Chapter I: The Noble Purposes of Eloquence (6)

When this is done, if I do not demonstrate, in about two minutes, that the monument does the same kind of good that anything else does, I shall 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? Certainly 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 mere 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, good actions (and the more disinterested, 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. E. Everett.

XCII.

EMANCIPATION OF THE CATHOLICS OF IRELAND.

This paper, gentlemen, insists upon the necessity of emancipating the Catholics of Ireland, and that is charged as a part of the libel. If they had waited another year, if they had kept this prosecution impending for another year, how much would remain for a jury to decide upon, I should be at a loss to discover. It seems as if the progress of public information was eating away the ground of the prosecution. Since the commencement of the prosecution, this part of the libel has unluckily received the sanction of the legislature. In that interval our Catholic brethren have obtained that admission, which, it seems, it was a libel to propose. In what way to account for this, I am really at a loss. Have any alarms been occasioned by the emancipation of our Catholic brethren? has the bigoted malignity of any individuals been crushed? Or, has the stability of the government, or has that of the country been weakened? Or, are one million of subjects stronger than three millions? Do you think that the benefit they receive should be poisoned by the stings of vengeance? If you think so, you must say to them, "You have demanded your emancipation and you have got it; but we abhor your persons, we are outraged at your success; and we will stigmatize, by a criminal prosecution, the adviser of that relief which you have obtained from the voice of your country."

I ask you, gentlemen, do you think, as honest men, anxious for the public tranquillity, conscious that there are wounds not yet completely cicatrized that you ought to speak this language at this time, to men who are too much disposed to think that in this very emancipation they have been saved from their own Parliament by the humanity of their Sovereign? Or, do you wish to prepare them for the revocation of these improvident concessions? Do you think it wise or humane at this moment to insult them, by sticking up in a pillory the man who dared to stand forth as their advocate? I put it to your oaths; do you think that a blessing of that kind, that a victory obtained by justice over bigotry and oppression, should have a stigma cast upon it by an ignominious sentence upon men honest and bold enough to propose that measure? to propose the redeeming of religion from the abuses of the Church--the reclaiming of three millions of men from bondage, and giving liberty to all who had a right to demand it--giving, I say, in the so much censured words of this paper, "Universal Emancipation!"

I speak in the spirit of the British law, which makes liberty commensurate with and inseparable from British soil--which proclaims even to the stranger and the sojourner, the moment he sets his foot upon British earth, that the ground on which he treads is holy, and consecrated by the genius of Universal Emancipation. No matter in what language his doom may have been pronounced; no matter what complexion incompatible with freedom an Indian or an African sun may have burned upon him; no matter in what disastrous battle his liberty may have been cloven down; no matter with what solemnities he may have been devoted upon the altar of slavery;--the first moment he touches the sacred soil of Britain, the altar and the god sink together in the dust; his soul walks abroad in her own majesty; his body swells beyond the measure of his chains that burst from around him and he stands redeemed, regenerated, and disenthralled, by the irresistible genius of Universal Emancipation. J. P. Curran.

XCIII.

THE PUBLIC INFORMER.

But the learned gentleman is further pleased to say, that the traverser has charged the government with the encouragement of informers. This, gentlemen, is another small fact that you are to deny at the hazard of your souls, and upon the solemnity of your oaths. You are upon your oaths to say to the sister country, that the government of Ireland uses no such abominable instruments of destruction as informers. Let me ask you honestly, what do you feel, when in my hearing, when in the face of this audience, you are called upon to give a verdict that every man of us, and every man of you, know by the testimony of your own eyes to be utterly and absolutely false? I speak not now of the public proclamation of informers, with a promise of secrecy and of extravagant reward; I speak not of the fate of those horrid wretches who have been so often transferred from the table to the dock, and from the dock to the pillory; I speak of what your own eyes have seen day after day, during the course of this commission, from the box where you are now sitting--the number of horrid miscreants who avowed upon their oaths that they had come from the very seat of government from the castle, where they had been worked upon by the fear of death and the hopes of compensation to give evidence against their fellows. I speak of the well-known fact that the mild and wholesome councils of this government are holden over these catacombs of living death, where the wretch that is buried a man, lies till his heart has time to fester and dissolve, and is then dug up a witness.

Is this fancy, or is it fact? Have you not seen him, after his resurrection from that tomb, after leaving been dug out of the region of death and corruption, make his appearance upon the table, the living image of life and of death, and the supreme arbiter of both? Have you not marked when he entered, how the stormy wave of the multitude retired at his approach? Have you not marked how the human heart bowed to the supremacy of his power, in the undissembled homage of deferential horror? How his glance, like the lightning of heaven, seemed to rive the body of the accused, and mark it for the grave, while his voice warned the devoted wretch of woe and death--a death which no innocence can escape, no art elude, no force resist, no antidote prevent. There was an antidote a juror's oath----but even that adamantine chain that bound the integrity of man to the throne of eternal justice, is solved and melted in the breath that issues from the informer's mouth. Conscience swings from her mooring, and the appalled and affrighted juror consults his own safety in the surrender of the victim. J. P. Curran.

