scholars and men of science by profession, of which some few are found in every civil- ized country, all nations may be considered as forming one intellectual republic ; but in reference to the diffusion of knowledge among the people, its action on the character of nations, and its fruitful influence on society, the most impor- tant differences exist between different countries. III. There remains to be discussed the last topic of our address the influence of a general diffusion of knowledge on morals, a point which, if it were debatable, would raise a question of portentous import ; for if the diffusion of knowledge is unfriendly to goodness, shall we take refuge in ignorance ? What is the precise question on which, in this 628 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO connection, rational scruples may be started, deserving a seri- ous answer ? The merits of the case may, I believe, be stated somewhat as follows that there seems, in individuals, no fixed pro- portion between intellectual and moral growth. Eminent talent and distinguished attainment are sometimes connected with obliquity of character. Of those who have reached the heights of speculative science, not all are entitled to the com- mendation of being "Learned without pride, and not too wise to pray;" and one entire class of men of letters and science the French philosophers of the last century were, as a body, though by no means without honorable exceptions, notori- ous for a disbelief of revealed religion ; an insensibility to the delicacies of moral restraint ; a want of that purity of feeling and character, which we would gladly consider the inseparable attendant of intellectual cultivation. It is a ques- tion of deep interest, whether, from these facts and others like them, any thing can be fairly deduced unfavorable to the moral influence of a diffusion of knowledge. No country in Europe had retained more of the feudal divisions than France before the revolution. A partition of the orders of society, but little less rigid than the Oriental economy of castes, was kept up. Causes, which time would fail us to develop, had rendered the court and capital signally corrupt, during the last century. It is doubtful whether, in a civilized state, the foundations of social morality were ever so totally subverted. It was by no means one of the least active causes of this corruption, that all connection between the higher ranks and the people was cut off by the constitu- tion of society, and the hopeless depression, degradation, and ignorance of the mass of the nation. Under these influences, the school of the Encyclopedists was trained. They did not make, they found, the corruption. They were reared in it. They grew up in the presence and under the patronage of a most dissolute court, surrounded by the atmosphere of an LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 629 abandoned metropolis, without the constraint, the corrective, or the check of a wholesome public sentiment, emanating from an intelligent and virtuous population. The great monitors of society were hushed. The pulpit, not over active at that time as a moral teacher in the Catholic church in Europe, was struck dumb, for some of the highest dignitaries were stained with all the vices of the rest of their order that of the nobility ; and some of the most virtuous and eloquent of the prelates had been obliged to exhaust their talents in pan- egyrics of the frail but royal dead. The press was mute on every thing which touched the vices of the time. It was not, then, the diffusion of knowledge from the philosophical circles of Paris, that corrupted France ; it wa's the gross dark- ness of the provinces, and the deep degradation every where of the majority of the people, which left unrebuked the de- pravity of the capital. It was precisely a diffusion of knowl- edge that was wanted. And if, as I doubt not, France at this time is more virtuous (notwithstanding the demoralizing effects of the revolution arid its wars) than at any former period, it is owing to the diffusion of knowledge, which has followed the subversion of feudalism, and the regeneration of the provinces. Paris has ceased to be France. A disso- lute court has ceased to give the tone of feeling to the entire kingdom ; for an intelligent class of independent citizens and husbandmen has sprung up on the ruins of a decayed landed aristocracy, and the reformation of France is rapidly going on, in the elevation of the intellectual, and with it the politi- cal, social, and moral character of the people. I do not deem it necessary to argue, at length, against any general inference from individual cases, in which intellectual eminence has been associated with moral depravity. The question concerns general influences and natural tendencies, and must be considered mainly in reference to the compara- tive effects of ignorance and knowledge on communities, nations, and ages. In this reference, nothing is more certain than that the diffusion of knowledge is friendly to the benign influence of religion and morals. The illustrations of this great truth are so abundant, that I know not where to begin, 630 EDUCATION FAVOK4BLE TO nor where to end with them. Knowledge is the faithful ally both of natural and revealed religion. Natural religion is one grand deduction made by the enlightened understanding, from a faithful study of the great book of nature ; and the record of revealed religion, contained in the Bible, is not merely confirmed by the harmony which the mind delights to trace between it and the " elder Scripture writ by God's own hand ; " but revelation, in all ages, has called to its aid the meditations and researches of pious and learned men; and most assuredly, at every period, for one man of learning, superficial or profound, who has turned the weapons of sci- ence against religion or morals, hundreds have consecrated their labors to their defence. Christianity is revealed to the mind of man in a peculiar sense. To what are its hopes, its sanctions, its precepts ad- dressed ; to the physical or the intellectual portion of his nature ; to the perishing or the immortal element ? Is it on ignorance or on knowledge that its evidences repose ? Is it by ignorance or knowledge that its sacred records are trans- lated from the original tongues into the thousands of lan- guages spoken in the world? and if, by perverted knowl- edge, it has sometimes been attacked, is it by ignorance or knowledge that it has been, and must be, defended ? What but knowledge is to prevent us, in short, from being borne down and carried away by the overwhelming tide of fanati- cism and delusion, put in motion by the moon-struck impos- tors of the day ? Before we permit ourselves to be agitated with painful doubts as to the connection of a diffusion of knowledge with religion and morals, let us remember that, in proportion to the ignorance of a community, is the ease with which their belief in truth can be shaken, and their assent obtained to the last specious delusion of the day, till you may finally get down to a degree of ignorance, on which rea- son and Scripture are alike lost ; which is ready to receive Joe Smith as an inspired prophet, and Matthias as But shame and horror forbid me to complete the sentence. But this topic must be treated in a higher strain. The dif- fusion of knowledge is not merely favorable to religion and LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE, AND MORALS. 631 morals, but, in the last and highest analysis, they cannot be separated from each other. In the great prototype of our feeble ideas of perfection, the wise and the good are so blend- ed together, that the absence of one would enfeeble and im- pair the other. There can be no real knowledge of truth which does not tend to purify and elevate the affections. A little knowledge much knowledge may not, in individ- ual cases, subdue the passions of a cold, corrupt, and selfish heart. But if knowledge will not do it, can it be done by the want of knowledge ? What is human knowledge ? It is the cultivation and improvement of the spiritual principle in man. We are com- posed of two elements ; the one, a little du^t caught up from the earth, to which we shall soon return ; the other, a spark of that divine intelligence, in which and through which we bear the image of the great Creator. By knowledge, the wings of the intellect are spread ; by ignorance, they are closed and palsied, and the physical passions are left to gain he ascendency. Knowledge opens all the senses to the won- ders of creation; ignorance seals them up, and leaves the animal propensities unbalanced by reflection, enthusiasm, and taste. To the ignorant man, the glorious pomp of day, the sparkling mysteries of night, the majestic ocean, the rushing storm, the plenty-bearing river, the salubrious breeze, the fer- tile field, the docile animal tribes, the broad, the various, the unexhausted domain of nature, are a mere outward pageant, poorly understood in their character and harmony, and prized only so far as they minister to the supply of sensual wants. How different the scene to the man whose mind is stored with knowledge ! For him the mystery is unfolded, the veils lifted up, as one after another he turns the leaves of that great volume of creation, which is filled in every page with the characters of wisdom, power, and love ; with lessons of truth the most exalted ; with images of unspeakable loveliness and wonder ; arguments of Providence ; food for meditation ; themes of praise. One noble science sends him to the barren hills, and teaches him to survey their broken precipices. 632 EDUCATION FAVORABLE TO Where ignorance beholds nothing but a rough, inorganic mass, instruction discerns the intelligible record of the primal convulsions of the world ; the secrets of ages before man was ; the landmarks of the elemental struggles and throes of what is now the terraqueous globe. Buried monsters, of which the races are now extinct, are dragged out of deep strata, dug out of eternal rocks, and brought almost to life, to bear witness to the power that created them. Before the admiring student of nature has realized all the wonders of the elder world, thus, as it were, re-created by science, an- other delightful instructress, with her microscope in her hand, bids him sit down and learn at last to know the universe in which he lives, -and contemplate the limbs, the motions, the circulations of races of animals, disporting in their tempestu- ous ocean, t drop of water. Then, while his whole soul is penetrated with admiration of the power which has filled with life, and motion, and sense these all but non-existent atoms, O, then, let the divinest of the muses, let Astronomy approach, and take him by the hand ; let her " Come, but keep her wonted state, With even step and musing gait, And looks commercing with the skies, Her rapt soul sitting in her eyes." Let her lead him to the mount of vision ; let her turn her heaven-piercing tube to the sparkling vault : through that let him observe the serene star of evening, and see it transformed into a cloud-encompassed orb, a world of rugged mountains and stormy deeps ; or behold the pale beams of Saturn, lost to the untaught observer amidst myriads of brighter stars, and see them expand into the broad disk of a noble planet, the seven attendant worlds, the wondrous rings, a mighty system in itself, borne at the rate of twenty-two thousand miles an hour on its broad pathway through the heavens ; and then let him reflect that our great solar system, of which Saturn and his stupendous retinue is but a small part, fills itself, in the general structure of the universe, but the space LIBERTY, KNOWLEDGE AND MORALS. 