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 UNIVERSITY OF 
 
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ADDKESS 
 
 DELn'ERED BEFORE THE 
 
 . pijiliratjiropir nn^ Diiilitlir kmlm 
 
 tliiibeKsliij of ^oHli-^^tolm, 
 
 Jun€ 8, 1S57. 
 
 BY 
 
 HENRY W. MILLER. ESQ 
 
 • RALEIGH: 
 
 HOLDEX k WILSON, " STANDARD " OFFICE. 
 1857, 
 
\ 
 
DiALircTic Hall, Juru 4, lSo7. 
 Sir; 
 
 In behalf of the biidy we represeur, we beg; leave to tender our thanks for 
 your very instructive, interesting and able Address before the two Literary So- 
 cieties ; and we respectfully request a copy of the same for publication. 
 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 JAMES P. COFFIN, 
 
 WM. C. DOWD, )- Oymmlttec. 
 
 OSCAR F. 
 
 OWD, V Oymmlt 
 
 HADLY, ) 
 
 Henry W. jIillee, Esq. 
 
 Raleigh, June 6, lSo7. 
 Gextlemex : 
 
 In compliance with the rei:iuesi you make, in behalf of the Dialectic Society, 
 I send a copy of the Address. 
 
 With sentiments of hijrh regard, 
 
 m I am your friend and obedient servant, 
 
 H. W. MILLER. 
 
 To Messrs. Coffix, 
 
 Down, > C^nmnlttee. 
 
 Hadly 
 
 :,! 
 
> • r 
 
 f 
 
ADDRESS. 
 
 GentUmeji of the PJulanthropic and Dialectic Societks: 
 
 In tliG beautiful story of Rasselas, Imlac, who rehearses 
 the history of his pilgrimage and adventures, for the amuse- 
 ment and instruction of the Prince of Abasyuia, is represen- 
 ted as longing, after an absence of twenty years, to return to 
 his native country, that he might repose, after his travels and 
 fatigues, amongst those " with whom he had sported away 
 tlie gay hours of dawning life." But how sad were his emo- 
 tions on thus returninfy! What chaus-es had been wrought 
 in every thing that met his eye ! Most of the companions of 
 his youth had departed ; and the few who were left retained 
 but a faint remembrance of him, or met him with cold mdif- 
 ference ! Yet, even with that sadness were associated joys 
 that brought gladness to his heart. 
 
 So, he who has been absent for a score of yeai-s, from the 
 scenes of his youth — from this " benign mother " that nursed 
 his dawning intellect, and watched over the wayward emo- 
 tions of his youthful heart, cannot expect to revisit them, 
 without having a cloud of momentary sadness pass across his 
 feelings. He listens, in vain, for those voices by which he 
 was once welcomed, and looks around, in disappointment, for 
 those familiar faces, by whose smiles he was greeted ! Those, 
 by whose side he sat for years, and with whom he vied, in 
 honorable rivalry, in the race of intellectual improvement, 
 have gone. Where death has withheld his fatal dart, the rude 
 hand of adversity, or the alluring smiles of fortune, have car- 
 ried them far away on the ocean of life ! 
 
 But, still, in the midst of the changes which appear — des- 
 pite the new garb in which nearly every thing around is 
 decorated, there is much that remains unaltered, — the sight 
 • of which revives the remembrance of pleasures that are 
 
• 
 
 gone, and paints in vivid colors on the canvass of memory, 
 the hfe-like forms — the smiling faces and bright eyes of 
 those companions who are absent ! The ancient bnildiugs, — 
 " wearing the mossy vest of time " — the venerable oaks, — the 
 play grouiid, " where sleights of art and feats of strength went 
 round," — the consecrated spot in which were deposited the 
 remains of the 3'outhful martj-rs in the cause of science,— 
 and that too from which " is breathed the memory of a good 
 man's tomb " — come before him with all their varied and sad 
 associations ! But how it gladdens his heart to know, that 
 tliere are still spared some of those honored patriarchs of 
 learning" — who are links between so many collegiate gen- 
 erations, — rich in the blessings of hundreds, who are fight- 
 ing the battles of science, virtue and patriotism, in the armor 
 which they buckled around them within these walls ! Long 
 may they live, to witness the annual return of this gladsome 
 festival, bespeaking the prosperity of an Institution, which, 
 whilst honoring them, is also a source of so much just pride 
 to every patriotic citizen of the State. And may that Institu- 
 tion herself, — so dear to her far-scattered children, — ever 
 prove,— ^ , 
 
 " Of all that's good and great, 
 Of all that's fair; the guardiau aud the seat, — 
 > Kurse of each brave pursuit, each generous aim, — 
 BjTKCTn exalted to the throne of fame! '' — 
 
 I am well aware, my friends, how difficult it is, on an occa- 
 
 ' sion like this, to present for consideration a subject which 
 
 ^ will suit the varied tastes and gratify the active curiosity of 
 
 ■' an enlightened audience. But to a citizen,^and especially 
 
 an educated citizen, — of this great Republic, who contem- 
 
 • plates, with patriotic pride, the full development of all the 
 
 * Professors MitcJidl and PhiUips, who have been long connected with the Uni- 
 vei'sity, and to whose valuable services it is indebted for much of its prosperity. 
 Since this address was delivered, the former has been snatched, by the hand ol 
 death, from his earthly labors. The circumstances connected with this melancholy 
 event, are well known to the public. Truly, was he a martyr to the cause of science! 
 A Christian scholar,- — ardtntly devoted to the duties of his high position, and to the 
 interests and character of the University, to which he was so great an ornament,— 
 his death will be universally lamented, and his memory ever dear to the friends of 
 <yJucation aud science ! 
 
.resources — moral, intellectual and physical — of his country, 
 no subject can bring more of interest and importance than 
 one, which presents to his view the prospects of that coun- 
 try's success and glory, and which warns him, in season, of 
 those dangers that threaten its ruin or disgrace. 
 
 It is good, at all times, if we desire to learn our duty to 
 the generation in which we live, to recur to the teachings of 
 history. Ko people cease to provide for the prosperity of 
 their ofispring, so long as they look back v/ith proud interest 
 to the achievements of their ancestors. And it certainly is 
 peculiarly belitting this occasion, in view of the moral and 
 political degeneracy now prevailing, and the ultimate national 
 disasters with which we are threatened, to institute a rigid 
 and fearless enquiry into the character and strength of those 
 tenures by which we hold our social blessings and political 
 rights. He who aims only at pleasing the fancy or grati- 
 fying a taste for novelty, when every energy should be 
 directed to the safety of those most substantial of all bles- 
 sings and valuable of all rights, which society and govern- 
 ment are formed to secure and perpetuate, would not be 
 acting less foolish than the architect who proceeds t^ add 
 rare and costly decorations to a temple, whose foundations 
 are at the very moment being undermined by causes, which 
 if not counteracted, must ensure its swift demolition ! 
 
 We cannot disguise the fact — it stands out in bold relief 
 before us, and is presented in a variety of forms well calcu- 
 lated to arouse the apprehensions of the most careless — that' 
 to rescue those great blessings which we enjoy as a people, 
 from the perils that environ them, there must be called into 
 action the most sleepless vigilance, unceasing energy, and 
 indomitable courage of the wise, the good and patriotic of 
 the land ! 
 
 To the consideration of this great subject, so important to 
 us and those who are to come after us, I ask your attention ; 
 and I trust we shall all approach it with no partizan feelings 
 or improper sectional prejudices, but under the influence of 
 those high and sacred obligations that rest on us as Chris 
 tians and patriots. 
 
