Caleb Cushing.

BORN in Salisbury, Mass., 1800. DIED at Newburyport, Mass., 1879.

THE NATION'S PROGRESS.

[From a speech at Baltimore, Md., 11 July, 1873, made while journeying from Washington with Franklin Pierce, to open the Crystal Palace at New York.]

THI

HERE was a time-and I see before me some few gray heads who may remember it-there was a time when the United States consisted of a narrow ribbon, as it were, of territory, extending along the shores of the Atlantic Ocean. When the thirteen United States, strong in their sense of right-strong in their sanguine anticipations of the futurestrong in the vigor of wise and good men-when these thirteen United States, I say, dared the power of Britain, we were then a comparatively humble people, occupying merely the narrow slope of the mountains looking towards the Atlantic. Time passed on. To those days of feebleness followed that period in which the vast Valley of the Mississippithe vastest body of cultivable earth that exists, in one mass, on the face of the earth-I say, the time came when that vast Valley of the Mississippi was opened to the enterprise and the industry of Americans. And then it was that the symbolic eagle of our arms took its flight across the Alleghanies, and spread its protecting wings over that great and rich Valley of the Mississippi. Then, then it was that we began to feel that we were great-that there might be, in the future, some untold destiny of magnificent greatness and glory for those original thirteen States. I say, we then first began to feel that it must and should be so. And it has become so; for that Valley of the Mississippi region, almost unknown to geographical inquiry, looked upon as the yet unconquered home of the savage, what is it now? Is it not now the glorious, the unparalleled centre of these United States?

This is now the United States-that colossus of power, that colossus of liberty, that colossus of the spirit of nations, which invites all men from the four corners of the globe to come hither, and find here a refuge from oppression; here to find inexhaustible resources for the development of industry and enterprise; here to add each an item from his intelligence, his virtue, his strength-to add the atom of his own individual capacity to the vast total of the untiring enterprise and industry of the people of the United States. This is the point at which we now stand; and I repeat that it is to no trivial question of the past, it is to no exhausted passions of the past, that we of this day are confined. Our flight is into other elements. Our duty is for other objects. It is,

gentlemen, in the confidence of our strength; for force is, of itself, the irrepressible instinct of action.

He who is strong, who feels coursing in his veins the blood of maturity and vigor, needs action and must have action. It is the very necessity and condition of existence.

I say, then, we are strong in our territorial extent; strong in the vast natural resources of our country; strong in the vigorous men and in the fair women who inhabit it; strong in those glorious institutions which our fathers of the Revolution transmitted to us; but above all, strong, stronger, strongest, in the irrepressible instinct of patriotic devotion to country which burns inextinguishably, like the vestal fire on its altars, in the heart of every American. I say, gentlemen, that is the point in the history of our country to which we have arrived.

John Todd.

BORN in Rutland, Vt., 1800, DIED at Pittsfield, Mass., 1873.

OLD-FASHIONED TALK ON THE WOMAN QUESTION.

[Woman's Rights. 1867.]

OBODY pretends that the sexes are equal in weight, in height, or

in bodily strength. The bodies of the two sexes seem to have been planned for different ends. As to the mind, I have no difficulty in admitting that the mind of woman is equal to ours,-nay, if you please, superior. It is quicker, more flexible, more elastic. I certainly have never seen boys learn languages or mathematics, up to a certain point, as fast or as easy as some girls. Woman's intuitions also are far better than ours. She reads character quicker, comes to conclusions quicker, and if I must make a decision on the moment, I had much rather have the woman's decision than man's. She has intuitions given her for her own protection which we have not. She has a delicacy of taste to which we can lay no claim. "Why, then," my lady reader will say, "why can't we be independent of man?" for this is the gist of the whole subject. I reply, you can't, for two reasons; first, God never designed you should, and secondly, your own deep instincts are in the way. God never designed that woman should occupy the same sphere as man, because he has given her a physical organization so refined and delicate that it can never bear the strain which comes upon the rougher, coarser nature of man. He has hedged her in by laws which no desires or

efforts can alter. We, sons of dust, move slower; we creep, where you bound to the head of the stairs at a single leap. And now bear with me, and keep good-natured, while I show you, what you, dear ladies, cannot do, and God does not ask you to do.

1. You cannot invent. There are all manner of inventions in our age, steam, railroads, telegraphing, machinery of all kinds, often five hundred and fifty weekly applications for patents at the Patent Office, but among them all no female applicants. You have sewing machines almost numberless, knitting machines, washing, ironing, and churning machinesbut I never heard of one that was the emanation of the female mind. Did you? Why sew, or wash, or card off your fingers, rather than to invent, if this was your gift? The old spinning-wheel and the old carding apparatus have gone by, but not by woman's invention. I suppose this power was denied you, lest it should take you out of your most important sphere-as I shall show.

2. You cannot compete with men in a long course of mental labor. Your delicate organization never has and never can bear the study by which you can become Newtons, La Places, or Bowditches in mathematics or astronomy. The world never has seen, and never expects to see, woman excelling in architecture. Neither in ancient or modern times. has she one monument of this kind, showing mastership. You do not find them in ancient Corinth, old Athens, great Rome, or in any city of the old or new world.