633 of one fixed star ; and that the power which filled the drop of water with millions of living beings, is present and active, throughout this illimitable creation ! Yes, yes, "An undevout astronomer is mad!" But it is time to quit these sublime contemplations, and bring this address to a close. I may seem to have undertaken a superfluous labor, in pleading the cause of education. This institution, consecrated to learning and piety ; these academic festivities ; this favoring audience, which bestows its counte- nance on our literary exercises ; the presence of so many young men, embarking on the ocean of life, devoted to the great interests of the rational mind and immortal soul, bear witness for me that the cause of education stands not here in need of champions. Let it be our pride, that it has never needed them among the descendants of the Pilgrims ; let it be our vow, that, by the blessing of Providence, it never shall need them, so long as there is a descendant of the Pilgrims to plead its worth. Yes, let the pride of military glory be- long to foreign regions ; let the refined corruptions of the older world attract the traveller to its splendid capitals ; let a fervid sun ripen for other states the luxuries of a tropical clime. Let it be ours to boast that we inherit a land of lib- erty and light ; let the schoolhouse and the church continue to be the landmarks of the New England village ; let the son of New England, whithersoever he may wander, leave that behind him which shall make him homesick for his native land ; let freedom, and knowledge, and morals, and religion, as they are our birthright, be the birthright of our children to the end of time ! VOL. i. 80 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK.' GATHERED together in this temple not made with hands, to commemorate an important event in the early history of the country, let our first thoughts ascend to Him whose heavens are spread out as a glorious canopy above our heads. As our eyes look up to the everlasting hills which rise before us, let us remember that, in those dark and eventful days, the hand that lifted their eternal pillars to the clouds was the sole stay and support of our afflicted sires. While we contem- plate the lovely scene around us, once covered with the gloomy forest and the tangled swamps through which the victims of this day pursued their unsuspecting path to the field of slaughter, let us bow in gratitude to Him, beneath whose paternal care a little one has become a thousand, and a small one a strong nation. Let us bear in thankful recol- lection, that at the period when the sturdy limbs of the tree which now overshadows us, hung with nature's rich and verdant tapestry, were all folded up within their seminal germ, the thousand settlements of our beloved country, teem- ing with life and energy, were struggling with unimagined hardships for a doubtful existence, in a score of feeble plan- tations scattered through the hostile wilderness. It is not alone the genial showers of the spring and the native richness of the soil which have nourished the growth of this stately tree. The sod from which it sprung was moistened with the blood of brave men who fell for their country, and the ashes of peaceful dwellings are mingled with the consecrated earth. * Address delivered at Bloody Brook, in South Deerfield, September 30, 1835, in commemoration of the fall of the "Flower of Essex," at that spot, in King Philip's war, September 18, (O. S.,) 1675. (634) THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 635 [ri hke manner, it is not alone the wisdom and the courage, the piety and the virtue, of our fathers, not alone the pru- dence with which they laid the foundations of the state, to which we are indebted for its present growth arid pros- perity. We ought never to forget we ought this day especially to remember that it was in their sacrifices and trials, their heart-rending sorrows, their ever-renewed tribula- tions, that the corner stone of our privileges and blessings was laid. As I stand on this hallowed spot, my mind filled with the traditions of that disastrous day, surrounded by these natura memorials, impressed with the touching ceremonies we have just witnessed, the affecting incidents of the bloody scene crowd upon my imagination. This compact and prosperous village disappears, and a few scattered log cabins are seen, by the mind's eye, in the bosom of the primeval forest, cluster- ing for protection around the rude block-house in the centre. A cornfield or two has been rescued from the all-surrounding wilderness, and here and there the yellow husks are heard to rustle in the breeze that comes loaded with the mournful sighs of the melancholy pine woods. Beyond, the intermi- nable forest spreads, in every direction, the covert of the wolf, of the rattlesnake, of the savage ; and between its gloomy copses, what is now a fertile and cultivated meadow, stretches out a dreary expanse of unreclaimed morass. I look, I listen. All is still, solemnly, frightfully still. No voice of human activity or enjoyment breaks the dreary silence of nature, or mingles with the dirge of the woods and watercourses. All seems peaceful and still ; and yet there is a strange heaviness in the fall of the leaves in that wood which skirts the road ; there is an unnatural flitting in those shadows ; there is a plashing sound in the waters of that brook, which makes the flesh creep with horror. Hark ! it is the click of a gunlock from that thicket : no, it is a pebble that has dropped from the overhanging cliff upon the rock beneath. It is, it is the gleaming blade of a scalping- knife: no, it is a sunbeam, thrown off from that dancing ripple. It is, it is the red feather of a savage chief, peeping 636 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. from behind that maple-tree : no, it is a leaf which Septem- ber has touched with her many-tinted pencil. And now a distant drum is heard: yes, that is a sound of life, con- scious, proud life. A single fife breaks upon the ear, a stirring strain. It is one of the marches to which the stern warriors of Cromwell moved over the field at Naseby and Worcester. There are no loyal ears to take offence at a puritanical march in a transatlantic forest ; and hard by, at Hadley, there is a gray-haired fugitive, who followed the cheering strain, at the head of his division in the army of the great usurper. The warlike note grows louder ; I hear the tread of armed men. But I run before my story. Before we proceed to the details of the catastrophe, which forms the subject of this day's commemoration, let us con- sider, for a moment, the state of things at that time existing in New England, and the previous events of the war, of which this was so prominent an occurrence. Although the continent of America, when discovered by the Europeans, was in the possession of the native tribes, it was obviously the purpose of Providence that it should be- come the abode of civilization, the arts, and Christianity. How shall these blessings be introduced ? Obviously by no other process none other is practicable than an emigra- tion to the new-found continent from the civilized communi- ties of Europe. This is doubly necessary, not only as being the only process adequate to produce the desired end, but in order to effect another great purpose in the order of Provi- dence, namely, the establishment of a place of refuge for the victims of persecution, and the opening of a new field of action, where principles of liberty and improvement could be developed, without the restraints imposed on the work of reform, by long-established and inveterate abuses. There was, therefore, a moral necessity that the two races should be brought into contact in the newly-discovered region ; the one, ignorant, weak in every thing that belongs to intellectual strength, feebly redeeming the imperfections of the savage by the stern and cheerless virtues of the wil- derness ; the other, strong in his powerful arts, in his weapons THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 637 of destruction, in his capacity of combination ; strong in the intellectual and moral elevation of his character and purposes, the two thus separated by a chasm which seems all but impassable ! A fearful approach ; a perilous contiguity ! But how shall it be avoided ? Shall this fair continent, adequate to the support of civilized millions, on which Nature has bestowed her richest bounties, lie waste, the exclusive domain of the savage and the wild beast ? If not, how shall it be settled ? The age of miracles is past ; the emigrants must be brought hither, and sustained here, by the usual motives and impulses which operate on the minds of men. If things are left to second causes, the passion for adventure, the lust of power, the thirst for gold, will spur on the remorseless bands of Pizarro and Cortes. Prospects of politi- cal aggrandizement and commercial profit must actuate the planters of Virginia. The arm of spiritual persecution must drive out the suffering Puritan in search of a place of rest. In correspondence with the motives which prompt the sepa- rate expeditions or the individual leaders, will be the relations established with the natives. In Spanish America, a wild and merciless crusade will be waged against them ; they will be hunted by the war-horse and the bloodhound ; vast multi- tudes will perish ; the residue will be enslaved, their labor made a source of profit, and they will thereby be preserved from annihilation. In the Anglo-American settlements, trea- ties will be entered into, mutual rights acknowledged ; the artificial relations of independent and allied states will be established ; and, as the civilized race rapidly multiplies, the native tribes will recede, sink into the wilderness, and disap- pear. Millions of Mexicans, escaping the exterminating sword of the conquerors, subsist in a miserable vassalage to the present day : of the tribes that inhabited New England, not an individual of unmixed blood, and speaking the lan- guage of his fathers, remains. Was this an unavoidable consequence ? However deplor- able, there is too much reason to think that it was. We cannot perceive in what way the forest could have been cleared, and its place taken by the cornfield, without destroy- 638 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. ing the game ; in what way the meadows could be drained, and the beaver-dams broken down, without expelling their industrious little builders ; nor in what way the uncivilized man, living by the chase, and requiring a wide range of forest for his hunting-ground, destitute of arts and letters, belonging to a different variety of the species, speaking a different tongue, suffering all the disadvantages of social and intellectual inferiority, could maintain his place by the side of the swelling, pressing population, the diligence and dex- terity, the superior thrift, arts, and arms, and the seductive vices, of the civilized race. I will not say that imagination cannot picture a colonial settlement, where the emigrants should come in such num- bers, with such resources, with such principles, dispositions, and tempers, as instantly to form a kindly amalgamation with the native tribes, and, from the moment of setting foot on the new-found soil, commence the benign work of brother- hood and assimilation. I would not stint the resources, nor sound the depths, of godlike benevolence. But, in a practical survey of life on both sides, such a consummation seems impossible. The new comers are men. men of all tempers and characters. Their society may be formed on the plat- form of religion ; their principles may be pure, lofty, austere ; their dispositions peaceful ; their carriage mild and gentle ; but their judgments will be fallible, and they cannot be expected to rise far above the errors and prejudices of their age. Our fathers regarded the aboriginal inhabitants as heathen. They bestowed unwearied pains to Christianize them, and with much greater success than is generally sup- posed. Still the mass remained unconverted, and an ominous inference was drawn from the expulsion of the native races of Canaan. Scarcely, moreover, were the first colonists set- tled in Plymouth, when licentious adventurers followed in their train, who not only introduced among the Indian tribes the destructive vices of the Europeans, and furnished them with fire-arms and weapons of steel, but by acts of violence and injustice gave provocation for their use. Then, too, we must look on the Indian, not with the eye THE BAT1LE OF BLOODY BROOK. 