The progess of the United States from the period when 
 the great men of the Kevohition declared their indepen- 
 dence to the present time, in population, in commerce, in 
 agriculture, in the arts and sciences, in every thing that 
 advances the power and adds to the renown of a nation, 
 has no parallel in the history of the world. At the close of 
 the Eevolution their population numbered something over 
 three milhons. In 1S55 it had increased to upwards of 
 twenty-five millions. In the year 1790, their imports 
 amounted in value to fifty-two millions of dollars. At the 
 close of the year 1855 — a period of sixtj^-five years — they 
 had increased to the sum of two hundred and sixty milhons. 
 During the same period the exports increased from nineteen 
 millions to two hundred and eighty millions. Their tonnage 
 during the same years rose from five hundred thousand to 
 five millions of dollars in value. In the year 1791, the 
 exportation of cotton from this country was unknown. In 
 the year 1855, the exports alone of that staple amounted to 
 upwards of one thousand and eight millions of pounds — the 
 value of which was estimated at about ninety millions of 
 dohars. The exports of this sta|)le for the last year were 
 valued at one hundred and twenty -five millions. 
 
 In the eloquent speech delivered by that great man, 
 Edmund Burke, in the British Parliament, on the 22d of 
 March, 1775, in favor of conciliation with the American 
 colonies, may be found this language: "I pass, therefore, 
 to the value of the colonies in another point of view — tlieir 
 agrieulture. This they have prosecuted with such a spirit, 
 that besides feeding plentifully their own growing multitude, 
 their annual export of grain, comprehending rice, had some 
 years ago exceeded a million of dollars in value. Of their 
 last harvest, I am persuaded they will export much more. 
 At the beginning of the century some of these colonies 
 imported corn from the mother country. For some time 
 past the old world has been fed from the new. The scarcity 
 which you have felt would have been a desolating famine, 
 if this child of your old age, with a true filial piety, with a 
 
Koman cliarity, had not put the full breast of its youthful 
 exuberance to the mouth of its exhausted parent !" 
 
 Exceeded a million in value ! Wonderful may have been 
 the fact at that period, but how would the bright and lofty 
 imagination, even of Burke, pale at the sight of the riches 
 which are noio poured from the lap of that " child" of the 
 new world, into the granaries and storehouses of the old I 
 How much more earnestly would he have pleaded with a 
 stubborn and truculent ministry — and how much more 
 boldly would even he — bold and fearless as he was in 
 defence of her rights — have hurled in the teeth of that 
 ministry, the defiance of that oppressed " child of England's 
 old age," could he have foreseen what three-quarters of a 
 century has brought forth ! In 1854 upwards of fifty mil- 
 lions of dollars in value of vegetable food alone, was sent 
 by that " child " to feed the other nations of the earth ! 
 
 Two years ago the United States stood second in com- 
 mercial importance to Great Britain alone. Assuming the 
 past rate of the progress of these two powers, as indicating 
 their future relative commercial advancement, they will 
 become equal in this respect, in the year 1863 — from which 
 period, should her glorious Constitution and Union be pre- 
 served, this country will stand, amongst the nations of the 
 earth, first in commercial prosperity and power ! 
 
 "When the Convention, to form the Federal Constitution, 
 assembled in 1T87, there were not twenty colleges in the 
 Union. At the close of the last year they had increased to 
 upwards of one hundred and fifty — most of them well 
 endowed, and liberally patronized, and having an aggre- 
 gate of fifteen thousand students. In 1791 the only theo- 
 logical school in the Union was the seminary of St. Mary's, 
 in Baltimore. Since that time the number of such schools 
 has increased to upwards of fifty. There are sixteen law 
 and about forty medical schools in the Union — all founded 
 since the year 1800. In this enimieration are not included 
 those thousands of smaller seminaries of education which 
 appear in the intellectual firmament of our country like so 
 many stars sparkling in the heavens ! At the beginning of 
 
10 
 
 our career as an independent nation, there Avas not a dollar 
 of public funds dedicated to the support of free schools — to 
 the education of the poor. iSTow, there is an aggregate fund 
 of forty millions of dollars, set apart by the several States, 
 for that benevolent — that noble object! 
 
 A commerce, which at the gloomy period preceding the 
 adoption of the federal constitution, hardly had courage and 
 enterprize sufficient to creep along the Atlantic coast, is now 
 penetrating every land, entering every harbor, and whiten- 
 ing every sea. A nation which at the dark period of its 
 struggle for independence, against the greatest military 
 power of the age, could scarcely command the means of 
 clothing the handful of gallant men, upon whom its defence 
 and salvation depended, has now a credit unbounded — a 
 revenue too large for wise and economical expenditure, and 
 sources of national wealth of which no other people on earth 
 can boast ! 
 
 At the time the federal constitution — that master-piece of 
 political wisdom and sagacity — was formed, the territory of 
 the United States was contained within the boundaries of 
 the Atlantic on the east, the lakes on the north, the Misis- 
 sippi on the west, and the thirty-first degree of latitude to 
 the mouth of the St. Mary's, on the south. Since that period 
 the acquisitions from Spain, France and Mexico, have en- 
 larged our territory to its present almost boundless extent. 
 Where but thirteen States, exhausted in resources by a long 
 and bloody war for independence, proclaimed our weight in 
 the scale of nations, we now behold thirty-one States, in- 
 creasing rapidly in population, and advancing with aston- 
 ishing strides to wealth, power and influence. The territory 
 of the United States contains upwards of two million nine 
 hundred thousand square miles — capable of sustaining a 
 population, proportionate to that of France, of six hundred 
 millions ! If divided into States of equal size, nearly sixty 
 as large as Kew York could be carved out of that territory, 
 or upwards of three Mmdred and eighty States of the area of 
 Massachusetts ! 
 
 Such are some of the evidences of our national progress 
 
11 
 
 and power. I have not the time, were it necessary to tlie 
 purpose I have in view, to array with particularity many 
 others, equally as striking and important — how that nation 
 has knit together her various parts by iron bands of inter- 
 course — how section converses witJi section on the wings of 
 the lightniug — how her majestic rivers have been made to 
 bear on their bosoms an internal commerce, the extent and 
 value of which are contemplated with astonishment — how 
 she has shot across the two oceans in whose arms she is 
 clasped, the beams of liberty and civilization — what she has 
 done towards pouring the glad tidings of Revelation into the 
 benighted regions of the earth, and lifting up the mind of 
 the heathen from the degrading worship of his l»rutish idol 
 to the sublime contemplation of the true God ! Isov need I 
 enumerate to you her intellectual triumplis, or repeat the 
 illustrious names she has given to every branch of literature, 
 science and the arts ! 
 
 All this, gentlemen, is the fruit of our glorious Constitu- 
 tion — securing peace and union, and protecting the rights of 
 all sections ! It is the work too of but a life-time 1 Many 
 yet live whose memories tonch the two extremes of the pe- 
 riod. And though so much has been accomplished, wdiat an 
 immense field is still open for patriotic exertion ! And what 
 a heavy responsibility is resting on those whose duty it is to 
 labor in that field — a responsibility from which no earthly 
 power can absolve them — a responsibility to conscience and 
 to glory — a responsibility to posterity and the world — a re- 
 sponsibility to that Iligh and Omnipotent Tribunal, at the 
 bar of which, even nations will be called to answer ! 
 
