The New York Herald Newspaper, July 30, 1853, Page 6

ny, to whied he had surrendered. himself sc Reecanous of taste. and the facw of history which be had learned, , and be began to interpret, the shapes of and fear in which imagination began to before bim the good and evil of the future. the sme outward world is around you above The sweet and solemn flow river uleaming through intervale here n and samples of the sane old thin and retiring; the same range hilla yonder, tolerant of eulture to the top, | then by primeval forests, on whose crest rays of sunvet lingered; the summit of As- yy; the great northern light that never seta; the ions that walk arouud and watch the pole; | seme oature, undecayed, unc ing, is here. | Almost the idoiatries of the old pa; m grow in- ‘ible. “ Magnorum luminum capita veneram- | ur,’ exclaims Seneca. Subitur et ex abrupto wasti | @mnzs cruptio aras habet!” We stand at the foun- | tain of a stream. We stand, rather, where stream, | wadden and from hidden springs, bursts to light, | from which we can look along and dowa, as it were, | on oar own Connecticut, and trace its a erage | pathway to the -ea; and we venerate an almoat | would build a!turs here. Almost it seems as if here | we ht learn the secrets of his supremacy. Wo know that God gave him an excellent spirit, and an wnderstanding above that of other men. That ulti- | mate fact we accept and repose on; yet more we | would know, if we could, and hither weshould come | to know it. if I may adopt the lofty language of one of the ad- mirere of William Pitt, we come naturally here, as if , we could recall every circumstance of splendid pre- paration which con‘ributed to fit the great man for | the scene of his glory. We come, as if better here | than elsewhere, “we could watch, fold by fold, the bracing on of his Vulcanian panoply, and observe, with pleased auxicty, the leading forth of that cha- riot h, borne on irresistible wheels, and drawi | by steeds of immortal race, is to crush the necks of | mighty and sweep away the serried streagth of armies.” “And, therefore, it were fitter that [ should ask yon than speak to you concerning him. Lit- tle, indeed, anywhere can be added now to that | wealth ef eulogy that bes been heaped upon his | tomb. Before he died even, renowned in two hemis- pheres, in ours he seemed to be known with univer | wal nearness of knowledge. He walked so long and so conspicuonsly before the general eye—his actions, his opinions on all things which had been large encuxh to agitate the public mind | for the last thirty years and more, had had importance | and consequence so remarkable, anxiously waited for, passionstely canvassed, not adopted always into | the particular measure, or deciding the particular vote of government or the country, yet sinkin deep into the reason of the people—a stream of influence | whose fruits itis yet too soon for political philoso- | pby to appreciate completely; au impreasion of bis | ordinary intellectual endowments, and of superiority in that maost imposing wible of all forms of manifestation, tho moring of others’ minds by speech—this impression had grown +o unversal and fixed, and it had | kindled curiosity 'o hear him and read him, so wide and ao larg:ly indulzed, his individnality altogether was se absulut and so pronounced—the force of wilt no less than the power of genius, the exa:t type and fashion of his mind not less than its gen- eral magnitude were so distinctly shown throug his musical und transparent style—the exterior | the man—the grand inystery of brow and | @ye—the deep tenes, the solemnity, the sove- | nty as of tho-e who would build States, “where every power and every grace did seem to | Wet its seal,” bud been made by personal observa- tion, by desoription, by the exaggeration even of these who bad feit the spell, by art, the daguerreo- pe, and picture and statue, so familiar to tre | ican eye, graven on the memory like the Wash- | of Stuart, the narrative of the mere incidents belie REN % F E i i Ha ‘tically, and with snct skill, and had been so ely | commited to heart, that when he died there scemed | to be little left but t» say where and how his change | gather of his life and college, of his life had been s» often told, by some #0 authen- | transcendent afterwards, of men by speech, was already devel in aremarkable degree. Always, there is a best writer and speaker or two in college; bat this stereo- | worship of God, by what good faith to all other na- head om my father’s shoulder and wept.” That 8 , that glow, those tears, reveal to us what his memory and c could hardly do to him, that already, somewhere, at some hour of day or evening, or night, as he read some page, or beard some narrative, or saw sorae happie! schoolfellow set off from Exeter to begin his col- lege life, the love of intellectual enjoyment, the ambition of intellee ual supremacy had taken hold of him; that, when or how he knew not, but it had come to be, before he was aware of it, his last thought before he slept, his first when he awoke, and shaped hia dreams. Behold’in them, too, his w_ole future. That day, that hour, that very m>- | ment, from the deep snows of that slow hill he set out on the long ascent that bore him ‘no step backward,” to the high places of the world. He remained under the tuition of Mr. Wood until He | August, 1796, and then entered this college, where | he was, at the end of the full term of four years, graduated in 1801. Of that college life you can tell me more than [ can tell you. [t is the universal evi- dence that it was distioguished by exemplary demeamor, by reverence for religion, respect for instruction, and observance of law. We bear from all sources, too, that it was dis- tiuguished by assiduous and various studies. With the exception of one or two branches, for which his anarat preparation had failed to excite a taste, he is reported to have addressed himself to the pre- scribed tasks, and to have availed himself of the whole body of means of liberal culture appointed by the governmest, with decorum and conscieatious zeal. We hear more than this. The whole course of traditions concerning his college life is full to prove two facts. The first is that his reading, general and various, far beyoui the requirements of the faculty. or the average capacity or taste of that stage of the literary life, was not solid and useful merely, which is vague commendation, but it was such as predicated and educated the future states man. In English literature, its finer parts—its poetry and tasteful writing. I mean—he had read much rather than many things, but he had read somewhat. That a young man of his emotional nature, full of eloquent feeling, the germs of a fine taste, the ear for the music of words, the eye for all beauty and all sublimity already in extraordiaary measure his, already practising the art of compo- sition, speech and criticism, should have recreated himeelf, as we know he did, with Shakspeare, and Pope, and Addison, with the great romance of Defoe, with the more recent bineraphies of Johnson, | and his grand imitations of Juvenal, with the sweet and refined simplicity and abstracted observation of | wrought his work ; some tribute to tl Goldsmith, mingled with sketches of homefelt de- | light, with the elegy of Gray, whore solemn touches soothed the thonghte or tested the consciousness of the last hour, with the x seine originality of the then recent Cowper, whom home. as it proved, to die—this we should have ex- pected. But I have heard, and believe, that it was Yo another institution, more austere and characteris- tic, that his own mind was irresistibly and instinct: | even then attracted. The conduct of what row, thoughtful, boding, ailent, the sense of deso- lation, as if renown and grace were dead—as if the hunter’s path, and fthe sailor's in the great soli- tude of the wilderness or sea, henceforward were more lone! and Jers safe than hefnte—had this prediction wi me how calmly had that sob! of d_ put it all aside, asa per- nicious