639 of sentiment and romance, but of truth and reality. Seen as he really is, he stands low in the scale of humanity. His vices were not all learned of the white settlers. Before the European was known on the continent, he was perpetually engaged in exterminating conflicts with the neighboring tribes. His merciless mode of waging war, the horrors of the scalping-knife and the stake, are of his own invention. Within the bosom of his tribe he leads an indolent, a squalid, and a cheerless existence, alternating from repletion to starva- tion; and between tribe and tribe he is unacquainted with those restraints of international law, which do so much to soften the horrors of war. The superior race approaches, jealousies arise, acts of violence are committed, and war rages. It is, in its nature, a destructive war, for the savage rarely gives quarter. Is the blame all on one side ? Does reason require us to trace all the evils to the corruption of the civilized race ? to suppose that no malignant feelings, no acts of barbarity, no outbreakings of savage rage or savage fraud, are to be laid to the account of the untutored child of nature ? There are other considerations which must not be over- looked in this connection. When we contemplate the dense population of the civilized settlements that now line the coast, and fill the interior regions adjacent to it, we must not conclude that vast aboriginal tribes, once occupying them, were exterminated to make room for the white race. This portion of the continent was very thinly peopled on the arri- val of our fathers. There never were any large towns inhabited by the natives of New England like those which were found by the Spaniards, in Mexico and Peru. It was probably not practicable, without the aid of the arts of civil- ized life, without the use of iron, and without agriculture, to support a numerous population in so cold a climate, on a comparatively hard soil, covered with forests. In addition to this, the tribes had been greatly reduced by a pestilence a few years before the commencement of the plantation at Plymouth. A constant and uniform statement was made by the Indians to the first settlers, that an epidemic disease ran through this part of New England a few years before the 640 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. landing of the Pilgrims, baffling their simple skill, and in some cases reducing large clans almost to the point of ex tinction. In this state of things, the settlers at Plymouth, and after- wards those of Massachusetts, landed on the coast ; and fifty- five years a period longer than that which has elapsed since the peace of 1783 passed away before the com- mencement of hostilities, in either colony, between the set- tlers and the natives. It is true that, in 1636 and 1637, the Pequot war broke out in Connecticut, a war in which all the New England colonies took part. But the Pequots were themselves an invading race. They had dispossessed the tribes which previously occupied the eastern portion of Con- necticut ; and when the war with the English commenced, the remnants of those tribes, cut off or subjugated, promptly seized the opportunity of revenging the injuries inflicted on themselves by the great war-chiefs of the Pequots. In the disastrous campaigns of 1636 and 1637, in which that tribe was destroyed, one thousand persons are said to have perished ; and the warriors of Sassacus were computed at seven hun- dred. As every able-bodied savage was a warrior, the whole number of his tribe could not have exceeded three thousand, a large community to be subjugated by their own or others' wrong, but a small number to lay claim to the perpetual reser- vation of a region like Connecticut. There is still another circumstance of very considerable interest in reference to the melancholy fate of the New Eng- land Indians. To barbarous tribes, who stand as low in the scale of humanity as the Pequots and Narragansetts, the Wam- panoags or the Nipmucks, who live by hunting and fishing, with scarce any thing that can be called agriculture, and wholly without arts, the removal from one tract of country to another is comparatively easy. A change of abode implies no great sacrifice of private interest or social prosperity. No fixed property is destroyed, no pursuits deserted not to be resumed, no venerable establishments broken up, none of the great and costly structures of a civilized state of society abandoned. Nor is this all. The extreme simplicity of sav- THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 641 age life favors the amalgamation of tribes, forced by circum- stances upon each other. As far as we can trace the relations of the North American tribes with each other, both before and since the settlement of the country, an absorption of the fragments of once powerful communities by more prosperous tribes, is constantly going on. In no part of the human fam- ily is war so much the business of life, as among the native races of our continent ; nowhere are wars more sanguinary and fatal ; and in proportion to the simplicity of their mode of life, is the ease with which the feeble remnants of once powerful but subjugated tribes are swallowed up by the vic- tor, or forced into union with neighboring friendly clans. On the same principle, with the advance of civilization, the native tribes receded. No wars, literally of extermination, at any time were waged. The battles were stern, decisive, and, to those engaged in them, fatal. Prisoners of war were reduced to slavery, and sometimes sold into foreign bondage. But no general and indiscriminate slaughter took place. The num- ber of Indians slain in the early wars, I take to have been not much greater than that of the whites, in the same period. The great majority of the Indians did what the settlers of Deerfield, Hadley, Northampton, and Springfield, were at times tempted to do, and would have done, had the war con- tinued ; they fell back upon their kindred. As the English colonists, if the fortune of war had been adverse, would have gone back from the Connecticut River to the coast, the In- dians, that hunted and fished on the river, retired before the advancing settlements, united themselves with their brethren farther west and north, supplying the waste of their continual wars, and easily incorporated among them.* * It can be scarcely necessary to state, that considerations of this kind have no applicability to the questions recently agitated in the Unit- ed States, relative to the rights acquired by Indian tribes, under solemn compacts, voluntarily entered into by the United States, at the instance and for the benefit of an individual state, and for considerations deemed advantageous, at the time, both to the individual state and the general government. The author's opinion of those questions was fully expressed, in the House of Representatives of the United States, in 1830 and 1831. VOL. I. 81 642 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. I dwell the more on this point, because it is one of vague reproach to the memory of our fathers ; and yet I am not sure that, unless we deny altogether the rightfulness of set- tling the continent, unless we maintain that it was from the origin unjust and wrong to introduce the civilized race into America, and that the whole of what is now our happy and prosperous country ought to have been left, as it was found, the abode of barbarity and heathenism, I am not sure that any different result could have taken place. Had the colonists and the Indians been men without interests, passions, and vices, collisions and bloodshed might have been avoided ; but, taking white men as they are, and savages as they are, looking on the one hand, not for faultless perfection of counsel or policy, on the part of governments or individ- uals, but allowing for the occasional operation of human weaknesses in both, and expecting of the Indians that they will display towards the new settlers the violence and barbar- ity which mark their intercourse with each other, and which belong to uncivilized heathen, I am unable to see that there was on either side great matter of reproach. On the contrary, I see much deserving of the highest commendation, in the humanity and forbearance of the colonists, and in the hospitality and magnanimity of the Indian chiefs, who for an entire generation maintained the peace of the country, in the new and critical condition of affairs in which they were placed.* The colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts both commenced their settlements in amity with the Indians. They were welcomed, in both cases, by the tribes with which they came immediately in contact. It was the estab- lished policy of the colonists to purchase the Indian title to the land, at a price regarded as satisfactory by those who dis- posed of it, and, by prohibiting private purchases, to protect the natives from being overreached by adventurers. I believe that it was with perfect justice, as it evidently was with entire sincerity, that Governor Winslow declared, in the * See some judicious remarks on this subject in Mr Upham's Artil lery Election Sermon, delivered June, 1832, p. 8. THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 643 spring of 1676, that "before these present troubles broke out, the English did not possess one foot of land in the col- ony of Plymouth, but what was fairly obtained by honest purchase of the Indian proprietors." But, however justly we may defend the memory of our fathers against the charge of wantonly pursuing a policy of extermination, it is not the less certain that the march of events was well calculated to excite the jealousy of the native tribes. Every day's experience of the growing power of the whites gave force to this jealousy ; and as war is the mad resort to which, in the blindness of his passions, savage as well as civilized man instinctively flies, for the redress of all sorts of public injuries, real or threatened, it was perfectly natural that the bold and impatient chiefs of the native races should at length begin to contemplate the possibility of arresting by force the progress of the dangerous intruders. They had learned the use of fire-arms, and obtained a supply of them from the French in Nova Scotia, the Dutch in New York, and from illicit traders in New England. It required but little discernment to perceive that, in every thing but the undefined resources of civilized communities, (the extent of which they had not yet learned fully to appreciate,) the Indians greatly overbalanced the colonists. In addition to the general sense of encroachment and danger, it is easy to conceive that a thousand individual provocations, on both sides, must have taken place between parties like the whites and the Indians ; causing a great amount of irritation and bitterness between the two races. Their relations towards each other reached their crisis in 1675. Thirty-eight years had elapsed since the destruction of Sassacus and his Pequots. A race of young warriors had grown up, on whom the lesson of wisdom taught by that catastrophe was lost. As has been just observed, they had learned to use and repair the