 It is hardly reasonable to suppose that those who laid the 
 foundation of our government, with all their far-reaching 
 sagacity, looked forward, at the time, with any degree of 
 confidence, to the successful extension of the limits of the 
 Union beyond the Mississippi. If any such thought entered 
 their minds, it was but a dim shadow of the future realit}^, 
 as evanescent as it was undefined. In truth there wei-e 
 many, whose wisdom and forecast entitled their opinions to 
 great weight, that deprecated any such enlargement of our 
 
12 
 
 domain, as the foreshadowing of early dissolution and ruin. 
 But to the extent of our experience, so far, it is evident that 
 all such apprehensions were not only visionary, but enter- 
 tained under a mistaken view of that constitution of gov- 
 ernment which they were forming. The opinion had taken 
 strono; hold on the minds of some of the ablest statesmen of 
 the day, that none but a strong central power or govern- 
 ment, approaching, in its composition, a monarchy, could 
 keep together the various interests and conflicting views, 
 jirejudices and pursuits of so large an extent of country. 
 They were ignorant — great and wise as they were — of the 
 beauty and perfection of their own mechanism : for, if ad- 
 ministered according to its true spirit and intent, — the fed- 
 eral government exercising no powers but such as are ex- 
 pressly granted, or which are necessary to execute such 
 granted powers, — and each State scrupulously refraining 
 from all interference in the domestic, civil and political af- 
 fairs of her sister States, there is no constitution — no form of 
 government, ':hat the wit of man ever devised or is capable 
 of devising, better calculated to kee^D together and harmo- 
 nize conflicting interests and pursuits, and better adapted to 
 the expansion of the territory, and the enlargement of the 
 population, over which it is to extend its control ! 
 
 If that constitution be properly administered by the sev- 
 eral departments of the federal government, it is impossible 
 that any State, or portion of the people, can suffer wrong or 
 oppression from those sources. Such evils cannot arise and 
 work out their disastrous consequences, under the sanction of 
 the Constitution! They cannot be its legitimate offspring. 
 Sophistry, — sectional prejudices, — the lust of power, — the 
 dictates of an unholy ambition — may pervert its meaning 
 or enlarge its grants, for wicked and selfish jDurposes and 
 ends, but the consequences which must inevitably follow, 
 will not be the fruit of the tree which our fathers planted. 
 They will be the bitter fruit of a poisonous graft. Most 
 truly and eloquently has it been said by a great statesman 
 of the South, who was hardly canonized by death before the 
 fatal experience of the country proved his enlarged wisdom 
 
13 
 
 and great sagacity — "That Constitution presents in tlie 
 whole, a political system as remarkable for its grandeur as 
 for its novelty and refinement of organization. For the 
 structure of such a system, — so lolse, just and Ijeneficent, we 
 are far more indebted to a superintending Providence, that 
 so disposed events as to lead as if by an inevitable hand, to 
 its formation, than to those who erected it. Intelligent, ex- 
 perienced and patriotic as they were, they were yet but 
 builders, binder that great siqyerbitendlng direction, P'' 
 
 But the insatiable last of domination can mar and ulti- 
 mately destroy the fairest fabric which the skill and indus- 
 try of man can erect. It is beyond the reach of human in- 
 genuity to provide by written constitutions and laws against 
 the deceptive forms it assumes, and the varied means it 
 adopts, to do its work of ruin and disaster. The same spirit 
 by which the fallen angel was actuated — "better rule in Hell 
 than serve in Heaven " — seems to have been, in all ages and 
 countries, the rallying cry of those artificers of mischief who 
 respect no law, and submit to no rule but their own inordi- 
 nate lust for personal aggrandizement. And how often has 
 religious fanaticism been enlisted to aid the machinations 
 and serve the purposes of such men ! Unfortunate is it for 
 the peace and happiness of this great country, — unfortunate 
 it may be for the success and permanence of that beautiful 
 and wise system of government which the great men of 
 the Revolution established and transmitted to us, that they 
 could not exclude from the structure every material through 
 which fanaticism would attempt a breach. But this was be- 
 yond the power of human wisdom. 
 
 ISTo usurper, gentlemen, ever attained the bloody purpose 
 ot his ambition — no traitor ever betrayed his country or her 
 cause — no reckless agitator ever destroyed the peace of a 
 liappy and contented people or community, without pre- 
 senting an excuse sufficiently plausible to justify his conduct, 
 in the estimation, at least of his wicked and unscrupulous 
 adherents. Cromwell, with his eye fixed on the imperial 
 purple, claimed to be the chosen of God to rid his country 
 of the tyranny of the Stuarts. Napoleon grasped and exer- 
 
14 
 
 cised all the powers of a Dictator, in the name and under the 
 garb of devotion to the liberties of the people. Arnold, 
 whilst stars and garters and titles of nobility in the service 
 of the enemies of his country, were flitting before his fiery 
 imagination, pleaded the neglect of that country in justifi- 
 cation of his treason. It cannot be expected that the ene- 
 mies of our Constitution and Union— the fanatical disturbers 
 of our national peace — should do otherwise than assume the 
 robes of virtue and justice, proclaim themselves the friends 
 of liberty and the enemies of oppression, to justify or pal- 
 iate their nefarious warfare against that constitution and the 
 rights which it recoo'nizes and was intended to secure ! They 
 are but following the example of those who have preceded 
 them in works of wickedness and ruin. Tkuth, however 
 candid the air, or fascinating the garb, in which she pr-e- 
 sented herself, has always been rudely rejected as hypo- 
 critical and libelous, by the tyrant, the traitor, and the fac- 
 tious demagague ! 
 
 It is a lamentable, but stern fact, which all history attests, 
 that republics are prone to indulge that indolence and indif- 
 ference, under the influence of which they are often unable 
 to anticipate and provide against dangers. How long was 
 the almost heaven-inspired eloquence of the great Grecian 
 orator heard, in thunder tones, before the Athenians reahzed 
 the startling fact that Philip was at their giites ! Nor are 
 they less liable to close their eyes to those internal foes, 
 which have proved more fatal to well-regulated liberty than 
 the most powerful of external enemies. The patriotic ap- 
 peals and prophetic warnings of the immortal Tully, "with 
 all the State-wielding magic of his tongue," could not arouse 
 his countrymen to the fact, that corruption, treason and am- 
 bition were undermining the foundations of Roman liberty 
 and paving the way to a gigantic despotism ! 
 
 "What folly is it to rely merely on the forms of a consti- 
 tution for protection and safety, forgetting that sleepless vig- 
 ilance is the only safeguard against the encroachments of 
 tyranny, as well as the withering, fatal eftects of corruption ! 
 No one was more firmly impressed with this great truth than 
 
15 
 
 the illustrious Ilaraj^dcn, ^vho saw most clearly that submis- 
 sion to the exactions of the Crown, even in the most tritiing 
 particular, would render the forms and provisions of those 
 great charters by which the rights of Englishmen were in- 
 tended to be defined and secured, more worthless even 
 than the parchment on which they wore written. He boldly 
 cast his life into the scale against the odious ship money — 
 •'not because twenty shillings would have ruined his for- 
 tune, but because the payment of half twenty shillings on 
 tlie principle upon which it was demanded, would have made 
 him a slave !" 
 
 Gentlemen, it would be criminal in us, — in any citizen 
 who values the great blessings we enjoy, — to remain heed- 
 less of those dangers that are undermining the very founda- 
 tions of our republican institutions, and propelling us on- 
 ward to national ruin. In this connection, the truth should 
 be boldly and fearlessly spoken. It is demanded by every 
 consideration of duty and patriotism ! 
 
 The licentiousness of the public press, — the prevalence 
 and increasing influence of a corrupting literature, — the de- 
 cay of political virtue, — the progress of social debasement, — 
 the prostitution of the pulpit to the fiendish purposes of fac- 
 tion and sedition, — the rank growth of a fierce and brazen 
 infidelity, — the reckless appeals and lawless threats of sec- 
 tionalism, have been for years past infusing their poison 
 into the minds and hearts of a vast portion of our people ! 
 
