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Webster, Fletcher
Oration Delivered Before the Authorities
Of the City of Boston, .....
Boston, 1846.

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YALE
UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

AS

0 E A T I 0 N

DELIVERED

BEFORE THE AUTHORITIES

CITY OF BOSTON, .i'
IN THE ^
TEEMONT TEMPLE,
JULY 4, 1846.

BY FLETCHER WEBSTEE.

BOSTON: 1846.
J. H. eastburn, city printer.

CITY OF BOSTON.

In the Board of Mdermen, July Sth, 1846.
Resolved, That the thanks of this Board, in behalf of the City Council, be
presented to Fletcher Webster, Esquire, for the appropriate, able and elo
quent Oration, pronounced by him, before the Municipal Authorities, at the
celebration of the Seventieth Anniversary of the Declaration of the Indepen
dence ofthe United States. And that he be requested to furnish a copy ofthe
same, for the Press. And that the Mayor be requested to communicate to him
a copy of this vote. A True Copy. Attest. S. F. McCLEARY, City Clerk.

OEATION.

Fellow Citizens !
By the blessing of Heaven we are allowed to meet
once more on this anniversary, and to meet in happi
ness ; no sadness mingles vsdth our general exclama
tions of joy — no groans make discord with our voices
of congratulation. Our first emotion, on thus com
ing together, should be one of profoundest gratitude,
that we are so permitted to assemble, so to celebrate
the great deeds of our Fathers, and to exult in the
continued enjoyment of the fortune of national inde
pendence and greatness which they bequeathed us.
"We meet to brighten the memory of the glorious
past, to strengthen ourselves in our onward progress ;
to speak great names, to remember great enterprises,
to look forward to a great career. A whole country,
millions of people, with one accord, all classes and all
conditions, this day and hour rejoice.
With all shows and displays let us forever celebrate
this day. Music, and flowers, and dances ; the har
mony of ringing bells, the roar of cannon, the glitter
of uniforms, the shouts of men, the laughter of chil
dren, the soft glad voices of women — let all forever
unite to make one joyous festival. It is our best tri
bute to the memory of the dead, to be happy to-day.

4
Rome with all its holidays had no such occasion
of triumph as this. England with her accumulated
glories and thousands of victories has none : all na
tions and people of the world beside have none. We
celebrate no single triumph, but the result of a long
series of victories ; we celebrate the memory of no
mere successful battle, but the great triumph of a
people, the victory of liberty over oppression, won by
suffering, and struggle, and death ; the fruit of high
sentiment, of resolute patriotism, of consummate wis
dom, of unshaken faith and trust in God ; — a victory
and a triumph not for us only, but for all the oppress
ed, everywhere, and in every age to come ; — a victory
that has invaded the surest strong-holds of bigotry
and despotism, that has lightened the chains, and
cheered the hearts of down-trodden men in every re
gion;— a victory whose future results to us and to others
no imagination can foresee, and which are yet but
commencing to unfold themselves ; — -a victory, that
shining like the fiery pillar of old, leads on, and to all
nations lights the way to freedom.
On so glorious an anniversary as this of ours, while
exulting and rejoicing, we should also reflect, and take
a salutary lesson, in comparing ourselves with our
fathers. This is a period when every American
should consider of his duties as a citizen of this coun
try, of his obligations towards the nation of which he
forms some part, and the government in which,
thanks to our ancestors, each of us has some voice.
Our fathers considered with awful solemnity, in grave
debate, in private conference, in public meeting, and
in solitary meditation, what was their duty towards
their country before they adopted those measures,
which led to the immortal resolve of the fourth of July,
and this was their sole inquiry^ What was their duty ?

They did not care to ask what would be thought or
said of them by others ; who would scoff" and sneer,
who would reproach, who would persecute. Their
duty, their duty to themselves and the country was the
only point they felt interested to ascertain, That they
meant to discharge, and that done, consequences
might take their course. They were ready to meet
all responsibilities, all reproaches, all trials and perils,
except those of violated conscience and betrayed
trust ; and if we would prove sons of our fathers, such
and such only should be our conduct.
There are many great responsibilities which each
one of us, as a citizen, has to meet, and we must meet
them, each one for himself, individually ; each of us
must judge for himself and must stand or fall alone,
by his own merits or demerits. He can plead as ex
cuse for violated or neglected duty, no conduct of
others, no general consent, no popular cry. To him
self, to his country, to his Maker, he shall stand con
demned or approved, just as he has neglected, or
performed his duty.
All cannot be statesmen. Few can do more than
give occasional thought to public matters. Support
of the laws, peaceful behavior, orderly conduct and
cheerfuF submission to the requisitions of lawful gov
ernment, are all that can be expected daily from citi
zens generally. But there are times when this easy
discharge of duty is not a full discharge. There are
times when it comes home to a man directly, to decide
as a citizen, what he must do or forbear ; when his
sense of right is appealed to, or ought to be, and on
such occasions the honest and upright performance of
his duty is a subject that should receive conscientious
attention, and which he should decide upon, not with
a view to the opinions and conduct of others, but
from higher and wiser and better considerations.