So of painting and sculpture. You need not tell us what you are hereafter to do; but you have never yet shown a Phidias, a Raphael, a Michael Angelo, or a Canova. You cannot point to a woman who can pretend to stand by the side of Homer, Virgil, Shakespeare, or Milton. The world has never seen a female historian who came near the first rank. And even in cooking and in millinery, as is well known, men must and do stand at the head of these occupations.

But, you will perhaps say, "We have never had a fair chance-a fair fight in the field. We have been held down by prejudice, and tyranny, and public opinion against us, and all that." Suppose it be so, fair one, there is one field you have had to yourself, and nobody has lifted against you one finger. I mean that, for the last half century, we, cruel men, have invented, manufactured, and bought, and brought home, the piano, and you have had it all to yourselves. What is the result? It is, that the master performers, and teachers, and musicians, are men,—is it not? Nay, have you never seen the girl thumping and drumming her piano for years, under the best teachers, and yet her brother come along and take it up, and without any teaching, soon go in advance of the sister? I have seen it often. In none of these departments can woman compete with man. Not because her immortal mind is inferior,-far from it,VOL. VI.-3

but because her bodily organization cannot endure the pressure of continued and long labor as we can. We may deny this, and declare it is not so; but the history of our race, and the state of the world now, show that it is so. I don't say that here and there a woman can't endure much and long; but they are rare exceptions. Did you ever know a woman who could endure being a teacher till seventy-five, as men often do? The fact that in medical colleges, in medical books, in medical practice, woman is recognized as having a peculiar organization, requiring the most careful and gentle treatment, and the consent of the world, all go to show that her bodily powers are not able to endure like those of the other sex. The wheels and workmanship are too delicate to be driven with the mainspring of the old-fashioned bull's-eye.

The design of God in creating woman was to complete man-a onesided being without her. Together they make a complete, perfect unit. She has a mission-no higher one could be given her-to be the mother, and the former of all the character of the human race. For the first, most important, earthly period of life, the race is committed to her, for about twelve years, almost entirely. The human family is what she makes them. She is the queen of the home, its centre, its light and glory. The home, the home is the fountain of all that is good on earth. If she desires a higher, loftier, nobler trust than this, I know not where she can find it. Mother, wife, daughter, sister, are the tenderest, most endearing words in language. Our mothers train us, and we owe everything to them. Our wives perfect all that is good in us, and no man is ashamed to say he is indebted to his wife for his happiness, his influence, and his character, if there is anything noble about him. Woman is the highest, holiest, most precious gift to man. Her mission and throne is the family, and if anything is withheld that would make her more efficient, useful, or happy in that sphere, she is wronged, and has not her "rights.'

"

John Brown, of Dsawatomie.

BORN in Torrington, Conn., 1800. EXECUTED at Charlestown, Va., 1859.

HIS ADDRESS TO THE COURT, BEFORE SENTENCE.

[Last Speech in the Court-House at Charlestown, Va., 2 November, 1859. Sanborn's "Life and Letters of John Brown." 1885.]

HAVE, may it please the Court, a few words to say.

In the first place, I deny everything but what I have all along admitted, the design on my part to free the slaves. I intended certainly to

have made a clean thing of that matter, as I did last winter, when I went into Missouri and there took slaves without the snapping of a gun on either side, moved them through the country, and finally left them in Canada. I designed to have done the same thing again on a larger scale. That was all I intended. I never did intend murder, or treason, or the destruction of property, or to excite or incite slaves to rebellion, or to make insurrection.

I have another objection: and that is, it is unjust that I should suffer such a penalty. Had I interfered in the manner which I admit, and which I admit has been fairly proved (for I admire the truthfulness and candor of the greater portion of the witnesses who have testified in this case),had I so interfered in behalf of the rich, the powerful, the intelligent, the so-called great, or in behalf of any of their friends,-either father, mother, brother, sister, wife, or children, or any of that class, and suffered and sacrificed what I have in this interference, it would have been all right; and every man in this court would have deemed it an act worthy of reward rather than punishment.

This court acknowledges, as I suppose, the validity of the law of God. I see a book kissed here which I suppose to be the Bible, or at least the New Testament. That teaches me that all things whatsoever I would that men should do to me, I should do even so to them. It teaches me, further, "to remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them." I endeavored to act up to that instruction. I say, I am yet too young to understand that God is any respecter of persons. I believe that to have interfered as I have done-as I have always freely admitted I have done-in behalf of His despised poor, was not wrong, but right. Now, if it is deemed necessary that I should forfeit my life for the furtherance of the ends of justice, and mingle my blood further with the blood of my children and with the blood of millions in this slave country whose. rights are disregarded by wicked, cruel, and unjust enactments,—I subsub mit; so let it be done.

Let me say one word further.

I feel entirely satisfied with the treatment I have received on my trial. Considering all the circumstances, it has been more generous than I expected. But I feel no consciousness of guilt. I have stated from the first what was my intention and what was not. I never had any design against the life of any person, nor any disposition to commit treason, or excite slaves to rebel, or make any general insurrection. I never encouraged any man to do so, but always discouraged any idea of that kind.

Let me say, also, a word in regard to the statements made by some of those connected with me. I hear it has been stated by some of them that I have induced them to join me. But the contrary is true. I do not