 We have these evils, these dangers, these enemies of our 
 domestic peace and political prosperity to meet, — to grapple 
 with, — to drive back — to vanquish, or disastrous, desolat- 
 ing in its efi"ects wiU be that storm which must ere long pass, 
 with all its fury, over our national hopes and prospects ! 
 
 The freedom of the press is, indeed, one of the bulwarks 
 of civil and religious liberty. This has been recognized as a 
 fundamental principle in all our bills of rights and constitu- 
 tions of government. And well may it be so regarded, 
 when directed by truth and virtue, and influenced by devo- 
 tion to the public weal. But when swayed by licentious- 
 ness — when discardina: truth and caressino^ falsehood, — when 
 
16 
 
 subsidized by political agitators, and pandering to tlie base 
 passions and prejudices of the unscrupulous and the law- 
 less, — there could not be invented — there never entered into 
 the conception of the spirits of Pandemonium itself, — with 
 all their brazen zeal and wicked ingenuity, — a more fiery 
 and potent engine of evil. Then, most truly, is it a faithful 
 representation of the " snaky sorceress " of Milton — with her 
 brood of odious offspring — which, 
 
 " Never ceasing bark'd 
 With wide Cerberian mouths, full loud, and rang 
 A hideous peal ! " — 
 
 To illustrate the truth of this, it is only necessary to direct 
 your attention to a portion of the northern press, especially 
 many of the public journals in those large cities, in which 
 "flow the dregs and feculence of every land." Since the 
 time John Coster made known, by his rude characters and 
 images, the art of printing, has there ever been seen in the 
 history of the press — even in the most corrupt periods of 
 political convulsions — anything surpassing these, in scandal, 
 in vituperation, in coarseness, in falsehood and wickedness ? 
 There is no taste, however vulgar, to which they are not the 
 ready and willing caterers — no character is too elevated for 
 the assaults of their malicious slanders — no public institution 
 is too valuable and sacred for their scurrility and defama- 
 tion — no rights, social, civil or religious — whether they be 
 personal or relative — so valuable as to be shielded from their 
 iniquitous eagerness to effect tlie social degradation and po- 
 litical ruin of those who enjoy them ! The most minute de- 
 tails of the most horrible crimes — however revolting to the 
 moral sense — are seized on with avidity, and sent forth with 
 a thrill of ecstacy, to their hundreds of thousands of readers, 
 either to gratify an already vitiated taste, or to infuse their 
 poison into thousands of families, which before were unac- 
 customed to the language of vice or the scenes of profligacy ! 
 It is impossible for such evils to continue, without corrupting 
 all the fountains of social virtue — all the avenues ol domestic 
 peace, and demolishing all the safeguards to public morals ! 
 
17 
 
 Newspapers have heen entitled " the swift-winged heralds 
 of an improved and pi'ogressive age/' This niay be true, 
 but how many of these " swift-winged heralds '' are but fail- 
 types of tlie Hock of fonl and noisome birds that liovered 
 over the luckless mariners in the '' Fairie Queene" of Spen- 
 cer ! Each has its appropriate representative — 
 
 " The ill-faste owle — death's dreadful messengere, — 
 The hoars-nio-ht-raven, trump of doleful drere, — 
 The leufhev-winged batt, daye's enemy, — 
 The rueful screech, — still waitins; on the here, — ■ 
 The whistler shrill, — that whoso hears doth die, — 
 The hellish harpies, — prophets of sad destiny!" 
 
 A loathsome flock indeed ! — distilling from their "■ shaggy 
 wings and horrid beaks" poison, pestilence and death ! Nor 
 have we any '■'palmer's magic wand " by which they can be 
 dispersed, and their ill-omened influence checked and coun- 
 teracted, unless it be the nioral power of an enhghtened and 
 "v^irtuous public opinion ! 
 
 jSTor is less evil to be apprehended from the spread of that 
 corrupt literature which for years has been thrown ofl" from 
 the diseased brain of its profligate authors, with a fertility 
 with which the press, even with its steam-propelled energies, 
 has hardly been able to keep pace. JNTo work of Action, 
 whatever may be the moral of its story, is considered too 
 coarse or vicious to command a publisher, — nothing which 
 is published is too worthless or corrupt to rally its host of 
 readers — nothing that is thus read, fails to enlist scores of ad- 
 miring puffers ■ It is thus that principles, ruinous to domes- 
 tic peace and destructive of public virtue, are disseminated 
 with a stealthiness which enables them in most instances to 
 elude the observation, and thereby to escape the efi'orts of 
 the virtuous to counteract them. Lamentable indeed must 
 be the moral condition of a people who discard the produc- 
 tions of the great masters of a Christian literature for the 
 effusions of the propagandists of German materialism and 
 French infldelity. Degraded must be the taste of those who 
 reject the invigorating, life-giving nourishment which is im- 
 parted to the intellect by the rich pages of Milton, Addison, 
 
 2 
 
IS 
 
 Scott, Bnrke, Prescott, and their great compeers, — and are 
 content to draw their mental aliment from the feted store- 
 honse of Sue and his pestifei-ous imitators, — whose prodnc- 
 tions creep throngh the social circle, leaving the track of 
 their moral slime, — like tJiat of "snaky reptiles amidst the 
 yielding flowrets ! " 
 
 Another and equally as dangerous a characteristic of much 
 of the periodical literature which is issued in such profusion 
 I'rom the Northern press, is its tendency to engender sec- 
 tional strife, and infuse sectional prejudices into the minds of 
 its readers. How often is it made the channel of the most 
 A 'olent abuse, — the vehicle of the foulest slanders and most 
 , vindictive assaults on the institutions of our own section ! 
 Indeed, judging from the tone and spirit of many of these 
 productions — the avidity with which they are read, and the 
 industry Avith which they are circulated, — one would readily 
 conclude, that there are no consequences to which they may 
 lead, however disastrous to our peace and security, that 
 would not be hailed by their authors and propagators with 
 rapture. Kot even their school-books are free from thig 
 venom. The young are thus taught to inhale, with the first 
 breath of knowledge, the noxious effluvia of sectional ha- 
 tred. And strange — humiliating is the fact, that such pub- 
 lications receive patronage from that very people whose ruin 
 they seek ! AVill not timely warning against these evils be 
 iieeded ? AYill those who are so deeply interested, slcej) on, 
 in the face of such facts ? The glare of the incendiary's 
 torch could not more speedily arouse from their slumbers the 
 inmates of the dwelling whose destruction is sought, than 
 should such fanatical firebrands wake to vigilance and action, 
 that people Avhose hearths and altars they menace ! 
 
 Pardon me, gentlemen, for directing your attention, at this 
 point, to the glaring, the gross, the inexcusable injustice, 
 which has been done your own State, by authors who aspire 
 to the honor of being regarded ^''national historians !" 
 
 On the 20tli of May, 1775, more than a year before the 
 congress at Philadelphia proclaimed the American colonies 
 free and independent States, a gallant band in ISTorth-Car- 
 
19 
 
 oliiia, led by those stout-hearted patriots, the Brevards, the 
 Polks, the Alexanders, pledged then- " lives, their fortunes 
 and most sacred honor'' in defence of the independence of 
 their country. I care not what phrases they used — what lan- 
 guage they adopted. I look at the great and immortal deed 
 which they did ! That is a fixed fact in the history of the 
 State. 
 
 On the 27th of February, 1TT6, the victory of Moore's 
 Creek was achieved. That was, beyond question, one of 
 the most important battles fought during the Revolution. It 
 broke the power and organization of the royalists at the 
 South. It expelled the regal governor from the State. It 
 frustrated the plans of invasion by Sir Henry Clinton — drove 
 the British lieet from our coast, and inspired the friends of 
 independence, in every part of the country, wnth conlidence 
 and patriotic ardor! 
 