or idle m! Yet in the fulfilment of that prediction is told the remaining story of his life. It does not come within the plan which I have marked out for this discourse to repeat the inci- denta of that subsequent history. more con- spicuous are known to you and the whole American world. Minuter details the time does not permit. nor the occasion require. Some quite general news of what he became and achieved, some at- tempt to appreciate that intellectual power and force of will and elaborate culture, and that power of eloquence, so splendid.and remarkable, by which he he’ endearing and noble parts of his character, and some attempt to vindicate the political morality by which his pub- lic life was guided, even to its last great act, are all that I propose, and much more than { can hope worthily to accomplish. Jn coming, then, to consider what he became and achieved, I _bave always thought it was not easy to lay too much stress, in the first place, on that realiza- tion of what might have been regarded incompa- tible forms of Siperioriin and that exemplification of what might have been thought incompatible gifts or acquirements, which meet us in him everywhere. Remark, first, that eminence, rare, if not unprece- dented, of the first rate, in the two substantially dis- tinct and unkindred professions—that of the law, and that of publi life. In surveying that ultimate and finished greatness in which he stands before you in bis full stature and at his best, ths double and blended eminence is the first thing that fixes the eye, and the last. When he died he was first of | American lawyers and first of American statesmen. In both charactera he continued discharging the foremost part in each, down to the falling of the aw- ful curtain. Both characters he kept distinct—the babits of mind, the forms of reasoning, the nature of the proofs, the style of eloquence, neither hurt nor | changed the other. How much his understanding | was ‘ quickened and invigorated’ by the law, I | have often beard him acknowledge and explain. Bat bow, in spite of the law, was that mind, by other felicity, and other cultnre, ‘‘ opened and liberalized” | also?” How few of what are called the bad intelles- tual habita of the bar he carried into the duties of | statesmanship! His interpretetions of the constita thon and of treaties—his exoositions of public law— | how little ia them, where, if anywhere, you would | expect it, of the mere ingenuity, the moving of ‘ver | miculate questions,” the word-catching,the sehool astic subtlety which, in the words of his memorable | e quoted when he oume | quotation— | ‘ean sever and divide A hair 'twixt north and northwest side” | ascribed by Satire to the profession, and how much | of its truer functions and nobler power of calling, history, language, the moral sentiments, reason, ive! Locke calls the human understanding, the limits of | common sense, the high spirit of magnanimous | human knowledge, the means of coming to the | knowledge of the different classes of truths, the laws | of thought, the science of proofs which is logic, selerce of morals, the facts of history, the 3; laws, the conduct and aims of reasonings in politics— these were the strong meat that announced and be- gan to train the great political thinker and reasoner of a later day. I have heard that he might oftener be found in | sober and conservative habit of mind nationality, to the search of truth! How little do you find in his politics of another bad habit of the protession, the worst ‘idol of the cave,” a morbid, | of | unreasoning and regretful passion for the past, that bends and sweeps over the stream, ranning irreversi- | bly, because it will not return and will not pause, | and gives back to vanity every hour a changed and | less beautiful face! We ascribe to him certainly a | nd such he some solitary seat or walk, with a volume of Gor had—such a habit, the study and practice of the law | jon’sor Ramsay's Revolution, or of the Federalist, or of Hume's History of England, or of his Essays, | or of Grotius, or Puffendorf, or Cicero, or Mon- Ee uieu, or Locke, or Burke, than with Virgil or Shi 0 ions, in the department of philosophy. he was already a curious student. before the United Fraternity, when he gradaated, treated that topic of opinion, under some aspects, doubtless does not impair. But his was my Lord Bacon's conservatism. fle held with him, “that | antiquity deserveth this reverence, that men should make a stand therenpon and discover what is the ‘speare, or the Spectator. Of the history of | best way; but when the discovery is well taken, then to make profession.” He would keep the | The oration he delivered | Union according to the Constitution, not as a relic, | a memorial, a tradition—not tor what it had done, though that kindled his fortitude and excited his ad- | as I recollect from once readiaythe manuscript, with | miration—but for what it is now and hereafter to copiousness, judgment, and enthusiasm; and some of | do, when adapted by a wise, practical philosophy to his ridicule of the Berkleian theory of the non- | a wider and higher erea, to larger numbers, to existence of matter, 1 well remember, anticipated | the sarcasm of a later day on a currency all metallic, and of nullification as a strictly constitutional remedy. | than he has grasped and severer and more glorious specvaton, Who better i isplaye1 the advancing | Who | tendencies and enlarging duties of America? The other fact, as well established, by all we can | has caught, whose eloquence, whose genias, whose that the faculty, 20 ped and effective ing the minds of | counsels, have caught more adequately the genuine | ana Ee ion of our destiny? Who has better expound- ed by what moral and prudential polivy, by wat improved culture of heart and reason, by what true came, with what dignity, with what possession of typed designation seems wholly inadequate to con- | tions, the dangers of that destiny may be disarmed, himeelf, with what loving thought for others, with | vey the impression he made in his time. Many now | and its large promise laid hold on? what gratitude to God, utterred with unfalteriag | alive have said that some of his performances, hav- voice, that it was appointed to him there to die, to | ing regard to his youth, his objects, his topics, his aay bow thus leaning on the rod and staff of promise, | sudiences—one the Celebration of Indepependeuce, he took his way into the great darkness undismayed, one a eulogy on a stadent much beloved—produced | tinge the lawyer. till death should be thus swallowed up of life; and | an instant effect, and left a recollection to which then to relate how they laid him inthat simple grave, | nothing else could be compared, tie, could be felt yu and turning and pauring and joining their voices to the voloes of the sea, bude him hail and farewell. , What there is in literature, ag sg with the vuriety and beauty and adequacy ef tho series of discourses through which the love amd grief, and deliberate reasoning admiration of , a for this great man, bave been uttered. Lit- fle, indeed, there would be for me to say, if I] were | ea of the higher ambition of professing to omit | all which others bave said on this theme before—lit- fe to add if I sought to ssy anything new. | I nave thonght, ad the place where I was to suggested the topic—that before we 9 ce teevulumess and historical greatness of Mr. Webster, itm its two chief departments, and attempt to appre- ¢iate by what qualities of genius and character, and | what succession of action he attained it, there might be an interest in going back of all this, 30 to say, ‘and pansing a few moments upon his youth. [ imolude in that designation, the period from his | birth on the isth day of Jannary, 1782, until 180: when, twenty-three years of age, he declined the | elerkship of his father’s Court, and dedicated him- self irrevocably to the profession of the law, and the ehances of summons to less or more | oa lic Life. These twenty-three years we shall all the