guns, which they had obtained from various quarters. They were well acquainted with the numbers and habits of the settlers, and had found out that the proportion of non-combatants to fighting men was vastly greater than among themselves. The Narragansetts and 644 THE BATTLE, OF BLOODY BROOK. Pokanokets were now the most powerful of the New Eng land tribes. They occupied the old colony of Plymouth and the state of Rhode Island. The latter was the tribe with which the settlers of Plymouth first entered into amica- ble relations, under their friendly chief Massasoit, and these relations remained unimpaired to his death. He was the unwavering friend of the settlers, and adhered with fidelity to the compact which he had formed with them, in the very infancy of the colony. Massasoit died about 1660. He left two sons, who, at their own request, and during their father's lifetime, received the English names of Alexander and Philip. Alexander was the elder, and exercised the authority of sachem on his father's death, not without sus- picion, how well founded it is now impossible to say, of entertaining hostile designs towards the colony. On his death, he was succeeded by his brother Philip, a person greatly the superior both of his elder brother and his father, in reach of policy, capacity, and vigor. With his accession to power in his tribe, the suspicion of unfriendly purposes towards the whites rapidly increased. The government of Plymouth colony entertained serious fears that he meditated mischief to the settlement. The government of Massachu- setts seems at first to have thought these fears without foun- dation. Under its mediation, an interview between the two parties was brought about in the meeting-house at Taunton, in 1671, the commissioners of Plymouth and Massachu- setts, and their armed attendants, being arrayed on one side of the church, and Philip and his chieftains on the other. In this conference, Philip made the submission which was required of him, renewed the compact with Plymouth, and agreed to give up his fire-arms. These measures, however they may have delayed the exe- cution of his projects, no doubt confirmed him, by the sense of new injury, in his ultimate design ; and from this period, he is supposed to have meditated the dangerous project of a union of all the tribes in New England against the colonists And here let us pause for a moment, to reflect on the re- spective condition and strength of the parties. Accustomed THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 645 to what we see around us of the power and resources of the United States, with only a fading tradition of the strength of the Indians, and with our minds habitually impressed with the essential superiority of the white race, we are in danger of greatly mistaking the relative strength of the par- ties. Very different was an Indian war, a century and a half ago, from those which are waged at the present day, in which, from the bosom of the overswarming population of the States, regiments of infantry, artillery, and dragoons are sent out, to trample down the enervated remnants of once warlike races, with the certainty, on both sides, if that force should fail, that another, twice as powerful, would instantly take its place. The population of New England at this period (1675) is not accurately known. It is conjecturally stated by Chalmers at one hundred and twenty thousand. But Dr Trumbull, by an accurate deduction from the known number of the militia of Connecticut, and the proportion it bore in the levies of the United Colonies, reduces it to one third of that amount, which I am inclined to think much nearer the truth. The whole interior of the country was unsettled. The region west of Connecticut was a pathless wilderness, and that portion of it now within the states of Massachusetts and Vermont was unoccupied even by savages. There were a few feeble settlements on the coasts of Maine and New Hampshire. In Massachusetts there were s small settlements at Westfield, Springfield, Northampton, Hadley, Hatfield, Deerfield, and North field ; some of them rather stations than settlements. After leaving the river to go to the east, Brookfield was the first settlement, and this, with Lancaster, was the only settlement in Worcester county. Medfield, Sudbury, Marlborough, Groton, Chelmsford, formed the frontier, and were all attacked by the Indians in the course of Philip's war. The danger of the settlements was so great, that all the male inhabitants were required to be armed ; and although the country was penetrated with the liveliest sense of peril, and numerous volunteers marched against the enemy, men, horses, and provisions were contin- ually called for, by the severest exercise of the power of impressment. 646 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. The numbers of the Indians are not more accurately known than those of the colonists. The warriors under the immediate command of Philip are supposed to have amounted to seven hundred. Those of the Narragansetts, who joined him in the course of the war, are estimated at two thousand. The tribes which occupied the central portions of the state, and the banks of the river, and who were drawn by Philip into the contest, cannot be estimated at less than seven or eight hundred more ; making the entire hostile force about thirty-five hundred. Many of the advantages of the contest were on the side of the Indians. War was their hereditary pursuit ; boldness and fortitude, the capacity of effort and fatigue, their chief virtues. The generation of colonists then on the stage was wholly unused to war. Thirty-eight years had passed since the conquest of the Pequots, and the military forces now raised were drawn, to a great extent, by conscription, from the various walks of industrious, peaceful life. The Indians had been in the habit of constant intercourse with the set tiers. Theyknew the position of their towns, and even ot their houses, fields, and places of worship. They knew the persons of the leading men ; and were able to choose the best place for an ambuscade, and the best time for an assault. Sundays and fast-days were the chosen times for an attack ; for then, observation had taught them, though the men went armed to " meeting," that the aged and the defenceless, the women and the children, were led, by the strong sense of religious duty, to venture abroad. On the other hand, the colonists had, of necessity, but a limited acquaintance with the haunts of the Indians, in the forests and the swamps. The Indians, though not as well furnished with arms, were better marksmen than the English. The state of the roads, and the nature of Indian warfare, excluded the use of artil- lery ; and the peculiar weapons of the savage, the toma- hawk and the scalping-knife, with the inhuman tortures inflicted on the prisoners, carried terrors to hearts unshaken by common perils. Caesar tells us that when, for the first time, he was about to come into conflict with the barbarous THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BKOOK. 647 Germans, a race which stood at about the same point, on the scale of civilization, as the North American Indians, many of the young officers who had followed him from Rome, panic-struck with the thought of a battle with the dreaded barbarians, sought excuses for asking a furlough ; and those whose pride forbade their quitting the army, hid themselves in their tents and wept. It is not to be wondered at, if the horrors of Indian warfare were felt by the young men of Massachusetts, who were dragged from the plough and the workshop, and forced to plunge into pathless woods and frightful swamps, in search of the ferocious savage. Both parties concentrated their strength, as for a decisive struggle. The confederation among the colonies, formed in 1643, of which defence against the Indians was the main object, had experienced some interruption, but was revived at the commencement of the war. A little more than half the troops raised in the United Colonies were apportioned 01, Massachusetts. Philip, on the other hand, had, as is sup- posed, for some years labored to effect a general confederacy of the Indian tribes. There are not wanting even sugges- tions, that he endeavored to rouse the native tribes as far south as Virginia ; but these suggestions are chiefly entitled to notice as indications of the opinion formed by the English writers of the reach of his policy and activity of his movements. I see in the contemporary accounts no proof of any such remote operations. But the events of the war showed that he had labored with success among all the Indians in New England, with the exception of the Mohe- gans, and that he narrowly failed to engage the Mohawks in the contest. It deserves remark, that in this fearful struggle for life and death, not a dollar nor a man was furnished by the mother country for the defence of the colonies. The designs of Philip were penetrated by his secretary, Sausamon, a converted Indian well acquainted with the Eng- lish language, and by this channel they were disclosed to the English. Sausamon was immediately after murdered on the ice on Middleborough Pond, by order of Philip, and the agency of some of his chief men. The murder took place 648 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. within the jurisdiction of Plymouth, and those concerned in it, three in number, were immediately brought to justice. This happened in the spring of 1675, and hastened the com- mencement of hostilities, which had been reserved by Philip for the following year. He was now compelled to plunge into the contest, without the aid of the Narragarisetts, who were not yet prepared. The Indians had a superstition, that the party which struck the first blow would be defeated. For this reason, they took pains, by repeated insults and threats, by killing their cattle, and plundering their houses, to bring on an actual commencement of hostilities, on the part of the settlers. Irritated by these provocations, an English- man at last fired at and mortally wounded an Indian. The alarm spread ; intelligence of the state of things reached Plymouth and Boston, and troops were put in motion. The Indians anticipated their arrival by an attack on the town of Swansea, on the twenty-fourth of June, 1675. The inhab- itants were fired upon, on their return from public worship, and ten were killed in different parts of the town on that day. Thus was the blow struck, and a war commenced, not in- ferior in magnitude, compared with the population of the parties engaged in it, to the revolutionary war ; nor of minor importance, if we contemplate the consequences, had the Indians prevailed. Among the romantic traits with which his biographers have adorned the character of Philip, they have described him as shedding tears, when told that his young men had begun the war. Fifty years after his fall, the neighboring inhabitants of Bristol, and the aged Indians who had survived the war, pointed out the spring where Philip was seated when he received the news of the tragedy dt Swansea, and wept at the thoughts of the destruction which impended over his race.