condition of having given equivalents for nominal favors, and yet of being reproached with ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion, which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.

In offering to you, my countrymen, these counsels of an old and affectionate friend, I dare not hope they will make the strong and lasting impression I could wish; that they will control the usual current of the passions, or prevent our nation from running the course, which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations. But, if I may even flatter myself, that they may be productive of some partial benefit, some occasional good; that they may now and then recur to moderate the fury of party spirit, to warn against the mischiefs of foreign intrigue, to guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism; this hope will be a full recompense for the solicitude for your welfare, by which they have been dictated.

How far in the discharge of my official duties, I have been guided by the principles which have been delineated, the public records and other evidences of my conduct must witness to you and to the world. To myself, the assurance of my own conscience is, that I have at least believed myself to be guided by them.

In relation to the still subsisting war in Europe, my Proclamation of the 22d of April, 1793, is the index to my Plan. Sanctioned by your approving voice, and by that of your Representatives in both Houses of Congress, the spirit of that measure has continually governed me, uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or divert me from it.

After deliberate examination, with the aid of the best lights I could obtain, I was well satisfied that our country, under all the circumstances of the case, had a right to take, and was bound in duty and interest to take, a neutral position. Having taken it, I determined, as far as should depend upon me, to maintain it, with moderation, perseverance, and firmness.

The considerations, which respect the right to hold this conduct, it is not necessary on this occasion to detail. I

will only observe, that, according to my understanding of the matter, that right, so far from being denied by any of the Belligerent Powers, has been virtually admitted by all.

The duty of holding a neutral conduct may be inferred, without any thing more, from the obligation which justice and humanity impose on every nation, in cases in which it is free to act, to maintain inviolate the relations of peace and amity towards other nations.

The inducements of interest for observing that conduct will best be referred to your own reflections and experience. With me, a predominant motive has been to endeavour to gain time to our country to settle and mature its yet recent institutions, and to progress without interruption to that degree of strength and consistency, which is necessary to give it, humanly speaking, the command of its own fortunes.

Though, in reviewing the incidents of my administration, I am unconscious of intentional error, I am nevertheless too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope, that my Country will never cease to view them with indulgence; and that, after forty-five years of my life dedicated to its service with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.

Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards it, which is so natural to a man, who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations; I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat, in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws under a free government, the ever favorite object of my heart, and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutua. cares, labors, and dangers.

United States,

September 17th, 1796.

GEORGE WASHINGTON.

The following Note is taken from Mr. Sparks's edition of the Writings of Washington, from which the Farewell Address is correctly copied, in text, orthography, and punctuation:

This ADDRESS is here printed from a copy of "Claypoole's American Daily Advertiser," for September 19, 1796. On this paper are indorsed the following words, in Washington's handwriting, which were designed as an instruction to the copyist, who recorded the ADDRESS in the letter book:

"The letter contained in this gazette, addressed 'To the People of the United States,' is to be recorded, and in the order of its date. Let it have a blank page before and after it, so as to stand distinct. Let it be written with a letter larger and fuller than the common recording hand. And where words are printed with capital letters, it is to be done so in recording. And those other words, that are printed in italics, must be scored underneath and straight by a ruler."

(482)

CHRONOLOGICAL SERIES OF EVENTS IN THE

EARLY PART OF MR. WEBSTER'S LIFE.

BORN 18th of January, 1782, in Salisbury,* N. H.

Sent to Exeter Academy May, 1796, and remained only a few months.
Prepared for college by the Rev. Mr. Wood, of Boscawen.
Entered Dartmouth College in 1797.

