^*'% l^^-- /\. -.^IK'" **"^^ °"W^-" 7 -S. 4 o t. .^ .>v^-o %/ ;^^\ ^^^^^^ ,X-*\^ o V 0^ o V °t. ''•'^' >^^. : ^^""^^^ o5^x. ♦ °o Reprinted for the Pilgrim Tercentenary The American Spirit The Landing of the Pilgrims and Other Orations WEBSTER ELDER SCOTT, FORESMAN and COMPANY Chicago New York REPRINTED FOR THE PILGRIM TERCENTENARY THE AMERICAN SPIRIT AS EXPRESSED IN THE FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND AND SELECTIONS FROM OTHER ORATIONS BY DANIEL WEBSTER EDITED FOR SCHOOL USE BY SARAH ELDER TEACHER OP ENGLISH, KALAMAZOO HIGH SCHOOL KALAMAZOO, MICHIGAN SCOTT, FORESMAN AND COMPANY CHICAGO NEW YORK F6« "We sit here in the Promised Land That floM's with Freedom's honey and milk; But 'twas they won it, sword in hand, Making the nettle danger soft for us as silk." "Harvard Commemoration Ode," LowtJl. ^ 'i^^ () COPYRiaHT, 1920, SCOTT, FORESMAN AND COMPANY OCT 22 IJ2Q ©ClA6009'i5 FOREWORD The object of the Pilgrim Tercentenary Celebration is to arouse and strengthen the true American spirit. No writer or speaker has better expressed that spirit than Daniel Webster. These two thoughts have brought about the present publication. "The First Settlement of New England" is the most complete and appropriate for this occasion of Webster's patriotic speeches. Selections from the other orations have been added, wherever passages have been found setting iforth in a forceful way the American idea. There have been included also a brief list of poems embodying the same idea, a list of pictures illustrating episodes of the Pilgrims' journey, and a pageant which has been successfully given. The biographical materia is largely a group of selections brought together from eminent sources to illustrate how Webster himself was a development of the American ideal. For the use of the quotations, particularly from Lodge's Daniel Webster, Houghton Mifflin & Co.; Curtis's Life of Daniel Webster, Appleton ; McMaster's Daniel Webster, Century; as well as for the text of the orations which is taken from the National Edition of Webster's Writings and Speeches, grateful acknowledgment is made to the pub- lishers. The Editor. CONTENTS PAGE Foreword 3 Introduction — The Pilgrim Tercentenary 7 The Pilgrim Calendar 9 The Mayflower Compact 10 Inscription on the Pilgrim Memorial Monument 11 A Pageant of the Pilgrims 12 Daniel Webster — The Tj^pical New Englander 15 The Defender of the Constitution 19 The Greatest American Orator 22 Important Events in the Life of Daniel Webster 27 Most Famous Orations of Daniel Webster 28 Bibliographies ' 29 Orations — Outline of First Settlement of New England 33 First Settlement of New England 35 The Greek Revolution 67 The Bunker Hill Monument 70 Adams and Jefferson , 74 The Character of Washington 76 The Landing at Plymouth 80 Pilgrim Festival at New York in 1850 85 The Addition to the Capitol 93 INTEODUCTION The Pilgrim Tercentenary On Monday, December 21,* 1620, the Pilgrims landed on the shore of Plymouth Harbor. It was for them not only the culmination of a long, stormy, uncomfortable voyage of sixty-six days, but the consummation of their quest for a home wherQ they might govern themselves, educate their children, and, unmolested, worship God after their own fashion ; a quest pursued for thirteen years from the leaving of their English homes in 1607. For us it was the beginning of the great American Eepublic. The com- pact signed on board the Mayflower ten days before was a momentous document, the first "constitution" of a great Christian commonwealth, the first declaration of the rights of Englishmen to self-government in the fullest sense. The anniversary of these events has, from time to time, been fittingly commemorated. The first celebration took place under the auspices of the "Old Colony Club" on Friday, December 22, 1769. To the social aspect of this occasion there was added in 1770 a short address, pro- nounced "with mode^st and decent firmness, by a member of the club, Edward AVinslow, Jr., Esq." In 1771, at the suggestion of Eev. Chandler Eobbins, a public sermon was delivered, as peculiarly adapted to the occasion. The anniversary celebrations continued without interruption until 1780, in spite of the dissolution of the "Old Colony \ ♦The date was December 11. old style. By mistake the twenty- second of Jtecember has been the date usually observed in anniver- sary celebrations. 8 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT Club" in 1773. After an interval of fourteen years a public discourse was again delivered by the Rev. Dr. Rob- bins. With private celebrations or public addresses the day was from that time on annually commemorated until 1819. In 1820 the "Pilgrim Society" was formed by the citizens of Plymouth and the descendants of the Pilgrims in other places who were desirous of uniting "to commemorate the landing, and to honor the memory of the intrepid men who first set foot on Plymouth Rock."* The founding of this society gave a new impulse to the anniversary celebration, and Daniel Webster was requested to deliver the public address on the twenty-second of December of that year, the bicentennial. He entitled his oration "The First Set- tlement of New England." From 1820 to the present day, with occasional inter- ruptions, the twenty-second of December has been cele- brated by the Pilgrim Society. Not only in Plymouth and New England has the day been commemorated but in other parts of the country as well, particularly in New York. Twice, in 1843 and again in 1850, Webster was the speaker at the annual dinner of the New England Society of New York. Now the three hundredth anniversary approaches. And it is being fittingly commemorated. The celebration is international in its scope, beginning in July in England in the original homes of the Pilgrims and the points of their departure, continuing in Holland in the later summer, and again in England at Southampton and Plymouth. It will reach its height in America at Provincetown in the fall and thence will touch all America and all the English- *See the works of Webster, Vol. I, pp. 3 and 4. Little, Brown and Company, 1854. IXTRODUCTIOX 9 speaking world, celebrating especially November 11th,* when the Mayflower compact was signed; Thanksgiving Day, the most distinctive American festival — one of New England origin ; and finally the three hundredth anniver- sary of the landing at Plymouth, December 21, 1920. THE PILGRIM CALENDAR July 1620— January 1621 (All these dates, except where otherwise stated, are according to Old Style. To conform to our present reckoning (New Style) add in each case 10 days. Forefathers' Day is Old Style, Dec. 1 1 ; New Style, Dec. 21. There are differences of opinion and uncer- tainties in a few cases.) July 25. The Mayflower leaves London. 29. Arrives at Southampton. 31. (Probably.) The Pilgrims leave Leyden. Aug. 1. Pilgrims in Speedioell sail from Delftshaven. 5. Speedwell arrives at Southampton. (Bradford, "about ye 5"; perhaps a day or two earlier.) 15. Both ships sail from Southampton. 22. Speedwell dangerously leaking. Puts in to Dartmouth. Sept. 2. Sails from Dartmouth. 5. Speedwell again leaking. 7. Arrives at Plymouth. 12. Speedioell sails for London with twenty passengers. 16. Mayflower sails from Plymouth. Oct. 3. First death on board. Heavy gales. Ship in danger. Nov. 9. Signs of land. 10. Discovers Cape Cod (somewhere about Truro). 11. Cape Cod ( Provincetown ) Harbor. Go ashore to cut wood. Compact signed in cabin. 12. Sunday. All on ship for rest and worship. 13. The sliallop puts ashore for mending. The women land and wash soiled clothes. •Armistice Day. 10 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT 15. First exploring party of sixteen starts. 17. The party returns with Indian corn and report of Indians. 22. Weather turns cold and stormy. 27. Second exploring party of thirty-four (nine sailors) goes ashore. Peregrine White born. * 29. Expedition returns with corn. Eighteen men remain on shore over night. Dec. 3. Much Illness from exposure. 6. Third exploring party seeks a harbor for settlement. Eighteen — including Standish, Carver, Bradford, and others — ^with ship's mate, who has been at Plymouth. 7. Mrs. Dorothy Bradford drowned. 8. The exploring party lands in the night on Clarke's Island, Plymouth Harbor. 11. (Monday; New Style, 21). Twelve Pilgrims land from shallop and explore. (Forefathers' Day as we celebrate it.) 13. Return to the Mayfloicer at Provincetown Bay. 14. The Mayflower sails for Plymoutli. 16. Anchors in Plymouth Harbor. 17. Sunday. All stay on ship. 18. Exploring parties out on shore. 20. Town site determined. 21-22. Stormy days keep them on ship. 23. Timber felling begins. 25. The beginning of the first house. 26. Violent storm liolds them on the ship. 28. Gun platform on hill begun. Land in village allotted. Many ill. 29-30. Stormy and kept to ship. Indian smokes seen. THE MAYFLOWER COMPACT In ye name of God, Amen. We whose names are under- written, the loyall subjects of our dread soveraigne Lord, IXTRODUCTIOX H King James, by ye grace of God, Great Britaine, France, & Ireland king, defender of ye faith, &c., haveing under- taken, for 3'e glorie of God, and advancemente of ye Christian faith, and honour of our king & countrie, a vo3^age to plant ye first colonic in ye Northerne parts of Virginia, doe by these presents solemnly & mutualy in ye presence of God, and one of another, covenant & combine our selves togeather into a civill body politick, for our better ordering & preservation & furtherance of ye ends aforesaid ; and by vertue hearof to enacte, constitute, and frame such just & equall lawes, ordinances, acts, consti- tutions, & offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meete & convenient for ye generall good of ye Colonic, unto which we promise all due submission and obedience. In witness whereof we have hereunder sub- scribed our names at Cap-Codd ye 11. of November, in ye year of ye raigne of our soveraigne lord. King James, of England, France, & Ireland ye eighteenth, and of Scot- land ye fiftie fourth. Ano : Dom. 1620. From Bradford's Hisiori/ "Of Plimoiifh I'lantntion." INSCRIPTION ON Tin: PiL(;i!i:\[ :\iemorial monument, rROVIXCETOWN, ]\rASS. On N'ovember 21, 1620, the Mayflower, carrying 102 passengers, men and women and children, cast anchor in this harbor 67 days from Plymouth, England. The same day the 41 adult males in the company had solemnly covenanted and combined themselves together into a "civill body Politick." This body politick, established and maintained on this 13 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT bleak and barren edge of a vast wilderness, a state without a king or a noble, a church without a bishop or a priest, a democratic commonwealth, the members of which were straitly tied to all care of each other's good, and of the whole by everyone. With long-suffering devotion and sober resolution they illustrated for the first time in history the principles of civil and religious liberty and the practice of a genuine democracy. THEREFOEE— the remembrance of them shall be per- petual in the vast republic that has inherited their ideals. Charles W. Eliot. A PAGEANT OF THE PILGRIMS 1620-1920 TERCENTENARY OF THE LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS Auspices of Americanization Department Y. M. C. A. of Chicago Scene I . COURT OF CHARLES I Scene at Hampton Court Gardens. Queen Henrietta Maria and her ladies and favorites ' hold court. Dancing. They are interrupted by Prynne and his followers, who rebuke the queen for her levity. Queen Guards Page Trumpeter Ladies and Gentlemen in Waiting Cromwell Dance Ironsides Dance (Faun and Nymphs) Prynne King Mob (Puritans) Aid Scene II PILGRIMS AT LEYDEN Scene on the dock: Dutch burghers strolling about, women knitting and marketing, children playing games. Pilgrims enter INTRODUCTION 13 ready to embark. Children play together. Robinson, Brewster, and Carver draw up resolutions. Prayer and hymn. Embarka- tion. Scene III LANDING FROM THE MAYFLOWER Great joy of Pilgrims — "Praise God." Settling. Hardships, anxiety, and homesickness. Fear of savages. Samoset appears. "Welcome Englishmen." Squanto shows planting and fishing. Chief Massasoit forms treaty with the Pilgrims. Thanksgiving feast after the good harvest of 1623. Games. Men enter sports and athletics with the Indians. Elder Robinson Dutch Women Squanto Elder Brewster Dutch Children Chiefs Elder Carver Puritan Children Dancers Pilgrims Massasoit Bowmen Puritan Women Samoset Scene IV GROWTH OF COLONIES Important Events in Early American History Organization of Government. Governor of Plymouth Colony — Bradford. Governor Winthrop. Founding of Massachusetts Bay Colony, 1631. Connecticut, 1635 — Governor Winslow. Laws — "The Body of Liberties." Harvard College founded, 1636. Com- mon Schools system founded in 1647. First books printed, 1639 — New England Almanac. Psalms, 1640. Short Scenes in Early American Infe The work of John Eliot among the Indians. The story of Miles Standish, John Alden, and Priscilla. Tableaux — Colonial Scene and Minuet. Girl Scouts Colonial Ladies and Gentlemen Betsy Ross Liberty Boys of '76 George Washington Attack on Fort ]\fcHcnry — The Star Spangled Banner. Gunners Flag Raiser Signal Corps Pioneer Scene — Lincoln family and groups of pioneers. Abraham Lincoln and Mrs. Lincoln Ladies 14 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT Scene V INTERLUDE — PROGRESS OF THE NATION Allegorical dance of the years : past, present, and future. Scene VI AMERICA — THE LAND OF OPPORTUNITY America, Opportunity, and Abundance Greet Progress, Arts, and Sciences. America Beauty Architecture Opportunity Music Education Progress Art Invention Abundance Dancing Sciences Harvest Children Scene VII PROCESSION OF NATIONS Procession of Peoples of the Earth. They pass before the Altar of Freedom and feed its flames with Loyalty and Service. Foreign groups pass in order of arrival in America. Assemble around altar. Rededication to the principles of Americanism. Sing "America." i Daniel Webster the typical new englander That Daniel Webster should have been the orator of the bicentennial celebration of the Pilgrim landing at Ply- mouth was most natural and fitting. He was at that time the foremost orator in America and soon to be ranked, on account of this very speech and others which shortly fol- lowed, chronologically fourth of the world's orators. And who shall say which is greatest — Demosthenes, Cicero, Burke, or Webster? He was also in many marked phases a typical representative of the New England for which he spoke. Neither of his parents was a descendant of Mayflower Pilgrims, but they were of real Puritan stock,, and in his childhood the family suffered the hardships and developed the virtues of the Plymouth Puritans. In a speech de- livered at Saratoga in 18^:0 Webster said : "It did not happen to me to be l)orn in a log cabin ; but my elder brothers and sisters were born in a log cabin, raised amid the snowdrifts of New Hampshire, at a period so early that, when the smoke first rose from its rude cliimney and curled over the frozen hills, there was no similar evidence of a white man's habitation between it and the settlements on tlie rivers of Canada. Its remains still exist. I make to it an annual visit. I carry my children to it, to teach them the hardships endured by the generations which have gone before them. I love to dwell on the tender recollections, the kindred ties, the early affec- tions, and the touching narratives and iacidents which 15 16 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT miiigie with all I know of this primitive family abode. I weep to think that none of those who inhabited it are now among the living; and if ever I am ashamed of it, or if I ever fail in affectionate veneration for him who reared it, and defended it against savage violence and destruction, cherished all the domestic virtues beneath its roof, and, through the fire and blood of a seven years' revolutionary war, shrunk from no danger, no toil, no sacrifice, to serve his country, and to raise his children to a condition better than his own, may my name and the name of my posterity be blotted forever from the memory of mankind !"