* But the die was cast. Sorrowful or joyous, Philip roused himself, with all his energies, to the war. Retreating before the embodied forces of Plymouth and Massachusetts, his * Callendar's Sermon, p. 73. THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 649 warriors were divided into bands, and scattered along the frontier settlements, carrying terror and havoc before them. Swansea was destroyed, Taimton was attacked, Middle- borough and Dartmouth burned, and all Plymouth filled with alarm. Surrounded in a swamp at Pocasset, the iron grasp of Church almost upon him, the flames of Brookfield announce that the theatre of the war is changed, and thither the chieftain and his principal warriors repaired. From the smoking ashes of Brookfield the scene is shifted to Connecti- cut River ; and Hadley, Hatfield, and Deerfield, are in arms. While the Indians hovered about Brookfield, a considerable force from the eastern part of the' state, from Springfield, and Connecticut, was concentrated there, under the skilful com- mand of Major Willard. When the Indians disappeared from Brookfield, and showed themselves in this region, Major Wil- lard marched, with a part of his forces, to Hadley. Here the principal station of defence was assumed, and the companies of Captain Lothrop and Captain Beers, of Watertown, were left in garrison. Major Willard returned to the eastern part of the state, and the chief command devolved on Major Pynchon, of Springfield. The Indians, at Hadley, already in secret understanding with Philip, on his arrival in their neighborhood, threw off the mask. By professions of friendly intentions, they had obtained a supply of arms, and had been intrusted with the defence of a fort about a mile above Hat- field. The English received intelligence that they were preparing to desert the fort and join the enemy. Determined that they should not carry with them the weapons with which they had been furnished for the defence of the settle- ment, Captains Lothrop and Beers, with one hundred men, were sent to disarm them. The Indians had already fled in the night to Deerfield. Lothrop and Beers came up with them in the morning, in a swamp, a short distance south of the Sugar-loaf Hill, when an action ensued, in which ten of the English and twenty-six of the Indians were slain. This was on the twenty-fifth of August, (old style,) 1675. The first of September following was a day of alarm and blood. The woods from Hadley to Northfield were filled VOL. i. 82 650 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. with lurking bands of savages. Deerfield was attacked on that day, and many of the houses and barns in the settlement were burned. Hadley was assailed on the same day. It was a day observed as a fast by the church in that place. While the inhabitants were engaged in the religious services, the savages burst in upon the village. Although it was the prac- tice to go armed to church, yet, taken by surprise at the sudden inroad, the inhabitants were thrown into confusion. The savage foe rushes on ; the citizens are about to disperse and fly. At the moment of greatest confusion and danger, a venerable stranger appeared, of commanding aspect, clothed in black apparel, of unusual fashion, his hair white from age. With sword in hand, he places himself at the head of the flying inhabitants, encourages them to stand and resist the enemy, animates them at once by his example and his voice, disposes them in the most advantageous manner, fights valiantly at their head, and repulses the enemy. This done, he vanishes as promptly as he appeared. The superstitious Indians, not less than the devout and awe-struck English, believed it was an angel. The wish to conceal the place of refuge of the fugitives for a long time prevented an explana tion of the fact. In the course of time it was discovered to have been General Gofie, one of the judges who sat in the trial of Charles L, and who, taking refuge on this the very frontier of the British empire, with one of his colleagues, Whalley, had for many years lived in concealment in the house of Mr Russell, the minister at Hadley. The inhabitants of the settlements on the river, and indeed in the frontier towns generally, were obliged either wholly to confine themselves to the garrisoned houses, as they were called, or to flee to them on the first alarm, abandoning their homes and property to pillage and conflagration. On the day following the assaults on Deerfield and Hadley, a party went out from the garrison at Northfield, then called Squakeag, to work in the fields. Eight of their number were shot down by the invisible foe. Order had been already taken to remove the settlers from Northfield, it being considered too exposed a position. On the third of September, not having heard of THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 651 the tragedy of the preceding day, Captain Beers, of Water- lown, was despatched from Hadley, with a detachment of between thirty and forty mounted men, to bring off the inhabitants of Northfield. He passed in safety through the forest, which stretched along the eastern bank of the river, the tract of country now occupied by Sunderland, Montague, and Erving's grant. He had crossed Miller's river before he saw any traces of the enemy. Having passed the night about three miles from the place of his destination, on the morning of the fourth, they were attacked by a large body of Indians before they could regain their horses. Captain Beers and several men were killed at the commencement of the action. Attempting to reach their horses, twelve more fell ; a small remnant only found their way back to Hadley. On the following day, the fifth, Major Treat, who com- manded the Connecticut troops, was detached from Hadley, with a hundred men, to chastise the Indians. But they fled before the approach of a commanding force into the forest. The heads of Captain Beers's unfortunate men exposed on stakes where they fell, and their mangled bodies suspended from the trees, bore witness to the fatal issue of the battle. Major Treat continued his march without interruption, though his troops were fired upon by the concealed foe. and he him- self struck with a spent ball ; but no one was killed, and the inhabitants in garrison at Northfield were brought off in safety. On his way back, he fell in with Captain Appleton, who, in expectation of a serious conflict, had followed him from Hadley, with a reinforcement, and who was desirous of pursuing the enemy to his hiding-places. But it was judged inexpedient, without more accurate information of their numbers, to plunge into the forest, and the united force returned to Hadley. Northfield, thus abandoned by the in- habitants, was immediately burned by the Indians. Among the papers preserved in the public archives, I have found a list of the unfortunate men who were killed with Captain Beers, or made prisoners when he fell. He was an officer of sterling valor, a public servant of approved patriotism and usefulness. At the time when he fell, in the service of 652 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. his country, he was, as he had been for thirteen years, the representative of Watertown in the General Court, and deserves that his name should be held in honorable remem- brance. No monument the work of men's hands marks the spot where he fell ; but tradition has affixed his name to the plain where the death-struggle began, and to the moun- tain where he sunk before the barbarous foe, and will hand it down to the latest posterity. By the destruction of North field, Deerfield became the frontier settlement on Connecticut River, and as such was again doomed to bear the brunt of savage warfare. On the twelfth, as a portion of the inhabitants, twenty-two in num- ber, were passing from one of the garrisoned houses to attend worship in the other, they were fired upon, but no one was slain. The empty garrison house was set on fire, and one man left in it was heard of no more. Aid was despatched from Hadley, under Captain Lothrop, who, with the men at Deerfield, under Captain Appleton, engaged in an unsuccess- ful pursuit of the flying enemy. The master genius who guided them had taught them to carry on exclusively a war- fare of ambuscade and surprise. While these events occurred on Connecticut River, those parts of the country where the war broke out were compara- tively tranquil. No man had seen King Philip on Connecticut River; he constantly went disguised, even from his friends, and never passed the night twice in the same spot. He was known at this time to be in this neighborhood by the transfer of the war to this quarter, by the report of friendly Indians, who acted as spies, and by those who occasionally came in as deserters. In the following winter, Mrs Rowlandson, who was made prisoner at Lancaster, saw him frequently in this region. The terror of his name wrought powerfully on weaker minds ; and as he was never encountered in the field, nor identified among those exposed to the chances of war, the boldest began to regard him with something of that un- defined dread, inspired by an invisible and malignant spirit of evil, ranging the gloomy forest, lighting up the darkness of night by the blaze of peaceful hamlets, pointing the THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 653 death-volley, from the ambuscade, at the wayfarer and hus- bandman, and vanishing with the light of day, or at the approach of a powerful force. Having thus sketched the progress of the war in its prelimi- nary scenes, we are brought to the affecting tragedy, which is the more immediate object of this day's commemoration. The presence of Philip on the river made it necessary to establish a formidable force in some convenient position. Hadley, which had been selected for this purpose by Massachusetts, was adopted by the commissioners of the United Colonies as the most suitable place for the head-quarters of the little army. Small detachments were posted at the other settle- ments ; but here was concentrated the greater part of the troops assigned to this quarter. It of course became neces- sary to increase the supply of provisions at Hadley. A con- siderable quantity of wheat being preserved in stacks at Deerfield, it was deemed expedient to have it threshed, and brought down to Hadley. Captain Lothrop and his company volunteered to proceed to Deerfield, and protect the convoy. His march from Hadley was effected without interruption j the wheat was threshed, placed in eighteen wagons, with a portion of the effects of the inhabitants of Deerfield, disposed to remove, and the train moved down the road towards its destination. Captain Moseley, who had arrived 011 Connecti- cut River three days before, was at this time stationed with his company at Deerfield, and proposed, while Captain Loth- rop was on the march downward, to range the woods in search of the enemy. Moseley was a partisan of great skill and courage ; he had commanded a privateer in the West Indies. It is not im- probable that Captain Lothrop and his men, relying too much on Moseley's cooperation, proceeded without due caution. Having passed with safety through a level and closely- wooded country, well calculated for a surprise, and deeming themselves in some degree sheltered by the nature of the ground they had reached, the tradition is, that on their arrival at the spot near which we are now assembled, their vigilance relaxed. The forest that lines the narrow road, on which 654 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. they were marching, was hung with clusters of grapes ; and. as the wagons dragged through the heavy soil, it is not un- likely that the teamsters, and possibly a part of the company, may have dispersed to gather them. Such is the contempo- rary account. At this moment of fatal security, and just as they had reached the brook which winds through the village, a band of savages, outnumbering Captain Lothrop's com- pany ten to one, pours in upon them a murderous fire from their ambuscade on the right of the line of march. A con- siderable number drop at the first volley. The Indians spring from their covert upon the survivors, who, broken and scattered by the overwhelming attack, fly to the shelter of the forest, on the spot where we stand. Here ensued the death-struggle ; escape was impossible. The young men fled each to his tree, imitating the barbarous foe in his mode of warfare, and determined to sell their lives as dearly as pos- sible. But the enemy