youth of Webster. “Its incidents are few | and well known and need not long detain us. Un- | til May, 1796, beyond the close of his fourteenth | se lived at home, attending the schools of Mittters Chase and Tappan, successively—at work | sometimes and sometimes at play, like any boy— | but finding alyeady, as few beside him did, the stimau- lations and the feed of intellectual life in tho social library—drinking in unawares from the moral and physical aspects about him, the lesson and the pow of contention and seil'trust, and learning how mu grander than the forest benuing te the lonz stor: or the silver and cherishing Merrimac swollen to | inundation, and turning, as love become madnesss, and admitted only, not explained; | they know were the first sweet tones of inexplicable And yet I hardly know what there is in public bio- | but delightful influence of that voice, unconfirmed as to be eompared | yet and ‘unassured, whose more consummate expres- | | sion charmed and suspended the soul of a nation. | ae read these essays now disappcints you some- what. it which now As Quintillian says of Hortensias, Appa- ret placuisse aliquid eo dicente quod legentes non invenimus. Some spell there was in the spoken word which the reader misses. To find the secret of that spell, you mast recall the youth of Webster. eg fovdly and appreciated by that circle as much as by any audience, large, more exacting, more various, abd more fit, which afterwards he found everywhere—known to be inanly, just, pure, generous, affectionate—known and feit by his strong | will, his high aims, his commanding character, his uncommon and difficult y warmest good wish wi | then, when unchecked by any severe theory of unoppressed by an: compatible with his place and (fame, or unequal to himself, he just unlocked the deep spring of that eloquent feeling, which, in connection with his dread of saying something in- power of mere intellect, was such a stupendous psy- chological mystery, and gave himself the very genius of eloquence, not to the conduct of an argument or the investigation and display of a truth of the rea- son, but to a fervid, beautiful, and prolonged emo- tion, to grief, to enlogy, to the patriotisin of scholars. What wonder, as they looked op that presiding brow, the eye large, sad, nnworldly, incapable to be fathomed, the lip and chin, whose firmness, ag of chiseled, perfect marble, profoundest sensibility alone caused ever to tremble—why can we doubt or wonder at the traditions of the eflect they produced and the predictions they suggested 7 His college life closed in August, 1301. I do not ment that he had thought of stadying the profession of theclogy, but am assured and believe there is | \¢ | And, on the other hand, would you say that the not. Certai ly, he began at once the study of the to ravage the subject intervale—or old woods sal | jaw, and interrupted only by the necesity of teach- denly retiring before axe and ‘ire—learning to feel | how moch grander than these was the coming in of ivilization us there he saw it, courage, labor, pa- tience, plain living, heroical acting, high tcinkiag, beantiful feeling, the fear of God, love of country, and neizhbo: hood, and family, obedience to law, and all that form of homan life of which his father, and mother. and sisters, and brother were the od exemplificatian. In the arms of that circle, on pa- rent knees, or later, in intervals of work or play, the future American statesman acquired the idea of tountry, acd became conscious of a national tie and snational life. Thereand then something glimpses alitele of the romance. the eweet and bitter momo- Ges of a soldier and borderer of the o!d colonial time and , opened to the large dark eyes of the child | ies of French anc indians stealing up to | e very place where the story waa telling; of moa shot down at the plough, within sight of the old log house; of the massacre at Fort William aad Mary; Starke, of Howe, of Wolfe falling in the arms of vic- , + and then of the next age, its grander scenes ivher names; of the father’s part at Benning. | tow and White kiains; of Lafayette and Washinz- | ton; and then of the Constitution, just adopted, aud Lene thankaging to Alraighty God, and the Union just spring into life—-all radiant aa morning, harbio- and prom fa brighter day. You have heard or in that season he bonybt and first read tue Consti- | tution on the cotton handxerchief. A small cannon, I thiok hia biographers say, was the ominous play- thing of Napoleon's childhood. Bat this reminds ns rather of the yoathfat Luther, astonished | and kindélin, the first Letin Bible he evoc saw—- or the still attracted him. Long before bis fourwenth year, the qmotber aret, and then the father, and the teachers, ‘and the schools. and the litt'e acighborhood, had discovered an extraordinary bope in him--a purpose ® dream nt yet confersed, of giving him an edie tio, began to be cherisoed, snd in May, 1 | fourteen, bo was seut to Exeter. I have myself heard & gentlemen, long a leader of the [awex bar, aud | empinent in public life, now no more, who Was then a pil at the a hool, describe ‘ils large frame, superb Rice, ana rustic dress, surmounted with a studeot's ame; and | wo, and immature nanuerswhen first ho a. ten, Low soon and universally his capacity wes | ‘owned. Who does vot wish that the glorioas Buck- minster could have foreseen and witnewed whole gcaivess, bot certainly the renown of nce, Which were to come to the young stranger, whom, choking, speechless, the wile tain of as yet, he tried to ensourage to declaim before the unconsei pright tribes of The intineaces of ter on bim were | pxvellent, but bis stay was br In the winter of 1786 be was at home, and in Febuary, 1707 was placed under the private tuition, and in tie fmily of, Rev. Mr. Wood, of Boscawen. It 7 fe | with bie father, to the house ot Tage te first heard with astonishment, | fhat the parental love and good senso had re- | Jolved on the great sacrifice of siving him an @dueation at college. ‘‘Iremember,” he writes, “the very bill we were ascending, through deep » in a New eee sleigh, when my | made his purpose known me. peek. How conld he, I thought, with so ‘8 femily, and in such narrow circumstances, of incurring #0 at an oper. for got A warm glow ran A cror me, Tiley wy ing the academy afew months, with wi the recreation of recording deeds, the office of Mr. Thompson, of Saliabury, and of Mr. Gore, in Boston, antil March, 1805, when resisting the sharp temptation of a clerkship, and an anaual salary of $1,400, he was admitted to the bar. | ing to its fhe first President, just inaugurated, with soenes of , fore his lif 7 score years and ten, siould end, he sl country,in which be was coming te | expanded ecross 4 continent—the thirteen States of | and firm tread, tie eminent but severe beauty of the | deak | the Rio Grande, a unger Pascal, permitted to look intothe | her area reven ui Enolid, to whose sublimities an irresistible naturehad | more in number ich he unit prosecuted it d And so he has put on the robe of manhood, and has come to do the work of life. Of bis youth there inno need to say more. strenuous; in many things privileced. Tue iaflnence of home, of his father, and the excellent mother, and that noble brother, whom he loved so dearly, and | TMourued with such sorrow—these influences on his heart, principles, will, aims, were elevated and strong. At an early ave, comparatively, the then great distinction of tbersl education was his. His | college life was brilliant and without a stain; and in moving his adaission to the bar, Mr. Gore presented | him as one of extraordinary promise. It had been pure, happy, With prospects bright apoa the world he came— Pure love of virtus, strong dexirs of fame Men watched the way hia lofty mind wonid take, And all foretold the progress he would make, And yet, if on some day, as that season was draw- ,it had been tore prolonged to little more than three- 1sO1 multiplied to thirty-one Northwest and the great yal! those stars of