* Webster shared the Puritan reverence for education, and gained an education by great sacrifice, made largely by his father and the family. As a child he was sent to the dis- trict school, following the wandering schoolmaster from place to place, for the district was large and had three log schoolhouses. The boy was thirteen when his father reached a decision about his further education and an- nounced his determination. Webster tells the story :t "Of a hot day in July, it must have been in one of the last years of Washington's administration, I was making hay with my father, just where I now see a remaining elm tree. About the middle of the forenoon the Honorable Abiel Foster, M. C, who lived in Canterbury, six miles off, called at the house, and came into the field to see my father. He was a worthy man, college-learned, and had been a minister, but was not a person of any considerable natural power. My father was his friend and supporter. He talked awhile in the field, and went on his way. Wlien he was gone, my father called me to him, and we sat down •National Edition of Webster's Writings. Vol. Ill, p. 30. tCurtis: Life of Daniel Webster, Vol. I, pp. 17 and 18. INTRODUCTION 17 beneath the elm on a haycock. He said, 'My son, that is a worthy man; he is a member of Congress; he goes to Philadelphia, and gets six dollars a da)% while I toil here. It is because he had an education, which I never had. If I had his early education I should have been in Phila- delphia in his place. I came near it as it was. But I missed it, and now I must work here.' 'My dear father,' said I, 'you shall not work. Brother and I will work for you, and will wear our hands out, and you shall rest.' And I remember to have cried, and I cry now at the recollection. 'My child,' said he, 'it is of no importance to me. I now live but for my children. I could not give your elder brothers the advantages of knowledge, but I can do something for you. Exert yourself, improve your opportunities, learn, learn, and when I am gone, you Mali not need to go through the hardships which I have under- gone, and which have made me an old man before my time.' " A year later young Daniel was entered at Exeter Acad- emy, and after some tutoring, matriculated in Dartmouth College in 1797, from which he was graduated in 1801. "He was recognized by all as the foremost man in the col- lege, as easily first, with no second. He read voraciously all the English literature he could lay his hands on, and remembered everything he read."* Of his own methods he sa)'s: "So much as I read, I made my own. When a half-hour. or an hour at most, had elapsed. T closed my book, and thought over what I had read. If there was anything peculiarly interesting or striking in the passage, I en- •Lodgre: Webster, p. Ifi. 18 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT deavored to recall it and lay it up in my memory, and commonly could effect my object. Then if, in debate or conversation afterward, any subject came up on which I had read something, I could talk very easily so far as I had read, and there I was very careful to stop."* His religious training and attitude were those of the Puritan, beginning as he himself tells, with his being taught to read "by his mother or sister at so early an age that he never knew the time when he could not peruse the Bible with ease."t "His talents were known in the neigh- borhood, and the passing teamsters, while they watered their horses, delighted to get 'Webster's boy' with his delicate look and great dark eyes, to come out beneath the shade of the trees and read the Bible to them with all the force of his childish eloquence."| This earliest textbook was curiously the basis of his admission to Exeter Academy as McMaster relates: "Young Buckminster summoned Webster to his presence, put on his hat, and said, 'Well, sir, what is your age?' 'Fourteen,' was the reply. 'Take this Bible, my lad, and read that chapter,' The passage given him was St. Luke's dramatic description of the conspiring of Judas with the chief priests and scribes, of the Last Supper, of the betrayal of Judas, of the three denials of Peter, and of the scene in the house of the high priest. But young Webster was equal to the test, and read the whole passage to the end in a voice and with a fervor such as Master Buckminster had never listened to before. 'Young man,' ♦McMaster: Life of Webster, pp. 17 and 18. flbid, p. 9. JLodge. p. 11. INTRODUCTION 19 said he, 'you are qualified to enter this institution,' and no more questions were put to him."* THE DEFENDER OF THE CONSTITUTION Webster's rightful claim to his title of "Defender of the Constitution" is based, as were his opportunities for education, on his father's character and conduct. Ebenezer Webster, his father, just after the treason of Arnold, guarded the general's tent at West Point, and Washington said to him, "Captain Webster, I believe I can trust you.'"t George Ticknor Curtis relates the elder Webster's share in the adoption of the Constitution when he was a member of the New Hampshire convention. "Mr. Webster once repeated to me, with great pride, a little speech made by his father before giving his vote for the Constitution, and requested me, if I ever had an oppor- tunity, to do something to perpetuate it. It is well known that when the Convention of New Hampshire first assembled, in February, 1788, a majority of the delegates were found to be under instructions from their towns to vote against the Constitution. This was the case with Colonel Webster. But the Convention was adjourned to meet again in June; and, in the meantime, Colonel Web- ster obtained from his constituents permission to vote according to his own judgment. When the vote was about to be taken, he rose, and said : 'Mr. President, I have listened to the arguments for and against the Constitution. I am convinced such a government as that Constitution *McMaster: Life of Wehster, pp. 15 ff. tLodge : Daniel Webster, p. 7. ' 20 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT will establish, if adopted — a government acting directly on the people of the States — is necessary for the common defense and the general welfare. It is the only government which will enable us to pay off the national debt — the debt which we owe for the Kevolution, and which we are bound in honor fully and fairly to discharge. Besides, I have followed the lead of Washington through seven years of war, and I have never been misled. His name is subscribed to this Constitution. He will not mislead us now. I shall vote for its adoption.' "* The story is further told of Daniel Webster's own first acquaintance with the Constitution : "It was in the shop kept by one of these early district school teachers that Daniel, while still a mere child, first beheld a copy of the Federal Constitution, printed with gorgeous adornment on a cotton pocket handkerchief. Attracted probably by the eagle, the flags, and the brilliant coloring, he bought the handkerchief, read the text, and from this, he says, 'I learned either that there was a Constitution or that there were thirteen States'." t But what this title really signifies and what Mr. Webster stands for in our history is best summed up by Henry Cabot Lodge in the last paragraph of his life of Daniel Webster: "But after all has been said, the question of most in- terest is, what Mr. Webster represented, what he effected, and what he means in our history. The answer is simple. He stands today as the preeminent champion and exponent of nationality. He said once, 'There are no Alleghanies in ♦Curtis: Li'/e o/ Wehster, Vol. I. p. 9. tMcMtister : Daniel Webster, pp. 'J and 10. INTRODUCTION 21 my politics,' and he spoke the exact truth. Mr. Webster was thoroughly national. There is no taint of sectionalism or narrow local prejudice about him. He towers up as an American, a citizen of the United States in the fullest sense of the v;ord. He did not invent the Union, or dis- cover the doctrine of nationality. But he found the great fact and the great principle ready to his hand, and he lifted them up, and preached the gospel of nationality throughout the length and breadth of the land. In his fidelity to this cause he never wavered nor faltered. From the first burst of boyish oratory to the sleepless nights at Marshfield, when, waiting for death, he looked through the window at the light which showed him the national flag fluttering from its staff, his first thought was of a united country. To his large nature the Union appealed power- fully by the mere sense of magnitude which it conveyed. The vision of future empire, the dream of the destiny of an unbroken union touched and kindled his imagination. He could hardly speak in public without an allusion to the grandeur of American nationality, and a fervent appeal to keep it sacred and intact. For fifty years, with reitera- tion ever more frequent, sometimes with rich elaboration, sometimes with brief and simple allusion, he poured this message into the ears of a listening people. His words passed into textbooks, and became the first declamations of schoolboys. They were in everyone's mouth. They sank into the hearts of the people, and became uncon- sciously a part of their life and daily thoughts. When the hour came, it was love for the Union and the sentiment of nationality which nerved the aim of the North, and sus- tained her courage. That love had been fostered, and that 22 THE AMERICAX SPIRIT sentiment had been strengthened and vivified, by the life and words of Webster. No one had done so much, or had so large a share in this momentous task. Here lies the debt which the American people owe to Webster, and here is his meaning and importance in his own time and to us today. His career, his intellect, and his achievements are inseparably connected with the maintenance of a great empire, and the fortunes of a great people. So long as English oratory is read or studied, so long will his speeches stand high in literature. So long as the Union of these States endures, or holds a place in history, will the name of Daniel Webster be honored and remembered, and his stately eloquence find an echo in the hearts of his countrymen."* THE GREATEST AilERICAN ORATOR The story of Webster's shyness in Exeter, brought on doubtless by some of his associates ridiculing his rustic manners and clothes, is well known. In his autobiography he says : "There was one thin,2: I could not do — I could not make a declamation, I could not speak before the school. The kind and excellent Buckminster sought especially to persuade me to perform the exercise of declamation like the other boys, but I could not do it. Many a piece did I commit to memory, and recite and rehearse in my own room, over and over again, yet, when the day came, when the school collected to hear declama- tions, when my name was called, and I saw all eyes turned to my seat, I could not raise myself from it. Sometimes the instructors frowned, sometimes they smiled. Mr. Buck- ♦Lodge : Daniel Webster, pp. 361-2. INTRODUCTION 23 minster always pressed and entreated, most winningly, that I would venture, but I could never command sufficient resolution. When the occasion was over, I went home and wept bitter tears of mortification."* In Dartmouth he rapidly outgrew this hindrance and made several addresses which gave evidence of his future line of thought and something of his coming power, t This is particularly true of the oration which the citizens of Hanover, the college town, asked him to deliver on the Fourth of July, 1800. His studies as a lawyer and his training in the courts, where he met as his opponents and colleagues, the greatest lawyers of the day, rapidly per- fected his style and developed, his resources; the following account of his first speech in Congress, given on June 10, 1813, is not extravagant: ''The speech took the House by surprise, not so much from its eloquence as from the vast amount of historical knowledge and illustrative ability displayed in it. How a person, untrained to forensic contests and unused to public affairs could exhibit so much parliamentary tact, such nice appreciation of the difficulties of a difficult question, and such quiet facility in surmounting them, puzzled the mind. The age and inexperience of the speaker had prepared the House for no such display, and astonishment for a time subdued the expression of its admiration. " 'No member before,' says a person then in the House 'ever riveted the attention of the House so closely, in his first speech. Members left their seats, where they could not see the speaker face to face, and sat down, or stood on the floor, fronting him. All listened attentively and •Curtis: Lije of Daniel Webster, "Vol. I, p. 20. tLodge: Daniel Webster, pp. 20-23. 