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a measure strictly of self-defence, and intended to protect the legitimate resources of our own country from being any longer made use of, not as they should be, for our benefit, but to increase and strengthen the resources and power of a foreign nation. The time is propitious. Causes that formerly prevented the union of opinions in favor of this measure, no longer exist; the old world is at peace, and every nation is busily employed in repairing the waste of war, by cultivating the arts, and extending the blessings of peace ;-England has come out of the most portentous war that Europe has ever suffered, not only unbroken, but with increased power. Her agriculture, manufactures, and commerce were cherished; were without interruption, and increased, while those of neighboring nations were suspended, interrupted, or destroyed. Her colonies and dependent territories have been greatly enlarged, at the expense of her enemies; and regions, with which we and others once had trade and intercourse, having fallen under her power, are now closed against us. We have no other questions depending with her, except those concerning impressment and the fisheries, and their settlement can, in no manner, be affected by the passing of this act.

England is a great and illustrious nation, having attained to this pre-eminence by generous and successful efforts, in breaking down the civil and religious bondage of former ages. Her patriots, her scholars, and her statesmen have adorned her history, and offer models for the imitation of others. We are the powerful descendants of England, desiring perpetual friendship, and the uninterrupted interchange of kind offices and reciprocal benefits with her. We have demonstrated, in circumstances the most critical, constant and persevering evidence of this disposition. We still desire the impartial adjustment of our mutual intercourse, and the establishment of some equitable regulations, by which our personal and maritime rights may be secure from arbitrary violation: A settlement that, instead of endless collision and dispute, may be productive of concord, good humor, and friendship: and it depends on her, whether such is to be the relation between us. From "Speech on the Navigation Act," 1818.

AMERICAN INFLUENCE.

H. W. HILLIARD.

ONE of England's own writers has said, "The possible destiny of the United States of America, as a nation of one hundred millions of freemen, stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, living under the laws of Alfred, and speaking the language of Shakspeare and Milton, is an august conception."

It is an august conception, finely embodied; and I trust in God that

it will, at no distant time, become a reality. I trust that the world will see, through all time, our people living, not only under the laws of Alfred, but that they will be heard to speak throughout our wide-spread borders the language of Shakspeare and Milton. Above all is it my prayer that, as long as our posterity shall continue to inhabit these mountains and plains, and hills and valleys, they may be found living under the sacred institutions of Christianity. Put these things together, and what a picture do they present to the mental eye! Civilization and intelligence started in the East; they have travelled, and are still travelling, westward; but when they shall have completed the circuit of the earth, and reached the extremest verge of the Pacific shores, then, unlike the fabled god of the ancients, who dipped his glowing axle in the western wave, they will take up their permanent abode.

Then shall we enjoy the sublime destiny of returning these blessings to their ancient seat; then will it be ours to give the priceless benefits of our free institutions, and the pure and healthful light of the gospel, back to the dark family which has so long lost both truth and freedom; then may Christianity plant herself there, and while with one hand she points to the Polynesian isles, rejoicing in the late-recovered treasure of revealed truth, with the other present the Bible to the Chinese. It is our duty to aid in this great work. I trust we shall esteem it as much our honor as our duty. Let us not, like some of the British missionaries, give them the Bible in one hand and opium in the other, but bless them only with the pure word of truth.

HAMILTON.

GOUVERNEUR MORRIS.

BRETHREN of the Cincinnati-there lies our chief! Let him still be our model. Like him, after long and faithful public services, let us cheerfully perform the social duties of private life. Oh! he was mild and gentle. In him there was no offence; no guile. His generous hand and heart were open to all.

Gentlemen of the bar-you have lost your brightest ornament. Cherish and imitate his example. While, like him, with justifiable and with laudable zeal, you pursue the interests of your clients, remember, like him, the eternal principle of justice.

Fellow-citizens-you have long witnessed his professional conduct, and felt his unrivalled eloquence. You know how well he performed the duties of a citizen-you know that he never courted your favor by adulation or the sacrifice of his own judgment. You have seen him contending against you, and saving your dearest interests, as it were,

in spite of yourselves. And you now feel and enjoy the benefits resulting from the firm energy of his conduct. Bear this testimony to the memory of my departed friend. I charge you to protect his fame. It is all he has left-all that these poor orphan children will inherit from their father. But, my countrymen, that fame may be a rich treasure to you also. Let it be the test by which to examine those who solicit your favor. Disregarding professions, view their conduct, and on a doubtful occasion ask, Would Hamilton have done this thing?

You all know how he perished. On this last scene I cannot, I must not dwell. It might excite emotions too strong for your better judgment. Suffer not your indignation to lead to any act which might again offend the insulted majesty of the laws. On his part, as from his lips, though with my voice-for his voice you will hear no more-let me entreat you to respect yourselves.

And now, ye ministers of the everlasting God, perform your holy office, and commit these ashes of our departed brother to the bosom of the grave.

From "Address to the Cincinnati,” 1804.

ON THE DISTRIBUTION BILL.

THOMAS H. BENTON.