 Yet st]-ange to say, the " historian of Washington," whose 
 work promised to be a faithful record of our glorious strug- 
 gle for national existence — in which the gallant deeds of 
 each were the property of all — does not pay those great 
 events — those daring blows struck for independence — even 
 the cold respect of a passing notice." The history of the 
 struo-o'le of Greece against her Persian invaders, without the 
 devotion of Leonidas or the glory of Thermopylae ! 
 
 In giving to the world, and securing to posterity, a faithful 
 history of the great deeds of the men of other States — the 
 Adamses, the Hancocks, the Henrys, the Warrens, the 
 Schuylers, and Putnams, of other sections — incomprehensi- 
 ble is it, that one professing to write the great epic of the 
 American Revolution, the biography of Washington, the 
 
 * Since this Address vras delivered, the fourth volume of " Irving's Life of Wash" 
 ingtou " has come to hand. In giving an account of the operations of Cornwallis 
 at the South, in 1780, the following allusion is made to the Mecklenburg Declaration ; 
 "It should never be forgotten, that at Mecklengburg, in the heart of North-Carolina, 
 was fulminated the first declaration of independence of the British crown, upwards 
 of a year before a like declaration by Congress.'' No particulars of the event — no 
 names of the brave men who participated in it — are given ! Being thus uoticed five 
 years after its chronological order, we may reasonably indulge the hope, that when 
 the historian resumes his labors, and records " the Presidential career of Washing- 
 tou," he may remember the battle of Moore's Creek! 
 
Christian hero of onr race — should find naught in the exploits 
 and characters, in the inflexible patriotism and sterling vir- 
 tues of Caswell, Ashe, Moore, Liilington, Howe and Brevard, 
 to command the justice, if not to call forth the admiration 
 and gratitude of history ! Even the gallant Nash — that 
 heroic Bayard in the cause of independence, who enriched 
 the soil of a distant State with his blood— falls in tlie great 
 conflict, without eliciting a passing comment on his bright 
 and glorious career. 
 
 Such injustice cannot always triumph. The memory of 
 the illustrious deeds of those great men cannot sleep forever! 
 There are indications of an awakening to a just sense of the 
 obligations we are under to them, and the honor which is 
 due their achievements; and every citizen of our State must 
 be cheered by the assurance, that one of her own sons, of 
 whose genius as an orator and fame as a writer, we are all 
 proud, has undertaken this labor of love — this task of historic 
 justice! With a theme worthy of his eloquent pen and pa- 
 triotic heart, may he reap a rich reward for his labors, in the 
 gratitude of that people, the deeds of whose ancestors he 
 seeks to rescue from oblivion and enshrine in the recollection 
 and veneration of the good ! 
 
 But let us recur again to the dangers which threaten us. 
 It cannot be successfully controverted, in the face of the 
 proofs which are constantly arising, that some sections of our 
 country — I speak not in unkindness — are becoming the nur- 
 series of many of the most dangerous and disorganizing doc- 
 trines, moral, social and political, with which virtue and 
 truth have ever yet been challenged to contend. And who 
 has not been struck with the power of reproduction — the in- 
 exhaustible fruitfulness, which in many instances, marks the 
 progress of these doctrines — the readiness and facility with " 
 which they assume a position in the social and political or- 
 ganization, and the irresistible sway which they speedily ac- 
 quire not only over the ignorant, but over many of the best 
 cultivated minds ! Fourierism, with its train of levelling 
 precepts and degrading purposes; Freeloveism,^ that moral 
 leper, striking with fiendish delight, at the very foundations 
 
21 
 
 of domestic virtue, and aiming its deadly blows at the deli- 
 cate yet sacred pulsations of the social heart; Mor'UionisiUy 
 that hyena of modern debasement, the consequences of whose 
 i*avages no man can contemplate without horror, who values 
 those most inestimable of all jewels, domestic peace and 
 social happiness, and who reverences that great law, that 
 sacred command of nature and nature's God, upon which all 
 good government is based, and witliout which society itself 
 would be a curse ; Sj/iritualism, that newly discovered link, 
 that electric wire between the fell spirits of darkness in the 
 lower world, and their most apt ]>upils and faithful agents 
 and representatives in this; Abolltionisrn^ that modern mo- 
 loch of political and religious fanaticism, whose insatiable 
 wrath is sought to bo appeased by the sacrifice of our rights, 
 our happiness, and our honor, and the destruction of the na- 
 tional peace ; these are but samples of that brood of liarpies 
 which are preying on the very vitals of the social and polit- 
 ical organization of some sections of our country, and which, 
 unless promptly cliecked in their career of mischief, must 
 hasten that desolation, moral, social and political, which they 
 are seeking with so much persevering eagerness and such 
 envenomed rapacity ! 
 
 Nor is the dowmvard tendency of social and civil organi- 
 zation in some sections of our country less strikingly illus- 
 trated in the decay of ^>?^i//c virtue. When before did your 
 national legislature, to which, in times past, every American 
 citizen turned with pride and coniidence, present such a hu- 
 mihating spectacle as it did but a few months since? Tlie 
 house of representatives, besieged for years b}' a swarm of 
 speculators, stockjobbers and intriguers, with their debased 
 and cunning agents, eager for public plunder — the scene 
 closed with the virtual conviction of three of its members of 
 corruption and briber}^ ! The national senate too — that cit- 
 adel of the rights of the States, and the freedom of the 
 people — that body once honored by the genius and patriot- 
 ism of Clay, Calhoun, Webster, Wright and other noble 
 spirits, now, alas ! gathered forever to their fathers — that 
 body, subjected to the mortifying alternative of considering- 
 
a memorial from upwards of forty members of a State legis- 
 lature charging one of its own members with having attained 
 his high position by bribery ! 
 
 "Every man has his price," exclaimed Walpole ; and where 
 men sink their country's good in the success of party — where 
 the emoluments of office become the rewards of partizan ser- 
 vices alone, and every higher aspiration and nobler emotion 
 is swallowed up in the struggle for riches, — where the cmri 
 sacra fcnnes directs every impulse and controls every action, 
 that maxim of the shrewd English statesman will hold a 
 prominent and ruling place in political ethics, and the cor- 
 ruption fund of politicians will seldom remain idle for the 
 want of men — rtien ! — ci'eattires rather, bearing the forms ol 
 men, on whose brows is stamped the self-debasing, self- 
 damning advertisement of their own political venaHty ! 
 
 What a fatal degeneracy from that stern and inflexible 
 virtue — that lofty independence and noble patriotism which 
 illustrated the principles and conduct of legislators, during 
 the early days of the republic ! 
 
 Bolingbroke, living in an age when political corruption 
 was rife, remarked " He who undertakes to govern a free 
 people by corruption, cannot boast the honoi of the inven- 
 tion. The experiment is as old as the w^orld, and he can pre- 
 tend to no other honor than that of being an humble imitator 
 of the Devil ! " 
 
 Whatever may be properly deducible from the condition 
 of things during the age of Bolingbroke, it is not unreasona- 
 ble to suppose that even the Prince of Darkness himself 
 would hardly regard it a compliment to be held responsible 
 for the innumerable low, cunning, debasing schemes of cor- 
 ruption which are fashionable amongst so manj' politicians in 
 this age of progress — an age " well schooled in crooked 
 policy and quirks of State !" 
 