XCIV.

RED JACKET'S SPEECH TO THE MISSIONARY.

Brother, listen to what we say. There was a time when our forefathers owned this great island. Their seats extended from the rising to the setting sun. The Great Spirit had made it for the use of Indians. He had created the buffalo, file deer, and other animals for food. He had made the bear and the beaver. Their skins served us for clothing. He had scattered them over the country, and taught us how to take them. He had caused the earth to produce corn for bread. All this He had done for his red children, because He loved them. If we had some disputes about our hunting-ground, they were generally settled without the shedding of much blood. But an evil day came upon us. Your forefathers came across the great water, and landed on this island. Their numbers were small. They found friends and not enemies. They told us they had fled from their own country for fear of wicked men, and asked for a small seat. We took pity on them; granted their request; and they sat down amongst us. We gave them corn and meat; they gave us poison in return.

The white people, brother, had now found our country. Tidings were carried back, and more came amongst us. Yet we did not fear them. We took them to be friends. They called us brothers. We believed them and gave them a larger seat. At length their numbers had greatly increased. They wanted more land; they wanted our country. Our eyes were opened, and our minds became uneasy. Wars took place. Indians were hired to fight against Indians, and many of our people were destroyed. They also brought strong liquor amongst us. It was strong and powerful and has slain thousands.

Brother, our seats were once large, and yours were small. You have now become a great people, and we have scarcely a place left to spread our blankets. You have got our country but are not satisfied; you want to force your religion upon us. You say that you are sent to instruct us how to worship the Great Spirit agreeably to his mind; and, if we do not take hold of the religion which you white people teach, we shall be unhappy hereafter. We are told that you have been preaching to the white people in this place. These people are our neighbors. We are acquainted with them. We will wait a little while, and see what effect your preaching has upon them. If we find it does them good, makes them honest, and less disposed to cheat Indians, we will then consider again of what you have said. Brother, you have now heard our answer to your talk, and this is all we have to say at present. Cram.

XCV.

PARTITION OF POLAND.

Now, sir, what was the conduct of your own allies to Poland? Is there a single atrocity of the French, in Italy, in Switzerland, in Egypt, if you please, more unprincipled and inhuman than that of Russia, Austria, and Prussia, in Poland? What has there been in the conduct of the French to foreign powers; what in the violation of solemn treaties; what in the plunder, devastation, and dismemberment of unoffending countries; what in the horrors and murders perpetrated upon the subdued victims of their rage in any district which they have overrun, worse than the conduct of those three great powers in the miserable, devoted, and trampled-on kingdom of Poland, and who have been, or are, our allies in this war for religion and social order, and the rights of nations? "Oh! but you regretted the partition of Poland! " Yes, regretted! You regretted the violence, and that is all you did. You united yourself with the actors; you, in fact, by your acquiescence, confirmed the atrocity. But they are your allies; and though they overran and divided Poland, there was nothing, perhaps, in the manner of doing it which stamped it with peculiar infamy and disgrace. The hero of Poland [Swarrow], perhaps, was merciful and mild! He was "as much superior to Bonaparte in bravery, and in the discipline which he maintained, as he was superior in virtue and humanity! " He was animated by the purest principles of Christianity, and was restrained in his career by the benevolent precepts which it inculcates! Was he? Let unfortunate Warsaw, and the miserable inhabitant's of the suburb of Praga in particular, tell! What do we understand to have been the conduct of this magnanimous hero, with whom, it seems, Bonaparte is not to be compared? He entered the suburb of Praga, the most populous suburb of Warsaw; and there he let his soldiery loose on the miserable, unarmed, and unresisting people. Men, women, and children, nay, infants at the breast, were doomed to one indiscriminate massacre. Thousands of them were inhumanly, wantonly butchered! And for what? Because they had dared to join in a wish to meliorate their own condition as a people, and to improve their Constitution, which had been confessed by their own Sovereign to be in want of amendment. And such is the hero upon whom the cause of religion and social order is to repose! And such is the man whom we praise for his discipline and his virtue, and whom we hold out as our boast and our dependence; while the conduct of Bonaparte unfits him to be even treated with as an enemy? C. J. Fox.

XCVI.

NATIONAL DISGRACE.

Sir, we may look in vain to the events of former times for a disgrace parallel to what we have suffered. Louis the Fourteenth, a monarch often named in our debates, and whose reign exhibits more than any other the extremes of prosperous and of adverse fortune, never, in the midst of his most humiliating distresses, stooped to so despicable a sacrifice of all that can be dear to man. The war of the succession, unjustly begun by him, had reduced his power, had swallowed up his armies and his navies, had desolated his provinces, had drained his treasures, and deluged the earth with the blood of the best and most faithful his subjects. Exhausted by his various calamities, he offered his enemies at one time to relinquish all the objects for which he had begun the war. That proud monarch sued for peace, and was content to receive it from our moderation. But when it was made a condition of that peace, that he should turn his arms against his grandson, and compel him by force to relinquish the throne of Spain,--humbled, exhausted, conquered as he was, misfortune had not yet bowed his spirit to conditions so hard as these.