I SCORN the bill. I scout its vaunted popularity. I detest it. Nor can I conceive of an object more pitiable and contemptible than that of the demagogue haranguing for votes, and exhibiting his tables of dollars and acres, in order to show each voter or each state, how much money they will be able to obtain from the treasury if the land bill passes." Such haranguing, and such exhibition, is the address of impudence and knavery to supposed ignorance, meanness, and folly. It is treating the people as if they were penny wise and pound foolish, and still more mean than foolish. Why, the land revenue, after deducting the expenses, if fairly divided among the people, would not exceed nine-pence a head per annum; if fairly divided among the states, and applied to their debts, it would not supersede above nine-pence per annum of taxation upon the units of the population. The day for land sales has gone by. The sales of this year do not exceed a million and a half of dollars, which would not leave more than a million for distribution, which, among sixteen millions of people, would be exactly four-pence half-penny, Virginia money, per head; a fip in New York, and a picaillon in Louisiana. At two millions, it would be nine-pence a head in Virginia, equivalent to a levy in New York, and a bit in Louisiana; precisely the amount which, in specie times, a gentleman gives to a negro boy for holding his horse a minute at the door. And for this miserable doit-this insignificant subdivision of a shilling-a York

shilling-can the demagogue suppose that the people are base enough to violate their Constitution-mean enough to surrender the defence of their country, and stupid enough to be taxed in their coffee, tea, salt, sugar, coats, hats, blankets, shoes, shirts, and every article of comfort, decency, or necessity, which they eat, drink, or wear, or on which they stand, sit, sleep, or lie? From "Speech in the Senate," 1841.

TO THE NOBLESSE OF PROVENCE.

MIRABEAU.

WHAT have I done that was so criminal? I have wished that my Order were wise enough to give to-day what will infallibly be wrested from it to-morrow; that it should receive the merits and glory of sanctioning the assemblage of the Three Orders, which all Provence loudly demands. This is the crime of your "enemy of peace!" Or rather I have ventured to believe that the people might be in the right. Ah, doubtless, a patrician soiled with such a thought deserves vengeance! But I am still guiltier than you think; for it is my belief that the people which complains is always in the right; that its indefatigable patience invariably waits the uttermost excesses of oppression, before it can determine on resisting; that it never resists long enough to obtain complete redress; and does not sufficiently know that to strike its enemies into terror and submission, it has only to stand still, that the most innocent as the most invincible of all powers is the power of refusing to do. I believe after this manner: punish the enemy of peace!

But you, ministers of a God of peace, who are ordained to bless and not to curse, and yet have launched your anathema on me, without even the attempt at enlightening me, at reasoning with me! And you, "friends of peace," who denounce to the people, with all vehemence of hatred, the one defender it has yet found, out of its own ranks ;— who, to bring about concord, are filling capital and province with placards calculated to arm the rural districts against the towns, if your deeds did not refute your writings;-who, to prepare ways of conciliation, protest against the royal Regulation for convoking the StatesGeneral, because it grants the people as many deputies as both the other orders, and against all that the coming National Assembly shall do, unless its laws secure the triumph of your pretensions, the eternity of your privileges! Disinterested "friends of peace!" I have appealed to your honor, and summon you to state what expressions of mine have offended against either the respect we owe to the royal authority or to the nation's right? Nobles of Provence, Europe is attentive; weigh well your answer. Men of God, beware; God hears you!

MONOMANIA.

DAVID PAUL BROWN.

So fearfully and wonderfully are we made, that by the excessive indulgence of an unrestrained, morbid passion, or by an insurmountable obstacle suddenly checking that indulgence, insanity is equally likely to ensue. A check to the ruling passion of pride, of love, of hope, of patriotism, of ambition, an utter check, when those passions are at their highest tide, will cause them, to use a strong figure, to overflow the banks of reason and spread around them destruction and desolation! This is what is called monomania—and is characterized by the ruling or despotic propensity. Why did Lord Castlereigh destroy himself? Why did Mr. Whitbread destroy himself? both prime ministers of England-because they were so ensnared by political wiles as to be defeated in the objects of their ambition; they became mad; and suicide was the result. Why did Sir Samuel Romilly take his own life? a man of the highest intellect and the warmest heart-who was at once a public and a private example-while revelling upon the very summit of distinction, and professional honor; he was bereft of the partner of his bosom. His ruling passion was resisted, life became no longer of any value, and he terminated it with his own hand. The coroner's inquest placed all these deaths to the account of insanity.

From "A Forensic Argument," Philadelphia, 1859.

ACTIONS AND MOTIVES.

DAVID PAUL BROWN.

I AM now speaking of the criminal character of conspiracy. It is not necessary that an act should be done at all. Nay, if the act be a felony, the conspiracy is lost utterly, for, being but a misdemeanor, it is merged in the graver offence. It is the agreement to do the act which constitutes the crime. Your honor will perceive the beautiful philosophy of the law. Not like the metaphysical moonshine that is introduced here. The whole law, and especially the criminal law, consists of a system of checks and safeguards. It is the protection of the community against vice-and subserves the divine law in forming, guarding, and inducing virtue in man. That is the basis of it-built upon that— the object is not to punish; the object is to prevent, or reform. What does it do? As long as man keeps his design within his heart-within his breast, though it be of demoniac gloom and blackness-of course human tribunals cannot suspect it, and cannot affect it. He is left to the punishment of the Omnipotent; "for darkness and light are both

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