Chapter XIV: Preface (12)

In this instance, we can be at no loss for these. This land, sir, is full of the monuments of his genius. His memory is as imperishable as American history itself, for he was one of those who made it. Sir, he belonged to that marked class who are the men of their century; for it was his rare good fortune not only to have been endowed with the capacity to do great things, but to have enjoyed the opportunities of achieving them. I know, sir, it has been said and deplored, that he wanted some of the advantages of an early education; but it, perhaps, has not been remembered that, in many respects, he enjoyed such opportunities for mental training as can rarely fall to the lot of man. He had not a chance to learn so much from books, but he had such opportunities of learning from men as few have ever enjoyed. Sir, it is to be remembered that he was reared at a time when there was a state of society, in the commonwealth which gave him birth, such as has never been seen there before nor since. It was his early privilege to see how justice was administered by a Pendleton and a Wythe, with the last of whom he was in the daily habit of familiar intercourse. He had constant opportunities to observe how forensic questions were managed by a Marshall and a Wickham. He was old enough, too, to have heard and to have appreciated the eloquence of a Patrick Henry, and of George Keith Taylor. In short, sir, he lived in a society in which the examples of a Jefferson, and a Madison, and a Monroe, were living influences, and on which the setting sun of a Washington cast the mild effulgence of its departing rays.

He was trained, too, as has been well said by the senator from Michigan, [Mr. Cass,] at a period when the recent revolutionary struggle had given a more elevated tone to patriotism, and imparted a higher cast to public feeling and to public character. Such lessons were worth, perhaps, more to him than the whole encyclopedia of scholastic learning. Not only were the circumstances of his early training favorable to the development of his genius, but the theatre upon which he was thrown, was eminently propitious for its exercise. The circumstances of the early settlement of Kentucky, the generous, daring, and reckless character of the people――all fitted it to be the theatre for the display of those commanding qualities of heart and mind, which he so eminently possessed. There can be little doubt but that those people and their chosen leader exercised a mutual influence upon each other; and no one can be surprised that, with his brave spirit, and commanding eloquence, and fascinating address, he should have led not only there, but elsewhere.

I did not know him, Mr. President, as you did, in the freshness of his prime, or in the full maturity of his manhood. I did not hear him, sir, as you have heard him, when his voice roused the spirit of his countrymen for war――when he cheered the drooping, when he rallied the doubting through all the vicissitudes of a long and doubtful contest. I have never seen him, sir, when, from the height of the chair, he ruled the House of Representatives by the energy of his will, or when upon the level of the floor he exercised a control almost as absolute, by the mastery of his intellect. When I first knew him, his sun had a little passed its zenith. The effacing hand of time had just begun to touch the lineaments of his manhood. But yet, sir, I saw enough of him to be able to realize what he might have been in the prime of his strength, and in the full vigor of his maturity. I saw him, sir, as you did, when he led the ‘opposition’ during the administration of Mr. Van Buren. I had daily opportunities of witnessing the exhibition of his powers during the extra session under Mr. Tyler’s administration. And I saw, as we all saw, in a recent contest, the exhibition of power on his part, which was most marvellous in one of his years.

Mr. President, he may not have had as much of analytic skill as some others, in dissecting a subject. It may be, perhaps, that he did not seek to look quite so far ahead as some who have been most distinguished for political forecast. But it may be truly said of Mr. Clay, that he was no exaggerator. He looked at events through neither end of the telescope, but surveyed them with the natural and the naked eye. He had the capacity of seeing things as the people saw them, and of feeling things as the people felt them. He had, sir, beyond any other man whom I have ever seen, the true mesmeric touch of the orator――the rare art of transferring his impulses to others. Thoughts, feelings, emotions, came from the ready mould of his genius, radiant and glowing, and communicated their own warmth to every heart which received them. His, too, was the power of wielding the higher and intenser forms of passion with a majesty and an ease, which none but the great masters of the human heart can ever employ. It was his rare good fortune to have been one of those who form, as it were, a sensible link, a living tradition which connects one age with another, and through which one generation speaks its thoughts and feelings, and appeals to another. And, unfortunate is it for a country, when it ceases to possess such men, for it is to them that we chiefly owe the capacity to maintain the unity of the great Epos of human history, and preserve the consistency of political action.

Sir, it may be said that the grave is still new-made which covers the mortal remains of one of those great men who have been taken from our midst, and the earth is soon to open to receive another. I know not whether it can be said to be a matter of lamentation, so far as the dead are concerned, that the thread of this life has been clipped when once it had been fully spun. They escape the infirmities of age, and they leave an imperishable name behind them. The loss, sir, is not theirs, but ours; and a loss the more to be lamented that we see none to fill the places thus made vacant on the stage of public affairs. But it may be well for us, who have much more cause to mourn and to lament such deaths, to pause amidst the business of life for the purpose of contemplating the spectacle before us, and of drawing the moral from the passing event. It is when death seizes for its victims those who are, by ‘a head and shoulders, taller than all the rest,’ that we feel most deeply the uncertainty of human affairs, and that ‘the glories of our mortal state are shadows, not substantial things.’ It is, sir, in such instances as the present that we can best study by the light of example the true objects of life, and the wisest ends of human pursuit.