We know the event. He persisted still in the war, until the folly and wickedness of Queen Anne's ministers enabled him to conclude the peace of Utrecht, on terms considerably less disadvantageous even than those he had himself proposed. And shall we, sir, the pride of our age, the terror of Europe, submit to this humiliating sacrifice of our honor? Have we suffered a defeat at Blenheim? Shall we, with our increasing prosperity, our widely diffused capital, our navy, the just subject of our common exultation, ever-flowing coffers, that enable us to give back to the people what, in the hour of calamity, we were compelled to take from them; flushed with a recent triumph over Spain, and yet more than all, while our old rival and enemy was incapable of disturbing us, shall it be for us to yield to what France disdained in the hour of her sharpest distress, and exhibit ourselves to the world, the sole example in its annals of such an abject and pitiful degradation? C. J. Fox.

XCVII.

A POLITICAL PAUSE.

Where, then, sir, is this war, which is prolific of all these horrors, to be carried? Where is it to stop? Not till we have established the house of Bourbon! Or, at least, not until we have had due "experience" of Bonaparte's intentions! And all this without an intelligible motive. All this because you may gain a better peace a year or two hence! So that we are called upon to go on merely as a speculation. We must keep Bonaparte for some time longer at war, as a state of probation! Gracious God, sir! is war a state of probation? Is peace a rash system? Is it dangerous for nations to live in amity with each other? Are your vigilance, your police your common powers of observation, to be extinguished by putting an end to the horrors of war? Cannot this state of probation be as well undergone without adding to the catalogue of human sufferings?

"But we must pause!" says the honorable gentleman. What! must the bowels of Great Britain be torn out her best blood be spilled--her treasures wasted--that you may make an experiment? Put yourselves oh! that you would put yourselves on the field of battle, and learn to judge of the sort of horrors that you excite! In former wars a man might, at least, have some feeling, some interest, that served to balance, in his mind, the impressions which a scene of carnage and of death must inflict.

If a man had been present at the battle of Blenheim, for instance, and had inquired the motive of the battle, there was not a soldier engaged who could not have satisfied his curiosity, and even, perhaps, allayed his feelings. They were fighting, they knew, to repress the uncontrolled ambition of the Grand Monarch.

But if a man were present now at the field of slaughter, and were to inquire for what they were fighting--"Fighting!" would be the answer; "they aren't fighting; they are pausing." "Why is that man expiring? " Why is that other writhing with agony? What means this implacable fury? " The answer must be, "You are quite wrong, sir, you deceive yourself--they are not fighting, do not disturb them they are merely pausing! This man is not expiring with agony--that man is not dead he is only pausing! Lord help you, sir! they are not angry with one another; they have now no cause of quarrel; but their country thinks that there should be a pause. All that you see, sir, is nothing like fighting--there is no harm, nor cruelty, nor bloodshed in it, whatever: it is nothing more than a political pause! It is merely to try an experiment--to see whether Bonaparte will not, behave himself better than heretofore; and in the mean time we have agreed to pause in pure friendship!"

And is this the way, sir, that you are to show yourselves the advocates of order? You take up a system calculated to uncivilize the world--to destroy order,--to trample on religion,--to stifle in the heart, not merely the generosity of a noble sentiment, but the affections of social nature; and in the prosecution of this systems you spread terror and devastation all around you. C. J. Fox

XCVIII.

WASHINGTON'S SWORD AND FRANKLIN'S STAFF.

The Sword of Washington! The Staff of Franklin! O, sir, what associations are linked in adamant with these names! Washington, whose sword was never drawn but in the cause of his country, and never sheathed when wielded in his country's cause! Franklin, the philosopher of the thunder-bolt, the printing-press, and the ploughshare! What names are these in the scanty catalogue of the benefactors of human kind! Washington and Franklin! What other two men whose lives belong to the eighteenth century of Christendom, have left a deeper impression of themselves upon the age in which they lived, and upon all after-time? Washington, the warrior and the legislator! In war, contending, by the wager of battle, for the Independence of his country, and for the freedom of the human race,--ever manifesting, amidst its horrors, by precept and by example, his reverence for the laws of peace, and for the tenderest sympathies of humanity; in peace, soothing the ferocious spirit of discord, among his own countrymen, into harmony and union, and giving to that very sword, now presented to his country, a charm more potent than that attributed, in ancient times, to the lyre of Orpheus.