ermmpire—the Mi the Ne ‘ons gates of the Rocky Mow the territory of the below sown full of issippi, the Sabine, 3 furded—the ponde- ng opened to shut no more--the great tranqnil sea become our sea— trial, the madness of party, the injustice of foreign powerv, the vast enlargement of her terri the antagonism of in interest end fe ling-—the fepirit of nat’onality would grow str ¢ etill pod move plastic—that the tide of Awert feeling would run ever fuller—that her agrou would grow. more svientitic arts sand instructed, and better rewarded — d to a wider and stil wider To) her ¢ Ig would T ever in this vat wth of nat greatness time would be found for the higher ities of the sonl—that ber popular aud her higher education would go on advancing--that ber charities aod all her enterprises of philenthropy would go on enlarging —that ber age of Jettered glory should find its anspicious dawn; and then it hed been also foretold him that even 80, with hor growth and strength, should his fame grow and be establi-! d cherished, there where she shouid garner up heart—that by tong aridations of service and labor he should rise to be, before he should te of death, of the peerless armong her great ones—that he should win the double honor, wer supremacy—that he should become her wisest to | | ment, if for many years before his death they would | counsel and at eloquent to persnade. that he shold come to be called the defen er of the Constitution and preserver of hon- orable peace-that the “austere glory of differ ing’’ to save the Union should be his—that his death, atthe summit of greatness, on the verge of a ripe and venerable age, should be distinguished less by the flags at balfmast on ocean and lake, lew by the perieed ey the appointed eulogy, than by ovorspreading al) faces, by ushing toars, by sor- | acter, ld to him that be- | | know whether there is any foundation for the state- | d see that | the robbery of Goodrich, bi his part, | sixty-nine years, robed as they were with honor and | mes larger, her people five times | with love, with associations of great service done to that throug ail the experiences of | the State, and of great fame gathered and safe, aad | + she would playin lume affairs | and more recognize 1—that | force unabated. | | } | | | | { the dorble wreath of professional and pablio | meet commanding authority, and as the hig And while the lawyer did not hurt the statesman, | the statesman did not hurt the lawyer. More, the statesman did not modify, did not unrobe, did not It would not he to him that the epigram would have application where the old Latia satirist makes the client complain that his law suit is concerning tres capallae—three kids; and that his | advocate, with large disdain of them, is haranguiug with loud vuice and both hands about the slaughters of Canne, the war of Mithridates, the perjuries of Hannibal. I do never detect that in his dis- cussions of law he did not recognize authority, just as anxiously seek fer adjudication old and new in bis favor, just as closely sift them and | collate them, that he might bring them to his side if he could, or leave them ambiguous and | harmless if be could not; that he did uot just as ri- gorously observe the peculiar mode which that scisnce employs in passing fromthe known to the | unknown; the Heont er lots of the law, as if he had never investigated any other than legal truth by any | other organ than legal logic in his life. Peculiarities ot legal reasouing certainly he had, belonging to the peculiar structure and vast power of his mind; more original thought, more discourse of principles, less of the mere subtlety of analysis, which is not rsstrained | by good sense, and a higher Bone of duty temeper- ing and combining one truth in a practical science by other truths, from absurdity or mischief—but still it was all strict and exact legal reasoning. Thelong habit of employing the more popular methods, the probable and plausible conjectures, the approxima- tions, the compromives of deliberative discuss‘on, did not seem to have left the least trace on his vocabula- ry, or his reasonings, or his demeanor. No doubt, as a partoft his whole culture, it helped to give en- largement and general power and elevation of mind; but the sweet stream pasced under the bitter sea, the bitter sea preseed on the sweet stream, and each flowed unmingled, unchanged in taste or color. I bave said that this double eminence is rare if not upprecedented. We do no injustice to Mr. Webster if we do not keep thisever in mind. Where do you find a parallel in British publie life? The Earl of Chat turke, Fox, Sheridan, Windham, Pitt, Grat- were they also, or any one, the acknow- | leader in Westminster Hall or on the circuit? mere Parliamentary career of Mansfield or Thurlow, or Dunning, cr Erskine, or Camden, or Curran would compare in duration, constancy, variety of effort, the — range of topics discussed, the fulness, extent and affiuence of the discussion, the influence exerted, the space filled—the senatorial charactor completely rea- lzed—with his? In our own public life it is easier to | find a parallel. Great names crowd on us in each | department; greater or more loved or more venerable, | no annals can show. But how few, even bere, have gathered the doulble wreath and the blended fame! And now, having observed the fact of this union | of incompatible quality and excellence, inspect for a | moment each by itself. | The professional life of Mr. Webster began in tie | spring of Is It may not be said to have ended | until he died; but I do not know that it happened to | | him to appear in court for the trial of a cause after | bis ergument of the Goodyear patent for improve- | ments in the preparation of Iudia rubber, in Trenton, | in March, 162. | There [raw and last heard him. The thirty-four ‘ears which had elapsed since, a member of this Col- lee, at home for health, I first saw and heard him inthe Supreme Court of Massachusetts, in the county of Essex, defending Jackman, acensed of in almost all things changed him. The raven hair, the vigorous, full frame countenance, not yet sealed with the middle aze of nian, the exuberant demonstration of all sorts of power, which so marked him at first—for these, as | once they were, I explored in vain. Yet how far | higher was the interest that attended hiro now! Hi then the perfect mastery of the canse in its legal and | ntific principles, and in all its facta, the admir- | le clearness and order in which his propositions | were aovanced successively ; the power, the ooca- sional high ethical tone, the appropriate eloquence by which they were made probable and persuasive to the judicial reason—announced the leader of the Aierican ber, with every faculty and every om: plishmert by which lie had won that proud title, wholly uniovpaired—the cye not dim nor the natural | I cannet here and now trace his career at the bar —define the stages of his rive, or the moment he ceme to be first. J cannot enter even on his charac- ter aaa jurist, nor sioce the separate and able treat. | ment of the topic by one so well qualitied to do it justice, is it needful. Yet, let ine say, that herein, ‘also, the first thing which strikes you ia the anon of diverse, and, as | have said, wi ight have beea | regarded incompatible excellence’ T shall sabmit it to the judgment of the Arnerican bar, if a carefaily prepared opinion of Mr. Webster on any question cf lew whatever in the whele range of our j irisnra- dence twould not befaccepted everywhere az of the it evi dg- ( submit to that san dence of legal truth? not have rather chosen to entrust the muintensnce whatever, to his best exertion of his facnities, than to any other ability which the whole wealth of the pro- fersion could supply. leas by the public procession and | yer and a forensio oret 3 sudden palencas | not Cg ae the description of his professional char And this alone completes the description of a law- foe of the first claas; but it does. 