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Mr. HALE.――Mr. President: I hope I shall not be considered obtrusive, if on this occasion, for a brief moment, I mingle my humble voice with those that, with an ability that I shall neither attempt nor hope to equal, have sought to do justice to the worth and memory of the deceased, and at the same time appropriately to minister to the sympathies and sorrows of a stricken people. Sir, it is the teaching of inspiration that ‘no man liveth and no man dieth unto himself.’

There is a lesson taught no less in the death than in the life of every man――eminently so in the case of one who has filled a large space and occupied a distinguished position in the thoughts and regard of his fellow-men. Particularly instructive at this time is the event which we now deplore, although the circumstances attending his decease are such as are calculated to assuage rather than aggravate the grief which it must necessarily cause. His time had fully come. The three score and ten marking the ordinary period of human life had for some years been passed, and, full of years and of honors, he has gone to his rest. And now, when the nation is marshalling itself for the contest which is to decide ‘who shall be greatest,’ as if to chasten our ambition, to restrain and subdue the violence of passion, to moderate our desires and elevate our hopes, we have the spectacle of one who, by the force of his intellect and the energy of his own purpose, had achieved a reputation which the highest official honors of the Republic might have illustrated, but could not have enhanced, laid low in death――as if, at the very outset of this political contest, on which the nation is now entering, to teach the ambitious and aspiring the vanity of human pursuit and end of earthly honor. But, sir, I do not intend to dwell on that moral which is taught by the silent lips and closed eye of the illustrious dead, with a force such as no man ever spoke with; but I shall leave the event, with its silent and mute eloquence, to impress its own appropriate teachings on the heart.

In the long and eventful life of Mr. Clay, in the various positions which he occupied, in the many posts of public duty which he filled, in the many exhibitions which his history affords of untiring energy, of unsurpassed eloquence, and of devoted patriotism, it would be strange indeed if different minds, as they dwell upon the subject, were all to select the same incidents of his life, as preëminently calculated to challenge admiration and respect.

Sir, my admiration――ay, my affection for Mr. Clay――was won and secured many years since, even in my school-boy days――when his voice of counsel, encouragement, and sympathy, was heard in the other hall of this capitol, in behalf of the struggling colonies of the southern portion of this continent, who, in pursuit of their inalienable rights, in imitation of our own forefathers, had unfurled the banner of liberty, and, regardless of consequences, had gallantly rushed into that contest where ‘life is lost, or freedom won.’ And again, sir, when Greece, rich in the memories of the past, awoke from the slumber of ages of oppression and centuries of shame, and resolved

‘To call her virtues back, and conquer time and fate’――

there, over the plains of that classic land, above the din of battle and the clash of arms, mingling with the shouts of the victors and the groans of the vanquished, were heard the thrilling and stirring notes of that same eloquence, excited by a sympathy which knew no bounds, wide as the world, pleading the cause of Grecian liberty before the American congress, as if to pay back to Greece the debt which every patriot and orator felt was her due. Sir, in the long and honorable career of the deceased, there are many events and circumstances upon which his friends and posterity will dwell with satisfaction and pride, but none which will preserve his memory with more unfading lustre to future ages than the course he pursued in the Spanish, American, and Greek revolutions.

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Mr. CLEMENS.――Mr. President: I should not have thought it necessary to add any thing to what has already been said, but for a request preferred by some of the friends of the deceased. I should have been content to mourn him in silence, and left it to other tongues to pronounce his eulogy. What I have now to say shall be brief――very brief.

Mr. President, it is now less than three short years ago since I first entered this body. At that period it numbered among its members many of the most illustrious statesmen this republic has ever produced, or the world has ever known. Of the living, it is not my purpose to speak; but in that brief period, death has been busy here; and, as if to mark the feebleness of human things, his arrows have been aimed at the highest, the mightiest of us all. First, died Calhoun. And well, sir, do I remember the deep feeling evinced on that occasion by him whose death has been announced here to-day, when he said: “I was his senior in years――nothing else. In the course of nature I ought to have preceded him. It has been decreed otherwise; but I know that I shall linger here only a short time, and shall soon follow him.” It was genius mourning over his younger brother, and too surely predicting his own approaching end.

He, too, is now gone from among us, and left none like him behind. That voice, whose every tone was music, is hushed and still. That clear, bright eye is dim and lustreless, and that breast, where grew and flourished every quality which could adorn and dignify our nature, is cold as the clod that soon must cover it. A few hours have wrought a mighty change――a change for which a lingering illness had, indeed, in some degree, prepared us; but which, nevertheless, will still fall upon the nation with crushing force. Many a sorrowing heart is now asking, as I did yesterday, when I heard the first sound of the funeral bell――

“And is he gone?――the pure of the purest,
The hand that upheld our bright banner the surest,
Is he gone from our struggles away?
But yesterday lending a people new life,
Cold, mute, in the coffin to-day.”

