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individual man. As the one, commencing in the prudence, order and industry of the private circle, extends itself to all the duties. of social life, of the family, the neighborhood, the country; so the true domestic policy of the republic, beginning in the wise organization of its own institutions, pervades its territories with a vigilant, prudent, temperate administration; and extends the hand of cordial interest to all the friendly nations, especially to those which are of the household of liberty.

It is in this way that we are to fulfil our destiny in the world. The greatest engine of moral power, which human nature knows, is an organized, prosperous state. All that man, in his individual capacity, can do all that he can effect by his fraternities-by his ingenious discoveries and wonders of art-or by his influence over others-is as nothing, compared with the collective, perpetuated influence on human affairs and human happiness of a well-constituted, powerful commonwealth. It blesses generations with its sweet influence; even the barren earth seems to pour out its fruits under a system where property is secure, while her fairest gardens are blighted by despotism;-men, thinking, reasoning men, abound beneath its benignant sway,-nature enters into a beautiful accord, a better, purer asiento with man, and guides an industrious citizen. to every rood of her smiling wastes ;-and we see, at length, that what has been called a state of nature, has been most falsely, calumniously so denominated; that the nature of man is neither that of a savage, a hermit, nor a slave; but that of a member of a well-ordered family, that of a good neighbor, a free citizen, a wellinformed, good man, acting with others like him. This is the lesson which is taught in the charter of our independence; this is the lesson which our example is to teach the world.

The great epic poet of Rome, the subject of an absolute prince, in unfolding the duties and destinies of his countrymen, who had but lately grasped the sceptre of universal dominion, bids them look with disdain on the polished and intellectual arts of Greece, and deem their arts to be,

To rule the nations with imperial sway,

To spare the tribes that yield, fight down the proud,
And force the mood of peace upon the world.

The event corresponded but too faithfully with the spirit of this inauspicious counsel, in which ambition and the lust of power are thinly disguised, under the semblance of a compulsory pacification. Rome, corrupted and corrupting, fell unlamented. Let the national career of America be conceived and pursued, under the united influence of the spirit of civilization and Christianity. Let us cultivate those humanizing and liberal arts,-the precious legacy of the bright age of Greece,—and let us learn to find the true

objects of national pride, not in military achievement and extended conquest, but in the intelligent pursuit of the great interests of social man; in the cultivation of the soil; in the various branches of productive industry; in peaceful victories over the obstacles which physical nature throws in the progress of the human mind, toward the utmost development of its powers. Let us see

whether the murderous recourse to bloodshed which has hitherto disgraced the nations of Christendom, cannot be dispensed with, without sacrificing the public interest or honor; whether something effectual cannot be done to alleviate the painful inequalities of human fortune; and whether philosophy cannot be led from the closet, and religion from the altar, and made to exert a united, a practical, and an all-powerful influence on the affairs of men.

475

A DISCOURSE,

IN COMMEMORATION OF THE LIVES AND SERVICES OF

JOHN ADAMS AND THOMAS JEFFERSON,

DELIVERED IN FANEUIL HALL, BOSTON, AUG. 2, 1826.

BY DANIEL WEBSTER.

THIS is an unaccustomed spectacle. For the first time, fellowcitizens, badges of mourning shroud the columns and overhang the arches of this hall. These walls, which were consecrated, so long ago, to the cause of American liberty, which witnessed her infant struggles, and rung with the shouts of her earliest victories, proclaim, now, that distinguished friends and champions of the great cause have fallen. It is right that it should be thus. The tears which flow, and the honors that are paid, when the founders of the republic die, give hope that the republic itself may be immortal. It is fit, that by public assembly and solemn observance, by anthem and by eulogy, we commemorate the services of national benefactors, extol their virtues, and render thanks to God for eminent blessings, early given and long continued, to our favored country.

Adams and Jefferson are no more; and we are assembled, fellow-citizens, the aged, the middle-aged, and the young, by the spontaneous impulse of all, under the authority of the municipal government, with the presence of the chief magistrate of the commonwealth, and others its official representatives, the university, and the learned societies, to bear our part, in those manifestations of respect and gratitude which universally pervade the land. Adams and Jefferson are no more. On our fiftieth anniversary, the great day of national jubilee, in the very hour of public rejoicing, in the midst of echoing and reechoing voices of thanksgiving, while their own names were on all tongues, they took their flight, together, to the world of spirits.