24 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT silently, during the whole speech; and when it was over, many went up and warmly congratulated the orator; among whom were some, not the most niggard of their compliments, who most dissented from the views he had expressed.' "Chief Justice Marshall, writing to a friend some time after this speech says : 'At the time when this speech was delivered, I did not know Mr. "Webster, but I was so much struck with it that I did not hesitate then to state that Mr. Webster was a very able man, and would become one of the very first statesmen in America, and perhaps the very first.' "* » "The First Settlement of New England" was Webster's first great oration — an important departure from his speeches in court and Congress. The effect of this mem- orable oration is described by Mr. Ticknor in Curtis's Life of Webster :t "I went to Plymouth on the 21st of December, 1820, with Mr. and Mrs. Webster, Mr. and Mrs. I. P. Davis, Miss Stockton, Mr. F. C. Gray, and Miss Mary Mason. Where we stopped to dine we overtook fifty or sixty per- sons, among whom were Colonel Perkins, Mrs. S. G. Perkins, Mr. E. Everett, and many others of our acquaint- ance. Mr. Webster had been a little uninterested during the morning drive, wearied perhaps by his labors in the convention, and partly occupied with thoughts of the fol- lowing day. But at the little halfway house, where we all crowded into two or three small rooms, we had a very merry time, and Mr. Webster was as gay as anyone. In ♦Biographical notes by Mr. March, quoted in the Memoir by Edward EAerett in the National Edition, Vol. I, p. 29. tCurtis: Life of Daniel Webster, Vol. I, pp. 192-195. INTRODUCTION 25 the eveninof at Plymouth everything li;ul llie air of a fete; the houses of the principal street — in one of which we lodged — were all lighted up, so that the street itself was illuminated by them, and a band of music went up and down, followed by a crowd, while it serenaded the many strangers already collected from a distance for the great centenary anniversary. Old Mr. Samuel Davis, a sort of embodiment of the Pilgrim traditions of the seventeenth century, and others of the principal inhabitants of Ply- mouth paid their respects to Mr. Webster in the course of the evening, and made it very agreeable, from the recol- lections that they brought with them and the conversation that naturally followed. "In the morning I went with Mr. Webster to the church where he was to deliver the oration. It was the old First Church — Dr. Kendall's. He did not find the pulpit con- venient for his purpose, and after making two or three experiments, determined to speak from the deacon's seat under it. An extemporaneous table, covered with a green baize cloth, was arranged for the occasion, and, when the procession entered the church, everything looked appro- priate, though, when the arrangement was first suggested, it sounded rather odd. The building was crowded ; indeed, the streets had seemed so all the morning, for the weather was fine, and the whole population was astir as for a holiday. The oration was an hour and fifty minutes long, but the whole of what was printed a year afterward, for it was a 5^ear before it made its appearance, was not de- livered. His manner was very fine — quite various in the different parts. The passage about the slave trade was delivered with a power of indignation such as T nevor •?6 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT witnessed on any other occasion. That at the end, when, spreading his arms as if to embrace them, he welcomed future generations to the great inheritance which we have enjoyed, was spoken with the most attractive sweet- ness, and that peculiar smile which in him was always so charming. The effect of the whole was very great. As soon as he got home to our lodgings, all the principal people then in Plymouth crowded about him. He was full of animation and radiant with happiness. But there was something about him very grand and imposing at the same time. In a letter which I wrote the same day, I said 'he seemed as if he were like the mount that might not be touched, and that burned with fire.' " The Plymouth discourse was not published until about a year after its delivery. Public expectation had been greatly excited by the accounts of those who heard it, and the commendations of the local press. The following let- ter to Mr. Webster is a specimen of the manner in which it was received. (President John Adams to Mr. Webster.) Montezillo, December 23, 1831. "Dear Sir : I thank you for your discourse, delivered at Plymouth, on the termination of the second century of the landing of our fathers. Unable to read it from defect "of sight, it was last night read to me by our friend Shaw. The fullest justice that I could do it would be to transcribe it at full length. It is the effort of a great mind richly stored with every species of information. If there be an American who can read it without tears, I am not that American. It enters more perfectly into the genuine spirit INTRODUCTION 27 of New England than any production I ever read. The observations on the Greeks and Eomans; on colonization in general ; on the ^Yest India Islands ; on the past, present, and future of America, and on the slave trade are saga- cious, profound, and affecting in a high degree. "Mr. Burke is no longer entitled to the praise — the most consummate orator of modern times. ""Wliat can I say of what regards myself? To my humble name, 'Exegisti monumentum acre perennius.' "This oration will be read five hundred years hence with as much rapture as it was heard. It ought to be read at the end of every century, and indeed at the end of every year, forever and ever. "I am, sir, with the profoundest esteem, your obliged friend and very humble servant, "John Adams." The Honorable Daniel Webster. Respecting subsequent appreciation, it can only be neces- sary to say that this discourse has become classical in our literature, and that it is generally regarded as the corner- stone of 'Mr. "Webster's fame as an orator. IMPORTAXT EVENTS IK THE LIFE OF DANIEL WEBSTER 1782 January 18, birth in Salisbury, New Hampshire. 1794 Exeter Academy. 1797-1801 Dartmouth College. 1805 Admission to the bar in Boston. 1806 Death of his father. 1808 Marriage to Grace Fletcher of Hopkinton, New Hampshire. 28 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT 1813 Election to Congress from New Hampshire, 1813 Admission to the bar of the Supreme Court. 1814 Second election to Congress. 1816 Beginning of residence in Boston. 1823 Third term in Congress, representative of Boston District. 1827 Election to Senate. 1828 Death of wife. 1829 Marriage to Caroline LeEoy of New York. 1839 Reelection to Senate. 1841 Secretary of State under Tyler. 1843 Ashburton Treaty. 1843 Eesignation from Secretaryship. 1844 Eeelection to Senate. 1850 Secretary of State under Fillmore. 1853 Defeat at Baltimore Convention. 1853 October 24, death at Marshfield, Massachusetts. MOST FAMOUS ORATIONS OF DANIEL WEBSTEB 1818 Dartmouth College Case. 1820 Plymouth Speech. 1825 First Bunker Hill Monument Oration. 1826 Eulogy on Adams and Jefferson. 1830 Eeply to Hayne. White Murder Trial. 1833 Character of Washington. 1833 "The Constitution is not a compact between Sovereign States." 1843 Completion of the Monument. 1850 Seventh of March Speech. 1852 Addition to the Capitol. Bibliographies plymouth and the pilgrims A. C. Addison: The Eoinantic Story of the Mayflower Pilgrims. Boston, 1911. L. C. Page and Co. Very good illustrations. Charles M. Andrews: The Fathers of New England. New Haven, 1919. Yale University Press. E. Arber: The Story of the Pilgrim Fathers, 1606-1623. London, 1897. Ward & Downey. An excellently arranged compila- tion of sources on the history of the Pilgrims. Jane G. Austin: The Old Colony Stories: Betty Alden; A Name- less Nobleman; Standish of Standish; Dr. LeBaron and His Daughters; David Alden's Daughter, and other stories. Boston. Houghton, Mifflin Co. U. R. Bliss: The Old Colony Town. Boston, 1893. Houghton, Mifflin Co. William Bradford: History of Plimouth Plantation. Boston, 1898. Wright and Porter, State Printers. John Brown: The Pilgrim Fathers of New England. New York, 1895. Fleming H. Revell. Champlin Burrage: John Pory's Last Description of Plymouth Colony. Boston, 1918. Houghton, Mifflin Co. Ezra Hoyt Byington: The Puritan in England and New England. Gives the point of view of the Pilgrim Fathers. Mary Caroline Crawford: In the Days of the Pilgrim Fathers. Boston. Little, Brown and Co. H. M. Dexter: The England and Holland of the Pilgrims. 1905. Morton Dexter: The Story of the Pilgrims. Boston, 1894. Con- gregational S. S. and Publication Society. Samuel Adams Drake: The Making of New England. New York, 1886. Scribner. Agnes Edwards: Cape Cod, New and Old. Boston. Houghton, Mifflin Co. 29 30 THE AMEPvICAX SPIRIT Agnes Edwards: The Old Coast Road. From Boston to Plymouth. Boston. Houghton, Mifflin Co. John Abbott Goodwin: The Pilgrim Republic (new edition). Boston. Houghton, Mifflin Co. Mr. Goodwin is the brother of Mrs. Jane G. Austin, author of the "Old Colony Stories" and an authority on Pilgrim times, customs, and manners. William Elliot Griffis: The Pilgrims in Their Three Homes. Bos- ton, 1898. Houghton, Mifflin Co. William Elliot Griffis: Young People's History of the Pilgrims. Boston. Houghton, Mifflin Co. Charles Stedman Hanks: Our Plymouth Forefathers. Boston, 1008. Dana Estes & Co. Annie Russell Marble: The Women WJto Came in the May- flower. Boston. The Pilgrim Press. Winthrop Packard: Old Plymouth Trails. Boston. Small, May- nard and Co. John Gorham Palfrey: History of New England. 5 vols. Boston, 1859. Little, Brown and Co. Lyman P. Powell: Historic Toicns of New England. 5 vols. New York, 1898. G. P. Putnam's Sons. Roland G. Usher: The Pilgrims and Their History. New York, 1918. Macmillan. William B. Weeden: Economic and Social History of New Kny land, 1620-1789. Boston. Houghton, Mifflin Co. SUGGESTED POEMS ABOUT THE PILGRIMS Kutlierine Lee Bates : America the Beautiful. INI. E. Buhler: A Puritan Exhortation. Amelia Josephine Burrr Abraham's Children. Bliss Carman: The Return of the Mayflower. Felicia Hemans: The Landing of the Pilgrims. Alfred Noyes: The Mayflower. IXTRODUCTIOX 31 PAINTINGS AND PICTURES ILLUSTRATING THE PILGRIM STORY Bayes: Departure of the Mayflower (Perry 1334). George H. Poughton: John Alden and Priscilla (Perry), 1337; Pilgrim Exiles, 1336; Pilgrims Going to Church, 1339: Priscilla, 1338; Return of the Mayflower, 1336B; Two Farewells, 1335. Charles W. Cope: Sailing of the Mayflower. (In the House of Lords, London.) Departure of the Pilgrims from Delft Haven (Perry 1331C). James Montgomery Flagg: Landing of the Pilgrims. (Privately owned in New Haven.) W. F, Halsall: The Mayflower in Her First Morning at Sea. (In Pilgrim Hall, Plymouth.) The Mayflower in Plymouth Harbor. (In Pilgrim Hall, Plymouth.) (Perry 1331B.) Charles Lucy: The Embarkation. (In Pilgrim Hall.) Peter F. Rothermel: Landing of the Pilgrims. (Perry 13.32.) Henry Sargent: Landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth. (In Pilgrim Hall. Plymouth.) Robert G. Shaw: The Landing." (In Pilgrim Hall, Plymouth.) Robert M. Weir: Embarkation of the Pilgrims. (Panel of Rotimda of Capitol at Washington.) (Perry 1331.) Photographs and postcards of Plymouth Rock, Forefathers' Monument, and other historical scenes may be had from Plymouth dealers. A remarkable series of reproductions in color has been re- cently issued by the Old Colony Trust Company, Boston, in their brochure "Ncav England — Old and New." BIOGRAPHICAL ACCOUNTS OF WEBSTER Sarah K. Bolton: Daniel Webster in Famous American States- men. 1888. Crowell. George Ticknor Curtis: Jyife of Daniel ^Vebster, 2 vols. New York, 1870. D. Appleton Cd. This is the standard Web- ster Biography. 33 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT Sidney George Fisher,: True Daniel Wehster. 1911. Lippincott. Jolin Frost: Lije of Daniel Webster. 1869. Lee and Shepherd. Elbert Hubbard: Daniel Webster. Little Journeys to the Homes of American Statesmen. 1898. Putnam. Cliarles Lanman: The Private Life of Daniel Webster. New York, 1852. Harper and Bros. Henry Cabot Lodge: Daniel Webster in American Statesmen Series. Boston, 1883. Houghton, Mifflin Co. John Bach McMaster: Daniel Webster. New York, 1902. The Century Co. Frederic Austin Ogg: Daniel Webster. 1914. Jacobs. Charles F. Richardson : Daniel Webster for Young Americans. With essay by E. P. Whipple on Daniel Webster as a Master of English Prose and Style. Boston, 1903. Little, Brown and Co. Carl Schurz: Daniel Webster, in Library of the World's Best Literature. Vol. XXXVIII. An excellent, short, impartial account. Everett P. Wheeler: Daniel Webster in Great American Lawyers. Vol. III. University edition. Philadelphia, 1908. AVORKS OF WEBSTER Edward Everett: Webster's Works. 6 Vols. Boston, 1851. Little, Brown and Co. First volume contains a Biographical Memoir of Daniel Webster. National Edition, 18 Vols.: Writings and Speeches. Boston, 1903. Little, Brown and Co. E. P. Whipple: The Great Speeches and Debates of Daniel Web- ster. Boston, 1879. Little, Brown and Co. Several of Webster's orations have been edited and published for school use. These volumes all contain excellent bibliographical and critical material. OEATIOXS outlim;: of The First Settlement of Xew England T. Tlie Occasion — Beginning of the Third Centiin' of Xew England History. A. Xew England ancestors. B. New England posterity. II. The Purpose — Homage to Pilgrim Fathers. A. The Place— Plymouth Eock. B. The Time— December 23, 1620-1820. C. Comparison with military events. 1. Marathon and Grecian glory. 2. Plymouth and American liberty. III. The Pilgrim Motive. A. Love of religious liberty. B. Persecutions in England. C. The departure to Holland. D. Desire for a home. E. New England tbe chosen land. IV. The Peculiar Character of American Colonization. A. The difference in motive. B. The difference in organization. C. New and stronger ties. D. Eesulting progress. V. Benefits of America. A. American government. 1. Popular participation. 2. Distribution of property. 33 34 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT 3. Departments of government — compari- son with Greek and Roman. B. Education in Kew England. 1. Early provision for schools. 