A government like our own can be maintained only
by the wisdom and honesty of the people. Each man
should to some degree, and as far as his opportunities
allow, think for himself What slavery is baser, what
servitude more vile, than a miserable reliance on oth
ers for opinions — a fear to think alone, a desire to
have supporters, an inclination to join majorities and
shout whh masses, a surrender of personal and men
tal independence ? Such subserviency and timidity,
if they became general, would soon make this day an
occasion to be remembered with tears and waiUngs,
as the memorial of a lost blessing.
While, however, one should be independent in
thought, it is not necessary to be self-sufiicient ; to
despise counsel from the good and the wise ; to be
rash and ultra and dogmatical. The ultraism we
sometimes see is as unlike true independence of mind
as hcentiousness"" is unhke true liberty. And not only
should all of us form opinions for ourselves, upon
some solid and substantial grounds, but our consid
erations should be coextensive with our country. It
is a great fault to lack comprehension in our views,
to form a habit of thinking more of those things im
mediately around us than they deserve, of over-esti
mating the importance of our own particular town
or State, or portion of country, or society. It is a
sad weakness, as well as ignorance, to consider the
Uttle hills which close in one's own valley, as more
lofty and imposing than the distant mountain.
With entire independence of mind there should be
hberality and proper respect for the opinions of others,
and a disposition not to judge of every man and every
thing by the httle standard of mensuration in vogue
in our own small vicinage or circle. In a country so
vast as our own, composed of sovereignties with

diverse and independent powers, and various institu
tions; with such difference of chmate and soil, with
such variety of social position, from that of the re
fined and wealthy ease of an Atlantic city, to the ad
venturous and rough life of a frontiersman in the
new states, such diversity of origin, between descen
dants from the Puritan Fathers of New England, and
the more impulsive offspring of the Frenchman and
Spaniard, there nnist be vast difference in taste, habits
and manners in its different portions ; and since we
are all equally freemen, and equally in the enjoyment
of the same rights and powers under government and
equally responsible for and interested in its preserva
tion, there must be a great exercise of liberality by all,
and an absence of narrow mindedness, and self suffi
ciency, and contempt for the feelings and opinions of
others, or discord, mutual dislike and aversion will
sow seeds, whose fruits may poison aU the sources of
our national happiness and greatness. Independence
of spirit to govern our own conduct, with moderation,
liberality towards others, and good temper, are as ne
cessary for the successful maintenance of our govern
ment and our union, as wisdom, patriotism and vir
tue. I have ventured to make some suggestions as to
some of the general principles and motives which
should control the conduct of American citizens.
Though it is as little necessary to dweU on such topics
in this house, and before this audience, as in any other
spot, or in any other assembly, on our continent, still
I believe a recurrence to such considerations to be out
of place no where, and that they can never be to often
brought to mind.
At this present moment, perhaps, we may with un
usual propriety refer to and dwell upon the cardinal

vurtues of American, constitutional, national citizen
ship : the citizenship not of a city, or of a State, but
that of the Union. It is on the day of National Inde
pendence ; it is while we assemble under the na
tional banner, the stars and stripes, beneath whose
folds so many millions of our fellow citizens are this
day gathered, and some of them with arms in their
hands, in battle array ; it is under such circumstances
as these, that we may well deem it proper to take a
survey of our relations and duties as citizens of this
great republic.
For thirty years has this day's sun -shone upon us
at peace with all the world; all our martial displays
and musterings have been but pageants, our weapons
but symbols and ornaments, our ships wherever they
touched in their circuits over the wide spread seas,
but friendly visitants, whose presence, in every har
bor, was the signal for kindness and hospitalities,
and the assurance of friendship — our flag, wherever
on the surface of the globe it has spread its ensigns to
the breeze, has been a welcome harbinger of unbroken
peace. Not a mariner, of the thousands belonging to all
nations and people, who has descried on the sohtary
ocean a distant sail, but has hailed with pleasure its
appearance, when our colors rose aloft, in answering
signal to his own.
Of all the emblems of nationality ours alone has
given cause of fear or hate to none. The red cross
of !En gland has been torn and begrimed in many a
savage battle. It has been planted on the ruined
walls of St. Jean d' Acre ; it has waved over the cities,
plains and streams of China, of Affghanistan, of
Scinde, and of the Punjaub, all red with blood, shed •
by British soldiers. The Arab patriarch, with his