Mr. President, this is an occasion when eulogy must fail to perform its office. The long life which is now ended is a history of glorious deeds too mighty for the tongue of praise. It is in the hearts of his countrymen that his best epitaph must be written. It is in the admiration of a world that his renown must be recorded. In that deep love of country which distinguished every period of his life, he may not have been unrivalled. In loftiness of intellect, he was not without his peers. The skill with which he touched every chord of the human heart may have been equalled. The iron will, the unbending firmness, the fearless courage, which marked his character, may have been shared by others. But where shall we go to find all these qualities united, concentrated, blended into one brilliant whole, and shedding a lustre upon one single head, which does not dazzle the beholder only because it attracts his love and demands his worship?

I scarcely know, sir, how far it may be allowable, upon an occasion like this, to refer to party struggles which have left wounds not yet entirely healed. I will venture, however, to suggest, that it should be a source of consolation to his friends that he lived long enough to see the full accomplishment of the last great work of his life, and to witness the total disappearance of that sectional tempest which threatened to whelm the republic in ruins. Both the great parties of the country have agreed to stand upon the platform which he erected, and both of them have solemnly pledged themselves to maintain unimpaired the work of his hands. I doubt not the knowledge of this cheered him in his dying moments, and helped to steal away the pangs of dissolution.

Mr. President, if I knew any thing more that I could say, I would gladly utter it. To me, he was something more than kind, and I am called upon to mingle a private with the public grief. I wish that I could do something to add to his fame. But he built for himself a monument of immortality, and left to his friends no task but that of soothing their own sorrow for his loss. We pay to him the tribute of our tears. More we have no power to bestow. Patriotism, honour, genius, courage, have all come to strew their garlands about his tomb; and well they may, for he was the peer of them all.

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Mr. COOPER.――Mr. President: It is not always by words that the living pay to the dead the sincerest and most eloquent tribute. The tears of a nation, flowing spontaneously over the grave of a public benefactor, is a more eloquent testimonial of his worth and of the affection and veneration of his countrymen, than the most highly-wrought eulogium of the most gifted tongue. The heart is not necessarily the fountain of words, but it is always the source of tears, whether of joy, gratitude, or grief. But sincere, truthful, and eloquent, as they are, they leave no permanent record of the virtues and greatness of him on whose tomb they are shed. As the dews of heaven falling at night are absorbed by the earth, or dried up by the morning sun, so the tears of a people, shed for their benefactor, disappear without leaving a trace to tell to future generations of the services, sacrifices, and virtues of him to whose memory they were a grateful tribute. But as homage paid to virtue is an incentive to it, it is right that the memory of the good, the great, and noble of the earth should be preserved and honored.

The ambition, Mr. President, of the truly great, is more the hope of living in the memory and estimation of future ages than of possessing power in their own. It is this hope that stimulates them to perseverance; that enables them to encounter disappointment, ingratitude, and neglect, and to press on through toils, privations, and perils to the end. It was not the hope of discovering a world, over which he should himself exercise dominion, that sustained Columbus in all his trials. It was not for this he braved danger, disappointment, poverty, and reproach. It was not for this he subdued his native pride, wandered from kingdom to kingdom, kneeling at the feet of princes, a suppliant for means to prosecute his sublime enterprise. It was not for this, after having at last secured the patronage of Isabella, that he put off in his crazy and ill-appointed fleet into unknown seas, to struggle with storms and tempests, and the rage of a mutinous crew. It was another and nobler kind of ambition that stimulated him to contend with terror, superstition, and despair, and to press forward on his perilous course, when the needle in his compass, losing its polarity, seemed to unite with the fury of the elements and the insubordination of his crew in turning him back from his perilous but glorious undertaking. It was the hope which was realized at last, when his ungrateful country was compelled to inscribe, as an epitaph on his tomb, ‘Columbus has given a New World to the Kingdoms of Castile and Leon,’ that enabled him, at first, to brave so many disappointments, and at last, to conquer the multitude of perils that beset his pathway on the deep. This, sir, is the ambition of the truly great――not to achieve present fame, but future immortality. This being the case, it is befitting here to-day to add to the life of Henry Clay the record of his death, signalized as it is by a nation’s gratitude and grief. It is right that posterity should learn from us, the contemporaries of the illustrious deceased, that his virtues and services were appreciated by his country, and acknowledged by the tears of his countrymen poured out upon his grave.