3. Harvard College. C. Eeligious principles. VI. Duties of the Descendants of the Pilgrims. A. Preservation of forms of government and constitution. B. The outlook for American literature. C. The importance of Chtistianity. YII. The Progress of New England. A. One hundred years hence. B. "Welcome to future generations. FIRST SETTLEMENT OF N1<]W ENGLAXD Oration in Commemoration of the Two Hundredth Anniversary. Delivered at Plymoutli, on the 2'2d Day of December, 1820. 1. Let us rejoice that we behold fhis day. Let us be thankful that we have lived to see the bright and happy breaking of the auspicious morn which commences the third century of the history of New England. Auspi- cious, indeed — bringing a happiness beyond the common allotment of Providence to men — full of present joy, and gilding with bright beams the prospect of futurity, is the dawn that awakens us to the commemoration of the land- ing of the Pilgrims. 2. Living at an epoch which naturally marks the progress of the history of our native land, we have come hither to celebrate the great event with which that history com- menced. Forever honored be this, the place of our fathers' refuge ! Forever remembered the day which saw them, weary and distressed, broken in everything but spirit, poor in all but faith and courage, at last secure from the dangers of wintry seas,. and impressing this shore with the first footsteps of civilized man ! 3. It is a noble faculty of nature which enables us to connect our thoughts, our sympathies, and our happiness with what is distant in place or time; and, looking before and after, to hold communion at once with our ancestors and our posterity. Human and mortal although we are, we are nevertheless not mere insulated beings, without relation to the past or the future. Neither the point of time, nor the spot of earth, in wliich we physically live, 35 36 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT bounds our rational and intellectual enjo\Tnents, Wv live in the past by a knowledge of its history; and in tlie future by hope and anticipation. By ascending to an association with our ancestors; by contemplating their example and studying their character; by partaking their sentiments, and imbibing their spirit; b}' accompanyinir them in their toils, by sjTupathizing in their sufferings, and rejoicing in their successes and their triumphs, we seem to belong to their age and to mingle our own exist- ence with theirs. TVe become their contemporaries, live the lives which they lived, endure what they endured and partake in the rewards which they enjoyed. And in like planner, by running along the line of future time, by contemplating the probable fortunes of those who are coming after us, by attempting something which may promote their happiness, and leave some not dishonor- able memorial of ourselves for their regard, when we shall sleep with the fathers, we protract our own earthly being, and seem to crowd whatever is future, as well as all that is past, into the narrow compass of our earthly existence. As it is not a vain and false, but an ex- alted and religious imagination, which leads us to raise nur thoughts from the orb which, amidst this universe of worlds, the Creator has given us to inhabit, and to send them with something of the feeling which nature prompts, and teaches to be proper among children of the same Eternal Parent, to the contemplation of the myriads of fellow-beings, with which his goodness has peopled the infinite of space; so neither is it false nor vain to consider ourselves as interested and connected with our whole race, through all time : allied to our ancestors : allied to FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND 37 our posterity; closely compacted on all sides with others: ourselves being but links in the great chain of being, which begins with the origin of our race, runs onward through its successive generations, binding together the {)ast, the present, and the future, and terminating at last, with the consummation of all things earthly, at the throne of God. 4. We have come to this Rock, to record here our homage for our Pilgrim Fathers ; our s}Tnpathy in their sufferings ; our gratitude for their labors; our admiration of their virtues ; our veneration for their piety ; and our attachment to those principles of civil and religious liberty which they encountered the dangers of the ocean, the storms of heaven, the violence of savages, disease, exile, and famine, to enjoy and establish. And we would leave here, also, for the gen- erations which are rising up rapidly to fill our places, some proof that we have endeavored to transmit the great inheritance unimpaired; that in our estimate of public principles and private virtue, in our veneration of religion and piety, in our devotion to civil and religious liberty, in our regard for whatever advances human knowledge or improves human happiness, we are not altogether unworthy of our origin. 5. There is a local feeling connected with this occasion, too strong to be resisted; a sort of genius of the place, which inspires and awes us. We feel that we are on the spot where the first scene of our history was laid ; where the hearths and altars of New England were first placed ; where Christianity, and civilization, and letters made their first lodgment, in a vast extent of cnuntvy, covered witli a 38 THE ame:"jcax spirit wilderness, and peopled by roving barbarians. We are here, at the season of the year at which the event took place. The imagination irresistibly and rapidly draws around us the principal features and the leading characters in the original scene. We cast our eyes abroad on the ocean, and we see where the little bark, with the interesting group upon its deck, made its slow progress to the shore. We look around us, and behold the hills and promontories where the anxious eyes of our fathers first saw the places of habitation and of rest. We feel the cold which be- numbed, and listen to the winds which pierced them. Beneath us is the Eock,* on which jSTew England received the feet of the Pilgrims. We seem even to behold them, as they struggle with the elements, and, with toilsome efforts, gain the shore. We listen to the chiefs in coun- cil; we see the unexampled exhibition of female fortitude and resignation; we hear the whisperings of youthful im- patience, and we see, what a painter of our own has also represented by his pencil, f chilled and shivering childhood, houseless but for a mother's arms, couchless but for a mother's breast, till our own blood almost freezes. The mild dignity of Carver| and of Bradford ; the decisive and soldier-like air and manner of Standish; the devout Brewster; the enterprising Allerton; the general firmness and thoughtfulness of the whole band ; their conscious joy for dangers escaped; their deep solicitude about dangers •For further facts about the "Rock" see Palfrey's History of New England, Vol. I, p. 171, or Harper's Encyclopedia of U. S. History. tHenry Sargent's historical painting, "The Landing- of th^ Pil- grims at Plymouth." was presented by him to the Pilgrim .Society, in whose hall it first appeared in 1824. JFor a list of the pasi^engers on the Mayflower, see E. Arl^r'a Story of the PilgrUn Fathers, or Harper's Encycl^: oedia of U. S. History. FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND 39 to come; their trust in Heaven; their high religious faith, full of confidence and anticipation; all these seem to be- long to this place, and to be present upon this occasion, to fill us with reverence and admiration. 6. The settlement of New England by the colony which landed here* on the twenty-second t of December, sixteen hundred and twenty, although not the first European es- tablishment in what now constitutes the United States, was yet so peculiar in its causes and character, and has been followed and must still be followed by such conse- quences, as to give it a high claim to lasting commemora- tion. On these causes and consequences, more than on its immediately attendant circumstances, its importance, as an historical event, depends. Great actions and strik- ing occurrences, having excited a temporary admiration, often pass away and are forgotten, because they leave no lasting results affecting the prosperity and happiness of communities. Such is frequently the fortune of the most brilliant military achievements. Of the ten thousand battles which have been fought, of all the fields fertilized with carnage, of the banners which have been bathed in blood, of the warriors who have hoped that they had risen from the field of conquest to a glory as bright and as dur- able as the stars, how few that continue long to interest mankind ! The victory of yesterday is reversed by the defeat of today; the star of military glory, rising like a meteor, like a meteor has fallen ; disgrace and disaster hang on the heels of conquest and renown; victor and •For the name of what is now Plymouth and the exact place of the landing:, see Arber's Pilgrim Fathers, or Winsor's Narrative and Critical History. tThe twenty-first is now acknowledged to be the true anniver- sary. Seo Palfrey's Neiv Enfiland. 40 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT vanquished presently pass away to oblivion, and the world goes on in its course, with the loss only of so many lives and so much treasure. 7. But if this be frequenth^ or generally, the fortune of military achievements, it is not always so. There are en- terprises, military as well as civil, which sometimes check the current of events, give a new turn to human affairs, and transmit their consequences through ages. Vi^e see their importance in their results, and call them great, be- cause great things follow. There have been battles which have fixed the fate of nations. These come down to us in history with a solid and permanent interest, not created by a display of glittering armor, the rush of adverse bat- talions, the sinking and rising of pennons, the flight, the pursuit, and the victory; but by their effect in advancing or retarding human knowledge, in overthrowing or estab- lishing despotism, in extending or destroying human hap- piness. When the traveler pauses on the plain of Mara- thon, what are the emotions wdiich most strongly agitate his breast? What is that glorious recollection which thrills through his frame and suffuses his eyes? Not, I imagine, that Grecian skill and Grecian valor were here most signally displayed; but that Greece herself was here saved. It is because to this spot, and to the event which has rendered it immortal, he refers all the succeed- ing glories of the republic. It is because, if that day had gone othervdse, Greece had perished. It is because he perceives that her philosophers and orators, her poets and painters, her sculptors and architects, her governments and free institutions, point baclcward to Marathon, and that their future existence seems to have been suspended FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND H on the contingency, whether the Persian or the Grecian banner should wave victorious in the beams of that day's setting sun. And, as his imagination kindles at the retro- spect, he is transported back to the interesting moment; he counts the fearful odds of the contending hosts; his interest for ttie result overwhelms him; he trembles, as if it were still uncertain, and seems to doubt whether he may consider Socrates and Plato, Demosthenes, Sophocles, and Phidias, as secure, yet, to himself and to the world. 8. "If we conquer," said the Athenian commander, on the approach of that decisive day, "if we conquer, we shall make Athens the greatest city of Greece."* A prophecy, how well fulfilled ! "If God prosper us," might have been ihe more appropriate language of our fathers, when they landed upon this Pock, "if God prosper us, we shall here begin a work which shall last for ages; we shall plant here a new society, in the principles of the fullest liberty and the purest religion; we shall subdue this wilderness which is before us; we shall fill this region of the great continent, which stretches almost from pole to pole with civilization and Christianity; the temples of the true God shall rise where now ascends the smoke of idolatrous sacrifice ; fields and gardens, the flowers of summer, and the waving and golden harvest of autumn, shall spread over a thousand hills, and stretch along a thousand valleys, never yet, since the creation, reclaimed to the use of civilized man. We shall whiten this coast with the canvas of a prosperous commerce ; we shall stud the long and winding shore with a hundred cities. That which we sow in weakness shall be raised in strength. From •Herodotus VI, paragraph 109. 42 ■ 'i'HE AMERICAN SPIRIT our sincere, but houseless worship, there shall spring splendid temples to record God's goodness; from the simplicity of our social union, there shall arise wise and politic constitutions of government, full of the liberty which we ourselves bring and breathe; from our zeal for learning, institutions shall spring which shalf scatter the light of knowledge throughout the land, and, in time, paying back where they have borrowed, shall contribute their part to the great aggregate of human knowledge ; and our descendants, through all generations, shall look back to this spot, and to this hour, with unabated affection and regard." 