Franklin! The mechanic of his own fortune; teaching, in early youth, under the shackles of indigence, the way to wealth, and, in the shade of obscurity, the path to greatness; in the maturity of manhood, disarming the thunder of its terrors, the lightning of its fatal blast; and wresting from the tyrant's hand the still more afflictive sceptre of oppression: while descending the vale of years, traversing the Atlantic Ocean, braving, in the dead of winter, the battle and the breeze, bearing in his hand the Charter of Independence, which he had contributed to form, and tendering, from the self-created nation to the mightiest monarchs of Europe, the olive-branch of peace, the mercurial wand of commerce, and the amulet of protection and safety to the man of peace, on the pathless ocean, from the inexorable cruelty and merciless rapacity of war.

And, finally, in the last stage of life, with fourscore winters upon his head, under the torture of an incurable disease, returning to his native land, closing his days as the chief magistrate of his adopted commonwealth, after contributing by his counsels under the Presidency of Washington, and recording his name under the sanction of devout prayer invoked by him to God,--to that Constitution under the authority of which we are assembled, as the Representatives of the North American People, to receive, in the name of them and for them, these venerable relics of the wise, the valiant, and the good founders of our great confederated Republic, these sacred symbols of our golden age. May they be deposited among the archives of our Government! And may every American, who shall hereafter behold them, ejaculate a mingled offering of praise to that Supreme Ruler of the Universe, by whose tender mercies our Union has been hitherto preserved, through all the vicissitudes and revolutions of this turbulent world; and of prayer for the continuance of these blessings, by the dispensations of Providence to our beloved country, from age to age, till time shall be no more! J. Q. Adams.

XCIX.

THE RIGHT OF PETITION BY WOMEN.

The gentleman says that women have no right to petition on political subjects; that it is discreditable, not only to their section of the country, but also to the national character; that these females could have a sufficient field for the exercise of their influence in the discharge of their duties to their fathers, their husbands, or their children--cheering the domestic circle, and shedding over it the mild radiance of the social virtues, instead of rushing into the fierce struggles of political life. I admit, sir, that it is their duty to attend to these things. I subscribe fully, to the elegant compliment, passed by him upon those members of the female sex who devote their time to these duties. But I say that the correct principle is, that women are not only justified, but exhibit the most exalted virtue, when they do depart from the domestic circle, and enter on the concerns of their country, of humanity, and of their God. The mere departure of woman from the duties of the domestic circle, far from being a reproach to her, is a virtue of the highest order, when it is done from purity of motive, by appropriate means, and towards a virtuous purpose. That is the principle I maintain, and which the gentleman has to refute, if he applies the position he has taken to the mothers, the sisters, and the daughters of the men of my district who voted to send me here. The motive, the means, and the purpose of their petition will bear his scrutiny.

Why, sir, what does the gentleman understand by "political subjects?" Everything in which this House has an agency-everything which relates to peace and war, or to any of the great interests of society. Are women to have no opinions or actions on subjects relating to the general welfare? Where did the gentleman get this principle? Did he find it in sacred history--in the language of Miriam the Prophetess, in one of the noblest and most sublime songs of triumph that ever met the human eye or ear? Did the gentleman never hear of the deed of Jael, who slew the dreaded enemy of her country? Has he forgotten Esther, who, by her petition saved her people and her country? Sir, I might go through the whole sacred history, and find innumerable examples of women, who not only took an active part in the politics of their times, but who are held up with honor to posterity for doing so.

To go from sacred history to profane, does the gentleman there find it "discreditable" for women to take any interest or any part in political affairs? Has he forgotten the Spartan mother, who said to her son, when going out to battle, "My son, come back to me with thy shield, or upon thy shield?" Does he not remember Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi, who declared that her children were her jewels? And why? Because they were the champions of freedom. Has he not read of Arria, who, under imperial despotism, when her husband was condemned to die by a tyrant, plunged the sword into her own bosom, and, handing it to her husband, said, "Take it, Pætus, it does not hurt," and expired?

To come to a later period, what names are more illustrious than that of Elizabeth, the great British queen, and that of Isabella of Castile, the patroness of Columbus, the virtual discoverer of this hemisphere, for without her that discovery would not have been made? Did they bring "discredit" on their sex by mingling in politics? And what were the women of the United States in the struggle of the Revolution? Were they devoted exclusively to the duties and enjoyments of the fireside? When the soldiers were destitute of clothing, or sick, or in prison, from whence did relief come? From the hearts where patriotism erects her favorite shrine, and from the hand which is seldom withdrawn when the soldier is in need. The voice of our history speaks trumpet-tongued of the daring and intrepid spirit of patriotism burning in the bosoms of the ladies of that day "Politics," sir, "rushing into the vortex of politics!" They gloried in being called rebel ladies, refusing to attend balls and entertainments, but crowding to the hospitals and prison-ships! And, sir, is that spirit to be charged here, in this hall where we are sitting, as being "discreditable" to our country's name? So far from regarding such conduct as a national reproach, I approve of it, and glory in it. J. Q. Adams.

C.

VALUE OF POPULARITY.