 But, gentlemen, if there is any one cause, which more 
 than others is calculated to arouse the apprehensions of 
 every patriot, it is that sectional animosity — that bitter fra- 
 ternal strife, which has prevailed for years past, increasing 
 to a degree of intensity which threatens to make implacable 
 
m 
 
 enemies of those, who, looking to the same government for 
 protection, should regard the prosperity and honor of that 
 government, their noblest pride, as it assuredly is their high- 
 est interest. It is folly — it is madness to suppose that our 
 present system of government can be preserved and perpet- 
 uated on the principle t/iat this Union is to he licpt togdhtr 
 by force ! Those who framed it foresaw, most clearly, that a 
 resort to force between the States, or the application of force 
 on the part of the federal government ((gainst the States, 
 would produce a revolution which must sweep away the sys- 
 tem itself. It was not the purpose of our fathers to establish 
 a government which was to be dependent on the strong arm 
 
 • of military power to sustain itself in the varied conflicts be- 
 tween the ditferent States and sections. Seeking to establish 
 it on well-defined principles of civil policy — on Constitu- 
 tions and laws — the will of a majority clearly and fairly ex- 
 pressed — they relied on the virtue, the patriotism, the affec- 
 tion of the people to preserve that system, by a faithful ad- 
 herence to those Constitutions and a strict observance of 
 those laws in their true spirit. They intended that reason 
 and affection should bo the corner-stone of the edilice. They 
 looked to the mild and peaceful operations of the principles 
 of Christianity, and not the wild and spasmodic action of 
 heathen or intidel precepts — to the law of love and not the 
 law of FORCE, — to shield it from the evils and protect it from 
 the ruin which has befallen every other system of govern- 
 ment from the factious democracies of Greece to the fiery 
 despotism of ISTapoleon, When that great principle, l.ying 
 at the very foundation of our Union is lost sight of — dis- 
 carded — repudiated — and the lust of sectional domination, 
 the law of force, is substituted in its stead, and made the 
 main-spring, the motive power of social and political ac- 
 tion, the fate of our national constitutionals sealed, and the 
 downfall of the republic is inevitable ! It may maintain the 
 
 forms of what our forefathers intended it to be, but it will 
 have lost its reality. The shadow of a federal representa- 
 tive republic may still linger, but it wn'll soon pass away, to 
 give place to an inexorable, overshadowing, consolidated des- 
 
2i 
 
 potism ! During tlie Hevolutionary war, one of the most 
 sagacious statesmen of England, whilst contemplating the 
 probability of a final severance of the colonies from the 
 mother country, exclaimed — " The cement of reciprocal es- 
 teem and re<jard can aJo/ie T)lnd together the 'parts of this great 
 falrric!'''' How much more necessary is the "cement of re- 
 ciprocal esteem and regard '' to preserve our Union — to keep 
 together tlds great fabric of government! Destroy that ce- 
 ment — that esteem and regard between the diti'erent sec- 
 tions — and the fabric crumbles, — or, if kept together by the 
 iron bands of military force, it can no longer be the abode, 
 the citadel of freedom, but becomes, at once, the fortress of 
 tyranny — the prison house of despotism ! 
 
 Washington, in tliat most invaluable legacy of patriotic 
 advice, which he left his countrymen, was not content with 
 warning them against "the frightful despotism of party spirit 
 generalhj'''—\XvA.i "alternate domination of one faction over 
 another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, which in dif- 
 ferent ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid 
 enorinities," — but most pointedly and eai-nestly did he en- 
 treat them to beware of "parties founded npon geographiccd 
 discrhninations?'' He looked foi-wai'd to that condition of 
 things with deep and fearful apprehension, and his great — • 
 his magnanimous soul swelled with patriotic zeal and earnest- 
 ness when appealing to his countrymen "to frown indig- 
 nantly u|)on the first dawnings of such a spirit." Hardly 
 sixty years elapsed from the period when such warnings were 
 nttered before that fearful crisis came ! In the full blaze of 
 those bright hopes which arose from all nations, for the 
 success of onr expei'iraent of free government, that cloud, 
 charged with every element of disaster, overhung the hori- 
 zon ! Its fury has not yet been spent. Its final, fatal con- 
 sequences are ^-et hidden from our view ! ^Vhen its pent np 
 wrath is to be discharged — scattering its fiery desolation and 
 blasting all that is lovely and valuable m the rich inheritance 
 bequeathed ns by the immortal Washington and his compa- 
 triots, no human foresight can tell ! 
 
 And this party of " geographical discrimination " — this 
 
35 
 
 array of oi'ganized sectionalism, is based solely on hostility 
 to our institntions — our peace — our rights, as a component 
 part of this great nation, and aims at our disgrace and rnin ! 
 It seeks, by a sectional trinmph, to convert the national gov- 
 ernment into an engine for the ]^olitical snbjngation and 
 social dishonor ot one-half the States of this Union. Kor 
 has it lett nntried any means by which its designs may be 
 accomplished and its ends secured. The press, the hustings, 
 the halls of Congress, even the pnl]>it — all have been con- 
 verted into so many batteries of hery assault ! Yes, that 
 sacred place, from which should ever issue words of peace 
 and good will to man, consecrated as it should be, to the pre- 
 cepts of universal love, has been pi'ostituted to the wicked 
 purposes of faction, and to the inculcation of sectional bit- 
 terness and social strife ! Abandoning their sacred calling — 
 ceasing " to spread the treasured stores of truth divine " — 
 men professing to be ministei's of the gospel of peace, have 
 converted their holy olhces into instruments to arouse the 
 most lawless passions, and to instil into the minds and hearts 
 of their disciples, the most fanatical rancor, the most deadly 
 hatred towards their own countrymen and kindred — country- 
 men stilly thank God ! at least in all the proud recollections 
 of the j)ast — kindred in blood, as they should be, kindred in 
 affections ! 
 
 That was, beyond doubt, the severest blow which has yet 
 been inflicted on the cause of social peace, good government, 
 aud sound religion ! Are the men who instigated, directed, 
 dealt it, mad? Do they presume that the position they oc- 
 cupy consecrates the crime, the treason, into which they are 
 rushing? Have they calculated the consequences into which 
 they are hurrying their infatuated followers? Have they 
 contemplated the blackness of that gulf into which they 
 would plunge the country? The blasting curse of millions 
 should fall on the heads of men, who thus assume "the liver}- 
 of heaven " to serve the purposes of hell — who wrap tliem- 
 selves in the garments of religion to propagate and give force 
 and effect to doctrines, and to disseminate prejudices, which 
 must lead to civil war, to fraternal bloodshed, to the dissolu- 
 
tion of this Union, to tlie ruin of the republic, to the extin- 
 guishment of the last hope of free institutions ! 
 
 Rely upon it — rely upon it, gentlemen, as a fixed, immu- 
 table, never-dying, all-pervading tkuth, this Union, this gov- 
 ernment, and the great blessings they were intended to se- 
 cure, cannot last, cannot be perpetuated, if our religion is to 
 be debased and corrupted — if Christianity is to be superseded 
 or its divine influence destroyed ! Let the pulpit but cease 
 to be 
 
 "The most important and effectual guard 
 Support and ornament of virtue's cause." 
 
 Let it be diverted from the defence and maintenance of 
 Christianity and made subservient to the propagation of par- 
 tizan animosity and sectional rancor — let its occupants dash 
 away their commissions as "heralds of the cross," and put 
 on the insignia of noisy, fiictious, intriguing demagogues, and 
 the door to the most brazen, the blackest iniidelity will be 
 thrown wide open ! From that position there will be but 
 one step to the awful excesses and horrors that marked the 
 career of the French Revolution ! 
 