9. Of the motive which influenced the first settlers to a voluntary exile, induced them to relinquish their native country, and to seek an asylum in this then unexplored wilderness, the first an4 principal, no doubt, were con- nected with religion. They sought to enjoy a higher degree of religious freedom, and what they esteemed a purer form of religious worship, than was allowed to their choice, or presented to their imitation, in the Old World. The love of religious liberty is a stronger senti- ment, when fully excited, than an attachment to civil or political freedom. That freedom which the conscience demands, and which men feel bound by their hopes of salvation to contend for, can hardly fail to be attained. Conscience, in the cause of religion and the worship of the Deity, prepares the mind to act and to suffer beyond almost all other causes. It sometimes gives an impulse so irresistible, that no fetters of power or of opinion can withstand it. History instructs us that this love of FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND 43 religious liberty, a compound sentiment in the breast of man, made up of the clearest sense of right and the liighest conviction of duty, is able to look the sternest despotism in the face, and, with means apparently most inadequate, to shake principalities and powers. There is a boldness, a spirit of daring, in religious reformers, not to be measured by the general rules which control men's purposes and actions. If the hand of power be laid upon it, this only seems to augment its force and its elasticity, and to cause its action to be more formidable and violent. Human invention has devised nothing, human power has compassed nothing, that can forcibly restrain it, when it breaks forth. Nothing can stop it, but to give way to it; nothing can check it, but indulgence. It loses its power only when it has gained its object. The principle of toleration to which the world has come so slowly, is at once the most just and the most wise of all principles. Even when religious feeling takes a character of extrava- gance and enthusiasm, and seems to threaten the order of society and shake the columns of the social edifice, its principal danger is in its restraint. If it be allowed in- dulgence and expansion, like the elemental fires, it only agitates, and perhaps purifies, the atmosphere ; while its efforts to throw off restraint would burst the world asunder. 10. It is certain, that, although many of them were re- publicans in principle, we have no evidence that our New England ancestors would have emigrated, as they did, from their own native country, would have become wanderers in Europe, and finally would have undertaken the establish- ment of a colony here, merely from their dislike of the political systems of Europe. They fled not so much from 44 THE A3IEPvICAX SPIRIT the civil government, as from the hierarchy, and the laws which enforced conformity to the church establishment. Mr. Robinson* had left England a? early as sixteen hun- dred and eight, on account of the persecutions for non- conformity, and had retired to Holland. He left England, from no disappointed ambition in affairs of state, from no regrets at the want of preferment in the church, nor from any motive of distinction or of gain. Uniformity in matters of religion was pressed with such extreme rigor, that a voluntary exile seemed the most eligible mode of escaping from the penalties of non-compliance. The accession of Elizabeth had, it is true, quenched the fires of Smithfield,t and put an end to the easy acquisition of the crown of martvrdom. Her long reign had established the reforma- tion, but toleration was a virtue beyond her conception, and beyond the age. She left no example of it to her successor; and he was not of a character which rendered it probable that a sentiment either so wise or so liberal should originate with him. At the present period it seems incredible, that the learned,, accomplished, unas- simiing, and inoffensive Robinson should neither be tolerated in his peaceable mode of worship in his own country, nor suffered quietly to depart from it. Yet such was the fact. He left his country by stealth, that he might elsewhere enjoy those rights which ought to belong to men in all cotmtries. The departure of the Pilgrims for Holland is deeply interesting, from its circumstances, and also as it marks the character of the times, independ- •John Robinson was pastor of the Separatist Coni^reeation at Scrooby. England, and removed with its members to Holland in 160S. tTo find out who kindled the "fires at Smithfield." and who suf- fered in them, read Jesse's Memoirs of the Court of England, Vol. I. Chapter XTV. FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW KNGLAND 45 cntly of its conner'tion with naiiu's now incorporated ^ with the history of empire.- The embarkation was in- tended to be made in such a manner that it might escape the notice of the officers of government. Great pains had been taken to secure boats, wliicli shonld come undiscovered to the shore, and receive tlie fugitives; and frequent dis- appointments had been experienced in this respect. 11. At length the appointed time* came, bringing with it unusual severity of cold and rain. An unfrecjuented and barren heath, on the shores of Lincolnshire, was the selected, spot, where the feet of the Pilgrims were to tread, for the last time, the land of their fathers. The vessel which was to received them did not come until the next day, and in the meantime the little band was collected, and men and women and children and baggage were crowded together, in melancholy and distressed confusion. The sea was rough, and the women and children were already sick, from their passage down the river to the place of embarkation on the sea. At length the wished-for boat silently and fear- fully approaches the shore, and men and women and chil- dren, shaking with fear and with cold, as many as the small vessel could bear, venture off on a dangerous sea. Immedi- ately the advance of horses is heard from behind, armed men appear, and those not yet embarked are seized, and taken into custody. Tn the hurry of the moment, there had been no regard to the keeping together of families, in the first embarkation, ancV on account of the appearance of the horsemen, the boat never returned for the residue. Those who had got away, and those who had not, were in equal dis- •The Scrooby congregation made its first attempt to leave Eng- land in the autumn of 1607. Again in the spring of 160S their departure was rudelv interrupted. Read the account in Palfrey's History of New England, Vol. I. p. 13S. or consult Dexter. Story of the Pilgriins 46 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT tress. A storm of great violence, and long duration, arose at sea, which not onl}^ protracted the voyage, rendered dis- tressing by the want of all those accommodations which the interruption of the embarkation had occasioned, but also forced the vessel out of her course, and menaced immediate shipwreck; while those on shore, when they were dismissed from the custody of the officers of justice, having no longer homes or houses to retire to, and their friends and protectors being already gone, became objects of necessary charity, as well as of deep commiseration. 12. As this scene passes before us, we can hardly forbear asking, whether this be a band of malefactors and felons flying from justice. What are their crimes, that they hide themselves in darkness? To what punishment are they exposed that, to avoid it, men, and women, and children, thus encounter the surf of the North Sea, and the terrors of a night storm? What induces this armed pursuit, and this arrest of fugitives, of all ages and both sexes? Triith does not alloW us to answer these inquiries in a manner that does credit to the wisdom or the justice of the times. This was not the flight of guilt, but of virtue. It was an humble and peaceable religion, flying from causeless oppression. It was conscience, attempt- ing to escape from the arbitrary rule of the Stuarts. It was Eobinson and Brewster, leading off their little band from their native soil, at first to find shelter on the shores of the neighboring continent, but ultimately to come hither ; and having surmounted all difficulties and braved a thou- sand dangers, to find here a place of refuge and of rest. Thanks be to God, that this spot was honored as the asylum of religious liberty ! May its standard, reared here, FIRST .SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND ^7 ri'inain forever! May it rise up as high as heaven till its banner shall fan the air of both continents, and wave as* a glorious ensign of peace and security to the nations ! 13. The peculiar character, condition, and circumstances of the colonies which introduced civilization and an English race into New England, afford a most interesting and ex- tensive topic of discussion. On these, much of our sub- sequent character and fortune has depended. Their in- fluence has essentially affected our whole history, through the two centuries which have elapsed; and as they have become intimately connected with government, laws, and property, as well as with our opinions on the -subject of religion and civil liberty, that influence is likely to con- tinue to be felt through the centuries which shall suc- ceed. Emigration from one region to another, and the emission of colonies to people countries more or less dis- tant from the residence of the parent stock, are common incidents in the history of mankind; but it has not often, perhaps never, happened, that the establishment of col- onies should be attempted vinder circumstances, however beset Avith present difficulties and dangers, yet so favor- able to ultimate success, and so conducive to magnificent results, as those which attended the first settlements on this part of the American continent. In other instances, emigration has proceeded from a less exalted purpose, in a period of less general intelligence, or more without plan and by accident; or under circumstances, physical and moral, less favorable to the expectation of laying a foundation for great public prosperity and future empire. 14. A great resemblance exists, obviously, between all the English colonies established within the present limits 48 'i'HE AMEKICAX SPIRIT of the United States; but the occasion attracts our atten- flon more immediately to those which took possession of New England, and the peculiarities of these furnisli a stronsr contrast with most other instances of colonization. 15. Different, indeed, most widely different, from all instances of emigration and plantation, were the condition, the purposes, and the prospects of our fathers, when they established their infant colony upon this spot. They came hither to a land from which they were never to return. Hither they had brought, and here they were to fix their hopes, their attachments, and their object in life. Some natural tears they shed, as they left the pleasant abodes of their fathers, and some emotions they suppressed, when the white cliffs of their native country, now seen for the last time, grew dim to their sight. They were acting, however, upon a resolution not to be daunted. With what- ever stifled regrets, with whatever occasional hesitation, with whatever appalling apprehensions, which might sometimes arise with force to shake the firmest purpose, they had yet committed themselves to Heaven and the elements; and a thousand leagues of water soon interposed to separate them forever from the region which gave them birth. A new existence awaited them here; and when they saw these shores, rough, cold, barbarous, and barren, as then they were, they beheld their country. That mixed and strong feeling, which we call love of country, and which is, in general, never extinguished in the heart of man, grasped and embraced its proper object here. What- ever constitutes counirii, except the earth and the sun, all the moral causes of affection and attachment which operate FIRST SETTLEMENT OF* NEW ENGLAND .49 upon the heart, they had brought with them to their new abode. Here were now their families and friends, their homes, and their property. Before they reached ^the shore, they had established the elements of a social system,* and at a much earlier period had settled their forms of religious worship. At the moment of their landing, therefore, they possessed institutions of government, and institutions of religion : and friends and families, and social and religious institutions, constituted by consent, founded on choice and preference, how nearly do these fill up our whole idea of country! The morning that beamed on the first night of their repose, saw the Pilgrims already at home in their country. There were political institutions and civil lib- erty, and religious worship. Poetry has fancied nothing, in the wanderings of heroes, so distinct and characteristic. Here was man, indeed, unprotected and unprovided for, on the shore of a rude and fearful wilderness; but it was politic, intelligent, and educated man. Everything was' civilized but the physical world. Institutions, containing in substance all that ages had done for human government, were organized in a forest. Cultivated mind was to act on uncultivated nature; and, more than all, a government and a country were to commence, with the very first foundation laid under the divine light of the Christian religion. Happy auspices of a happy futurity ! WTio would wish that his country's existence had otherwise begun? Who would desire the power of going back to the ages of fable? Who would wish for an origin obscured in t^e •The Mayflower compact was .sig'ned on November It, 1620, by ^rty-one adult members of the Pilgrim company. The text is nrinted in tho Introduction. For an account see Palfrey, Vol. I, p. 164, or "Mourt's Relation."?" in Arber's Pilgrim Fathers. 50* THE AMERICAN SPIRIT darkness of antiquity ? Who would wish for other emblaz- oning of his country's heraldry, or other ornaments of her genealogy,' than to be able to say that her first existence was with intelligence, her first breath the inspiration of liberty, her first principle the truth of divine religion? 16. Local attachments and sympathies would ere long spring up in the breast of our ancestors, endearing to them the place of their refuge. Whatever natural objects are associated with interesting scenes and high efforts, obtain a hold on human feeling, and demand from the heart a sort of recognition and regard. This Eock soon became hallowed in the esteem of the Pilgrims, and these hills grateful to their sight. Neither they nor their children were again to till the soil of England, nor again to traverse the seas which surround her. But here was a new sea, now open to their enterprise, and a new soil, which had not failed to respond gratefully to their laborious indus- try, and which was already assuming a robe of verdure. Hardly had they provided shelter for the living, ere they were summoned to erect sepulchers for the dead. The ground had become sacred by inclosing the remains of some of their companions and connections. A parent, a child, a husband, or a wife had gone the way of all flesh, and mingled with the dust of New England. We natu- rally look with strong emotion to the spot, though it be a wilderness, where the ashes of those we have loved repose. Where the heart has laid down what it loved mo'st, there it is desirous of laying itself down. No sculptured marble, no enduring monument, no honorable inscription, no ever- burning taper that would drive away the darkness of the% tomb, can soften our sense of the reality of death, and FIRST SETTLEMENT OK NEW ENGLAND 51 liallow to our feelings the groun.l which is to cover us, like the consciousness that we shall sleep, dust to dust, with the objects of our affections. 