amounted to seven hundred ; the force of Captain Lothrop, weakened by the first fatal fire, fell below a tenth of that number. His men were conse- quently surrounded, singled out, shot down, crushed by over- whelming numbers, and finally sunk, one great and fearful sacrifice, to the tomahawk. Lothrop fell at the commence- ment of the action, " a godly and courageous commander : " the loss of their leader increased the confusion of the scene ; and, before its close, the whole company, with the exception of a few who escaped, was destroyed. The cruel fate of these unfortunate young men did not remain long unavenged. While the Indians were employed in mangling, scalping, and stripping the dying and the dead, Captain Moseley, who, as has been observed, was ranging the woods, hearing the report of musketry, hastened, by a forced march, to the relief of his brethren. The Indians, confiding in their superior numbers, taunted him as he advanced, and dared him to the contest. Moseley came on with firmness, repeatedly charged through them, and destroyed a large num- ber, with the loss on his side of but two killed and eleven wounded. His lieutenants, Savage and Pickering, greatly distinguished themselves on this occasion. He was, how- THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 655 ever, so greatly outnumbered, that, though he sustained the action from eleven o'clock till evening, he did not succeed in driving the enemy from the field. At this juncture, Major Treat arrived with a hundred soldiers, and sixty Mohegan Indians, and, joining his forces with Captain Moselev's, drove the enemy from the field of the hard-fought and murderous action. They fled across the brook/ about two miles to the westward, closely pursued by the American force, and here the action was probably suspended by the night. A quantity of bones, lately found in that quarter, is very probably the remains of the Indians who fell there at the close of the action. The united English force encamped for the night at Deer- field. They returned in the morning to bury the dead, and found a part of the Indians upon the field, stripping the bodies of the victims. These they quickly dispersed, and the re- mains of the brave young men, or some portion of them, were committed to the earth, near the spot which we have this day consecrated anew to their memory. A list of the brave men who fell with Lothrop, with the names of the towns to which they belonged, has been pre- served in the public archives.* They were fifty-nine in number, and three of Captain Moseley's shared the same fate. The accounts vary as to the number who escaped. Hubbard states them as not above seven or eight ; a letter written by Mr Cotton, five days after the event, reduces the number to two. A tradition still preserved at Newbury gives us the names of two out of three reputed survivors. An individual who died at Newbury, in the year 1824, at the age of ninety-seven, was well acquainted with Henry Bod- well and John Tappan, two of Captain Lothrop's soldiers. Bodwell was a man of great strength. His left arm was broken by a musket ball ; but, forcing his way with the but- end of his musket through a band of Indians, who endeav- ored to surround him, he got safe to Hadley. John Tappan crept into the channel of a watercourse, and drew the grass * See note at the end of this address. 656 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. and shrubs over his head.* The Indians passed near him repeatedly, but he was not discovered. The escape of a third, Robert Dutch, of Ipswich, was still more extraordinary. He received a musket shot in the head, was wounded by a tomahawk, stripped of his clothing, and left for dead. On the approach of Captain Moseley, he revived, and was rescued. The tidings of this disastrous day spread alarm and sorrow through the colony. Essex felt the bereavement in almost every family. The flower of her population her hopeful young men, "all culled out of the towns belonging to that county," called by the voice of duty, in the morning of life, to leave their homes and kindred, and encounter all the hor- rors of savage warfare was cut down. By the records of the ancient town of Newbury, it appears that, on the fifth of August, there were impressed, to go against the Indian enemy, nine men ; on the sixth, seven more ; on the twenty- seventh, seven more. From August fifth to September twenty-seventh, there were impressed, in the single town of Newbury, thirty men and forty-six horses facts that show the prodigious severity of the military service of the colony at that period, vastly greater than at any subsequent period in the history of the country. The catastrophe of the eighteenth of September the day we commemorate was the heaviest which had befallen the colony. " It was a sadder rebuke of Providence," says Dr Increase Mather, " than any thing that hitherto hath been," "a black and fatal day, wherein there were eight persons made widows, and six-and-twenty children made fatherless, and about sixty persons buried in one fatal grave. "f Time would fail me to recount in detail the succeeding incidents of the war ; but they ought not to be dismissed without an allusion. Deerfield was soon deserted by the * There is some reason to think that this tradition refers to another action in this neighborhood. f The spot has recently been identified by excavation, on the road- sidi!, directly in front of the house of Stephen Whitney, Esq., of South Deerfield. THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 657 inhabitants, and burned by the Indians. Springfield was next assaulted, and a considerable portion of it was sacked and burned. On the nineteenth of October, Hadley was again attacked by a powerful force, but by the vigorous and successful resistance of the troops, then under the chief com- mand of Captain Samuel Appleton, was rescued. A predatory warfare was kept up, during the rest of the Etutumn, on the remaining settlements on Connecticut River, but the storm of war was carried back to the place of its origin. The great Narragansett expedition, in which the combined forces of Massachusetts, Plymouth, and Connecticut, were placed under Governor Winslow, of Plymouth, as comrnander-in- chief, took place in December. On the nineteenth of that month, the great battle of Petaquamscot was fought, which, for the zeal with which the men, after a march of fifteen miles in a snow-storm, went into the action, the bravery with which it was fought, the destruction of the enemy, and the hardships endured by the troops, in a night march of eighteen miles, in the depth of winter, after the battle, has no parallel in our history. Six captains fell at the head of their com- panies. By this battle, the power of the Narragansetts was effectually broken. Among the plunder of the day were muskets which had belonged to Captain Lothrop's men. The Indians who escaped from the slaughter fled to the Nipmuck country. Winter gave no respite to this tremendous war. In Feb- ruary, Lancaster fell ; and, in appalling succession, Medfield, Weymouth, Groton, Warwick, Marlborough, Rehoboth, Prov- idence, Chelmsford, Sudbury, Scituate, Bridgewater, Plym- outh, and Middleborough, were assaulted, and wholly or in part destroyed before the middle of May. No period of the revolutionary war was, to the interior of any part of the United States, so disastrous. In May, from the lower part of the state the scene of action again shifted to Connecticut River. On the eighteenth of May, a large body of Indians, concen- trated at Deerfield. was surprised by an English force from the lower towns, and several hundreds were destroyed. The fortune of the day was unhappily clouded, at its close, by the VOL. i. 83 658 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. loss of Captain Turner, and a considerable number of men, On the twelfth of June, another furious attack was made on Hadley, but successfully resisted by the troops. Again the main body of the enemy disappeared from this region, and emerged in the Narragansett country. They were keenly pursued, and in the months of July and August sus- tained several Vigorous defeats. The tide of fortune turned at once. About a twelvemonth from the commencement of the war, the Indians became disheartened and spiritless, and made their submission in great numbers to the colonial governments. Philip still stood at bay. He had endeavored, by an arti- fice of cruel treachery, to enlist the Mohawks in the war. But his murderous fraud was discovered, and the Mohawks, instead of joining, swore enmity to him. He was accord- ingly driven back to the neighborhood of Mount Hope, and abandoned by the greater part of those whom he had so lately roused and united in the cause. On the second of August, he was surprised by Captain Church, a man who, if his sphere of action had equalled his intrepidity and skill, would have possessed a name in the world as distinguished as that of any of Napoleon's generals. One hundred and thirty of Philip's men were slain ; his wife and his son made prisoners. He him- self escaped. Some of the Indian prisoners said to Church, u You have now made Philip ready to die, for you have made nim as poor and as miserable as he used to make the English. You have now killed or taken all his relations, and this bout has almost broken his heart." He makes one more plunge into the swamps. An Indian, whose brother Philip had killed for proposing peace, discov- ered to Church the place of his concealment. This intrepid officer, with a few brave volunteers, is instantly at the spot. The swamp is invested under cover of darkness, and an Englishman and an Indian planted behind every tree, at the outlet. At break of day the attack commences. The ill- starred chieftain, who, hunted to his last retreat, had dropped asleep, started from a troubled dream, seized his gun, and, half naked, ran directly towards a tree, behind \v hich were THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 659 posted an Englishman and the very Indian whose brother he had killed. The Englishman's gun missed fire ; the Indian fires, and shoots the fallen chief through the heart. " He fell upon his face in the mud and water, with his gun beneath him." Such was the fate of Philip, which was immediately fol- lowed by a termination of the war in every quarter, except the eastern frontier. It proved highly disastrous to the im- mediate followers of Philip. Happy if the kindred tribes had learned wisdom from the fatal lesson ! Thus fell King Philip! ,The ground on which we stand is wet with the blood which flowed beneath the tomahawk of his young men ; and the darkness of night in these peaceful vales was often lighted up, in days of yore, by the flames of burning villages, kindled by his ruthless warriors. But that blood has sunk, not forgotten, but forgiven, into the ground. Havoc and dismay no longer stalk through these happy meadows ; and as we meet to-day to perform the simple and affecting rites of commemoration over the grave of the gallant victims of the struggle, let us drop a compassionate tear also for these the benighted children of the forest, the orphans of Provi- dence, whose cruelties have long since been expiated by their fate. It could not be expected of them to enter into the high counsels of Heaven. It was not for them dark, and uninstructed even in the wisdom of man to compre- hend the great design of Providence, of which their wilder- ness was the appointed theatre. It may well have exceeded their sagacity, as it baffles ours, that this benign work should so often have moved forward through pathways dripping with blood. Yes ! the savage fought a relentless war ; but he fought for his native land ; for the mound that covered the bones of his parents ; he fought for his squaw and pap- poose, no, I will not defraud them of