Completed his college course in August, 1801, and immediately entered
the office of Mr. Thompson, next door neighbor to his father, as a
student of law. Mr. Thompson was a gentleman of education and
intelligence, and was afterward a member of both houses of Congress.
Mr. Webster remained in his office till, in the words of Mr. March, “he
felt it necessary to go somewhere and do something to earn a little
money." In this emergency, application was made to him to take
charge of an academy at Fryeburg, in Maine, upon a salary of about
one dollar per diem. As he was able, besides, to earn enough to pay
for his board and to defray his other expenses by acting as assistant to
the register of deeds for the county, his salary was all saved-
- a fund
for his own professional education, and to help his brother through
college. In July, 1804, he took up his residence in Boston. Before
entering upon the practice of his profession, he enjoyed the advantage
of pursuing his legal studies for six or eight months in the office of
the Hon. Christopher Gore. This was a fortunate event for Mr. Web-
ster. Mr. Gore, afterwards Governor of Massachusetts, was a lawyer
of eminence, a statesman, and a civilian, a gentleman of the old
school of manners, and a rare example of distinguished intellectual
qualities united with practical good sense and judgment. We will
close this notice by an extract from Mr. Choate's Eulogy, delivered
before the Faculty, Students, and Alumni of Dartmouth College,
commemorative of Daniel Webster:-

-

"And so he has put on the robe of manhood, and has come to do the work of life. Of his youth there is no need to say more. It had been pure, happy, strenuous; in many things privileged. The influence of home, of his father and the excellent mother, and that noble brother whom he loved so dearly and mourned with such sorrow these influences on his heart, principles, will, aims, were elevated and strong. At an early age, comparatively, the then great distinction of liberal education was his. His college life was brilliant and without a stain; and in moving his admission to the bar, Mr. Gore presented him as one of extraordinary promise:

*In 1828, the town of Franklin was incorporated from parts of four towns, and in cluded that part of Salisbury in which the Webster homestead was situated.

"And yet, if on some day, as that season was drawing to its close, it had been foretold to him that before his life, prolonged to little more than threescore years and ten, should end, he should see that country in which he was coming to act his part expanded across a continent, - the thirteen states of 1801 multiplied to thirty-one, the territory of the NorthWest, the great valley below, sown full of those stars of empire, the Mississippi forded, and the Sabine, the Rio Grande, and the Nueces, the ponderous gates of the Rocky Mountains opened to shut no more, the great tranquil sea become our sea, her area seven times larger, her people five times more in number that through all the experiences of trial, the madness of party, the injustice of foreign powers, the vast enlargement of her territory, the antagonism of interior interest and feeling, the spirit of nationality would grow stronger still and more plastic, that the tide of American feeling would run ever fuller- that her agriculture would grow more scientific -- her arts more various and instructed, and better rewarded - her commerce winged to a wider and still wider flight, that the part she would play in human affairs would grow nobler ever and more recognized, that in this vast growth of national greatness, time would be found for the higher necessities of the soul,that her popular and her higher education would go on advancing that her charities and all her enterprises of philanthropy would go on enlarging that her age of lettered glory should find its auspicious dawn; and then it had also been foretold him that even so, with her growth and strength, should his fame grow and be established and cherished, there where she should garner up her heart; that by long gradations

of service and labor he should rise to be, before he should taste of death, of the peerless among her great ones that he should win the double honor, wear the double wreath, of professional and public supremacy; that he should become her wisest to counsel, and her most eloquent to persuade; that he should come to be called the Defender of the Constitution and Preserver of Honorable Peace, that the 'austere glory of differing' to save the Union should be his, that his death, at the summit of greatness, on the verge of a ripe and venerable age, should be distinguished less by the flags at half mast on ocean and lake, less by the minute gun, less by the public procession and the appointed eulogy, than by sudden paleness overspreading all faces, by gushing tears, by sorrow, thoughtful, boding, silent, the sense of desolation, as if renown and grace were dead -as if the hunters' path and the sailors', in the great solitude of the wilderness or sea, henceforward were more lonely and less safe than before, had this prediction been whispered, how calmly had that perfect sobriety of mind put it all aside as a pernicious or idle dream! Yet in the fulfilment of that prediction is told the remaining story of his

life."

It is related by the friends of Mr. Webster who were present at his death, that, a short time before he breathed his last, he fell into a light slumber, which lasted some time; and when he awoke, he opened his eyes, and, realizing where he was, spoke, in his deep-toned voice, I STILL LIVE! Prophetic words, and will be true as long as the English language is spoken.