household, his flocks and his herds, as he traverses
his native deserts, watches, with less dread, the gath
ering of the awful simoon, than the approach of the
tricolor of France, betokening rapine, and death and
all the horrors of a razzia.
The Russian Eagle to the Circassians, the Turkish
'Crescent to the Syrians, the Austrian, Russian and
Prussian standard to the Poles, and, in short, the stand
ard of almost every nation but our own has been
somewhere, tb some people or country, within a year,
the signal for war and bloodshed.
Ours alone has waved in universal peace, admired
and beloved; sufficiently adorned with all the glory
that victory in war can emblazon upon it, supported
by sufficient force to make it everywhere respected,
it has been unfurled on every continent, in every isle
ofthe sea, by every coast, and on every ocean, in
grateful, graceful peace. High and glorious privi
lege! noblest of all distinctions! better than all the
trophies of war tha;t could be hung around and upon
it! How sincerely must every good man have de
sired that so forever it might be displayed !
But such has not been decreed to be its fortune.
Already it waves defiance to a neighboring people;
already have copious libations of blood been poured
out beneath it; it now advances a fearful meteor,
portending all the fury of battle, and the calamities of
warfare. We are at war, and for the first time now in a gen
eration, we are called on to reflect what are our duties
as citizens of the republic in a time of war.
A state of war, however produced, is, as all will
admit, to be most deeply lamented. The most suc
cessful soldier, with all of "war's red honors on his
crest" will tell us in more emphatic tones than any

10

other, how terrible is such a condition and how inade
quate in general are its triumphs to repay or repair its
miseries. Experience tells us that they are usually
far less valuable than those of peace, and the prevail
ing sentiment of mankind declares it to be that last
dreadful appeal, to which nations should resort only
when all other means have been tried, and tried in
vain, to obtain justice, maintain right, or avoid op
pression. An aggressive warfare, among civilized states,
would at the present time with difficuUy be supported
against the influence of the general opinion of the
good and wise in all countries.
But while it is to be admitted that war is the
source of all the evils that have been ascribed to it,
it cannot be generally denied that there are times
when war is not only unavoidable, but necessary, just
and desirable — when the wisest and the best may
feel called upon to draw the sword and be ready to
dye it in blood. Depict, in what glowing colors we
please, the horrors of the civil wars of England, un
der Charles the First; add up the lists of the slain,
give us all the stormings of castles, the explosions of
mines, the murderous hand-to-hand conflicts, the more
bloody routs and pursuits, the ruined homes, the de
vastated fields, the starving, houseless men, women
and children — yet which of us, what man of heart
and independence and piety, what New Englander,
true to the memory and faith of his fathers, but feels
his blood spring in his veins, and his hand clench as
if grasping his weapon, when he reads of his Puritan
ancestors, as at last they stood, on the moors, by their
desert temples, or in pitched battle, and drew to de
fend their rights — which of us whose whole soul is
not in their ranks, praying as they prayed, fighting as

11
they fought, and exulting and triumphing, as they
successfully resisted ? They fought for the rights
of conscience, of free intercourse between their own
souls and their Maker, of unconstrained liberty in
matters of faith, which are dearer, and ought to be
dearer to a man, than all else the world contains ;
an abandonment of which is the basest of coward
ice, the worst of all slavery, and the most contempti
ble of all sin. To their devotion and courage, and
resolution, the world owes, and we owe the greater
portion ofthe spiritual liberty which men now enjoy.
Of all the victims of that war there is not a man,
who if now he could return and see the results
which the shedding of his blood helped to purchase,
but would rejoice at the opportunity he had of con
tributing so much towards freeing the human mind
and soul from thraldom. And does any one believe
that these results could have been attained in any
other method than by arms and successful phys
ical resistance ? Can any one tell us how many ages
of lectures and sermons and tracts and remonstrances
and pamphlets would have run out, before the pos
sessors of power in those days would have yielded
to the force of reasoning, and argumentation and
exhortation ? Beyond a certain point, speaking and
writing and argument and expostulation are worse
than useless : they are base and unworthy, and it be
comes a man or a nation to " try the last."
The war of our own Revolution, all must admit,
was another, in which he, ofthe citizens of this coun
try, who did not join heart and hand, was justly
proscribed by the general opinion of all the world.
Where but for the swords of our fathers, would be
the very right we now possess of assembling in this
house to-day, or on any other day, and communing with

12
each other, or our God? Is any one insane enough
to suppose, that resolutions and addresses, breath
and paper, and pen and ink, would have achieved
the Declaration of Independence, and maintained it ?
Would an orator have supplied the place of Warren,
or Putnam, or Prescott, on Bunker Hill.^ Would a
circumvallation of pamphlets have brought about the
capitulation of Yorktown ?
These, and such as these, are cases where war, with
all its woes, must be undergone. There are certain
ultimate rights which must be maintained, and when
force is brought to overthrow them, it must be resisted
by force.
Nor, as I imagine may be safely conceded, is even
war,, so far an exception to the general rule of the di
vine government, that it is an unmitigated evil.
In our world we have nothing wholly good, or
wholly bad. There is no virtue, no happiness, no ex
cellence, without some alloy; neither is there any
calamity or evil that has not some admixture of good —
" There is a soul of goodness in things evil.
Would men observingly distil it out."
Does any one venture so far to question the wisdom
and benevolence of Providence, as to regard even the
terrible pestilence, the cholera, the plague, as a mere
evil, entirely bad, and with no principle of compensa
tion in it ?
No one can for a moment contemplate the wonder
ful adaptation of the laws of Nature to the happiness
and well being of all creatures, man included, the va
rious provisions for their existence under different cir
cumstances and in different climates, the adaptation
of structure and powers to condition, the proportion of
capability of resistance and endurance to trial and ex-