'y the side ef all this, 60 to speak, there was i and enforcement of any important propositions of | law whatever, before any legal tribunal of character | that whole class of qualities which made him for any deaeriy trial by jury whatever, criminal or universal assent, foremost. no faculty was unused or needless ; but you were most struck there to see the unrivalled “legal reason put off, as it were, and re-appear in the form of a robust common eloquent feeling, applying itself to an ex- cit'ng subject of business; to see the knowledge of men and life by which the falsehood and vera- ox of witnesses—the probabilities and improbabi- lities of transactions as sworn to, were discerned ia a moment—the direct, plain, forcible spee :h—the'con- summate narrative—the easy and perfect analysis by whicb he conveyed his side of the cause to the mind of the jury—the eccasional gush of the strong fveling, indignation or pity—a masterly, yet natural way in which all the moral emotions of which bis cause was snsceptible, were called to use—the occasional sovereignty of dictation to which his convictions seemed spontaneously to rise. His efforts in trials by jury. compose & more traditional and evanescent part ‘ot b's professional reputation than his arguments on questions of law ; but [almost think they were his mightiest professional displays, or displays of any kind, ufter all. { doubt if his prosecution of the murderer of Joseph White was not a far more difficult and higher eff rt ef mind than his more famous “ Oration for the Crown '—the reply to Mr. Hayne, delivered a few menths before. It would not be unpleasing and would be quite within my plan and my actual preparation, to pause and recall the names, and attempt to appreciate the influence of some of that succession of competitors of judicial friends—of Mason, and Smitn, and Story, and Dexter, and Parsons, by whore rivalry and counsels he was honored, and stimulated, and trained—but that time forbids it. Equally within my plan it would also be to enumerate the names, atleast, of some of the great causes by which his fame was built, and try to convey some impression of the novelty of the questions involved, and the im- portance of the Prasiples adjudged. But there is only one of which I have time t> say anything, and that is the case which established the inviola- bility of the charter of Dartmouth College by the Legislature of the State ef New Hamp- shire. Acts of the Legislature, passed in the year 1816, had invaded its charter. A suit was lecughtte test their validity. is was tried in the Supreme Court of the State; a jadgment was given against the college, and this was appealed ) the Supreme Federal Court by writ of error. Upon selemn argument the charter was decided to be a contract whose obligation a State may not impair. The acts were decided to be invalid as ‘an attempt to | | impair it, and you hold your charter under that de- cision to-day. How much Mr. Webster contributed to that result, how much the effortadvanced his »wa distinction at the bar, you all know. Well, as if of joterey: I remember how it was written home rom argument of great power by charmed and melted his audience. Oiten since [ have heard vague accounts, not much more satisfac- tory, of the speech and the scene. I was aware that the report of his argument, as it is published, did not contain the actual peroration, and [ supposed it lost forever. By the great kindness of a learned aud excellent person, Dr. Chauney A. Goolrich, a Pro- fessor in Yale College, with whom I have not the honor of a personal acquaintance, although Washington, that Mr. Webster closed a legal | a peroration which | his virtues, accomplishments, and most useful | life were well known to me, I can read to you the words whose power, when those lips spoke them, s0 many owned, although they could not repeat them. As those lips spoke them we shall hear them nevermoro, but no utterance can extinguish their simple, sweet and perfect beauty. Let mo first bring the general ecene before you, and then you will hear the rest iu | Mr. Goodrich’s description. It was in 1818, in the thirty-ceventh year of Mr. Webster's age. addressed to a tribunal yreseed over by Marshall, assisted by Washiagton, Livingston, Johnson, Story, Todd an in all that gives illustration to a beush of law, aad sustained and venerated bya noble bar. He hid called to aid the ripe ani beautifal culture of Hopkinson, and of his opponents was William Wirt, It was | Duvall—a tribunal uosurpassed on earth | then and ever of the leaders of the bar, who, with | faculties and accomplishments fitting him to adorn and g: ide public life, abounding in deep profeasional learning and in the most various and elezant acqii- sitions, a ripe and splendid orator, made so by genins and the most assiduous culture, consecrated all to the service of the law—it was befvre that tri and in presence of an andivnce select and cri I, And thou, too, sat was a deatb-like stl thronghout gome momeuts; every one seemed ty be slowly recov ering himself, and coming gradua ly back to his or- dipary range of thought and feeling. It_ was while Mr. Webster was ascending through the long gradations of the legal peolieen to its Dighest rank, that by @ parallel series of displays on a stage, and in parts totally distinct, by other studies, thoughts and actious, he rose also aake at his death the first of American statesmen. The last of tue mighty rivals was dead before, and he stood alone. Give this aspect also of hs greatresa a passing glance. His public life began in May, 1813, in the House of Representatives in Con; . to which this State had elected him. It euded when he died. If ou except the interval between his removal from Kew Hampshire and his election in Massachusetts, it was a public life of forty years. By what political morality and by what enlarged patriotism, embracing the whole country, that lite was guided, I shall con- sider bereafter. Let me now fix your attention rather op the magnitude and variety and actual value of the service. Consider that from the day he went upon the Committee of Foreign Relations, in 1813, in time of war, and more and more the longer he lived, and the higher he rose, he was a man whose great talents and devotion to public duty placed and kept hit in a position of associated or sole command; command in the political connection to which he belonged, command in opposition, command in power; aud consider the responsibilities which that implies, what care, what prudenee, what mustery of the whole grand, exacting for the conduct of a party, as Gib- p says of Fox, abilities and civil discretion equal to the conduct ct an empire—consider the work he did in that life of forty years. The range of subjects investigated and discussed, composing the wavle theory and practice of our organic and adminuistra- tive politics, foreign and domestic, the vast body of instructive thought he produced and put in jossession of the country, how much he id in Congress as well as at the bar, to fix the true interpretation, as well as to im- press the transcendent value of the constitu- tion itself, as much altogether as any jurist or states- man since its aduption—how much to establish in the general mind the great doctrine that the govern- went of the United States is a government proper, established by the people of the States, not a com- act between sovereign communities—that withia ite limits it is acta, and that whether it is withia its limits or not, in any givea exertion of itself, is to be determined by the Supreme Court of the United States—the ultimate arbiter—in the last resort from which there is no appeal but to revolution. How much he did in the course of the discussion, which gtew out of the proposed mission to Panama, and, at a later day, out of the removal of the deposits, to place the executive department of the government on its true basis, and under its true limitations, to secure to that department all its just powers on the one hand, and on the other hand to vindicate to the legislative department, and _ especially to the