17. In a short time, other causes sprung up to bind the Pilgrims with new cords to their chosen land. Children were born, and the hopes of future generations arose, in the spot of their new habitation. The second generation found this the land of their nativit3% nd saw that they were bound to its fortunes. They beheld their fathers' graves around them, and while they rjud the memorials of their toils and labors, they rejoiced in the inheritance which they found bequeathed to them. 18. The second century opened upon New England under circumstances which evinced that much had already been accomplished, and that still better prospects and brighter hopes were before her. She had laid, deep and strong, the foundations of her society. Her religious prin- ciples were firm, and her moral liabits exemplary. Her public schools had begun to diffuse widely the elements of knowledge; and the college, under the excellent and acceptable administration of Leverett, had been raised to a high degree of credit and usefulness. 19. But if our ancestors at the close of the first century could look back with joy, and even admiration, at the progress of the country, what emotions must we not feel, when, from the point on which we stand, we also look hack and run along the events oi the century which has now closed! The country which then, as we have seen, was thought deserving of a "noble name," — which then ha d '•mightily increased," and become "very populous," — what 53 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT was it, in comparison with what our eyes behold it? At that period, a very great proportion of its inhabitants lived in the eastern section of Massachusetts proper, and in Plymouth colony. In Connecticut, there were towns along the coast, some of them respectable, but in the interior all was a wilderness beyond Hartford. On Connecticut ]-iver, settlements had proceeded as far as Deerfield, and Fort Dummer had been built near where is now the south line of New Hampshire. In New Hampshire no settlement was then begun thirty miles from the mouth of Piscataqua River, and in what is now ]\[aine, the inhabitants were confined to the coast. The aggregate of the whole popula- tion of New England did not exceed one hundred and sixty thousand. Its present amount (1820) is probably one million seven hundred thousand. Instead of being confined to its former limits, her population has rolled backward, and filled up the spaces included within her actual local boundaries. Not this only, but it has overflowed those boundaries, and the waves of emigration havie pressed farther and farther toward the west. The Alleghany has not checked it; the banks of the Ohio have been covered with it. New England farms, houses, villages, and churches spread over and adorn the immense extent from the Ohio to Lake Erie, and stretch along from the Alleghany on- wards, beyond the Miamis, and towards the Falls of St. Anthony. Two thousand miles westward from the rock where their fathers landed, may now be found the sons of the Pilgrims, cultivating smiling fields, rearing towns and villages, and cherishing, we trust, the patrimonial blessings of wisfe institutions, of liberty, and religion. The world has seen nothing like this. Regions large enough to FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND 53 be empires, and which, half a century ago, were known only as remote and unexplored wildernesses, are now- teeming with population, and prosperous in all the great concerns of life; in good governments, the means of sub- sistence, and social happiness. It may be safely asserted, that there are now more than a million of people, descend- ants of New England ancestry, living, free and happy, in regions which scarce sixty years ago were tracts of un- penetrated forest. Nor do rivers, or mountains, or seas resist the progress of industry and enterprise. Ere long, the sons of the Pilgrims will be on the shores of the Pacific* The imagination hardly keeps pace with the progress of population, improvement, and civilization. 20. It is now five-and-forty years since the growth and rising glory of America were portrayed in the English parliament, with inimitable beauty, by the most consum- mate oratort of modern times. Going back somewhat more than half a century, and describing our progress as fore- seen from that point by his amiable friend. Lord Bathur?t, then living, he spoke of the wonderful progress which America had made during the period of a single human life. There is no American heart, I imagine, that does not glow, both with conscious, patriotic pride, and admiration for one of the happiest efforts of eloquence, so often as the vision of "that little speck, scarce visible in the mass of national interest, a small seminal principle, rather than a formed body," and the progress of its astonishing develop-, mont and growth, are recalled to the recollection. But a •In reference to the fulfillment of this prediction, see Webster's address at the celebration of the New England Society of New York, December 22. 1850. See page 85. tSee Burke's Conciliation. 54 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT stronger feeling might be produced, if we were able to take up this prophetic description where he left it, and, placing ourselves at the point of time in which he was speaking, to set forth with equal felicity the subsequent progress of the country. There is yet among the living a most distinguished and venerable name, a descendant of the Pilgrims; one who has been attended through life by a great and fortunate genius; a man illustrious by his own great merits, and favored of Heaven in the long continuation of his years.* The time when the English orator was thus speaking of America preceded but by a few days the actual opening of the revolutionary drama at Lexington. He to whom I have alluded, then at the age of forl^, was among the most zealous and able de- fenders of the violated rights of his country. He seemed already to have filled a full measure of public service, and attained an honorable fame. The moment was full of difficulty and danger, and big with events of immeasurable importance. The country was on the very brink of a civil war, of which no man could foretell the duration or the result. Something more than a courageous hope, or characteristic ardor, would have been necessary to impress the glorious prospect on his belief, if, at that moment, before the sound of the first shock of actual war had reached his ears, some attendant spirit had opened to him the vision of the future; — if it had said to him, "The blow is struck, and America is severed from England for- ever!" — if it had informed him, that he himself, within the next annual revolution of the sun, should put his own liand to the great instrument of independence, and write ♦John Adams, second president of the United States. FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND 55 Ills name where all nations should behold it, and all time should not efface it ; that ere long he himself should main- tain the interests and represent the sovereignty of his new-born country in the proudest courts of Europe; that he should one day exercise her supreme magistracy; that he should yet live to behold ten millions of fellow-citizens paying him the homage of their deepest gratitude and kindest affections; that he should see distinguished talent and high public trust resting where his name rested; that he should even see with his own unclouded eyes the close of the second century of New England, he who had begun life albiost with its commencement, and lived through nearly half the whole history of his country; and that on the morning of this auspicious day he should be found in the political councils of his native state, revising, by the light of experience, that system of government which forty years before he had assisted to frame and establish; and, great and happy as he should then behold his country, there should be nothing in prospect to cloud the scene, nothing to check the ardor of that confident and patriotic hope which should glow in his bosom to the end of his long protracted and happy life. 21. The nature and constitution of society and govern- ment in this country are interesting topics, to which I would devote what remains of the time allowed to this occasion. Of our system of government the first thing to be said is, that it is really and practically a free system. It originates entirely with the people, and rests on no other foundation than thoir assent. To judge of its actual operation, it is not enough to look merely at the form of 56 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT its construction. The practical character of government depends often on a variety of considerations, besides the abstract frame of its constitutional organization. Among these are the condition and tenure of property; the laws regulating its alienation and descent; the presence or absence of a military power; an armed or unarmed yeomanry; the spirit of the age, and the degree of general intelligence. In these respects it cannot be denied that the circumstances of this country are most favorable to the hope of maintaining the government of a great nation on principles entirely popular. In the absence of military power, the nature of government must essentially depend on the manner in which property is holden and distributed. There is a natural influence belonging to property, whether it exists in many hands or few; and it is on the rights of property that both despotism and unrestrained popular violence ordinarily commence their attacks. Our ancestors began their system of government here under a condition of comparative equality in regard to wealth, and their early laws were of a nature to favor and continue this equality. 22. A republican form of government rests not more on political constitutions, than on those laws which regulate the descent and transmission of property. Governments like ours could not have been maintained, where property was holden according to the principles of the feudal system ; nor, on the other hand, could the feudal constitution pos- sibly exist with us. Our New England ancestors brought hither no great capitals from Europe; and if they had, there was nothing productive in which they could have been invested. Thev left behind them the whole feudal FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND 57 policy of the other continent. They broke away at once ■from the system of military service established in the dark ages, and which continues, down even to the present time, more or less to affect the condition of property all over Europe. Thev came to a new country. There were, as yet, no lands yielding rent, and no tenants rendering serv- ice. The whole soil was unreclaimed from barbarism. They were themselves, either from their original condition, or from the necessity of their common interest, nearly on a general level in respect to property. Their situation demanded a parceling out and division of the lands, and it may be fairly said, that this necessary act fixed the future frame and form of their government. The character of their political institutions Avas determined by the funda- mental laws respecting property. The laws rendered estates divisible among sons and daughters. The right of primo- geniture, at first limited and curtailed, was afterward abolished. The property was all freehold. The entailment of estates, long trusts, and the' other processes for fettering and tying up inheritances, were not applicable to the con- dition of society, and seldom made use of. On the con- trary, alienation of the land was every way facilitated, even to the subjecting of it to every species of debt. The establishment of public registries, and the simplicity of our forms of conveyance, have greatly facilitated the change of real estate from one proprietor to another. The consequence of all these causes has been 8 great subdivi- sion of the soil, and a great equality of condition ; the true basis, most certainly, of a popular government. *'If the people," says Harrington, "hold three parts in four of the territory, it is plain there can neither be any single 58 THE AaiERICAX SPIRIT person nor nobility able to dispute the government with them; in this case, therefore, except force he interposed, they govern themselves." 23. The division of governments into departments, and the division, again, of the legislative department into two chambers, are essential provisions in our system. This last, although not new in itself, yet seems to be new in its application to governments wholly popular. The Grecian republics, it is plain, knew nothing of it; and in Eome, the check and balance of legislative power, such as it was, lay between the people and the senate. Indeed, few things are more difficult than to ascertain accurately the true nature and construction of the Eoman commonwealth. The relative power of the senate and the people, of the consuls and the tribunes, appears not to have been at all times the same, nor at any time accurately defined or strictly observed. Cicero, indeed, describes to us an ad- mirable arrangement of political power, and a balance of the constitution, in that beautiful passage, in which he compares the democracies of Greece with the Eoman com- monwealth. 24. But at what time this wise system existed in this perfection at Eome, no proofs remain to show. Her con- stitution, originally framed for a monarchy, never seemed to be adjusted in its several parts after the expulsion of the kings. Liberty there was, but it was a dispiatatious, an uncertain, an ill-secured liberty. The patrician and the plebeian orders, instead of being matched and joined, each in its just place and proportion, to sustain the fabric FIRST SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND 59 of the state, were rather like hostile powers, in perpetual conflict. With us, an attempt has been made, and so far not without success, to divide representation into cham- bers, and, b}"" difference of age, character, qualification, or mode of election, to establish salutary checks, in govern- ments altogether elective. 