13

posure^ thetbousand checks and balances which miti
gate excess of every thing, and prevent destruction of
any thing, and the all wise and most marvellous laws
of decay and reproduction, without feeling a sublime
confidence in the greatness and goodness ofthe Crea
tor — a perfect trust, that whatever is allowed to occur,
whether apparent evil or good, is, after all, but only
good, and is the very thing that, could we be able to
see the whole of the great scheme of Providence and
of Nature, we should most have desired to take place.
Who can tell what other evils a pestilence may
have averted, if, indeed, a pestilence can be called an
evil at all? It is so considered because it brings
death, and death is considered as the greatest of ills.
It is to be more than doubted whether this idea is
not whoUy unjust.
It is natural to look on death with dread; the
body fears " to leave this sensible warm motion and
become a kneaded clod ;" but the soul knows death
to be no evil, no calamity. It is the last and greatest
of blessings. Consider this world: without death, and
then imagine if possible our condition ! Who would,
if he could, live forever here, in this ambiguous state of
existence, between earth and heaven, continually pin
ing after something which we cannot reach, or else de
graded to the nature of the materialities which sur
round us ; condemned forever to the prison house of
the body, which decays and changes, and gives each
succeeding day new cause of disgust ; shut out from
heaven and great hopes and boundless hght and
knowledge, to grope forever here ? With what un
speakable disgust one would contemplate an eternity
of earth !
But with the certainty of death before us, knowing
that we are but visitants, and have but a short time to

14
discover and enjoy all that earth has of desirable and
pleasant, how bright and beautiful it looks as we
hasten through it ! Enough so to make it excusable
that sometimes we almost wish to linger on our way.
If war, like a pestilence, brings death, it does no
more than time and nature are sure to provide us
with at last, and in this respect it brings no increase
of evil, but only hastens, perhaps, to many, what is a
good, and it often brings that as one would wish
to receive it.
To die in the discharge of duty, to die with honor,
before disgrace, or misfortune has sullied or dimmed
the character, whether after an old age of vhtue,
in one's bed, surrounded by friends, or by sickness,
and amid strangers, as he dies, who goes to spread
the gospel among the heathen on the fatal shores
of Africa or Asia, or to die in battie, gallantly
fighting for the right, and in obedience to the calls of
one's country, thus to die is the greatest privilege
which man can receive. To crown a virtuous and
useful life, with a death that finds one at his post,
wherever that may be, is the last event which the
Christian, be he the quiet civilian, the enthusiastic
missionary, or the dauntless warrior, would call an
evil. To war indeed we are indebted for many of the
highest virtues. Suppose it impossible for wars to oc
cur, where were nationality, where patriotisnti, where
love of home and friends? If there were no possible
occasion for the exercise of such virtues, if there were
no nation, or country, or fireside, or friends, that could
be attacked, and which we might be called on to defend
and protect, how long would such sentiments flourish?
How long would such virtues survive, after all possi
bility for their exercise had departed.

15

A people is made and kept together by the neces
sity of mutual support and defence. All the dearest
relations of life have their source in that dependence
which men feel one upon another. Neighbors would
be to each other nothing raore than strangers, if one
universal peace, that could never be interrupted,
should prevent all occasion for mutual aid. Coun
trymen would be but aliens, were all possibility re
moved that countrymen might be called on to stand
by each other in time of need and of danger. Where
would be statesmanship, where had been all the Ulus
trious legislators of former times, and of the present
day, had the world been wrapped in immutable
peace. Where were the value of diplomacy or the
excellence of wise and enlightened negotiation, were
frightened peace to be preserved from no threatening
war.'' Where had been the sublimest poetry, but for war?
Where had been the Royal Psalmist, had not the Phi
listines come up against Israel? Where Homer and
Virgil, had Troy never fallen before successful arms ?
Milton himself had been silent, had he not sung of
War in Heaven,
" When all the plain,
" Covered with thick embattled squadrons bright,
" Chariots, and flaming arms, and fiery steeds,
"Reflecting blaze on blaze, first met his view,"
It is true that war has tendencies to demoralization.
It often produces violence and recklessness and disre
gard of justice. But while the vices produced by war
are not to be denied, is it quite clear, men's passions
remaining as they are, that the vices of long continu
ed, undisturbed and luxurious peace are not equally
great. Were the Court and the times of Alexander, or
Peter the Great, or Bonaparte more vicious than those