Senate, all that belong to them— to arrest the tendencies which he thought at one time threatened to substitute the government o/ a single will of a siugle person,of great force of character and boundless popularity, and of a numerical majority of the people, told Hye e Bead, without intermediate institutions of any kind, judicial or sen torial, in place of the elaborate system of checks aud bdal- ances, by which the constitution aimed at a govera- ment of laws, and not of men—how much, attract- ing less popular attention, but scarcely less import- ant, to complete the great work which experieuce had shown to be Jeft untinished by the judiciary a:t of 1789, by providing for the punishment of all crimes against the United States—-how mach for securing a safe currency and .a true financial system, not only by tne promulgition | of sound opinions, but by good specific measures adopted, or bad ones defeated--how much to develope the vast material resources of the country, and to push forward the planting of the West, not troubled yy any tear of exhaustins 1 States—by liveral policy of public is—by vindicating the constita- tional power 0° gress to muke or aid in nfikiog large classes | jinprovements, and acting , on that doct nly trom 1513, whenever a | road was to be iit, ora rapid suppressed, ora caual among whom it is borne in mind, were some gradu: | ates of the college, who were attendiag to assist against her, that he opened the cause. I gladly pro- ceed in the words of Mr. Goodrich :— “Before going to Washiegtoe, which I did ohiefy for the sare of bearing Mr. Webster, 1 was told that 14 ar- guirg the care at Exeter New Hampanire he had laf: tne whole courtrcom iu tesrs at the cenclusiun ef bis xpaach, This. I confess, etrack me vnplearsetiy— any attempt at paibos on @ purely legal question like this esmed hardly in good taste. On my way to Warhington [ made the acquaintance of Mr. Webster. We were tozethor for several days ic Philadelphis, at the house of a common friend, and as the C.lleye question was ove of deep im: terest to literary mea, ¥e conversed cftn and largely oa the subject. As he éwelt upom the lestiog point, of the care im terme fo calm. simple and precise, [ ssid to my- self more than once, io reverence to the story] had hes1d, ‘Whatever may bave seemed apprepriate ia de- exding the college et home, and ow her on ground, here will be uo appeal to the feelings of Judge Marsuall ud Dis associates st Washington.’ ”” The Supreme Court of the United States held its session that winter in a mean apartment, of mode- rate size—the Capitol not having been built after its destruction in 1814. The audience, when the case came on, was therefore small, consisting chiefly of legal men, the élite of the profession throughont the eouutry. the calm tone of easy and dignified conversation. His matter was so completely at his command tiat he scarce), than four hours with a statement so luminous and a chain of reasoning 80 easy to be understood, and yet | approaching so nearly to absolute demonstration, that he seemed to carry with him every man of his either side. It was hardly eloqueuce, in the strict to be opened. © a breakwater or a lighthouse set up above or below the flow of the tide, if so far beyond the ability of a single State, or of so wide utility to commerce and labor as to rise to the rank of a work general in its influences — another tie of union, because another proof of the beneficence of union—how much to protect the vast mechanical | ond manufacturing interests of tne country, a value ) of many hundreds of millions, after having Mr. Webster entered on hia argument in | looked at his brief, but went on for more | sense of the term—it was pure reason. Now and | then, fora sentence or two, his eye flashed and his voice swelled into a bolder note as he uttered some emphatic thought, but he instantly fell back into the tone of earnest conversation which ran through- out the great body of his speech. A single cirvam- stance will show you the clearness and absorving power of his argument. lobserved that Judge Story, at the opening of the case, had prepared bimself, pen in hand, asif to take copious minutes. Hour aster hour, I saw him fixed in the same attitude, but so far as I could perceire, | with not a note on his paper. The argumeut civsed, and J could not discover that he had taken a single note. Others around me remarked the same tuing, and it was among the on dits of Washington, that a friend spoke to him of the fact with surprise, when the Judge remarked acd so easy to remember, that and, in fact, [ thought Mr. Webster stood for some r sothing about m: The argument ended, moments silent before the court, while every eye was | fiexd intently upon him. At length, addressing the Chief Justice, Marshall, he proceeded thas:— This sir. is mye It is ths cave not mowly of that humole inaita —it is the ease of every coliegs in our Jaod It is wore, mosynary ipetitution throughout our country—of all these great ebarities frur.ded dy the piety of our susvatry Jeviate buman misery, and scatter blessings aloag tae way of life. [tiewore! I: is in no of every man amongst us erty of whic be ‘stripped. for the q simoly this; ** Shall 6 Legiiatures be allowed to take thas which is it from its oriyinal use and apply is as they, im their diserevioa, destroy this litte iaatita- jon; It fe weak: itis iv your bardal I knew it is one of the Jestor lights in the literay horizes of our country. You may put {t out But if you do so, you must ourry *hrowgh your work, You mastextiaguis® oaesftor aa0 hee, oll tbere great lights of xaleace which, for more bem aceptury, have thrown their ravisnoe over our Isad! tia, wir, os T have said, a sansl! college. Aud yet there We Were who love ir. ir ruccer ded im kvepiog dows broke forza, ed, Dia firm oh treabled wish emis yes were filled vith , hia votes onoked, ai is Lips bis ve wemed rtruggling to the utwiet simply tw gaia tha: tery over biwesif «Dich might sara bim from wably burst of (hing, Tilt avs attempt to be ‘ee brokes words of tenderners in #hiey ke went on to apeak of his wirachneut to the colieg®; the whole reowed to be rolegled througbout wth the reaoliestions | of tether, mother, brotner, and ali the trialy and priva. ox through which he had made his way into life Every one aay tha: it wae whoily auerewedicnted, x pros awe om bis heart, which rourhs rel ef +s #ordn and tears, | ‘The court-room during these two or three minutes presented an extraordinary épectacle. Chief Justice farcball, with his tall and gaaut figure beat over as if to catch the slightest whisper, the deep farrows of his cheek expanded with emotion, and eyes aaifised with tears; Mr. Justico Washington at his side, wi his email and emaciated frame, wud a eoantevan more like marble than [ever saw on aay other ha man being, leaving forward with an earcer trunled look; ana the remainder of the court, at the two ex- tremities, pressing, as it were, towards a single point, while the audience below were wraoping them-e round in er folds ene ath the bench to look, and every movet if a painter could give uy those forms and countenances, and as he then stood in the midst—it would be one of the most touching pictures in the history of eloquence, One thing it taught me that the pathetic depends not merely on the words uttered, but still imore on the estimate we put upon him who ntters them. ‘There was not one among the strong minded mea of thet assembly who could think it upmanly to weep when he saw standing before him the man who had made ench an argoment, melted into the tenderness of a child, Mr. Webster bad now recovered his composure, and fixing hia keen eye on the Chief Jnetice, eaid, in thut deep tone with whioh be some- times thrilled the heart of an andience. “Sir Thnew not how others may feel,” (aiancing at the oppowen's of the College before bim,) * but for my- [fone the fealings which he bad | | strengthen the ties o: Tt in the cass of every lee | | as @ local constituency to grati wealth, all the hopes