The career of Henry Clay was a wonderful one. And what an illustration of the excellence of our institutions would a retrospect of his life afford! Born in an humble station, ♦without any of the adventitious aids of fortune by which the obstructions on the road to fame are smoothed, he rose not only to the most exalted eminence of position, but likewise to the highest place in the affections of his countrymen. Taking into view the disadvantages of his early position, disadvantages against which he had always to contend, his career is without a parallel in the history of great men. To have seen him a youth, without friends or fortune, and with but a scanty education, who would have ventured to predict for him a course so brilliant and beneficent, and a fame so well deserved and enduring? Like the pine, which sometimes springs up amidst the rocks on the mountain side, with scarce a crevice in which to fix its roots, or soil to nourish them, but which, nevertheless, overtops all the trees of the surrounding forest, Henry Clay, by his own inherent, self-sustaining energy and genius, rose to an altitude of fame almost unequalled in the age in which he lived. As an orator, legislator, and statesman, he had no superior. All his faculties were remarkable, and in remarkable combination. Possessed of a brilliant genius and fertile imagination, his judgment was sound, discriminating, and eminently practical. Of an ardent and impetuous temperament, he was nevertheless persevering and firm of purpose. Frank, bold, and intrepid, he was cautious in providing against the contingencies and obstacles which might possibly rise up in the road to success. Generous, liberal, and entertaining broad and expanded views of national policy, in his legislative course he never transcended the limits of a wise economy.

But, Mr. President, of all his faculties, that of making friends and attaching them to him was the most remarkable and extraordinary. In this respect, he seemed to possess a sort of fascination, by which all who came into his presence were attracted towards, and bound to him by ties which neither time nor circumstances had power to dissolve or weaken. In the admiration of his friends was the recognition of the divinity of intellect; in their attachment to him a confession of his generous personal qualities and social virtues.

Of the public services of Mr. Clay, the present occasion affords no room for a sketch more extended than that which his respected colleague [Mr. Underwood] has presented. It is, however, sufficient to say, that for more forty years he has been a prominent actor in the drama of American affairs. During the late war with England, his voice was more potent than any other in awakening the spirit of the country, infusing confidence into the people, and rendering available the resources for carrying on the contest. In our domestic controversies, threatening the peace of the country and the integrity of the Union, he has always been first to note danger, as well as to suggest the means of averting it. When the waters of the great political deep were upheaved by the tempest of discord, and the ark of the Union, freighted with the hopes and destinies of freedom, tossing about on the raging billows, and drifting every moment nearer to the vortex which threatened to swallow it up, it was his clarion voice, rising above the storm, that admonished the crew of impending peril, and counselled the way to safety.

But, Mr. President, devotedly as he loved his country, his aspirations were not limited to its welfare alone. Wherever freedom had a votary, that votary had a friend in Henry Clay; and in the struggle of the Spanish colonies for independence he uttered words of encouragement which have become the mottoes on the banners of freedom in every land. But neither the services which he has rendered his own country, nor his wishes for the welfare of others, nor his genius, nor the affection of friends, could turn aside the destroyer. No price could purchase exemption from the common lot of humanity. Henry Clay, the wise, the great, the gifted, had to die; and his history is summed up in the biography which the Russian poet has prepared for all, kings and serfs:

* * * * ‘Born, living, dying,
Quitting the still shore for the troubled wave,
Struggling with storm-clouds, over shipwrecks flying,
And casting anchor in the silent grave.’

But though time would not spare him, there is still this of consolation: he died peacefully and happy, ripe in renown, full of years and of honours, and rich in the affections of his country. He had, too, the unspeakable satisfaction of closing his eyes whilst the country he had loved so much and served so well was still in the enjoyment of peace, happiness, union, and prosperity――still advancing in all the elements of wealth, greatness, and power.

I know, Mr. President, how unequal I have been to the apparently self-imposed task of presenting, in an appropriate manner, the merits of the illustrious deceased. But if I had remained silent on an occasion like this, when the hearts of my constituents are swelling with grief, I would have been disowned by them. It is for this reason――that of giving utterance to their feelings as well as of my own――that I have trespassed on the time of the senate. I would that I could have spoken fitter words; but such as they are, they were uttered by the tongue in response to the promptings of the heart.

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Mr. SEWARD.――Mr. President: Fifty years ago, Henry Clay, of Virginia, already adopted by Kentucky, then as youthful as himself, entered the service of his country, a representative in the unpretending legislature of that rising state; and having thenceforward, with ardor and constancy, pursued the gradual paths of an aspiring change through halls of congress, foreign courts and executive councils, he has now, with the cheerfulness of a patriot, and the serenity of a Christian, fitly closed his long and arduous career, here in the senate, in the full presence of the republic, looking down upon the scene with anxiety and alarm, not merely a senator, like one of us who yet remain in the senate-house, but filling that character which, though it had no authority of law, and was assigned without suffrage, Augustus Cæsar nevertheless declared was above the title of Emperor, _Primus inter Illustres_――the Prince of the Senate.

Generals are tried, Mr. President, by examining the campaigns they have lost or won, and statesmen by reviewing the transactions in which they have been engaged. Hamilton would have been unknown to us, had there been no constitution to be created; as Brutus would have died in obscurity, had there been no Cæsar to be slain.