MY Lords, I come now to speak upon what, indeed, I would have gladly avoided, had I not been particularly pointed at for the part I have taken in this bill. It has been said by a noble lord on my left hand, that I, likewise, am running the race of popularity. If the noble lord means by popularity, that applause bestowed by after-ages on good and virtuous actions, I have long been struggling in that race; to what purpose, all-trying time can alone determine: but, if the noble lord means that mushroom popularity which is raised without merit, and lost without crime, he is much mistaken in his opinion.

I defy the noble lord to point out a single action of my life, in which the popularity of the times ever had the smallest influence on my determinations. I have a more permanent and steady rule for my conduct, the dictates of my own breast. Those that have foregone that pleasing adviser, and given up their mind to be the slave of every popular impulse, I sincerely pity: I pity them still more, if their vanity leads them to mistake the shouts of the mob for the trumpet of fame. Experience might inform them, that many who have been saluted with the huzzahs of a crowd one day, have received its execrations the next; and many who by the popularity of their times, have been held up as spotless patriots, have, nevertheless, appeared upon the historian's page,--when truth has triumphed over delusion,--the assassins of liberty.

True liberty, in my opinion, can only exist when justice is equally administered to all,--to the king and to the beggar. Where is the justice, then, or where is the law, that protects a member of Parliament more than any other man from the punishment due to his crimes? The laws of this country allow no place, nor employment to be a sanctuary for crimes; and where I have the honor to sit as judge, neither royal favor, nor popular applause shall ever protect the guilty. Lord Mansfield.

CI.

SCORN TO BE SLAVES.

The voice of your father's blood cries to you from the ground, "My sons, scorn to be slaves! In vain we met the frowns of tyrants; in vain we crossed the boisterous ocean, found a new world, and prepared it for the happy residence of liberty; in vain we toiled; in vain we fought; we bled in vain, if you, our offspring, want valor to repel the assaults of her invaders!" Stain not the glory of your worthy ancestors; but, like them, resolve never to part with your birthright. Be wise in your deliberations, and determined in your exertions for the preservation of your liberty.

Follow not the dictates of passion, but enlist yourselves under the sacred banner of reason; use every method in your power to secure your rights; at least, prevent the curses of posterity from being heaped upon your memories. If you, with united zeal and fortitude, oppose the torrent of oppression; if you feel the true fire of patriotism burning in your breasts; if you, from your souls, despise the most gaudy dress which slavery can wear; if you really prefer the lonely cottage, while blessed with liberty, to gilded palaces, surrounded with the ensigns of slavery you may have the fullest assurance that tyranny with her whole accursed train, will hide her hideous head in confusion, shame, and despair.

If you perform your part, you must have the strongest confidence, that the same Almighty Being, who protected your pious, and venerable forefathers, who enabled them to turn a barren wilderness into a fruitful field, who so often made bare His arm for their salvation, will still be mindful of their offspring.

May that Almighty Being graciously preside in all our councils. May He direct us to such measures as He himself shall approve, and be pleased to bless. May we be ever favored of God. May our land be a land of liberty, the seat of virtue, the asylum of the oppressed, "a name and a praise in the whole earth," until the last shock of time shall bury the empires of the world in undistinguished ruin. J. Warren.

CII.

LOSS OF THE ARCTIC.

It was autumn. Hundreds had wended their way from pilgrimages; from Rome and its treasures of dead art, and its glory of living nature; from the sides of the Switzer's mountains, and from the capitals of various nations, all of them saying in their hearts, we will wait for the September gales to have done with their equinoctial fury, and then we will embark; we will slide across the appeased ocean, and in the gorgeous month of October, we will greet our longed-for native land, and our heart-loved homes.

And so the throng streamed along from Berlin, from Paris, from the Orient, converging upon London, still hastening toward the welcome ship, and narrowing every day the circle of engagements and preparations. They crowded aboard. Never had the Arctic borne such a host of passengers, nor passengers so nearly related to so many of us. The hour was come. The signal-ball fell at Greenwich. It was noon also at Liverpool. The anchors were weighed; the great hull swayed to the current; the national colors streamed abroad, as if themselves instinct with life and national sympathy. The bell strikes; the wheels revolve; the signal-gun beats its echoes, in upon every structure along the shore, and the Arctic glides joyfully forth from the jersey, and turns her prow to the winding channel, and begins her homeward run. The pilot stood at the wheel, and men saw him. Death sat upon the prow, and no eye beheld him. Whoever stood at the wheel in all the voyage, Death was the pilot that steered the craft, and none knew it. He neither revealed his presence nor whispered his errand.

And so hope was effulgent, and little gayety disported itself, and joy was with every guest. Amid all the inconveniences of the voyage, there was still that which hushed every murmur,--"Home is not far away." And every morning it was still one night nearer home! Eight days had passed. They beheld that distant bank of mist that forever haunts the vast shallows of Newfoundland. Boldly they made it; and plunging in, its pliant wreaths wrapped them about. They shall never emerge. The last sunlight has flashed from that deck. The last voyage is done to ship and passengers. At noon there came noiselessly stealing from the north that fated instrument of destruction. In that mysterious shroud, that vast atmosphere of mist, both steamers were holding their way with rushing prow and roaring wheels, but invisible.