of an illustrious life on the | n lured into existence against his counsels, against his sci- ence of political economy, by a policy of artificial en- Sante ramsne for being sacrificed, and the pursuits and plana of large regions and communities broken up, and the acquired skill squaudered by a sudden and capricious withdrawal of the promise of government —how much for the right performance of the most delicate and difficult of all tasks, the ordering of the foreign affairs of a nation, free, sensitive, self-con- scicus, recognizing, it ix trae, pablio law and a mor- ality of the State binding on the conscience oftheState, yet aspiring to power, eminence, and command, is whole frame full of and all on fire with American feeling, sympathetic with liberty everywhere—how much for the right ordering of the foreign affairs of such a State—aiming in all his policy, from his speech n the Greek question in 1823, to his letter to M. Halsemann in 1850, to occupy the high, plain, yct dizzy ground which separates influence frum inter- vention, to avow and promulgate warm good will to humanity ever striving bo be free, to inquire authen- tically {nto the history of its struggles, to take official and avowed pains to ascertain the moment when its success may be recognized consistently, even with the great code that keeps the peace of the world, abstaining ever from everything which shall give avy nation a right under the law of nations to utter one word of complaint, still leas to retaliate by wer, the sympathy, but also the neutrality of Washing- audience without the slizhtest effort or weariness on | tou-—how, mucit #0 compare with honots conaur- rence of difficulties with the first power in the world, which anything less than the highest degree of dis- cretion, firmness, ability and means of commanding respect and coufideuce at home and abroad would inevitably have conducted to the last calamity, a disputed boundary line of many hundred miles, from the St. Croix to the Rocky Mountains, which di vided an exasperated and Lala cable border po- pulation, enlisted the pride au d the interests and controlled the politics of well ax pressed on the peace and which the most popular admiuistrations of the era of the quietest and best pnolic feelings, the times of Moprce ard of Jackson, could not adjust; which had grown so complicated with other topics of excite- ment that one false step, right or leit, would have been a step down & LE aero settled for- ever the claim of England to search our ships for the suppression of the slave trade—silenced forever, and a bew engayement entered into by treaty, bind- ing the natioaal faith to contribute a speciiic naval force for putting an end to tho great crime of ma1— the long practice of England w enter an Americaa ship and impress from its crew, terminated forever; the deck henceforth guarded sacredly and vomn- | pletely by the flag—how much by profound discern- ment, by elognent speech, by devoted life to Union, and breathe the fine and strong spirit of nationality trong ali our num- bers—how much, most of all, last of all, after the war with Mexico needless if his counsels had gove:n- A Th Mocte the mse | Cdr Dad ended in so vast an acquisition of territory. In presenting to the two great antagonist sections of our country so vast an area to enter on, so imperial a prize to contend for, and the acoursed fraiernal strife begun, how much then, when rising to the measure of a trve, and difficult, and rare greatness, remembering that he had a country to save as well , laying all the altar of a hazardous patriotism, te sought and win the more exceeding glory which now attends—wh ch in the next age shall more conspicuously attend-~ his name; who composes an agitated, and saves a sinking Jand! Recal this series of conduct and in- flues , Study them carefully in their fasts aud re- snlts—the reading of years—and you attain to a true appreciation of this aspect of his greatuess—his pub- ie character and life. For such a review the eulogy of an hour has no room, and I deliver it uver to history. Something I would have said on certain portions of this crowded lite, which had been the subject of controversy, ies or more, but I must forbear, especially in justice to bi-tory and to the dead. I would have declared my opinion here by the side of hia grave, on the difficulty, or the importance, and on the merit of © « itt nit, the negotiation of the Treaty of h id. [have seen it written much diplomatic glory, and that any seusibie and | honest man could have done as well. “1 will not an. | swer this by a pplying what Scaliger says of Lipsins, the pedant, who dogmatised on politics aa he did on the text of Tacitus or Seneca—Neque est politics, nec potest quicquem in poltia nihil possunt pedantes in pss rebus--nee ego mec albus doctus possuinny serilere m politicis ; and yet there is no time or veed of any other suswer. “The country, the worid, haa judged aud approved it. [hn one remembrance indulge me. and | leave it. It happeced to me to be a member of the Senate of the United States whey that treaty was negotiated, and ratifled in secret -es- sion. Ov the general diliculties which beset our Britieh relations at that momeot, the complexity, the irritation, of the embairassments of every descrip: tion, 100 mary for the populsrity of Monroe, too many for the w.llof Jackson, occasioned, among other things. by tne relation of the State of Maine to tho controver-y, you are allaware. But my opportunit, of frequent access to Mr. Webster, may have enable me Komewhot better to discover with what profound conviction of theve difficulties, what anxieties for the issue, hope and fear alternately preponderating, ho entered on that great trial of temper, firmness, apirit, discretion, ability, and good fortune, and carried .it through. As if it were last night, recall the time when, ation, I would not have exchanged it kings or people could bestow.” Such eminence and such hold on the public mind ashe attained demands extraordinary intellectual power, adequate mental culture, an impressive, at- tractive, energetic and great character, and extraor- dipary specific power also of influencing the convic- beg ‘and actions of others by speech. These all ke ad. in the quality of pure and sheer power of inte he was of the first class of men, is, I think, tne universal judgment of all who have personally witnessed his higher displays, and of all who without that opportunity have stidied his life in its actions and influences and stu- died bis mind in its recorded thoughts. To discern the existence of his supreme iutellestual power waseasy, inevitavle. To analyze it, to vom- pave or contrast it with other mental celebrities, aud show how it differed or resembled, was noé so easy. Wheiber, fer example, he would have excelled as much in other fields of exertion, as in speculative philosophy, in any of its departments, is a problem impossible to determine and needless to moot. To me it seems quite clear that the whole wealth of his owers, bis whole emotional nature, his eloqueat feel- os, his matchless capacity to affect others’ conduct by affecting their practical jndgments, could not huve been known, could not bave beon poured forth in @ stream so rich aad strong and full, could not have so reacted on and aided and winged the mighty in- telligence in any other walk of mind, or life, than that he chose—that in any other there mast have been some disjoining of qualities which God had upited—some divorce of pure intellect from the helps or hindrances or compauionsbip of common seuse and beautiful genius; and thatin aay field of speca- jative ideas but half of him, or part of him, could have found its eee What that part might have heen or done, it {s idle to inquire. peta fy more important it is to say that this extraordinary intellectual power was not op- pressed, but aided and accomplished by ease the most constant, the most severe, the most stimulant, and by a force of will ss remarkable as his genius, and by adequate mental and taste‘ul cul- ture. How much tie eminent greatness it reachel is due to the various and lofty competition to which he brought, if he could, the most careful pre- paration—competition with adversaries cum quibus cerlure erat gloriosus, quam omnino adversarios non habere, cum pesertim non modo, nunquam sit aut i lorum ab ipso cursus imperitus, out ab ipsis guus sed contra semper aiter ab allero adjustus e commu nicando, et momendo, et favendo, you may well ap- preciate. 