 There is, unquestionably, gentlemen, a point of endurance 
 beyond which forbearance becomes cowardice and submis- 
 sion crime. With nations, as it is in social intercourse, a 
 tame submission to wrong not only results in dishonor to the 
 oppressed, but imparts boldness to the spirit of tyranny in 
 tlie oppressor. When a people have forfeited their own self- 
 respect — their honor — they become fit subjects to gratify the 
 lust of domination in others. The fact of being united under 
 the same government, for general purposes, does not alter or 
 annul this great rule of social organization. Self-preserva- 
 tion should be the first law of civil government, as it is of 
 our social nature. Aggressions which would be just causes 
 of war between independent nations, cannot be expected to 
 result in less than alienation and distrust under a system like 
 ours. Are we expected to submit with blind pusilanimity to 
 the assaults which are incessantly made on our social peace 
 and civil rights? Is not the cup of forbearance already hrim 
 
27 
 
 full ? Can we be true to others — to the government under 
 whicli we Hve — if we are false to ourselves f 
 
 In view of the dangers threatened — in the lace of the 
 wrongs in store — what do the sacred obhgations of duty to 
 ourselves and our posterity demand at our hands? Union — 
 the union of her whole people, for the full development of 
 all her resources — moral, intellectual and physical — can alone 
 save the South from the dangers which are impending. To 
 each and all alike there is one danger and one safety ! How- 
 ever conflicting our opinions may be on questions of mere 
 expediency or policy, on those involving her riglits, her 
 honor, her safety, her very existence as a people, — there 
 should be no difference, no conflict, no wrangling, no waver- 
 ing ! Union in hand and heart — union in will and desire — 
 union in purpose and action, is the only bulwark of her 
 strength — the only citadel of her safety ! To waste her en- 
 ergies in idle and angry discussion with her adversaries on 
 those great issues, would be playing a part more foolish than 
 did the monkeys in Sinbad, in dashing the cocoanuts at their 
 enemies ! 
 
 " Divide and conquer," has been the stern maxim of north- 
 ern aggressiveness from the days of Alaric and Attila to the 
 present period. The destruction of Carthage was not more 
 inflexibly resolved on by Roman cupidity and ambition, than 
 is our social and political degradation desired and sought by 
 the lawless spirit of northern fanaticism ! We should be 
 false to ourselves — false to the cause of free government and 
 human civilization — recreant to the memory of our fathers — 
 aye, traitors to our own hoiiseholds, were we to neglect to 
 prepare for that struggle which is foreshadowed by events 
 that are passing around us. Were we to act thus, well might 
 the humblest of our people exclaim, in the language of the 
 Tliane of Scotland, as the eftects of the tyranny of Macbeth 
 rose to his view, 
 
 " Alas, poor country ! 
 Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot 
 Be called our motfter, but our grave!" 
 
28 
 
 Let me not be misunderstood, I urge the nnion of tlie 
 people of the South, not for the purpose of aggression and 
 wrong to others, but for protection and safety to themselves; 
 not to engender sectional prejudices and encourage fraternal 
 strife, but to ensure peace and harmony ; not to loeakcn the 
 bonds of our national Union, but to strengthen them, by stay- 
 ing the march of tanaticism ; not in the spirit of empty bra- 
 vado, but under the influence of that calm resolution and 
 indomitalile courage which in all ages has ever been able to 
 set at defiance and drive back the power of wrong and in- 
 justice! " By an eternal law," sa3's a great man, "Provi- 
 dence has decreed vexation to violence and poverty to ra- 
 pine !" The spirit which is now threatening our rights, our 
 peace, our safety, the security of our very hearths, is worse 
 than that of violence and rapine combined ! It adds to those 
 crimes othei's of far blacker malignity, treachery to friends, 
 a repudiation of solemn compacts, a determination to stab 
 whilst professing to embrace ! 
 
 And what stronger inducements, gentlemen, could operate 
 on the human heart, than those which appeal to every cit- 
 izen of the South ? No country on earth possesses in a higher 
 degree all the elements of wealth, power and greatness. 
 With a soil of inexhaustible fertility, yielding every variety 
 of production, intersected at all points by navigable streams, 
 with immense water power, with some of the best harbors in 
 the world, with mineral resources unsurpassed, w^ith territory 
 adequate to a population of more than two hundred millions 
 of souls; blessed in fine with everything that a bounteous na- 
 ture can bestow, nothing is needed to make her pre-eminent- 
 ly a prosperous, powerful people, but union, industry, energy, 
 enterprize, and that high, indomitable, self-sustaining, self- 
 reliant patriotism, which will press her onward to a full de- 
 velopment of all her resources ! With a population of ten 
 millions only, on an area of nearly a million of square miles, 
 what a vast space exists between what she is and what she is 
 capable of becoming ! With half the industry which has cover- 
 ed "as with a velvet carpet the slopes of the Alps," with a tithe 
 of the energ}^ which bridled the stormy waters of the German 
 
29 
 
 Ocean, and rescned from the waves one of the most fertile 
 conntries of the globe, and studded it with cities, the im- 
 agination staggers under the assurance of what she maj be- 
 come as a people ! 
 
 A distinguished European statesman remarks : " If we 
 imagine an universal confederacy of nations, we shall no 
 longer iind sufhcient motive for exertion to promote the pros- 
 perity, independence and power of eac/c^ 
 
 Here lies the danger to the individual States of this con- 
 federacy ! The glory of each in its appropriate sphere, lost 
 sight of, eclipsed, obscured, under the more dazzling bright- 
 ness of the glory of the whole ! The result follows, the pro- 
 gress of the nation is impaired by the want of devotion to 
 the interest and honor of the State in which we live. The 
 smallest planet, " wheeling unshaken through the void im- 
 mense," is no less a part of the great system of the universe, 
 because the gorgeous king of day sends forth his rays in all 
 their splendor. It is the beauty and lltness of each, revolv- 
 ing in its appointed orbit, as well as the harmony of the 
 whole, which proclaims, not only the wisdom of the design, 
 but the power of its Great Architect ! 
 
 It is by cultivating the social affeclions — by observing, 
 respecting and strengthening the ties of kindred and of 
 friendship, that we learn with clearness and fnlill with 
 alacrity, our duties to the State. Devotion to the former 
 is not more consistent with the prosperity of the latter, than 
 neglect of our duties and obligations to the State is incom- 
 patible with the safety and glory of the Union ! Cueran, 
 in his eloquent appeal to Ireland, to he true to herself] ex- 
 claimed, " It is in vain to say you will protect the freedom of 
 Britain, if you aljandon your own. The pillar, whose base 
 has no foundation, can give no support to the dome under 
 which its head is placed," 
 
 Forgetting, then, and casting to the winds, in view of the 
 momentous issue presented, all minor differences of opin- 
 ion, let us, I entreat you, unite, — unite as country7ne7i, in 
 improving the vast advantages with which we have been 
 blessed — in educating our youth — in cultivating a pure and 
 
high-toned literature — in enconraging the arts and sciences—- 
 in nnrturing the precepts of Christian love — in inspiring the 
 hearts of our people with an elevated patriotism, a bold 
 spirit of independence and self-reliance—in building up and 
 sustaining institutions of learning and benevolence — in de- 
 veloping our agricultural and manufacturing resources — in 
 breaking the chains of that commercial thraldom which have 
 so long bound us I Then, indeed, whilst true to ourselves — 
 whilst erecting around our rights a wall far stronger than ad- 
 amant against the inroads of fanaticism, we shall become the 
 vanguard of safety — the right arm of strength to the Union 
 of the States, and to the great cause of constitutional, repre- 
 sentative government ! 
 