Colonization, Revolution, and Organization――three great acts in the drama of our National Progress――had already passed when the Western Patriot appeared on the public stage. He entered in that next division of the majestic scenes which was marked by an inevitable rëaction of political forces, a wild strife of factions and ruinous embarrassments in our foreign relations. This transition stage is always more perilous than any other in the career of nations, and especially in the career of Republics. It proved fatal to the Commonwealth in England. Scarcely any of the Spanish-American states have yet emerged from it; and more than once it has been sadly signalized by the ruin of the republican cause in France.

The continuous administration of Washington and John Adams had closed under a cloud which had thrown a broad, dark shadow over the future; the nation was deeply indebted at home and abroad, and its credit was prostrate. The revolutionary factions had given place to two inveterate parties, divided by a gulf which had been worn by the conflict in which the Constitution was adopted, and made broader and deeper by a war of prejudices concerning the merits of the belligerents in the great European struggle that then convulsed the civilized world. Our extraordinary political system was little more than an ingenious theory, not yet practically established. The union of the states was as yet only one of compact; for the political, social, and commercial necessities to which it was so marvelously adapted, and which, clustering thickly upon it, now render it indissoluble, had not then been broadly disclosed, nor had the habits of acquiescence and the sentiments of loyalty, always slow of growth, fully ripened. The bark that had gone to sea, thus unfurnished and untried, seemed quite certain to founder by reason of its own inherent frailty, even if it should escape unharmed in the great conflict of nations which acknowledged no claims of justice and tolerated no pretensions of neutrality. Moreover, the territory possessed by the nation was inadequate to commercial exigencies and indispensable social expansion; and yet no provision had been made for enlargement, nor for extending the political system over distant regions, inhabited or otherwise, which must inevitably be acquired. Nor could any such acquisition be made, without disturbing the carefully-adjusted balance of powers among the members of the confederacy.

These difficulties, Mr. President, although they grew less with time and by slow degrees, continued throughout the whole life of the statesman whose obsequies we are celebrating. Be it known, then, and I am sure that history will confirm the instruction, that conservatism was the interest of the nation, and the responsibility of its rulers, during the period in which he flourished. He was ardent, bold, generous, and even ambitious; and yet, with a profound conviction of the true exigencies of the country, like Alexander Hamilton, he disciplined himself and trained a restless nation, that knew only self-control, to the rigorous practice of that often humiliating conservatism which its welfare and security in that particular crisis so imperiously demanded.

It could not happen, sir, to any citizen to have acted alone, nor even to have acted always the most conspicuous part in a trying period so long protracted. Henry Clay, therefore, shared the responsibilities of government with not only his proper contemporaries, but also survivors of the Revolution, as well as also many who will succeed himself. Delicacy forbids the naming of those who retain their places here, but we may without impropriety recall among his compeers a senator of vast resources and inflexible resolve, who has recently withdrawn from this chamber, but I trust not altogether from public life, (Mr. Benton); and another, who, surpassing all his contemporaries within his country, and even throughout the world, in proper eloquence of the forum, now in autumnal years for a second time dignifies and adorns the highest seat in the executive council, (Mr. Webster.) Passing by these eminent and noble men, the shades of Calhoun, John Quincy Adams, Jackson, Monroe, and Jefferson, rise up before us――statesmen whose living and local fame has ripened already into historical and world-wide renown.

Among geniuses so lofty as these, Henry Clay bore a part in regulating the constitutional freedom of political debate; establishing that long-contested and most important line which divides the sovereignty of the several states from that of the states confederated; asserting the right of neutrality, and vindicating it by a war against Great Britain, when that just but extreme measure became necessary; adjusting the terms on which that perilous yet honorable contest was brought to a peaceful close; perfecting the army and the navy, and the national fortifications; settling the fiscal and financial policy of the government in more than one crisis of apparently threatened revolution; asserting and calling into exercise the powers of the government for making and improving internal communications between the states; arousing and encouraging the Spanish-American colonies on this continent to throw off the foreign yoke, and to organize governments on principles congenial to our own, and thus creating external bulwarks for our own national defence; establishing equal and impartial peace and amity with all existing maritime powers; and extending the constitutional organization of government over all the vast regions secured in his lifetime by purchase or by conquest, whereby the pillars of the republic have been removed from the banks of the St. Mary to the borders of the Rio Grande, and from the margin of the Mississippi to the Pacific coast. We may not yet discuss here the wisdom of the several measures which have thus passed in review before us, nor of the positions which the deceased statesman assumed in regard to them, but we may without offence dwell upon the comprehensive results of them all.

The Union exists in absolute integrity, and the republican system is in complete and triumphant development. Without having relinquished any part of their individuality, the states have more than doubled already, and are increasing in numbers and political strength and expansion more rapidly than ever before. Without having absorbed any state, or having even encroached on any state, the Confederation has opened itself so as to embrace all the new members who have come, and now, with capacity for further and indefinite enlargements, has become fixed, enduring, and perpetual. Although it was doubted only half a century ago whether our political system could be maintained at all, and whether, if maintained, it could guarantee the peace and happiness of society, it stands now confessed by the world the form of government not only most adapted to Empire, but also most congenial with the constitution of Human Nature.