1 claim much, too, under the name of mere mental culture. Remark bis style, aud allow its full weight to the Horatian waxim, scrilendi recté sapere est et princrpium et fous, and {admit that he had fel und exquisite Judginent, largely of the gift of G But euch a style as his is due also to art, to practice, in the matter of style, incessant, to great examples of fine wring tumed by the nightly and the daily hand; to Cicero, through whose pelluced dee» stream, flowing ever grandiy, the pearl shows distinct, d Jarge and near, 23 if within the arm's re to Virgil, whose magic of words, whose exquisite structure and “rich economy of expression” no other writer ever equalled; to Shakspeare, of the style of whose comic dialogue we may, in language of a great critic, assert that it is that which in the English nation is never to become obsolete, & certain mode of phraseclogy 50 consonant and conge- nial to the analogy, to principles of the language, as to remain settied and unaltered—a style above gros ness, below mudish and pedantic forms of speech, where Hepes resides; to Addison, whom Jonnson Mackintosh and Macaulay concur to put at the head of ali fine vriters, for the amenity, del ood un ostentatious elegance of his Engiish; to Pope, lished, condensed, sentevtions; to Johnson; to Burke, in whom all the affluence and ull the energy of our tongue in both its great elements of Saxon and Latin might be exemplified; to the study and comparison, but not she copying of authors such as there; to habits of writing, and speakiog, and con- versing on the capital edd f always doing hig best—thus somewhat, I think, was acquired that remarkable production, The Last Week of Com- bined Study and Genius,” a rich, clesr, correct, har- monious, and weighty style of prose. Beyond these siudies and exervises of taste, he had read variously and judiciously. 1f any public man,orapy man, had more thoroughly mastered british constitutional and general history, or the history of British legislation, or could deduse the progress, eras, causes, and hiadraaces of British liberty in more prompt, exact and copious detail, or had in his memory at any given momeut a more am- ple ioe ry biography or political literature, I have not heard of hia. His library of English history, and of all history, was always rich, select, and ca- tholic, aud I well recollect hearing him, in 1819, while attending a commencement of this college, a& an evening party sketch with great emphasis and interest of manuer the merits of George Buchanan, the historian of Scotland—his latinity and eloquence almost equal to Livy’s, bis love of liberty and his genins greater, and his title to credit not mush worse. American history and American political literature he had by heart. The long series of infu- ences that trained us for representation and free government; that other series of influences which moulded us into a united government—the colonial era—the age of controversy before the revolations every scene and every person in that great tragic action—the age of controversy folowing the revola- tion, and preceding the constitution, unlike the earlier, in which we divided eracng ourselves on the greatest questions which can engage the mind of America, the questions of the existence of a na- tional government, of the contin istence of the State governmente,on the purti of powers, om the umpirage of disputes between them-—a contro- versy on which the destiny of the New World was staked; cvery question which has successively en- gaged our politics, and every name which has figured ia them, the whole stream of our time was open, clear, and preseut ever to his eye. I think, too, though nos a frequent and ambitious quoter of wathor! , he bad read iu the study of his profession of pr ca, and meditated, all the great writers and thinkera by whom the priaciplea of re publican goverment, and all freo governments, are most authoritatively expounded. Aristotle, Cicero, Machiavel. one of whose discourses on living main- tains in so masterly an argument, bow much wiser and more constant are the people than ibe prince—a doctrine of iberty consolatcry and full of joy. Har. rington, Milton, Sidacy, Locke, I kaow he had read and weighed. Otber classes of information there were, partly obtained from books, partly from observation; to some extent referable to his two main employments of politics and law, by which he was distinguished remarkably. Thus nebody but was struck with hig knowledge of civil and ical geography, and toa leas txtert of geology afd races—of all the great routes and marts of our foreign, coastwice, aud inte- rior commerce—the subjects which it exchinges, the whole circle of industry it camprehends and passes around, the kinds of our mechanical and manufac turing productions, and their relations to all labor and all lite, the history, theories, and practice of pitire, our own ‘and that of other coun- and its relations to government, liberty, = ‘or all that d | bappinesa, and the character of nations. This kind of information, enriched and assisted all his public efforts. Butto appreciate the variety and accuracy of hia knowledge and even tho trae compass of his mind you must converse with him with some decreo of freedom. There more than ia senatorial or trensied debete gleamed the true riches | of his genius as wellas tha goodness of bis large heurt and the kindness of his noble nats There, with no longer vah part bo discha: no longer compelled to eh and measure pt ypositions, to treed the dizvy heighta which part the antugoulama {the conrtituvion, to pot acide allusion rations, whick crowded on bis mind i A itus- action, and yet not entitled to | but which the dignity of a public syveur snce had to reject—in the confidence cf hoapk tality, which ever he dispoased asa prince who also was a friend—his memory, ove of his most extraor- dinary faculties, quite in proportion to all the rast, | pwept freo over the readings and labors of more than halt a cent 3 and then allusions, direct aul ready quotations, @ passing, mature only & iecollection ef ihe n | glorious pa cited, dar ve emotions wareh & z event had o> ce ex- e fora ant the face, and filling | the eye—-cften an instructive exposition of a current: maxim of plilosopby or politics, the history of an ita] of some incident casting 4 pew i some institution-—this flow of unstudied conve , quite as retvarkante y other exbibition of bis mind, better than any , », alonce opened glimpses of bis vue ta, and pave you te exporrience de- i p * walld rent its have Weir clo cll as the siormy sions’? | invention, the r Nght on sore y quence ns W There must be added next the clonent of an im- pressive character, Sospiring ard, trast, and ad- airation, not unmingled with love. !t had, [ think, t intrinsically a charm auch as belougs only to a good, noble, and beautiful watore. Ja its combination with so much fame, «0 much force of wil, and &@ mucb intellect, it filled and faccinated the ina netion and heart; it was affeetionate ia chikk | hood and youth, aod it was more than ever #0 in the few last months of his jong life | It is the aniversal testimony that he gave | to his parents In largest measure, honor, love, obe dience—that he eagerly appropriated the first meaas which he could command to relieve the father from the debta contracted to educate hia brother and him- self—that he selected his first place of professional practice that he might soothe the coming on of his old age—tiat all through life he noglected no occasion, sometimes wlien leaning on the erm of a friend alone