other hardships they endured, consider that liberty and union were purchased at too great a cost to be madly thrown away. Ask the old soldiers who fought in the war of 1812, was it for this they slept upon the damp, cold earth, without tents to shield them from the pitiless peltings of the storm? Was it for this that they suffered hunger and thirst, and perilled their lives in many a battle?

Why shall we destroy our Government? It has given us wise laws; and no nation has ever prospered like our own. How wondrous has been its growth! Go back in imagination but twelve short years. Look out upon the broad prairies beyond the Mississippi. Far as the eye can reach behold the long procession of emigrants; and almost before the mind can conceive the thought, California becomes a State, and San Francisco the New York of the Pacific!

Now gaze upon the mighty ocean. See one of our noble ships "careering over the waves." Wherever she goes, whatever port she enters, there is not a despot on earth who would dare to interfere with crew or cargo. Why is this? It is because she carries the star-spangled banner; and that symbol of our union and our strength bears witness to the whole world that we have the will and the power to protect our citizens abroad as well as at home:

"Forever float that standard sheet!

Where breathes the foe but falls before us?
With freedom's soil beneath our feet,

And freedom's banner streaming o'er us."

Why should we destroy our Government? The liberty we enjoy is not simply the work of the seven years' war of the Revolution. It is the result of centuries of contest. Although the great charter of British freedom was granted ages ago, it required the struggle of ages to secure it. The memory of that struggle was handed down to our fathers, and inspired them to the mighty work which they accomplished. There is not a provision in any of our bills of rights which may not be said to have been purchased with the tears and groans of a thousand years. If it be possible for those who have "shuffled off this mortal coil" to take an interest in the affairs of earth, how earnestly are our departed patriots gazing upon our country now! Methinks I can almost see their shadowy forms, and hear the rustling of their angel wings. George Washington is looking down upon us, and with solemn earnestness admonishes us to cherish an undying love for the Union, and frown indignantly upon every effort

to dissolve it. Andrew Jackson speaks to his friends, declaring, "the Federal Union, it must be preserved." The gallant Harry of the West is hovering over us, and, in trumpettones proclaims, "I am called upon to say when I will consent to a dissolution of this Union: my answer is, never! NEVER! NEVER!

My countrymen, let us heed those warning voices. Let us settle all our controversies in the Union. Oh, trust not to that last delusive argument of the secessionists, that this Government, once dissolved, can be reconstructed. The causes which destroy it will forever preclude a reunion. Hate will be intensified, and a war of extermination will ensue. It is in vain for either section to calculate upon the cowardice of the other. All are of the same race. All are

alike brave and a war once begun between us will have no parallel in the contests which history has described. May Almighty God avert it!-Hon. Thomas A. R. Nelson, 1861.

VINDICATION OF REBELLION.

WE are told that the laws must be enforced; that the revenues must be collected; that the South is in rebellion without cause, and that her citizens are traitors.

Rebellion! the very word is a confession-an avowal of tyranny, outrage and oppression. It is taken from the despot's code, and has no terror for other than slavish souls. When, sir, did millions of people, as a single man, rise in organized, deliberate, unimpassioned rebellion against justice, truth and honor? In the words of a great Englishman on a similar occasion: " 'you might as well tell me that they rebelled against the light of heaven; that they rejected the fruits of the earth. Men do not war against their benefactors; they are not mad enough to repel the instincts of selfpreservation. I pronounce fearlessly that no intelligent people ever rose, or ever will rise against a sincere, rational and benevolent authority."

Traitors! Treason! Ay, sir, the people of the South imitate and glory in just such treason as glowed in the soul of Hampden; just such treason as leaped in living flame from the impassioned lips of Henry; just such treason as encircles with a sacred halo, the undying name of Washington! Since when, sir, has the necessity arisen of recalling to American legislators the lessons of freedom taught in lisping childhood by loving mothers, that pervades the atmosphere

we have breathed from infancy, so forming part of our very being that in their absence we should lose the consciousness of our own identity? Heaven be praised that all have not forgotten them; that when we shall have left these familiar halls, and when force bills, blockades, armies, and all the accustomed coercive appliances of despots shall be proposed and advocated, voices shall be heard from this side of the chamber, that will make its very roof resound with the indignant clamor of outraged freedom. Methinks I still hear ringing in my ears the appeal of the eloquent Representative whose northern home looks down on Kentucky's fertile borders: "Armies, money, blood cannot maintain this Union; justice, reason, peace, may."