the sacred names which our hearts understand, he fought for his wife and children. He would have been, not a savage, he would have been a thing, for which language has no name, for which neither human nor brute existence has a parallel, if 660 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. he had not fought for them. Why, the very wildcat, the wolf, will spring at the throat of the hunter, that enters his deri ; the bear, the catamount, will fight for his hollow tree. The Indian was a man, a degraded, ignorant savage, but a human creature ; ay, and he had the feelings of a man. President Mather, in relating the encounter of the first of August, 1676, the last but one of the war, says, " Philip hardly escaped with his life also. He had fled and left his %>eage behind him ; also his squaw and his son were taken captive, and are now prisoners at Plymouth. Thus hath God brought that grand enemy into great misery, before he quite destroy him. It must needs be bitter as death to him to lose his wife and only son, (for the Indians are marvel- lous fond and affectionate towards their children,) besides other relations, and almost all his subjects, and country also." And what was the fate of Philip's wife and his son ? This is a tale for husbands and wives, for parents and children. Young men and women, you cannot understand it. What was the fate of Philip's wife and child ? She is a woman, he is a lad. They did not surely hang them. No, that would have been mercy. The boy is the grandson, his mother the daughter-in-law, of good old Massasoit, the first and the best friend the English ever had in New England. Perhaps perhaps, now Philip is slain and his warriors scat- tered to the four winds they will allow his wife and son to go back the widow and the orphan to finish their days and sorrows in their native wilderness. They were sold into slavery, West Indian slavery ! an Indian princess and her child sold from the cool breezes of Mount Hope, from the wild freedom of a New England forest, to gasp under the lash beneath the blazing sun of the tropics ! * " Bitter as death ; " ay, bitter as hell ! Is there any thing, I do not say in the range of humanity, is there any thing animated that would not struggle against this? Is * Morton's New England Memorial, Judge Davis's edition, p. 353, &c. THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 661 there I do not say a man who has ever looked in the face of his sleeping child ; a woman "that has given suck, and knows How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks her;" is there a dumb beast, a brute creature, a thing of earth or of air, the lowest in creation, so it be not wholly devoid of that mysterious instinct which binds the generations of beings together, that will not use the arms, which nature has given it, if you molest the spot where its fledglings nestle, where its cubs are crying for their meat ? Then think of the country for which the Indians fought ! Who can blame them ? As Philip looked down from his seat on Mount Hope, that glorious eminence, that " throne of royal state, which far Outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind, Or where the gorgeous east, with richest hand, Showers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold," as he looked down and beheld the lovely scene which spread beneath, at a summer sunset, the distant hill-tops glittering as with fire, the slanting beams streaming along the waters, the broad plains, the island groups, the majestic forest, could he be blamed if his heart burned within him as he beheld it all passing, by no tardy process, from beneath his control into the hands of the stranger ? As the river chief- tains the lords of the waterfalls and the mountains ranged this lovely valley, can it be wondered at if they beheld with bitterness the forest disappearing beneath the settler's axe ? the fishing place disturbed by his saw-mills ? Can we not fancy the feelings with which some strong- minded savage, the chief of the Pocomtuck Indians, who should have ascended the summit of the Sugar-loaf Mountain, (rising as it does before us, at this moment, in all its loveli- ness and grandeur,) in company with a friendly settler, con- templating the progress already made by the white man, and marking the gigantic strides with which he was advancing into the wilderness, should fold his arms and say, " White 662 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. man, there is eternal war between me and thee ! I quit not the land of my fathers but with my life. In those woods, where I bent my youthful bow. I will still hunt the deer ; over yonder waters I will still glide unrestrained in my bark canoe. By those dashing waterfalls I will still lay up my winter's store of food ; on these fertile meadows I will still plant my corn. Stranger, the land is mine ! I understand not these paper rights. I gave not my consent when, as thou sayest, these broad regions were purchased for a few bawbles of my fathers. They could sell what was theirs ; they could sell no more. How could my father sell that which the Great Spirit sent me into the world to live upon? They knew not what they did. The stranger came, a timid sup- pliant, few and feeble, and asked to lie down on the red man's bear-skin, and warm himself at the red man's fire, and have a little piece of land to raise corn for his women and children ; and now he is become strong, and mighty, and bold, and spreads out his parchment over the whole, and says, it is mine. Stranger! there is not room for us both. The Great Spirit has not made us to live together. There is poi- son in the white man's cup; the white man's dog barks at the red man's heels. If I should leave the land of my fathers, whither shall I fly? Shall I go to the south, and dwell among the graves of the Pequots ? Shall I wander to the west, the fierce Mohawk the man-eater is my foe. Shall I fly to the east, the great water is before me. No, stranger ; here I have lived, and here will I die ; and if here thou abidest, there is eternal war between me and thee. Thou hast taught me thy arts of destruction ; for that alone 1 thank thee ; and now take heed to thy steps, the red man is thy foe. When thou goest forth by day, my bullet shall whistle by thee ; when thou liest down at night, my knife is at thy throat. The noonday sun shall not discover thy enemy, and the darkness of midnight shall not protect thy rest. Thou shalt plant in terror, and I will reap in blood ; thou shalt sow the earth with corn, and I will strew it with ashes ; thou shalt go forth with the sickle, and I will follow after with the scalping-knife ; thou shalt build, and I will THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 663 burn, till the white man or the Indian shall cease from the land. Go thy way for this time in safety ; but remember, stranger, there is eternal war between me and thee ! " 'Such were the feelings which influenced the native tribes at the period of King Philip's war. But let not our generous sympathies with them betray us into injustice towards our fathers. The right by which the Pilgrims settled down upon the soil was better than that by which a great part of the native tribes (as far as we know) laid claim to the possession of it. The tribes along the coast were originally, and at no remote period, conquerors. The fathers of Massachusetts and Plymouth, of Rhode Island and Connecticut, purchased the land of those who claimed it, and often paid for it more than once. They purchased it for a consideration trifling to the European, but valuable to the Indian. An iron hatchet, or a kettle, or a piece of woollen cloth, was worth a square mile of unproductive forest. There is no overreaching in giving but little for that which, in the hands of the original proprietors, is worth nothing. Then, as to the conduct of the settlers towards the savages, pains, as wearied as unsuc- cessful, were taken to instruct them in the arts of civilized life and Christianity. Since the death of the apostle Paul, a nobler, truer, and warmer spirit than John Eliot never lived ; and, taking the state of the country, the narrowness of the means, the rudeness of the age, into consideration, the history of the Christian church does not contain an example of reso- lute, untiring, successful labor, superior to that of translating the entire Bible into the language of the native tribes of Massachusetts ; a labor performed, not in the flush of youth, nor within the luxurious abodes of academic ease, but under the constant burden of his duties as a minister and a preacher, and at a time of life when the spirits begin to flag. Eliot was ever forty-two years of age when he began to learn the Indian tongue and preach to the Indian tribes. " It is in- credible," says his biographer, " how much time, toil, and hardship he underwent in the prosecution of his undertaking ; how many weary days and nights rolled over him; how many tiresome journeys he endured, and how many terrible 664 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. dangers he experienced. If you would know what he felt and what carried him through all, take it in his own words, in a letter to Mr Winslow : ' I have not been dry, night nor day, from the third day of the week to the sixth ; but so travelled, ?nd at night pull off my boots, wring my stockings, on with them again, and so continue. But God steps in and helps.' " These were the circumstances under which the herculean labor was performed of translating the entire Scrip- tures into a dialect, probably as remote from the analogy of our own tongue and as unmanageable as any spoken on earth. That the settlers made as near an approach to the spirit ol the gospel, in their dealings with the Indians, as the frailty of our nature admits, under the circumstances in which they were placed, is clear, I think, from the circumstances already stated. The commencement of the death-struggle was post- poned longer than, in the nature of human affairs, might have been expected ; and when it came on, he must have a sensi- bility of a morbid cast, whose sympathies are enlisted but on one side. I hope I compassionate the sufferings of the In- dian ; Heaven forbid I should be indifferent to the sufferings of the fathers. When Philip's war began, the coast of New England, to a depth of eighteen or twenty miles, and the banks of Connecticut River to the northern boundary of this state, were the abode of some of the most interesting com- munities ever gathered in the world. I know not, in human history or on the face of the globe, a period or a spot where dearer hopes and richer prospects for the cause of liberty arid truth were ever centred. It was the second generation of settlers; the wrong of the first comers (if wrong it was) could not be laid at their door. They formed a group of Christian settlements, a family of youthful republics; a germ of civilization, enclosing all that now spreads around : all that for our children and a late posterity shall rise on this foundation, as the acorn encloses the trunk and branches of the future oak. Can the philosopher, the statesman, the Christian, be indifferent to their, fate " Can he contemplate with calmness the approach of the catastrophe that is to THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 665 sweep these springing towns, and cities, and villages, the elements of future states, the cradles of rising millions, into ruin ? Can we, who have received this precious heritage, coolly weigh in the scales of a fastidious criticism the coun- sels and acts by which our fathers, in the convulsive struggle for life, waged the war of extermination that burst forth around them? That war was brief; but its havoc and its terrors, worse than death, no tongue can describe. Six hun- dred of the inhabitants, the greatest part of whom