At a league's distance, unconscious, and at nearer approach, unwarned; within hail, and bearing right towards each other, unseen, unfelt, till in a moment more, emerging from the gray mists, the ill-omened Vesta dealt her deadly stroke to the Arctic. The death-blow was scarcely felt along the mighty hull. She neither reeled nor shivered. Neither commander nor officers seemed that they had suffered harm. Prompt upon humanity the brave Luce (let his name be ever spoken with admiration and respect) ordered away his boat with the first officer to inquire if the stranger had suffered harm. As Gourley went over the ship's side, oh, that some good angel had called to the brave commander in the words of Paul on a like occasion, "Except these abide in the ship, ye cannot be saved."

They departed, and with them the hope of the ship, for now the waters gaining upon the hold and rising upon the fires, revealed the mortal blow. Oh, had now that stern, brave mate, Gourley, been on deck, whom the sailors were wont to mind--had he stood to execute sufficiently the commander's will--we may believe that we should not have had to blush for the cowardice and recreancy of the crew, nor weep for the untimely dead. But, apparently, each subordinate officer lost all presence of mind, then courage, and so honor. In a wild scramble, that ignoble mob of firemen, engineers, waiters, and crew, rushed for the boats, and abandoned the helpless women, children, and men to the mercy of the deep! Four hours there were from the catastrophe of collision to the catastrophe of sinking!

Oh, what a burial was here! Not as when one is borne from his home, among weeping throngs, and gently carried to the green fields, and laid peacefully beneath the turf and the flowers. No priest stood to pronounce a burial-service. It was an ocean grave. The mists alone shrouded the burial-place. No spade prepared the grave, nor sexton filled up the hollowed earth. Down, down they sank, and the quick returning waters smoothed out every ripple, and left the sea as if it had not been. H. W. Beecher.

CIII.

THE GLORY AND GRANDEUR OF PEACE.

Whatever may be the judgment of poets, of moralist, of satirists, or even of soldiers, it is certain that the glory of arms still exercises no mean influence over the minds of men. The art of war, which has been happily termed by a French divine, the baleful art by which men learn to exterminate one another, is yet held even among Christians, to be an honorable pursuit; and the animal courage, which it stimulates and develops, is prized as a transcendent virtue. It will be for another age, and a higher civilization, to appreciate the more exalted character of the art of benevolence, the art of extending happiness and all good influences, by word or deed, to the largest number of mankind, which, in blessed contrast with the misery, the degradation, the wickedness of war, shall shine resplendent, the true grandeur of peace. All then will be willing to join with the early poet in saying, at least,

"Through louder fame attend the martial rage,
'T is greater glory to reform the age."

Then shall the soul thrill with a nobler heroism than that of battle. Peaceful industry, with untold multitudes of cheerful and beneficent laborers, shall be its gladsome token. Literature, full of sympathy and comfort for the heart of man, shall appear in garments of purer glory than she has yet assumed. Science shall extend the bounds of knowledge and power adding unimaginable strength to the hands of man, opening innumerable resources in the earth, and revealing new secrets and harmonies in the skies. Art, elevated and refined, shall lavish fresh streams of beauty and grace. Charity, in streams of milk and honey, shall diffuse itself among all the habitations of the world.

Does any one ask for the signs of this approaching era? The increasing beneficence and intelligence of our own day, the broad-spread sympathy with human suffering, the widening thoughts of men, the longings of the heart for a higher condition on earth, the unfulfilled promises of Christian progress, are the auspicious auguries of this happy future. As early voyagers over untried realms of waste, we have already observed the signs of land. The green twig and fresh red berry have floated by our bark; the odors of the shore fan our faces; nay, we may seem to descry the distant gleam of light, and hear from the more earnest observers, as Columbus heard, after midnight, from the mast-head of the Pinta, the joyful cry of Land! Land! and lo! a new world broke upon his early morning gaze. C. Sumner.

CIV.

ANCIENT AND MODERN PRODUCTIONS.

The classics possess a peculiar charm, from the circumstance that they have been the models, I might almost say the masters, of composition and thought, in all ages. In the contemplation of these august teachers of mankind, we are filled with conflicting emotions. They are the early voice of the world, better remembered and more cherished still than all the intermediate words that have been uttered, as the lessons of childhood still haunt us when the impressions of later years have been effaced from the mind. But they show with most unwelcome frequency the tokens of the world's childhood, before passion had yielded to the sway of reason and the affections. They want the highest charm of purity, of righteousness, of elevated sentiments, of love to God and man. It is not in the frigid philosophy of the porch and academy that we are to seek these; not in the marvelous teachings of Socrates, as they come mended by the mellifluous words of Plato; not in the resounding line of Homer, on whose inspiring tale of blood Alexander pillowed his head; not in the animated strain of Pindar, where virtue is pictured in the successful strife of an athlete at the Isthmian games; not in the torrent of Demosthenes, dark with self-love and the spirit of vengeance; not in the fitful philosophy and intemperate eloquence of Tully; not in the genial libertinism of Horace, or the stately atheism of Lucretius. No! these must not be our masters; in none of these are we to seek the way of life. For eighteen hundred years the spirit of these writers has been engaged in weaponless contest with the Sermon on the Mount, and those two sublime commandments on which hang all the law and the prophets. The strife is still pending. Heathenism, which has possessed itself of such siren forms, is not yet exorcised. It still tempts the young, controls the affairs of active life, and haunts the meditations of age.