16
of Sardanapalus, or Eatherine, or Charles the X. or of
other princes who reigned chiefly in peace ?
The evils of war, like all other evils, are made by
the kindness of Heaven temporary, while all the good
things that spring from it, are imperishable. Cities are
razed to the ground, but they rise again ; fields are
trampled into blood stained mire, but flourish green
again ; hosts of brave and vigorous men are cut off,
but their places are filled by succeeding generations ;
the calamities of war are recompensed and forgotten,
but the high virtues, the generous deeds, the wise
laws, the valuable arts, the lofty poetry, the noble
thought, which they gave occasion for, live forever.
War has also positive benefits. W^hat civilized
Gaul and Britain but invading Romans, and in Bri
tain, invading Normans? What first redeemed this
country from the wilderness but the force of arms
and such men as Standish and Church? How long
would all Mexico and the whole continent of South
America haA'^e remained in Indian ignorance and idol
atry, but for the invasion of the Cortes and Pizarro's
of Spain, who, though they brought misery and havoc
as their immediate companions, brought, in their train,
civilization and Christianity.
War opens the way for commerce, for the arts, nay
our missionaries follow with success, only where con
quest has somewhat subdued the savage fierceness of
native tribes, and forced them to hear and not strike.
And, are all the heroic virtues to pass for nothing ?
Courage, gallantry, fortitude, chivalry, a high sense of
honor, loyalty, self devotion? These are the noble
virtues, which always have aroused the admiration of
mankind, and always will, until the human mind and
nature shall be utterly changed.
In speaking thus of war, I would not be understood

17

as commending or approving it for itself It should
be far from any man's desire to excite a war spirit,
especially, if^ indeed, it be more wicked in one coun
try than in another to do so — especially, in this coun
try. Had we the best appointed armies that the world
ever saw, in hosts more muhitudinous than those of
Xerxes and Zinghis Khan, whh Hannibal and Napo
leon for their marshals, and all the continent south of
our limits lying open to us, inviting conquest, and
more rich in the gifts of nature than the fancies of an
cient voyagers had ever pictured it, sparkling with all
gems and gold, ruddy with spontaneous fruits, and
gilded with eternal summer, and could we pour
down upon it and possess it all, by successful war,
our conquests and our acquisitions in such a career
would be but defeats and losses, compared with the
triumphs and the progresses, and the benefits, that we
are every day securing by the wonderful achieve
ments of industrious and intelligent peace. Neither
Alexander, nor all the half fabulous monarchs and
conquerors of the ancient world, Belshazzar and the
Ptolemies, and Mahmoud the Great, and Nadir Shah,
acquired possessions by their arms, which, even in
their imaginations, equalled in extent, or splendor, or
real worth, what we actually now possess, and have
acquired, chiefly, by peaceful settlement ; nor do all
the fables of antiquity, of the Genii of the eastern
world, and wizards of Europe, of flying horses and
wishing carpets, and magical lamps, and magical
wands, and rings, and seals, exceed in extraordinary
and amazing events the history of the discoveries of
science and art, by which peace has revolutionized
the modern world.
What eastern brain, heated by all the fervor of a
tropical sun, and stimulated by competition and eX'

18

ample, ever, in its wildest flight, fancied the existence
of powers so beyond all nature and belief as those we
now daily employ by the force of steam and of the
magnetic telegraph ? The ancient legends of enchant
ment, indeed, are dull and tame, compared with the
records of the every day facts of the peaceful world of
modern times. For every object, whether of national
grandeur, of individual ambition, or general happiness,
no condition of things could be so propitious as the
continuance of enlightened, christian peace.
Very far be it from us to excite a feeling in a single
breast adverse to the perpetuity of such peace. Let
all the good and wise and patriotic unite to preserve
it unbroken, or to restore it when interrupted.
War, I said, was sometimes unavoidable, sometimes
just, and sometimes of such a nature as to cafl upon the
good and wise to support it and engage in it. Such
wars have been and may be again ; and who can say
how much the human mind, which has at last come to
accomplish so many miraculous achievements in the
arts and the sciences, has been trained and disci
plined and strengthened and sharpened, by the spirit
of excited competition, national as weU as individual ;
by rivalry, contention and war.
I have endeavored to show that even the worst of
wars was not so wholly bad that there was no good
in it, and that we are indebted to war for some positive
good. But be all this as it may, there are other con
siderations in regard to the subject, which practical
men will not lose sight of; and which no citizens or
members of organized society can disregard. Be war
whohy evil, or tempered with a little good, it is not
very probable that a state of things will soon exist, in
which war wiU be impossible, or cease to be a subject
of apprehension.