25. Having detained you so long with these observations, I must yet advert to another most interesting topic — the free schools. In this particular, New England may be allowed to claim, I think, a merit of a peculiar character. She early adopted, and has constantly maintained the principle, that is the undoubted right and the bounden duty of government to provide for the instruction of all youth. That which is elsewhere left to chance or to charity, we secure by law. For the purpose of public in- struction, we hold every man subject to taxation in pro- portion to his property, and we look not to the question, whether he himself have, or have not, children to be benefited by the education for which he pays. We regard it as a wise and liberal system of police, by which prop- erty, and life, and the peace of society are secured. We s^ek to prevent in some measure the extension of the penal code, by inspiring a salutary and conservative principle of virtue and of knowledge in an early age. We strive to excite a feeling of respectability, and a sense of character, by enlarging the capacity and increasing the sphere of intellectual enjoyment. By general instruction, we seek, as far as possible, to purify the whole moral atmosphere; to keep good sentiments uppermost, and to turn the strong current of feeling and opinion, as well as the censures of 60 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT tlie law and the denunciations of religion, against im- morality and crime. AVe hope for a security beyond the law, and above the law, in the prevalence of enlightened and well-principled moral sentiment. We hope to con- tinue and prolong the time, when, in the villages and farm-houses of New England, there may be undisturbed sleep within unbarred doors. And knowing that our government rests directly on the public will, in order that we maj'' preserve it, we endeavor to give a safe and proper direction to that public will. AVe do not, indeed, expect all men to be philosophers or statesmen ; but we confidently trust, and our expectation of the duration of our system of government rests on that trust, that by the diffusion of general knowledge and good and virtuous sentiments, the political fabric may be secure, as well against open violence and overthrow, as against the slow, but sure, undermining of licentiousness. 26. A conviction of the importance of public instruction was one of the earliest sentiments of our ancestors. No lawgiver of ancient or modern times has expressed more just opinions, or adopted wiser measures, than the early records of the colony of Plymouth show to have prevailed here. Assembled on this very spot, a hundred and fifty- three years ago, the legislature of this colony declared, "Forasmuch as the maintenance of good literature doth much tend to the advancement of the weal and flourish- ing state of societies and republics, this court doth there- fore order, that in whatever township in this government, consisting of fifty families or upwards, any meet man shall be obtained to teach a A]\IS AND JEFFERSON From a discourse in commemoration of the lives and services of Jolin Adams and Tliomas Jefferson, delivered in Faneuil Hall. August 2, 1S26. And now, fellow-citizens, let us not retire from this occasion without a deep and solemn conviction of the du- ties which have devolved upon us. This lovely land, this glorious liberty, these benign institutions, the dear purchase of our fathers, are ours; ours to enjoy, ours to preserve, ours to transmit. Generations past and generations to come hold us responsible for this sacred trust. Our fathers, from behind, admonish us, with their anxious paternal voices; posterity calls out to us, from the bosom of the future; the world turns hither its solicitous eyes; all, all conjure us to act wisely, and faitMully, in the re- lation which WG sustain. We can never, indeed, pay the debt which is upon us; but by virtue, by morality, by religion, by tlie cultivation of every good principle and every good habit, we may hope to enjoy the blessing, through our day, and to leave it unimpaired to our chil- dren. Let us feel deeply how much of what we are and of what we possess we owe to this liberty, and to these institutions of government. Nature has, indeed, given us a soil which yields bounteously to the hands of in- dustry', the mighty and fruitful ocean is before us, and the skies over our heads shed health and visjor. But what ORATIONS OF D.\XIEL WEBSTER 75 are lands, and seas, and skies to civilized man, without society, without knowledge, without morals, without re- ligious culture; and how can these be enjoyed, in all their extent and all their excellence, but under the protection of wise institutions and a free government? Fellow- citizens, there is not one of us, there is not one of us here present, who does not, at this moment, and at every mo- ment, experience in his own condition, and in the condition of those most near and dear to him, the influence and the benefits of this liberty and these institutions. Let us then acknowledge the blessing, let us feel it deeply and power- fully, let us cherish a strong affection for it, and resolve to jnaintain and perpetuate it. The blood of our fathers, let it not have been shed in vain; the great hope of posterity, let it not be blasted. The striking attitude, too, in which we stand to the world around us, a topic to which, I fear, I advert too often, and dwell on too long, cannot be altogether omitted here. Neither individuals nor nations can perform their part well, until they understand and feel its importance, and comprehend and justly appreciate all the duties be- longing to it. It is not to inflate national vanity, nor to swell a light and empty feeling of self-importance, but it is that we may judge justly of our situation, and of our own duties, that I earnestly urge this consideration of our position and our character among the nations of the earth. It cannot be denied, but by those who would dispute against the sun, that with America, and in America, a new era commences in human affairs. This era is distin- guished by free representative governments, by entire re- ligious liberty, by improved systems of national inter- 76 THE AMEEIC.\N SPIRIT course, by a newly awakened and an unconquerable spirit of free inquiry and by a diffusion of knowledge through the community, such as he has been before altogether un- known and unheard of. America, America, our country, fellow-citizens, our own dear and native land, is insepa- rably connected, fast bound up, in fortune and by fate, with these great interests. If they fall, we fall with them ; if they stand, it will be because we have upholden them. Let us contemplate, then, this connection, which binds the prosperity of others to our own; and let us manfully dis- charge all the duties which it imposes. If we cherish the virtues and the principles of our fathers. Heaven will assist us to carry on the work of human liberty and hujnan happiness. Auspicious omens cheer us. Great examples are before us. Our own firmament now shines brightly upon our path. Washington is in the clear, upper sky. These other stars have now joined the American constella- tion; they circle round their center, and the heavens beam with new light. Beneath this illumination let us walk the course of life, and at its close devoutly commend our be- loved country, the conmion parent of us all, to the Divine Benignity. THE CHARACTER OF WASHINGTON From a speech delivered at a public dinner in honor of the Cen- tennial birthday of Washington, at Washington, D. C, Feb- ruary 22, 1832. I remarked, gentlemen, that the whole world was and is interested in the result of this experiment. And is it not so? Do we deceive ourselves, or is it true that at this ORATIONS OF DAXIEL WEBSTER 77 inomeut the career which this government is running is among the most attractive objects to the civilized world? Do we deceive ourselves, or is it true that at this moment that love of liberty and that understanding of its true principles which are flying over the whole earth, as on the wings of all the winds, are really and truly of American origin ? The spirit of human liberty and of free government, nurtured and grown into strength and beauty in America, lias stretched its course into the midst of the nations. Like an emanation from heaven, it has gone forth, and it will not return void. ' It must change, it is fast changing the face of the earth. Our great, our high duty is to show, in our own example, that this spirit is a spirit of health as well as a spirit of power; that its benignity is as great as its strength; that its efficiency to secure individual rights, social relations, and moral order, is equal to the irresistible force with which it prostrates principalities and powers. The world, at this moment, is regarding us with a willing, but something of a fearful, admiration. Its deep and awful anxiety is to learn whether free states may be stable as well as free; whether popular power may be trusted as well as feared; in short, whether wise, regular, and virtuous self-government is a vision for the contempla- tion of theorists, or a truth estal)lished, illustrated, and brought into practice in the country of Washington. For the earth which we inhabit, and the whole circle of the sun, for all the unborn races of mankind, we seem to hold in our hands, for their weal or woe, the fate of this experiment. If we fail, who shall venture the repetition ? I f our example shall prove to be one, not of encouragement, 78 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT but of terror, not fit to be imitated, but fit only to be shunned, where else shall the world look for free models? If this great Western Sun be struck out of the firmament, at what other fountain shall the lamp of liberty hereafter be lighted? What other orb shall emit a ray to glimmer, even, on the darkness of the world ? There is no danger of our overrating or overstating the important part which we are now acting in human affairs. It should not flatter our personal self-respect, but it should reanimate our patriotic virtues, and inspire us with a deeper and more solemn sense, both of our privileges and of our duties. .We cannot wish better for our country, nor for the world, than that the same spirit which influenced Washington may influence all who succeed him; and that the same blessing from above, which attended his efforts, may also attend theirs. The political prosperity which this country has attained, and which it now enjoys, it has acquired mainly through the instrumentality of the present government. While this agent continues, the capacity of attaining to still higher degrees of prosperity exists also. We have, while this lasts, a political life capable of beneficial exertion, with power to resist or overcome misfortunes, to sustain us against the ordinary accidents of human affairs, and to promote, by active efforts, every public interest. But dis- memberment strikes at the very being which preserves these faculties. It would lay its rude and ruthless hand on this great agent itself. It would sweep away, not only what we possess, but all power of regaining lost, or acquir- ing new possessions. It would leave the country, not only bereft of its prosperity and liappiness, but without limbs. ORATIONS OF DANIEL WEBSTER 79 or organs, or faculties, by which to exert itself hereafter in the pursuit of that prosperity and happiness. Other misfortunes may be borne, or their effects over- come. If disastrous war should sweep our commerce from the ocean, another generation may renew it; if it exhaust our treasury, future industry may replenish it; if it desolate and lay waste our fields, still, under a new cultivation, they will grow green again, and ripen to future harvests. It were but a trifle even if the walls of yonder capitol were to crumble, if its lofty pillars should fall, and its gorgeous decorations be all covered by the dusts of the valley. All these might be rebuilt. But who shall reconstruct the fabric of demolished government? Who shall rear again the well proportioned columns of constitutional liberty? Who shall frame together the skilful architecture which unites national sovereignty with state rights, individual security, and public prosperity? No, if these columns fall, they will be raised not again. Like the Coliseum and the Parthenon, they will be destined to a mournful, a melancholy immortality. Bitterer tears, however, will flow over them, than were ever shed over the monuments of Eoman or Grecian art; for they will be the remnants of a more glorious edifice than Greece or Rome ever saw — the edifice of constitutional American liberty. But let us hope for better things. Let us trust in that gracious Being who has hitherto held our country as in the hollow of his hand. Let us trust to the vii^tue and the intelligence of the people, and to the efficacy of religious obligation. Let us trust t6 the influence of Washington's example. Let us hope that that fear of Heaven which expels all other fear, and that regard to duty which 80 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT transcends all other regard, may influence public men and private citizens, and lead our country still onward in her happy career. Full of these gratifying anticipations and hopes, let us look forward to the end of that century which is now c-omraenced. A hundred years hence, otlier disciples of "Washington will celebrate his birth, with no less of sincere admiration than we now commemorate it. Wlien they shall meet, as we now meet, to do themselves and him that honor, so surely as they shall see the blue summits of his native mountains rise in the horizon, so surely as they shall behold the rivor ou whose banks he lived, and on whose banks he rests, still flowing on toward the sea, so surely may they see, as we now see, the flag of the Union floating on the top of the capitol; and then, as now, may the sun in his course visit no land more free, more happy, more lovely, than this our own country ! Gentlemen, I propose — "The Memory of George Washington." THE LAXDIXG AT PLYMOUTH From a speech delivered at the public dinner of the New England Society of New York in commemoration of the landing of the Pilgrims, December 22, 1S43. The free nature of our institutions, and the popular form of those governments which have come down to us from the Eock of Plymouth, give scope to intelligence, to talent, enterprise, and public spirit, from