Our own productions, though they may yield to those of the ancients in the arrangement of ideas, in method, in beauty of form, and in freshness of illustration, are immeasurably superior in the truth, delicacy, all elevation of their sentiments,--above all, in the benign recollection of that great Christian revelation, the brotherhood of man. How vain are eloquence and poetry compared with this heaven-descended truth! Put in one scale that simple utterance, and in the other the lore of antiquity, with its accumulating glosses and commentaries, and the last will be light and trivial in the balance. Greek poetry has been likened to the song of the nightingale as she sits in the rich, symmetrical crown of the palm-tree, trilling her thick-warbled notes; but even this is less sweet and tender than the music of the human heart. C. Sumner.

CV.

THE ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE.

Why ought the slave trade to be abolished? Because it is incurable injustice! How much stronger, then, is the argument for immediate than gradual abolition! By allowing it to continue even for one hour, do not my right honorable friends weaken--do they not desert their own arguments of its injustice? If on the ground of injustice it ought to be abolished at last, why ought it not now? Why is injustice to be suffered to remain for a single hour?

I know of no evil that ever has existed, nor can imagine any evil to exist, worse than the tearing of eighty thousands persons annually from their native land, by a combination of the most civilized nations in the most enlightened quarter of the globe; but more especially by that nation which calls herself the most free and the most happy of them all. Even if these miserable beings were proved guilty of every crime before you take them off of which however not a single proof is adduced ought we to take upon ourselves the office of executioners? And even if we condescend so far, still can we be justified in taking them, unless we have clear proof that they are criminals?

I have shown how great is the enormity of this evil, even on the supposition that we take only convicts and prisoners of war. But take the subject in the other way; take it on the grounds stated by the right honorable gentleman over the way, and how does it stand? Think of eighty thousand persons carried away out of their country, by we know not what means, for crimes imputed; for light or inconsiderable faults; for debt, perhaps; for the crime of witchcraft; or a thousand other weak and scandalous pretexts, besides all the fraud and kidnapping, the villainies and perfidy, by which the slave trade is supplied. Reflect on these eighty thousand persons thus annually taken off! There is something in the horror of it, that surpasses all the bounds of imagination. Admitting that there exists in Africa something like to courts of justice; yet what an office of humiliation and meanness is it in us, to take upon ourselves to carry into execution the partial, the cruel, iniquitous sentences of such courts, as if we also were strangers to all religion, and to the first principles of justice.

But that country, it is said, has been in some degree civilized, and civilized by us. It is said they have gained some knowledge of the principles of justice. What sir, have they gained the principles of justice from us? Is their civilization brought about by us! Yes, we give them enough of our intercourse to convey to them the means, and to initiate them in the study of mutual destruction. We give them just enough of the forms of justice to enable them to add the pretext of legal trials to their other modes of perpetuating the most atrocious iniquity. We give them just enough of European improvements, to enable them the more effectually to turn Africa into a ravaged wilderness. But I refrain from attempting to enumerate half the dreadful consequences of this system. Do you think nothing of the ruin and the miseries in which so many other individuals, still remaining in Africa, are involved in consequence of carrying off so many myriads of people? Do you think nothing of their families which are left behind; of the connections which are broken; of the friendships, attachments, and relationships which are burst asunder? Do you think nothing of the miseries in consequence, that are felt from generation to generation; of the privation of that happiness which might be communicated to them by the introduction of civilization, and of mental and moral improvement? A happiness which you withhold from them so long as you permit the slave trade to continue.

How shall we hope to obtain, if it be possible, forgiveness from Heaven for these enormous evils we have committed, if we refuse to make use of those means which the mercy of Providence hath still reserved for us, for wiping away the guilt and shame with which we are now covered. If we refuse even this degree of compensation; if, knowing the miseries we have caused, we refuse even now to put a stop to them, how greatly aggravated will be the guilt of Great Britain! and what a blot will these transactions forever be in the history of this country! Shall we, then, delay to repair these injuries, and to begin rendering justice to Africa? Shall we not count the days and hours that are suffered to intervene, and to delay the accomplishment of such a work? Reflect what an immense object is before you; what an object for a nation to have in view, and to have a prospect, under the favor of Providence, of being now permitted to attain! I think the House will agree with me in cherishing the ardent wish to enter without delay upon the measures necessary for these great ends; and I am sure that the immediate abolition of the slave trade is the first, the principal the most indispensable act of policy, of duty, and of justice, that the Legislature of this country has to take, if it is indeed their wish to secure those important objects to which I have alluded, and which we are bound to pursue by the most solemn obligations. W. Pitt.