19
When every individual on the face of the globe
shall be governed by a conscientious sense of the
right ; when no one shall desire any thing which his
neighbor possesses ; when every one shall be a law,
and a just and righteous and well obeyed law to him
self; when all nations shall be ruled solely by wisdom
and virtue, and influenced by a perfect regard to the
welfare of others ; when in short men shall be chang
ed in nature, and every evil passion eradicated from
the human breast, wars will cease to be. Until this
time shall have come, which, alas, does not seem to
hasten rapidly towards us, whatever may be our zeal-
oiis wishes, or our ardent desires, we must conduct
ourselves with regard to things, not as we would have
them, but as they really are ; we must remember our
actual position and responsibilities, that we are citizens,
not of Eutopia, but of the United States of North
America. The scholar, the man of the closet, the enthusiast,
the speculative philanthropist, may, if he choose, in
dulge in golden fancies of unreal or impossible things ;
he may throw off all responsibility as a citizen and a
member of society, and freed from this cumbersome
weight which keeps others in the dusty road of prac
tical life, he may pursue his theories and speculations
to the end of their flight. He may paint a beautiful
world of unwearied peace and hold it up to our long
ing eyes ; denounce all violence and all resort to arms ;
declare to us how much of a pity it is, that " villainous
saltpetre has been digged out of the bowels of the
harmless earth," and we may listen to his fine decla
mations and glowing periods, and join with him in
his denunciations of the horrors of war ; but we listen
in vain for any description of a newly discovered,
short, practical and feasible way of attaining to such

20

a lovely condition of things, in which there will be no
further need of physical force for the government and
protection of society and of nations.
Could there be some means of reaching such a con
dition pointed out to us, which we could act upon, it
would become us at once to make the attempt. We
approve the object heartily, everybody approves it, the
whole world desires it ; our education and our religion
teach us to hope and pray that such an event may at
last arrive. It needs no exhortation to arouse our de
sires. We ask only the way to obtain them; but
what sort of directions do we receive ? It is recom
mended to us to begin the work by dismantling our
navies, disbanding our armies, disorganizing our mih
tia, destroying our forts, arsenals and magazines, mak
ing ourselves utterly defenceless and trusting every
thing that we have to the mercy of foreign and stranger
nations, to whom our institutions are wholly repug
nant, our prosperity and increasing greatness a con
tinual eyesore, and our whole history and existence, a
source of daily disquiet and apprehension.
How long after such an experiment was ma^de do
the authors of these sentiments suppose they would
have the opportunity of expressing them ? To what,
except that freedom, freedom of thought and right of
speech, purchased by the blood of the wise and valiant
of former days, and defended by the arms of their fel
low citizens this moment, do they owe the favor
of being protected in the utterance of such ideas ?
A freedom dearly bought, and to littie purpose, if
one of its earliest uses is to destroy the very means
by which it has been achieved and is now maintain
ed. We listen to such doctrines without impatience
and without disturbance, because we know that they
can never be adopted — did we believe, that any con-

21
siderable portion of our community could seriously
think of acting upon them, there would be a general
uprising of amazement and indignation.
Such views are not for men, who have, as we
have, grave, practical matters on hand; the govern
ment of a great country, full of most important inter
ests, exposed to rivalry and competition every where,
with fellow citizens scattered all over the world, look
ing home to us for protection and defence ; a great
commerce to take care of; a flag to cause to be res
pected on every sea ; a great territory to settle and
preserve ; a growing posterity to provide for, and a
national name, and a national honor, and national
rights, to vindicate and maintain and uphold.
We may and should, as citizens, do every thing to
avert war; we should seek to give no occasion for war;
as good men, and wise men, as christians, and as men
of business, we should endeavor to preserve peace ;
but, certainly, we should, in neither of these relations,
do any thing which would disable us from defending
ourselves should war be brought upon us, or put it
out of our power to protect those who have a right to
look to us for help. To put away our arms, to render
ourselves powerless, to invite aggression and insult, is
not the way to begin the introduction of universal
peace. War is but the result of certain causes, it is but the
fruit of certain seeds. It springs from the same source
that nourishes all other institutions, which are based
upon the application of physical force. It would be
just as wise and reasonable to attack all courts of law,
to put down all prisons, to declaim against the con
stable's baton, and the jailor's bolts and bars ; to begin
by abohshing all means of punishment, with a view of
eradicating crimes, as to destroy all means of national

22
defence with a view of putting an end to wars. This
is a mere plucking at the leaves of the Boon Upas,
instead of striking at the root.
What makes the necessity for government, munici
pal government? The bad passions of individual
man, who must be restrained from their indulgence
by the exercise of physical force, when other means
fail. Would it be wise to abohsh aU restraints of this
kind and trust solely to "moral suasion" in the gov
ernment of a commonweahh ? Whose property or
hfe would be safe a moment, if a littie " moral suasion"
were the only punishment for villains — if they chose
to listen — after they had murdered their neighbors or
burnt their houses ? As physical force is necessary
for the protection of society against individual mem
bers of it, who will not hsten to teachings, and who
will, despite all admonition, violate the rights of others,
so it is equally necessary for the protection and defence
of nations, while nations are composed of individuals
who require such restraints.
An eminent and most respected living British states
man,* has lately said, that " it is a reproach to human
nature that wars are sometimes just.'-' That may be
admitted, and it is equally a reproach to human nature
that civil punishments are sometimes just ; that society
is obliged to make war upon its own members, im
prison them, and even put them to death. Public war,
and municipal penal law, stand on the same founda
tion. Wars grow out of the necessity of restraining
by physical force the bad passions of men in nations,
as jails and scaffolds from the same necessity of re
straining individual men in society. National de
fences no more create war than punishments give
rise to crimes,
* Lord Aberdeen.