 Gentlemen, we cannot evade the high — the weighty re- 
 sponsibility imposed on us, by the age in which we live, by 
 the events that are passing around us, by the recollection of 
 tlie past, by tlie prospects of the future ! The very bles- 
 sings vre enjoy — the dangers that threaten them, — every 
 thing that can enliven our hopes or arouse our fears, — all 
 that can ennoble by a fearless jDcrformance, or degrade by a 
 cowardly abandomeut of duty — all we hear, and see and feel 
 in the midst of that storm of difficulties and trials which en- 
 compass uSj — invoke us to vigilance and incite us to action ! 
 
 There is much that is truly and most strikingly sublime 
 surrounding the history of that country in wdiich our lot has 
 been cast. Who can contemplate it without seeing the 
 guidauce-^the working of an Almighty arm? AVhilst the 
 empires of the old woi'ld were rising in grandeur and power, 
 and successively fading away under the grasp of corruption 
 and ambition ; whilst the whole Christian world was rocked 
 to and fro by the mighty conflict it waged for centuries with 
 the Moslem power of the East ; whilst Europe w^as slowly 
 emerging from the cloud of ignorance and barbarism, in 
 which it had been so long enveloped, this vast country, 
 now smiling with the fruits of industrj^, and rejoicing in the 
 rich trophies of civilization, lay embosomed in the sublime 
 repose — the undisturbed solitude of nature ! The genius of 
 one man threw open the door to its approach, and it sprang 
 
31 
 
 into view like a new creation. Its rude tenanrs, as wiki 
 and uncultivated as the vast forests and loftv mountains over 
 which they had so long roamed, unrestrained by government 
 and untrammeled by laws, gave Avay on the advance of sci- 
 ence — religion and civilization. Those who took tlieir place? 
 were a hardy, stern, energetic race, of resolute purpose and 
 indomitable will. Their history had l)een one of trials, diffi- 
 culties and dangers. They had been educated in the school 
 of a harsh and severe experience. They had fled from civil 
 and religious persecution. The wilderness, with freedom of 
 thought and unmolested worship of God, had higher charms 
 for them than all the refinements and glitter of European so- 
 ciety, with the weight of civil and religious tyranny press- 
 ing their energies to the earth, and enslaving their con- 
 sciences. When they came hither, they brought with them, 
 retained and cultivated those principles of free government, 
 in defence of which so many noble spirits had fallen martyrs 
 in the countries from which they fled. The names of Hussell, 
 of Sidney, of Hampden, inspired their hearts with contidence 
 and boldness. The doctrines for which they had so fearlessly 
 contended took deep root and spread. The great and final 
 conflict at last came. It brought with it trials and suftering-s 
 well calculated to appal the stoutest heart. They equalled 
 any that marked the struggles, which, in former ages, had 
 been waged by right and justice against oppression and 
 wrong. To all but a handful of gallant, imconquerable 
 spirits, the issue was one full of doubt and uncertainty. The 
 despondency which fell on many, only aroused new energy 
 and enkindled more indomitable resolution in the hearts of 
 those who saw, afar ofl' through the smoke and carnage of 
 battle, the light of victory. The same spirit that enabled 
 them to triumph over a foreign foe, secured them another 
 triumph, yet more glorious, because the more difficult — a tri- 
 uinjyli over themselves, a triumph over passion and preju- 
 dice — over selfishness and ambition — over anarchy and li- 
 centiousness! From confusion, sprang order; from sec- 
 tional animosity and dissention, concord and union ; from 
 weakness, strength ; from prostrate credit and shattered 
 
32 
 
 finances, national wealtli, and inexhaustible sources of rev- 
 enue ! The nations of the earth gazed in astonislnnent as 
 upon a new sun " risen on midnoon." To the political sys- 
 tem of the world, it was the fixing in its orbit a new planet, 
 producing alarm and confusion at first, but destined in the 
 end to secure more perfect harmony and greater security. 
 iSTew ideas were spread abroad, — new principles asserted 
 their I'ight to supremacy, — new theories of government were 
 proclaimed, in the very heart of the monarchies and des- 
 potisms of Europe ! Old political systems were shaken, — old 
 institutions crumbled away. There stood out in imposing 
 prominence before the civilized world, a practical, living, 
 speaking refutation of the doctrine of the divine right of 
 Kings. Few were found bold enough to re-assert the pre- 
 rogative claimed by Louis XIV of France — " I am the 
 State !" Every struggle for free government — every uprising 
 of the people against tyranny — every movement towards 
 popular institutions— every check given to oppression and 
 wrong, since that period were but emanations — waves, 
 from that Revolution which resulted in the achievement of 
 our independence and the establishment of our government ! 
 It is the height of folly to attempt to measure the cycle of 
 the immense, ever-spreading, never-ceasing influence of 
 that Kevolution, by a meter that would hardly encircle a sin- 
 gle human passion or emotion ! Who can estimate — who 
 can measure — who can limit that influence ? It has infused 
 itself into the whole social, moral and political element of 
 the world ! In humble submission to the Divine AYill, we 
 can but hope that it may secure to our land — • 
 
 "A thousaud thousaud blessings, 
 Which time shall bring to ripeness : — 
 
 'Till our children's children 
 Shall see them, and bless Heaven!" 
 
 "The time will come," exclaims De Toqueville, with pro- 
 phetic rapture, " when one hundred and fifty millions of men 
 will be living in America, equal in condition, the progeny of 
 one race, owing their origin to the same cause, preserving 
 
33 
 
 tlic same civilization, the same langnago, the same literature, 
 the same religion, the same habits, the same manners and 
 imbued with the same opinions, propagated under the same 
 forms ! The rest is uncertain, but this is certain ; and it is a 
 fact new to the world, a fact fraught with such portentous con- 
 sequences as to baffle the eftbrts even of the imagination !" 
 
 What a picture for the contemplation of the American 
 scholar, statesman and patriot ? And who does not desire — 
 earnestly, ardentl}^ desire its full, ample, complete realiza- 
 tion ? Who amongst us is unvv'ilhng to labor for its accom- 
 plishment? Who would extinguish those high hopes that 
 are rousing man in every quarter of the globe from the sleep 
 of ages ? Who wishes to see that bright star, wdiich is guid- 
 ing the empire of freedom, of science and civilization to the 
 west, shoot from its position and go down in darkness ? 
 
 If we hope to realize those high, anticipations ; if we wish 
 our descendants to enjoy the blessings which we now enjoy ; 
 if we desire the fulfilment of the high destiny that is prom- 
 ised us, we must defend, preserve, perpetuate, unimjpaired^ 
 that constitution which has been transmitted to us. That 
 only, under the hlesslng of God, can save us! That founda- 
 tion is of rocJc — all else is but drifting sand, to be swept away 
 by the first storm of agitation ! When Koman liberty had 
 been cloven down, and those who had defended it to the last 
 were commanded to declare their adhesion to the tyrant who 
 dealt the fatal blow, then it was that her immortal orator ex- 
 claimed : " I will not give to Caesar what belongs to my 
 country !" 
 
 We cannot — we dare not surrender one jot or tittle of that 
 constitution to the demands of sectional ambition or the mad 
 behests of fanaticism ! It is that which has made us what 
 we are — a prosperous, happy, powerful people. Under that, 
 and l>y that we are content to live. It will guide us to a still 
 higher degree of national prosperity and glory. It will prove 
 an impenetrable shield to our rights, our honor, our safety. 
 But if — which heaven forbid ! — the dread conflict witb fac- 
 tion and fanaticism nmcst come, let us appeal to the example 
 of the immortal Washington, to inspire our hearts with pa- 
 s' 
 
34 
 
 triotism to meet the crisis, and to the just God of onr fathers, 
 to lead us through that conflict, and give us courage to face, 
 and fortitude to bear, the direful consequences which may 
 follow 1