When we consider that the nation has been conducted to this haven, not only through stormy seas, but altogether, also, without a course and without a star; and when we consider, moreover, the sum of happiness that has already been enjoyed by the American people, and still more the influence which the great achievement is exerting for the advancement and melioration of the condition of mankind, we see at once that it might have satisfied the highest ambition to have been, no matter how humbly, concerned in so great transaction.

Certainly, sir, no one will assert that Henry Clay in that transaction performed an obscure or even a common part. On the contrary, from the day on which he entered the public service until that on which he passed the gates of death, he was never a follower, but always a leader; and he marshalled either the party which sustained or that which resisted every great measure, equally in the senate and among the people. He led where duty seemed to him to indicate, reckless whether he encountered one president or twenty presidents, whether he was opposed by factions or even by the whole people. Hence it has happened, that although that people are not yet agreed among themselves on the wisdom of all, or perhaps of even any of his great measures, yet they are nevertheless unanimous in acknowledging that he was at once the greatest, the most faithful, and the most reliable of their statesmen. Here the effort at discriminating praise of Henry Clay, in regard to his public policy, must stop in this place, even on this sad occasion which awakens the ardent liberality of his generous survivors.

But his personal qualities may be discussed without apprehension. What were the elements of the success of that extraordinary man? You, sir, knew him longer and better than I, and I would prefer to hear you speak of them. He was indeed eloquent――all the world knows that. He held the keys to the hearts of his countrymen, and he turned the wards within them with a skill attained by no other master.

But eloquence was nevertheless only an instrument, and one of many that he used. His conversation, his gesture, his very look, was persuasive, seductive, irresistible. And his appliance of all these was courteous, patient and indefatigable. Defeat only inspired him with new resolution. He divided opposition by his assiduity of address, while he rallied and strengthened his own bands of supporters by the confidence of success which, feeling himself, he easily inspired among his followers. His affections were high, and pure, and generous, and the chiefest among them was that which the great Italian poet designated as the charity of native land. And in him that charity was an enduring and overpowering enthusiasm, and it influenced all his sentiments and conduct, rendering him more impartial between conflicting interests and sections than any other statesman who has lived since the Revolution. Thus with very great versatility of talent and the most catholic equality of favor, he identified every question, whether of domestic administration or foreign policy, with his own great name, and so became a perpetual Tribune of the people. He needed only to pronounce in favor of a measure or against it, here, and immediately popular enthusiasm, excited as by a magic wand, was felt, overcoming all opposition in the senate chamber.

In this way he wrought a change in our political system, that I think was not foreseen by its founders. He converted this branch of the legislature from a negative position, or one of equilibrium between the executive and the house of representatives, into the active ruling power of the republic. Only time can disclose whether this great innovation shall be beneficent, or even permanent.

Certainly, sir, the great lights of the senate have set. The obscuration is not less palpable to the country than to us, who are left to grope our uncertain way here, as in a labyrinth, oppressed with self-distrust. The times, too, present new embarrassments. We are rising to another and a more sublime stage of natural progress,――that of expanding wealth and rapid territorial aggrandizement. Our institutions throw a broad shadow across the St. Lawrence, and, stretching beyond the valley of Mexico, it reaches even to the plains of Central America; while the Sandwich Islands and the shores of China recognise its renovating influence. Wherever that influence is felt, a desire for protection under those institutions is awakened. Expansion seems to be regulated, not by any difficulties of resistance, but by the moderation which results from our own internal constitution. No one knows how rapidly that restraint may give way. Who can tell how far or how fast it ought to yield? Commerce has brought the ancient continents near to us, and created necessities for new positions――perhaps connections or colonies there――and with the trade and friendship of the elder nations, their conflicts and collisions are brought to our doors and to our hearts. Our sympathy kindles, our indifference extinguishes the fire of freedom in foreign lands. Before we shall be fully conscious that a change is going on in Europe, we may find ourselves once more divided by that eternal line of separation that leaves on the one side those of our citizens who obey the impulses of sympathy, while on the other are found those who submit only to the counsels of prudence. Even prudence will soon be required to decide whether distant regions, East and West, shall come under our own protection, or be left to aggrandize a rapidly spreading and hostile domain of despotism.

Sir, who among us is equal to these mighty questions? I fear there is no one. Nevertheless, the example of Henry Clay remains for our instruction. His genius has passed to the realms of light, but his virtues still live here for our emulation. With them there will remain also the protection and favor of the Most High, if by the practice of justice and the maintenance of freedom we shall deserve it. Let, then, the bier pass on. With sorrow, but not without hope, we will follow the revered form that it bears to its final resting place; and then, when that grave opens at our feet to receive such an inestimable treasure, we will invoke the God of our fathers to send us new guides, like him that is now withdrawn, and give us wisdom to obey their instructions.