If it be true that no one can safely be pronounced happy while he lives; if that event which terminates life can alone crown its honors and its glory,-what felicity is here! The great Epic of

their lives, how happily concluded! Poetry itself has hardy closed illustrious lives, and finished the career of earthly renown. by such a consummation. If we had the power, we could not wish to reverse this dispensation of the Divine Providence. The great objects of life were accomplished; the drama was ready to be closed: it has closed; our patriots have fallen; but so fallen, at such age. with such coincidence, on such a day, that we cannot rationally la ment that that end has come, which we knew could not be long deferred.

Neither of these great men, fellow-citizens, could have died a any time, without leaving an immense void in our American soci ety. They have been so intimately, and for so long a time, blended with the history of the country, and especially so united, in our thoughts and recollections, with the events of the revolution, the the death of either would have touched the strings of public sympathy. We should have felt that one great link, connecting us with former times, was broken; that we had lost something more. as it were, of the presence of the revolution itself, and of the act of independence, and were driven on by another great recove, from the days of our country's early distinction, to meet postery, and to mix with the future. Like the mariner, whom the ocean and the winds carry along, till he sees the stars which have directed his course, and lighted his pathless way, descend one by one, be neath the rising horizon, we should have felt that the stream of time had borne us onward, till another great luminary, whose light had cheered us, and whose guidance we had followed, had sunk away from our sight.

But the concurrence of their death, on the anniversary of ade pendence, has naturally awakened stronger emotions. Both ad been presidents; both had lived to great age; both were early pa riots; and both were distinguished and ever honored by their ine diate agency in the act of independence. It cannot but seem striking and extraordinary, that these two should live to see the fiftieth year from the date of that act; that they should co that year; and that then, on the day which had fast linked furet er their own fame with their country's glory, the heavens should open to receive them both at once. As their lives themselves were the gifts of Providence, who is not willing to recognize their happy termination, as well as in their long continuance, proofs that our country, and its benefactors, are objects of His

care?

Adams and Jefferson, I have said, are no more. As human beings, indeed, they are no more. They are no more, as in 1776, bold and fearless advocates of independence; no more, as on su sequent periods, the head of the government; no more, as we have recently seen them, aged and venerable objects of admiration and regard. They are no more. They are dead. But how litte is

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there of the great and good, which can die! To their country they yet live, and live forever. They live in all that perpetuates the remembrance of men on earth; in the recorded proofs of their own great actions, in the offspring of their intellect, in the deep engraved lines of public gratitude, and in the respect and homage of mankind. They live in their example; and they live, emphatically, and will live in the influence which their lives and efforts, their principles and opinions, now exercise, and will continue to exercise, on the affairs of men, not only in their own country, but throughout the civilized world. A superior and commanding human intellect, a truly great man, when Heaven vouchsafes so rare a gift, is not a temporary flame, burning bright fowa while, and then expiring, giving place to returning darkness. It is rather a spark of fervent heat, as well as radiant light, with power to enkindle the common mass of human mind; so that when it glimmers, in its own decay, and finally goes out in death, no night follows, but it leaves the world all light, all on fire, from the potent contact of its own spirit. Bacon died; but the human understanding, roused by the touch of his miraculous wand, to a perception of the true philosophy, and the just mode of inquiring after truth, has kept on its course, successfully and gloriously. Newton died; yet the courses of the spheres are still known, and they yet move on, in the orbits which he saw, and described for them, in the infinity of space.

No two men now live, fellow-citizens,-perhaps it may be doubted, whether any two men have ever lived in one age,-who, more than those we now commemorate, have impressed their own sentiments, in regard to politics and government, on mankind, infused their own opinions more deeply into the opinions of others, or given a more lasting direction to the current of human thought. Their work doth not perish with them. The tree which they assisted to plant, will flourish, although they water it and protect it no longer; for it has struck its roots deep; it has sent them to the very centre; no storm, not of force to burst the orb, can overturn it; its branches spread wide; they stretch their protecting arms broader and broader, and its top is destined to reach the heavens. We are not deceived. There is no delusion here. No age will come, in which the American revolution will appear less than it is, one of the greatest events in human history. No age will come, in which it will cease to be seen and felt, on either continent, that a mighty step, a great advance, not only in American affairs, but in human affairs, was made on the 4th of July, 1776. And no age will come, we trust, so ignorant or so unjust, as not to see and acknowledge the efficient agency of these we now honor, in producing that momentous event.

We are not assembled, therefore, fellow-citizens, as men over

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