23
There is but one way to put an end to wars, and
wars and civil government will all end at once — when
men shall be universally good. And this will not be
brought about by theorists and ultra modern reformers.
There is one way — it was pointed out to us eighteen
hundred years ago — no visionary, impracticable, wild
scheme ; no declamation against classes and occupa
tions ; no illusive, delusive theory.
If wars shall cease, as we believe and hope they
one day will, they will cease because men obey the
injunctions of Christ. The scriptures nowhere de
nounce war in terms, they attack no classes, no pro
fessions, no occupations of men. They are addressed
to man as an individual, without regard to his station,
his profession, his country, or his age. They are in
structions to the human soul, the single, isolated hu
man soul, which must eventually as such single, iso
lated being, alone and unaccompanied give an account
of itself before its Maker. To every soul of man they
come direct, original, peculiar, as much so as if a new
revelation were made to each. Nor is there in them
one command which we could not at once obey, and
which it would not be for our present good, as well
as our future, immediately to obey. They denounce
neither war, nor civil government, but warn against
those vices which give occasion for both, and which,
if eradicated from the heart, would no longer cause a
necessity for either. Let each man adopt the rule of
life prescribed by our Saviour, and wars would fail of
themselves. Our Saviour does not reproach the cen
turion, who comes before him to ask his miraculous
interposition, with being a soldier ; he does not bid
him lay aside his weapon, and give up his command ;
but he so taught, that, were his instructions obeyed,
the sword of the soldier and the bars of the prison

24

would be no longer needed, punishment cease be
cause crime had ceased, and wars fail, because nation
no longer aggrieved or oppressed nation. As in every
thing else, so in wisdom and practicability the holy
teachings and writings excel all others. Let our
modern reformers take lessons from these highest of
all authorities, let them cleanse the fountain, let them
reform individual man, and nations will reform them
selves. We may not hope by any sudden and extraordinary
action of our own to put an end, at once, to the possi
bility of national warfare ; and instead of considering
impossible and extravagant propositions, or advocat
ing experiments in the face of all reason, of the teach
ings of liistory and experience, against the admoni
tions of those who have been esteerned the wisest and
most excellent among men, putting to hazard what
ever of freedom and prosperity we now possess, and all
our prospects of the future, let us rather consider what
is our duty, when such contingencies happen. He
would hardly be a pleasant companion, or a safe
guide to one wandering in the depths of some great
forest, who, instead of endeavoring with aU his art to
trace the narrow path, half overgrown with weeds and
thorns, that should lead through its gloomy mazes to
the open day, should amuse himself with making
plans of a broad road, conducting to a great city, to be
constructed at some future time.
Let us, instead of pursuing fanciful theories, endea
vor to trace our way along through the actual facts of
the present.
That wars are not likely soon to cease we must all
beheve; that they have not ceased, we happen to
know, from our being at this moment actually engag
ed in one. How shall Americans conduct themselves

26
in this war, or in any other war? I know of but one
rule, and that is well expressed by the Chief Magis
trate of our Commonwealth in his late proclamation —
"Whatever may be the difference of opinion as to
the origin or necessity of a war, when the constitu
tional authorities of the country have declared that
war with a foreign country actually exists, it is alike
the dictate of patriotism and humanity, that every
means, honorable to ourselves and just to our enemy,
should be employed to bring such war to a speedy
and successful termination. A prompt and energetic
cooperation of the whole people in the use of those
means, is eminently calculated to produce that most
desirable result."
The duties of a citizen, his rights and obligations,
are very plain to be understood. The highest obliga
tions of which man is capable are doubtless those
which he owes to his Maker and God. Next are
those which he owes to his country. These last arise
from the implied agreement which an individual is
supposed to make with the society of which he is a
member, and they are especially strong and impera
tive in a society, like our own, self-governed.
A man on becoming a member of society agrees to
part with certain natural rights, in exchange for the
benefits he receives from association. He agrees to
support that society and its laws, in consideration of
the protection which it affords him for his life, proper
ty and reputation. He obliges himself to obey and
support the laws of that society, and where, as with
us, he helps to make those laws, his obhgation is bind
ing to the utmost. It is one from which he can only
release himself when these laws, conflict with his duty
to his God. In that case, he may and should refuse
to obey the laws, and dare all consequences of such