* * * * *

Mr. JONES, of Iowa.――Mr. President: Of the vast number who mourn the departure of the great man whose voice has so often been heard in this hall, I have peculiar cause to regret that dispensation which has removed him from among us. He was the guardian and director of my collegiate days; four of his sons were my collegemates and my warm friends. My intercourse with the father was that of a youth and a friendly adviser. I shall never cease to feel grateful to him――to his now heart-stricken and bereaved widow and children, for their many kindnesses to me during four or five years of my life. I had the pleasure of renewing my acquaintance with him, first, as a delegate in congress, while he was a member of this body from 1835 to 1839, and again in 1848, as a member of this branch of congress; and during the whole of which period, some eight years, none but the most kindly feeling existed between us.

As an humble and unimportant senator, it was my fortune to coöperate with him throughout the whole of the exciting session of 1849–’50――the labor and excitement of which is said to have precipitated his decease. That coöperation did not end with the accordant vote on this floor, but, in consequence of the ♦unyielding opposition to the series of measures known as the ‘compromise,’ extended to many private meetings held by its friends, at all of which Mr. Clay was present. And whether in public or private life, he every where continued to inspire me with the most exalted estimate of his patriotism and statesmanship. Never shall I forget the many ardent appeals he made to senators, in and out of the senate, in favor of the settlement of our then unhappy sectional differences.

Immediately after the close of that memorable session of congress, during which the nation beheld his great and almost superhuman efforts upon this floor to sustain the wise counsels of the ‘Father of his Country,’ I accompanied him home to Ashland, at his invitation, to revisit the place where my happiest days had been spent, with the friends who there continued to reside. During that, to me, most agreeable and instructive journey, in many conversations he evinced the utmost solicitude for the welfare and honor of the republic, all tending to show that he believed the happiness of the people and the cause of liberty throughout the world depended upon the continuance of our glorious Union, and the avoidance of those sectional dissensions which could but alienate the affections of one portion of the people from another. With the sincerity and fervor of a true patriot, he warned his companions in that journey to withhold all aid from men who labored, and from every cause which tended, to sow the seeds of disunion in the land; and to oppose such, he declared himself willing to forego all the ties and associations of mere party.

At a subsequent period, sir, this friend of my youth, at my earnest and repeated entreaties, consented to take a sea voyage from New York to Havana. He remained at the latter place a fortnight, and then returned by New Orleans to Ashland. That excursion by sea, he assured me, contributed much to relieve him from the sufferings occasioned by the disease which has just terminated his eventful and glorious life. Would to Heaven that he could have been persuaded to abandon his duties as a senator, and to have remained during the past winter and spring upon that island of Cuba! The country would not now, perhaps, have been called to mourn his loss.

In some matters of policy connected with the administration of our general government, I have disagreed with him, yet the purity and sincerity of his motives I never doubted; and as a true lover of his country, as an honorable and honest man, I trust his example will be reverenced and followed by the men of this, and of succeeding generations.

* * * * *

Mr. BROOKE.――Mr. President: As an ardent, personal admirer and political friend of the distinguished dead, I claim the privilege of adding my humble tribute of respect to his memory, and of joining in the general expression of sorrow that has gone forth from this chamber. Death, at all times, is an instructive monitor as well as a mournful messenger; but when his fatal shaft hath stricken down the great in intellect and renown, how doubly impressive the lesson that it brings home to the heart that the grave is the common lot of all――the great leveller of all earthly distinctions! But at the same time we are taught that in one sense the good and great can never die; for the memory of their virtues and their bright example will live through all coming time in an immortality that blooms beyond the grave. The consolation of this thought may calm our sorrow; and, in the language of one of our own poets, it may be asked:

‘Why weep ye, then, for him, who having run
The bound of man’s appointed years, at last,
Life’s blessings all enjoyed, life’s labors done,
Serenely to his final rest has pass’d;
While the soft memory of his virtues yet
Lingers, like twilight hues when the bright sun has set?’

It will be doing no injustice, sir, to the living or the dead to say, that no better specimen of the true American character can be found in our history than that of Mr. Clay. With no adventitious advantages of birth or fortune, he won his way by the efforts of his own genius to the highest distinction and honour. Ardently attached to the principles of civil and religious liberty, patriotism was with him both a passion and a sentiment――a passion that gave energy to his ambition, and a sentiment that pervaded all his thoughts and actions, concentrating them upon his country as the idol of his heart. The bold and manly frankness in the expression of his opinions which always characterized him, has often been the subject of remark; and in all his victories it may be truly said he never ‘stooped to conquer.’ In his long and brilliant political career, personal considerations never for a single instant caused him to swerve from the strict line of duty, and none have ever doubted his deep sincerity in that memorable expression to Mr. Preston, ‘Sir, I had rather be right than be President.’