CVI.

"LET THERE BE LIGHT."

From her earliest colonial history, the policy of Massachusetts has been to develop the minds of all her people, and to imbue them with the principles of duty, To do this work most effectually, she has begun with the young. If she would continue to mount higher and higher towards the summit of prosperity, she must continue the means by which her present elevation has been gained. In doing this, she will not only exercise the noblest prerogative of government, but will coöperate with the Almighty in one of his sublimest works.

The Greek rhetorician, Longinus, quotes from the Mosaic account of the creation what he calls the sublimest passage ever uttered: "God said, 'Let there be light,' and there was light." From the centre of black immensity effulgence burst forth. Above, beneath, on every side, its radiance streamed out, silent, yet making each spot in the vast concave brighter than the line which the lightning pencils upon the midnight cloud. Darkness fled as the swift beams spread onward and outward, in an unending circumfusion of splendor. Onward and outwards still they move to this day, glorifying, through wider and wider regions of space, the infinite Author from whose power and beneficence they sprang. But not only in the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, did he say, "Let there be light." Whenever a human soul is born into the world, its Creator stands over it, and again pronounces the same sublime words, "Let there be light."

Magnificent, indeed, was the material creation, when, suddenly blazing forth in mid space, the new-born sun dispelled the darkness of the ancient night. But infinitely more magnificent is it when the human soul rays forth its subtler and swifter beams; when the light of the senses irradiates all outward things, revealing the beauty of their colors, and the exquisite symmetry of their proportions and forms; when the light of reason penetrates to their invisible properties and laws, and displays all those hidden relations that make up all the sciences; when the light of conscience illuminates the moral world, separating truth from error, and virtue from vice. The light of the newly-kindled sun, indeed, was glorious. It struck upon all the planets, and waked into existence their myriad capacities of life and joy. As it rebounded from them, and showed their vast orbs all wheeling, circle beyond circle, in their stupendous courses, the sons of God shouted for joy. That light sped onward, beyond Sirius, beyond the pole-star, beyond Orion and the Pleiades, and is still spreading onward into the abysses of space. But the light of the human soul flies swifter than the light of the sun, and outshines its meridian blaze. It can embrace not only the sun of our system, but all suns and galaxies of suns; aye! the soul is capable of knowing and of enjoying Him who created the suns themselves; and when these starry lustres that now glorify the firmament shall wax dim, and fade away like a wasted taper, the light of the soul shall still remain; nor time, nor cloud, nor any power but its own perversity, shall ever quench its brightness. Again I would say that whenever a human soul is born into the world, God stands over it, and pronounces the same sublime fiat, "Let there be light!" And may the time soon come, when all human governments shall coöperate with the divine government in carrying this benediction and baptism into fulfillment. H. Mann.

CVII.

TRUE ELOQUENCE.

When public bodies are to be addressed on momentous occasions, when great interests are at stake, and strong passions excited, nothing is valuable in speech farther than as it is connected with high intellectual and moral endowments. Clearness, force, and earnestness are the qualities which produce conviction. True eloquence, indeed, does not consist in speech. It cannot be brought from far. Labor and learning may toil for it, but they will toil in vain. Words and phrases may be marshalled in every way, but they cannot compass it. It must exist in the man, in the subject, and in the occasion. Affected passion, intense expression, the pomp of declamation, all may aspire to it; they cannot reach it. It comes, if it come at all, like the outbreaking of a fountain from the earth, or the bursting forth of volcanic fires, with spontaneous, original, native force. The graces taught in the schools, the costly ornaments and studied contrivances of speech, shock and disgust men, when their own lives, and the fate of their wives, their children, and their country hang on the decision of the hour. Then words have lost their power, rhetoric is vain, and all elaborate oratory contemptible. Even genius itself then feels rebuked and subdued, as in the presence of higher qualities. Then patriotism is eloquent; then self-devotion is eloquent. The clear conception, outrunning the deductions of logic, the high purpose, the firm resolve, the dauntless spirit, speaking on the tongue, beaming from the eye, informing every feature, and urging the whole man onward, right onward to his object--this, this is eloquence; or rather it is something greater and higher than all eloquence, it is action, noble, sublime, godlike action. D. Webster.

CVIII.

SOUTH CAROLINA AND MASSACHUSETTS.

The eulogium pronounced by the honorable gentleman on the character of the State of South Carolina, for her Revolutionary and other merits, meets my hearty concurrence. I shall not acknowledge that the honorable member goes before me in regard for whatever of distinguished talent, or distinguished character, South Carolina has produced. I claim part of the honor, I partake in the pride, of her great names. I claim them for countrymen, one and all,--the Laurenses, the Rutledges, the Pinckneys, the Sumters, the Marions,--Americans all, whose fame is no more to be hemmed in by State lines, than their talents and patriotism were capable of being circumscribed within the same narrow limits.