all classes making up the great body of the community I see today, and we all see, that the descendants of the Puritans who landed upon the Eock of Plymouth ; the OKATIO^S OF D-VMEL WEBSTER 81 followers of Kaloigh who settled Virginia and North (,'arolina; lie who lives where the truncheon of empire, so to speak, was borne by Smitli; the inhabitants of doorgia: he who settled under the auspices of France at the mouth of the Mississippi ; the Swede on the Delaware ; tlie Quaker of Pennsylvania — all lind, at this day, their common inter- est, tlieir common protection, their common glory, under the united government, which leaves them all, neverthe- less, in the administration of their own municipal and local affairs, to be Frenchmen, or Swedes, or Quakers, or what- ever they choose. And when one considers that this system of government, I will not say has produced, because Gixl and nature and circumstances have had an agency in it — but when it is considered that this system has not pre- vented, but rather encouraged, the gro^^'th of the people of this country from three millions, on the glorious 4th of July, 17TG, to seventeen millions now, who is there that will say. upon this hemisphere — nay, who is there that will stand up in any hemisphere, who is there in any part of the world, that will say that the great experiment of a united republic has faikxl in America ? The settlement at Plymouth is an event that in all time since, and in all time to come, and more in times to come than in times past, must stand out in great and striking characteristics to the admiration of the world. The sun's return to his winter solstice, in 1(V20, is the epoch from which he dates his first acquaintance with the small people, now one of the happiest, and destined to be one of the greatest, tliat his rays fall upon; and his annual visita- tion, from that day to this, to our frozen region, has enabled him to see that progress, PROGRESS, was the 83 THE AMERIC-\X SPIRIT characteristic of tJiat small people. He lias seen them from a handful, that one of his beams coming through a key- hole might illuminate, spread over a hemisphere, which he cannot enlighten under the slightest eclipse. Xor, though this globe should revolve round him for tens of hundreds of thousands of years, will he see such another incipient colonization upon any part of ""his attendant upon his mighty orb. There is not. Gentlemen, and we may as well admit it, in any history of the past, another epoch from which so many great events have taken a turn; events which, while important to us, are equally important to the country from whence we came. The settlement of Plymouth — concurring, I always wish to be understood, with that of Virginia — was the settlement of Xew England by colonies of Old England. Xow, Gentlemen, take these two ideas and run out the thoughts suggested by both. "\Miat has been and what is to be, Old England? \Miat has been, what is, and what may be, in the providence of God, Xew England, with her neighbors and associates? I would not dwell, Gentlemen, with any particular emphasis upon the sentiment, which I nevertheless entertain, with respect to the great diversity' in the races of men. I do not know how far in that respect I might not encroach on those mysteries of Providence which, while I adore, I may not compre- hend; but it does seem to me to be very remarkable, that we may go back to the time when Xew England, or those who founded it, were subtracted from Old England; and both Old England and Xew England went on. neverthe- less, in their mighty career of progress and power. T^t me be?in with Xew England for a moment. "\Miat ORATIONS OF 1)AN1J:L WEBSTER 83 • has resulted, embracing, as I say, the nearly contemp- oraneous settlement of Virginia, what has resulted from the planting upon this continent of two or three slender colonies from the mother country? Gentlemen, the great epitaph commemorative of the character and the worth, the discoveries and glory of Columbus was that he had given a new world to the crowns of Castile and Aragon. Gentlemen, this is a great mistake. It does not come up at all to the great merits of Columbus. He gave the territory of the southern hemisphere to the crowns of Castile and Aragon ; but as a place for the plantation of colonies, as a place for the habitation of men, as a place to which laws and religion, and manners and science, were to be trans- ferred, as a place in which the creatures of God should multiply and fill the earth, under friendly skies and with religious hearts, he gave it to the whole world, he gave it to universal man ! From this seminal principle, and from a handful, a hundred saints, blessed of God and ever honored of men, landed on the shores of Plymouth and elsewhere along the coast, united, as I have said already more than once, in the process of time, with the settle- ment at Jamestown, has sprung this great people of which we are a portion. I do not reckon myself among quite the oldest of the land, and yet it so happens that very recently I recurred to an exulting speech or oration of my own, in which I spoke of my country as consisting of nine millions of people. I could hardly persuade ^ myself that within the short time which had elapsed since that epoch our popula- tion had doubled ; and that at the present moment there does exist most unqucstional)ly as great a probability of 84 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT its continued progress, in the same ratio, as has ever existed in any previous time. I do not know whose imagination is fertile enough, I do not know whose conjectures, I ahnost may sa}'-, are wild enough to tell what may be the progress of wealth and population iii the United States in half a century to come. All we know is, here is a people of from seventeen to twenty millions, intelligent, educated, freeholders, freemen, republicans, possessed of all the means of modern improvement, modern science, arts, literature, with the world before them ! There is nothing to check them till they touch the shores of the Pacific, and then, they are so much accustomed to water, that that's a facility and no obstruction ! I can see, that on this continent all is to be Anglo- American from Plymouth Eock to the Pacific seas, from the north pole to California. That is certain; and in the Eastern world, I only see that you can hardly place a finger on the map of the world and be an inch from an English settlement. Gentlemen, if there be any thing in the supremacy of races, the experiment now in progress will develop it. If there be any truth in the idea, that those who issued from the great Caucasian fountain, and spread over Europe, are to react on India and on Asia, and to act on the whole Western world, it may not be for us, nor our children nor our grandchildren to see it, but it will be for our descend- ants of some generation to see the extent of that progress and dominion of the favored races. Eor myself, I believe there is no limit fit to be assigned to it by the human mind, because I find at work every- where, on both sides of the Atlantic, under various forms OEATIONS OF DANIEL WEBSTER 85 and degrees of restriction on the one hand, and under various degrees of motive and stimulus on the other hand, in these branches of a common race, the great principle of the freedom of human thought, and the respectability of individual character. I find everywhere an elevation of the character of man as man, an elevation of the individual as a component part of society. I find every- where a rebuke of the idea, that the many are made for the few, or that government is any thing but an agency for mankind. And I care not beneath what zone, frozen, temperate, or torrid ; I care not of what complexion, white or brown; I care not under what circumstances of climate or cultivation, if I can find a race of men on an inhabitable spot of earth whose general sentiment it is, and whose general feeling it is, that government is made for man — • man, as a religious, moral, and social being — and not man for government, there I know that I shall find prosperity and happiness. PILGRIM FESTIVAL AT NEW YORK IN 1S50 . After the customary toasts on this occasion had been given, the president of the day, Mr. Grinnell, asked attention to a toast wliich, as he said, was not on tlie list, but which he thought every one would vote ouglit to be placed there forthwith. He gave, "The Constitution and the Union, and their Chief Defender." This sentiment was received with great applause; and when Mr. Webster rose to respond to it, he was greeted with the most prolonged and tumultuous cheers. When the applause had subsided, he spoke as follows: Mr. President, and Gentlemen of the j^ew England Society of New York : — Ye sons of New England ! Ye S6 THK AMKKIC-\^' SPIRIT brethern of the kindred tie I I have come hither tonight, not without some inconvenience, that I might behold a wngregation w-hoe is no security without law, and that, under the circumstances in which they are plaoed, where thei^ is no military authority to cut their throats, ihwe is no sovervjign will but the will of the majority; that, thenf- fope, if they i^emain, they must submit to tiiat wtU." And this I believe to be strictly true, , I will venture to state, in a few wtads, what I take these American principles in substance to be, Tkey omsist, as 1 think, in the first place, in the estahliskm»it of pc^wlar governments, on the basis of wprcsjentation : fw it is x^ain that a pure democracy, like that which existed in s>c*rae of the states of Qwece, in which exwy individual had a direct vote in the ^ladxiient of all laws, cannot possiUy esist in a country of wide «t»it This repitesentatioB is to be BMde ORATIOXS OF DANIEL WEBSTER I>5 as equal as circumstancos will allow. Xow, tliis principle of popular representation, prevailing either in all the bnuuJies of governnionu or in some of them, has existeil in these States almost from the days of the settlements at Jamestown ainl riymouth: borrowed, no doubt, from the example of the jx>pular branch of the British legislatun?. The representation of the people in the British House of Commons was. however, originally very une<|ual. and is yet iK>t etjUiil. Indeevl, it may be doubted whether the ap|varance of knights and burgesses, assembling on the summons of the crown, was not intendcvi at first as an assistance imd support to the royal prerogative, in matters of ivvenue and taxation, rjither than as a mode of ascer- taining popular opinion. Xevertheless, representation had a popular origin, and savored more and more of the char- acter of that origin, as it acvjuired, by slow degrees, greater and greater strength, in the actu:^l government of the country. The constitution of the House of Commons was certainly a form of representation, however unequal ; num- Ivrs were counted, and majorities prevailed ; and wlien our ancestors, acting upon this example, introduced more ei]uality of representation, the idea assumed a mor« rational and distinct shape. At any nite, tliis manner of exercising popular power was familiar to our fathers when they settled on this continent. They adopted it, and gen- eration has risen up after generation, all acknowledging it, and all learning its practice and its forms. The next fundamental principle in our system is. that "e will of the majority, fairly expressed through means of opresentation. shall have the fonv of law; and it is quite vident that, in a coimtrv without thrones or aristocracies 96 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT or privileged castes or classes, there can be no other founda- tion for law, to stand upon. And, as the necessary result of this, the third element is, that the law is the supreme rule for the government of all. The great sentiment of Alzaeus, so beautifully presented to us by Sir William Jones, is absolutely indispensable to the construction and maintenance of our political systems : What constitutes a state? Xot high-raised battlement or labored mound, Thick wall or moated gate; Not cities proud, with spires and turrets crowned ; Not bays and broad-armed ports, Where, laughing at the storm, rich naviej ride; Not starred and spangled courts, Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to pride. No: Men, high-minded Men, With powers as far above dull brutes endued, In forest, brake, or den, As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude: Men who their duties know, But know their rights and, knowing, dare maintain; Prevent the long aimed blow, And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain : These constitute a state; And Sovereign Law, that State's collected will, O'er thrones and globes elate Sits empress, crowning good, repressing ill. And finally, another most important part of the great fabric of American liberty is, that there shall be written constitutions, founded on the immediate authority of the people themselves, and regulating and restraining all the pojvers conferred upon government, whether legislative, executive, or judicial. _ ^^ 3477^61 Lot-.19 ORATIONS OF DANIEL WEBSTER 97 This, fellow-citizens, I suppose to be a just summary of our American principles, and I have on this occasion sought to express them in the plainest and the fewest words. The summary may not be entirely exact, but I hope it may be sufficiently so to make manifest to the rising generation among ourselves, and to those elsewhere who may choose to inquire into the nature of our political insti- tutions,, the general theory upon which they are founded. And I now proceed to add, that the strong and deep- settled conviction of all intelligent persons amongst us is, that, in order to support a useful and wise government upon these popular principles, the general education of the people, and the wide diffusion of pure morality and true religion, are indispensable. Individual virtue is a part of public virtue. It is difficult to conceive how there can remain morality in government when it shall cease to exist among the people; or how the aggregate of the political institutions, all the organs of which consist only of men, should be wise, and beneficent, and competent to inspire confidence, if the opposite qualities belong to the individ- uals who constitute those organs, and make up that aggregate. VX. "O- \V <» -^ *^o. • A / .*j:^% cv vO* *i*^- ^> V *'V1'* c^ V , o " « %,_ _,<'° ^j^m-:-. "._>•** .v^^^ V„/ * 5^ ^ ^*-o^ ^N'-' ^^_ *• ^^9^^ ^- '^^ -< *»»_ ^-^