This is not the time nor occasion, sir, to enter into a detail of the public services of Mr. Clay, interwoven as they are with the history of the country for half a century; but I cannot refrain from adverting to the last crowning act of his glorious life――his great effort in the thirty-first congress for the preservation of the peace and integrity of this great republic, as it was this effort that shattered his bodily strength, and hastened the consummation of death. The Union of the states, as being essential to our prosperity and happiness, was the paramount proposition in his political creed, and the slightest symptom of danger to its perpetuity filled him with alarm, and called forth all the energies of his body and mind. In his earlier life he had met this danger and overcome it. In the conflict of contending factions it again appeared; and coming forth from the repose of private life, to which age and infirmity had carried him, with unabated strength of intellect, he again entered upon the arena of political strife, and again success crowned his efforts, and peace and harmony were restored to a distracted people. But, unequal to the mighty struggle, his bodily strength sank beneath it, and he retired from the field of his glory to yield up his life as a holy sacrifice to his beloved country. It has well been said that peace has its victories as well as war; and how bright upon the page of history will be the record of this great victory of intellect, of reason, and of moral suasion, over the spirit of discord and sectional animosities!

We this day, Mr. President, commit his memory to the regard and affection of his admiring countrymen. It is a consolation to them and to us to know that he died in full possession of his glorious intellect, and, what is better, in the enjoyment of that ‘peace which the world can neither give nor take away.’ He sank to rest as the full-orbed king of day, unshorn of a single beam, or rather like the planet of morning, his brightness was but eclipsed by the opening to him of a more full and perfect day――

‘No waning of fire, no paling of ray,
But rising, still rising, as passing away.
Farewell, gallant eagle, thou’rt buried in light――
God speed thee to heaven, lost star of our night.’

The resolutions submitted by Mr. Underwood, were then unanimously agreed to.

_Ordered_, That the secretary communicate these resolutions to
the House of Representatives.

On motion by Mr. Underwood,

_Resolved_, That, as an additional mark of respect to the memory
of the deceased, the senate do now adjourn.

* * * * *

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, JUNE 30, 1852.

THE journal of yesterday having been read, a message was received from the senate, by Asbury Dickins, Esq., its secretary, communicating information of the death of Henry Clay, late senator from the state of Kentucky, and the proceedings of the senate thereon. The resolutions of the senate having been read,

Mr. ♦BRECKENRIDGE then rose and said: Mr. Speaker, I rise to perform the melancholy duty of announcing to this body the death of Henry Clay, late a senator in congress from the commonwealth of Kentucky.

Mr. Clay expired at his lodgings in this city yesterday morning, at seventeen minutes past eleven o’clock, in the seventy-sixth year of his age. His noble intellect was unclouded to the last. After protracted sufferings, he passed away without pain; and so gently did the spirit leave his frame, that the moment of departure was not observed by the friends who watched at his bedside. His last hours were cheered by the presence of an affectionate son; and he died surrounded by friends who, during his long illness, had done all that affection could suggest to soothe his sufferings.

Although this sad event has been expected for many weeks, the shock it produced, and the innumerable tributes of respect to his memory exhibited on every side, and in every form, prove the depth of the public sorrow, and the greatness of the public loss.

Imperishably associated as his name has been for fifty years with every great event affecting the fortunes of our country, it is difficult to realize that he is indeed gone for ever. It is difficult to feel that we shall see no more his noble form within these walls――that we shall hear no more his patriot tones, now rousing his countrymen to vindicate their rights against a foreign foe, now imploring them to preserve concord among themselves. We shall see him no more. The memory and the fruits of his services alone remain to us. Amidst the general gloom, the Capitol itself looks desolate, as if the genius of the place had departed. Already the intelligence has reached almost every quarter of the republic, and a great people mourn with us, to-day, the death of their most illustrious citizen. Sympathizing, as we do, deeply, with his family and friends, yet private affliction is absorbed in the general sorrow. The spectacle of a whole community lamenting the loss of a great man, is far more touching than any manifestation of private grief. In speaking of a loss which is national, I will not attempt to describe the universal burst of grief with which Kentucky will receive these tidings. The attempt would be vain to depict the gloom that will cover her people, when they know that the pillar of fire is removed, which has guided their footsteps for the life of a generation.

It is known to the country, that from the memorable session of 1849–’50, Mr. Clay’s health gradually declined. Although several years of his senatorial term remained, he did not propose to continue in the public service longer than the present session. He came to Washington chiefly to defend, if it should become necessary, the measures of adjustment, to the adoption of which he so largely contributed; but the condition of his health did not allow him, at any time, to participate in the discussions of the senate. Through the winter, he was confined almost wholly to his room, with slight changes in his condition, but gradually losing the remnant of his strength. Through the long and dreary winter, he conversed much and cheerfully with his friends, and expressed a deep interest in public affairs. Although he did not expect a restoration to health, he cherished the hope that the mild season of spring would bring to him strength enough to return to Ashland, and die in the bosom of his family. But, alas! spring, that brings life to all nature, brought no life nor hope to him. After the month of March, his vital powers rapidly wasted, and for weeks he lay patiently awaiting the stroke of death. But the approach of the destroyer had no terrors for him. No clouds overhung his future. He met the end with composure, and his pathway to the grave was brightened by the immortal hopes which spring from the Christian faith.