were the very flower of the country, fell in battle, or were murdered, oftentimes with circumstances of the most revolting cruelty. This is the number officially reported at the time as falling. We may well suppose that half as many more fell victims in the progress of the war. It was a loss of her children to New England, not inferior to twenty thousand at the present day. What havoc for a single year ! Twelve towns in Massachu- setts, Plymouth, and Rhode Island, were utterly destroyed ; and many more were greatly injured. Six hundred buildings, mostly dwelling-houses, are known to have been burned ; and, according to Dr Trumbull's calculation, one man in eleven of the arms-bearing population was killed, and one house in eleven laid in ashes. Then contemplate the details of Indian warfare ; they are almost too much for the heart of man to bear, even as a tale that 'is told: what must they not have been to those who were daily and nightly exposed to them ! It is almost enough to make one faint to read the simple narrative of Mrs Row- landson, the wife of the minister at Lancaster. It was mid- winter, about five months after the catastrophe of Bloody Brook, her husband was absent in Boston, soliciting the means of defence, when her dwelling-house, which had been fortified as a garrison, was assaulted by several hundred Indians. The house is soon set on fire, to compel the wretched inmates to flee ; and yet the bullets, pouring in upon them like hail, threaten instant death if they come out. Driven at last by the flames, they venture out, men, women, and children. Many instantly fall, under the death-shower. Mrs Rowlandson, with a child of six years old in her arms. VOL. i. 84 666 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. is shot in the side by a bullet, which has first passed through her child's body ; her other children are torn from her. She is compelled to join the flight of the savages into the wilder- ness, scantily clad, unprotected against the wintry winds and the night frosts, her mortally wounded child in her arms, per- petually moaning, Mother, I shall die, I shall die; passing a night in the month of February on the snow, with her dying child in her arms, parched with fever, crying for water, which no one would bring it ; without food for herself, from Wednesday night till Saturday night, till the child died. " 1 cannot but take notice," says the heart-broken mother, " how, at another time, I could not bear to be in a room with a dead person ; but now the case is changed. I must and could lie down with my dead babe all the night after. In the morning, when they understood that my child was dead, they sent me home to my master's wigwam. I went to take up my dead chrtld in my arms, to carry it, but they bid me let it alone. There was no resisting, but go I must, and leave it." There are other horrors in that narrative which I dare not repeat. The cruel captivity of Mr Williams, the minister of Deerfield, is familiar to you all. It makes the flesh creep to read it. It was not till the year 1759, till Quebec fell, that the settlements on Connecticut River were safe from the incursions of the savage foe. There are men, I presume, living in Deerfield, who remember the time when it was not safe from their incursions. No, fellow-citizens, let us not, in our commiseration of the fate of the native tribes, be insensible to the sufferings, or unjust to the memory, of our fathers. Their claims to our reverence, as patriots and men, must not be disparaged nor qualified. In this day of abundance and prosperity, while we are reaping the fruits of their labors and sufferings, it is easy to point out their errors, and rebuke their faults. But are we sure that the great work which was given them to do, and which they did, could be performed by different men, and in a different way ? I speak not tauntingly, but in sober earnest, when I say, that it is one thing, in an age like this, of peace and prosperity, in an age of high refinement, and THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BROOK. 667 enlightened public sentiment, when the alarms of a savage frontier are no longer felt, the hardships of an infant settle- ment forgotten, the austerities of a struggling sect have passed away, and the dreary delusions of a benighted age are exploded, calmly, from our happy firesides, to theorize on the means by which the settlement of the country could have been effected ; and a very different thing, in times of persecution and terror, for men, pursued by the vengeance of an incensed hierarchy, thrown upon a dreary and savage coast, beset not merely by the savage tribes of the wilder- ness, but, as they believed, by the legions of darkness, to go forth into the forest, and encounter its hardships. We revolt at some of the features of the method in which the war was carried on, by the Moseleys and Churches, and other stern partisans of the day ; but they were made of those elements which seem demanded in the composition of a suc- cessful chieftain, in such a warfare ; and I am not sure thai men of milder tempers, or softer frames, would have beer, adequate to the work of a winter's campaign, through frozer swamps, where it was necessary to creep on your face, through the morass, till you came within sight of the enemy, and then, after the first discharge, spring up and close with him, in the death-grapple. In the account of one of his conflicts with a savage on the ice, Church states, that " the Indian seized him fast by the hair of his head, and endeav- ored, by twisting, to break his neck. But though Mi- Church's wounds had somewhat weakened him, and the Indian a stout fellow, yet he held him in play, and twisted the Indian's neck as well, and, taking the advantage, while they hung by each other's hair, gave him notorious bunts in the face, with his head. But in the. heat of the scuffle, they heard the ice break with somebody coming apace to them. Church concluded there was help for one or the other of them, but was doubtful which of them must now receive the fatal blow. Anon, somebody comes up, who proves to be a friendly Indian. Without speaking a word, he felt them out, (for it was so dark he could not distinguish them by sight, but one was clothed, and the other naked.) and feeling where 668 THE BATTLE OF BLOODY BUOOK. Mr Church's hands were fastened in the Indian's hair, with one blow settled his hatchet in between them, and thus ended the strife." Such was the price at which victory was to be bought ; the horrors that waited on defeat and captivity must not here be told. If we turn our thoughts to the grand design with which America was colonized, and the success with which, under Providence, that design has been crowned, I own I find it difficult to express myself in terms of moderation. When I compare the New England of the present day with the New England of our fathers, a century and a half ago ; the New England on which this morning's sun rose, with that of the day we commemorate ; when I consider this abundance and prosperity, these fertile fields, these villages, crowded with a population instinct with activity, hope, and enjoyment ; when I look at the hills, cultivated, or covered with flocks, to their summits, and only so much of the forest remaining as minis- ters to the convenience and use of man ; when I see the roads, the bridges, the canals, the railways, which spread their busy network over the face of the country, quickening into intensity the exchanges of business, and the intercourse of men; when I see the intellectual, moral, and religious growth of the community, its establishments, its institutions, its social action, and reflect that all this life, enjoyment, and plenty are placed under the invisible protection of the public peace ; when I consider, further, that what we see, and hear, and feel, and touch, of all these blessings, is perhaps the smallest part of them ; that, by the force of our example, by the blessed sympathy of light and truth, the glad tidings of political, of moral, and religious revival are destined to spread to distant regions, and flow down to the remotest generations, out of the living fountain which has been opened here, my heart melts within me for grief, that they, the high- souled and long-suffering fathers, they, the pioneers of the mighty enterprise, they, the founders of the glorious tem- ple, must die before the sight of all these blessings. O. that we could call them back, to see the work of their hands ! O. that our poor strains of gratitude could penetrate theii THE BATTLE OF BLOOD* BROOK. 669 tombs ! O that they could rise up in the midst of us, the hopeful ; the valiant, the self-devoted, and graciously accept these humbh offices of commemoration! But though they tasted not the fruit, they shall not lose the praise of their sacrifice and toils. I read in your eyes, that they shall not be defrauded of their renown. This great assembly bears witness to the emotions of a grateful posterity. Yon simple monument shall rise a renewed memorial of their names. On this sacred spot, where they poured out their life-blood in defence of that heritage which has descended to us, we this day solemnly bring our tribute of gratitude. Ages shall pass away ; the stately tree which overshadows us shall wither and fall, and we, who are now gathered beneath it, shall mingle with the honored dust we eulogize ; but the "Flower of Essex " shall bloom in undying remembrance ; and with every century, these rites of commemoration shall be repeat- ed, as the lapse of time shall continually develop, in richer abundance, the fruits of what was done and suffered by our fathers. JN T E . SEE PAGE 655. I HAVE been favored with the following list of those who fell with Cap tain Lothrop, kindly furnished me by Rev. Joseph B. Felt, whose profound acquaintance with the antiquities of Massachusetts is known to the public. Mr Felt observes, that the names in the list are given by him as spelled in the original, which appears to be from the hand of an illiterate writer. The list was copied, two or three years ago, from a paper in the secretary of state's office, in Boston. List of those slain at Bloody Brook, 18th September, (O. S.,) 1675. Capt. Thomas Laythrop, Sergeant Thomas Smith, Samuel Stevens, John Hobs, Ipswich; Daniel Button, Salem ; John Harriman, Thomas Bayley, Eze- kiel Sawier, Salem ; Jacob Kilborne, Thomas Manning, Ipswich ; Jacob Wayn- writt, Ipswich; Benjamin Roper, do.; John Bennett, Manchester; Thos. Mentor, Caleb Kimball, Ipsioich; Thomas Hobs, Ipswich; Robert Homes, Edward Traske, Salem; Richard Lambert, Salem; Josiah Dodge, Beverly; Peter Woodberry, Beverly; Joseph Balch, Beverly; Samuel Whitteridge, Ipswich; William Dew, Serg't Samuel Stevens, Samuel Crumpton, John Plum, Thomas Buckley, Salem ; George Ropes, Sakm ; Joseph King, Thomas Alexander, Francis Friende, Abel Oseph, John Litheate, Samuel Hudson, Adam Clarke, Ephraim Fearah, Robert Wilson, Salem; Stephen Welman, Salem; Benjamin Farnell, Solomon Alley, Lynn; John Merrik, Robert Hius- dall, Samuel Hinsdall, Barnabas Hinsdall, John Hinsdall, Joseph Gilbert, John Allin, Manchester ; Joshua Carter, Manchester ; John Barnard, James Tufts, Salem ; Jonathan Plympton, Philip Barsham, Thomas Weller, William Smeade, Zebediah Williams, Eliakim Marshall, James Mudge, George Cole, . Three of Captain Moseley's men, when he went to relieve Captain Loth- rop, were killed : only two of their names are legible Peter Barren and John Gates. The same day two were killed at Northampton, Praiswer Turner, Uzacaboy Shackspeer. END OF VOL. I. (670) University of California Library Los Angeles This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. Phone Renewals 310/825-9188 JUNO? 1Mb Form L9- ri I PLEA DO NOT REMOVE THIS BOOK CARDS -^LIBRARY University Research Library o ^ 0) 01