And now, to you, Mr. President, and to my brother Senators on all sides of this chamber, I bid a respectful farewell. With many of those from whom I have been radically separated in political sentiment, my personal relations have been kindly, and have inspired me with a respect and esteem that I shall not willingly forget. With those around me from the Southern States, I part as men part from brothers on the eve of a temporary absence, with a cordial pressure of the hand and a smiling assurance of the speedy renewal of sweet intercourse around the family hearth. But to you,

noble and generous friends, who, born beneath other skies, possess hearts that beat in sympathy with ours; to you who, solicited and assailed by motives the most powerful that could appeal to selfish natures, have nobly spurned them all; to you who, in our behalf, have bared your breasts to the fierce beatings of the storm, and made willing sacrifice of life's most glittering prizes in your devotion to constitutional liberty; to you who have made our cause your cause, and from many of whom I feel I part forever, what shall I, can I, say? Nought, I know and feel, is needful for myself; but this I will say for the people in whose name I speak to-day: whether prosperous or adverse fortunes await you, one priceless treasure is yours the assurance that an entire people honor your names, and hold them in grateful and affectionate memory. But with still sweeter and more touching return shall your unselfish devotion be rewarded. When, in after days, the story of the present shall be written; when history shall have passed her stern sentence on the erring men who have driven their unoffending brethren from the shelter of their common home, your names will derive fresh lustre from the contrast; and when your children shall hear repeated the familiar tale, it will be with glowing cheek and kindling eye: -their very souls will stand a-tiptoe when their sires are

named, and they will glory in their lineage from men of spirit as generous, and of patriotism as high-hearted, as ever illustrated or adorned the American Senate.

Hon. Judah P. Benjamin, 1861.

CONFIDENCE IN THE FUTURE.

Ir a portion of these States propose to inaugurate a new and great experiment upon this continent, in the establishment of two confederacies, lying side by side, the one based upon free labor, and the other upon chattel slavery, to run the race of greatness for a hundred years, I, for my children and children's children, will accept the issue. One of the powers will be dominant, and the other will at last exist, as some of the petty States of Europe exist, more by permission than by any inherent strength. Which this dominant power will be, I care not now to say; but I am willing to abide the trial. It is safe to say that it will be that one which combines most of the elements which in these times go to make up a great nation. It will be that one which rests, not upon one form of industry only, but upon the infinite diversity of pursuits which compose our modern civilization. It will be that one in which shall flourish most, agriculture in its best methods; manufactures in their endless variety of fabrics; the mechanic arts in their countless forms; commerce vexing every sea; science, literature, inventions superseding human labor; all the nobler arts; institutions of learning of every grade; universal education; all that sustains and adorns life, all that enters into the structure of that grandest of human creations-if it be not rather a divine work-a mighty State.

I, for one, accept the position which the irreparable ordinances of nature shall decree for the State in which my fortunes are cast. If war shall come, as it will come-though I cannot contemplate it with indifference-I abide its result with profound tranquillity. For the world will be taught again the old lesson, that national strength reposes in the homes of free labor; that it springs up from the farm, and out of the workshop. And they who provoke the trial will find that a great English statesman said most truly, "No sword is sharper than that which is forged from the plowshare; no spear more deadly than that which is beaten from the pruning-hook."

And, sir, the most precious of all earthly possessions, con

stitutional republican liberty, is still secure. It will remain committed to the guardianship of a people equal to the sacred trust, and able to defend it against a world in arms. We have already had foreshadowed the erection, upon these shores, of governments "strongly military" in their character; and, sir, whatever provincial oligarchies, whatever petty or powerful despotisms may arise on our borders, the Republic of the United States of America will ever be, as it has been, the champion of the liberties of the WHOLE PEOPLE. Whoever else may prove recreant, we can never give up that precious inheritance which our fathers brought with them to this continent and transmitted to us in yet more abundant measure. Not by our apostacy shall these inestimable rights of the people be betrayed and lost, only to be recovered after other centuries of heroic struggle and endurance,—when other Elliots and Martens have perished in prison; when other Miltons have grown blind while their studious lamps "outwatched the bear;" when other Hampdens have fallen on the bloody field; when other Russells have written and pleaded and suffered; when other Sydneys have spent the long night in solving the great problems of human liberty, and then when the morning came, have gone calmly out to seal the written page with their blood.

This birthright shall never be surrendered by us. It has been won on too many fields of stricken battle; it has been vindicated in too many triumphant debates. To secure it too many noble victims have bowed their serene brows to the block; too many martyrs have lifted up unshaking hands in the fire.-Hon. James Humphrey, 1861.

THE SUPREME COURT NOT PARAMOUNT.

SIR, I desire to speak with great respect of that venerable court. The habits and studies of my life have taught me to defer to the authority of the judges. I recognize the great power which the Constitution has conferred upon them. I yield to their absolute authority over individuals who are rightfully before them for judgment; but their power, su preme as it is, is limited to the parties and the case. reach no further. The principle involved may be overruled by themselves, or their successors, and it may be reëxamined when it touches the meaning of the Constitution by every other department of the Government. It is not of very great importance in itself what political opinions these very learned

It can