26
refusal, and he should withdraw from that society,
and seek another, if he is permitted so to do, as with
us he is. He cannot remain receiving its benefits and
protection, and at the same time refusing to discharge
his own obligations to it. His conscience, which, so
tender and yet so powerful, leads him to refuse com
pliance with the injunctions of the laws of the land,
should also lead him to dechne receiving further per
formance of the engagements of society towards him,
while he refuses to fulfil his own towards society. A
citizen who knows the powers of Government and
helped to bestow them and create them, must support
them. He cannot set up his own individual opinion
as to their proper or improper exercise and obey only
when he thinks them rightfully and wisely employed,
and yet continue to be a citizen, or an honest member
of society. Such a course is inconsistent with all or
ganized government. It is nullification of the worst
sort ; and such a principle, if acted upon at aU, must
be fatal to aU government, state as well as national.
If a law of the United States is to be obeyed only
when one approves it, a law ofthe State is to be treat- >
ed in the same way ; each one must judge for himself,
whether on the whole he will obey, or not, any law
whatever. Let this principle become general, where
were government ? If it may justify one, it must jus
tify all in refusing to obey the requisitions of lawful
government, and every body sees, at once, that it
would produce the most absurd result in every attempt
at social order. There are no individuals in this coun
try who did not know, as soon as they knew anything,
that the Government of the United States had the
power to make war or peace, and that that govern
ment was chosen by a majority of the people ; and
there are few, moreover, who have not, in some form

27
or other, taken an oath to support that government.
How could any such people have ever consented to
that government, or especially taken an oath to sup
port it, when they knew that it had the power of do
ing what they beheved to be in violation of the Divine
law ; and how can they be content to continue to re
ceive the protection of that government, after it has
been guilty of such an enormity. To continue to do
so is to be guilty of a fraud. They must withdraw
from such society, if they cannot obey its laws, and
seek some other. They cannot conscientiously re
main members of it. A man may not be permitted to
throw off his obligation to society and yet remain in
it Allegiance to one's country and government is
not to be discarded like an old garment. There is
something real, tangible, substantial in the duties
which one owes to his country. Patriotism is not the
name of a shadow. It is as much a duty, as the love
of parents, or love of truth ; as the obhgations of mor
ality or honesty. It is a positive virtue, as it should
be, and is, to most men, a real pleasure.
If it be narrow minded to love one's country more
than another land, it is equally so to love one's friends
and parents more than strangers. We must regard
aliens and those most nearly connected with us, and
to whom we are bound by every tie that can draw
hearts together, with equal affection, upon the same
principle that we must look on foreign nations with
tike feehngs of interest and loyalty, as upon our own
land and people. The whole earth is thus to be em
braced in our impartial regard, and why stop at earth,
while there are other spheres ? Let our love take in
the other planets, and their satellites, and their inhab
itants, and let us extend an equal affection to the man
in the moon, and to the friends at our side.

28

There can be no great value in those sublimated
sentiments and affections, which overlook every thing
around, and stretch at vague and imaginary objects.
Instead of refining upon our duties, and rarefying our
affections, in the place of soaring into thin air and
empty space in search of vapory responsibilities, let
us attend to those substantial and real ones which
come upon us thick and fast enough ; let us acquit
ourselves of our every day, tangible, practical obhga
tions, before we seek new, imaginary, and greater
ones. Affections were given us for some real objects
and practical purposes ; whatever they are, they must
attach somewhere; whether like the gossamer, they
float lightly on the summer breeze, seeking to fasten
on some trifle, or bind us like cables, holding on,
through storms and tempests, where all our earthly
hopes are anchored ; and where do they, and where
should they, cling closer and stionger than round
home, and friends, and country.
No man can speak the words " Our Country" with
out an emotion. Let him hear them in a foreign
land! How at once before him rises all that he
loves ; his hopes, his pride, his joys, his treasures, all
are there. With that country, whh her institutions,
her fame, her happiness, he is identified. Nothing
can separate him from her. His character as a citizen
ofthe country clings to him, forever, and every where.
He cannot, if he would, shake it off. Her honors are
his, her glories are his, her fortunes are his, and who
desires other? The name of country haUows all that
belongs to it ; a withered leaf, a floating spar, a worth
less pebble is dear, if from home. Enemies, at home,
as one looks back on them, seem like friends ; domes
tic hatreds are forgotten, in that general love one feels
for aU his countiy. There is no better, nor nobler, nor

29

purer sentiment in the human heart than a just love
of country.
An American does, and should love his country,
with a pecuhar love ; in peace or in war. In war he
should be ready, always, to defend her with his body,
whenever lawfully called on by her authorities, whom
he has helped to establish, and undertaken and vowed
to support. In peace he should love and reverence
his country. It is not necessary that he should be a
vainglorious braggart, that he should esteem every
thing American vastly higher than any thing foreign,
or be so puffed up with empty pride as to be indiffer
ent to the opinions and sentiments of the world at
large ; a continual boasting of American prowess, and
over estimating American power and influence, and
prating about American liberty, and glory, and eagles,
and stars, and stripes, is no more a mark of a real pa
triot and true American, than it is of a wise man.
Those are apt to talk the most of their country's glory,
whether American or any other, who have the least
to do with it.
It is very natural and becoming to desire that our
country and its institutions should be esteemed by
others as highly as we esteem them ourselves, and it
cannot be considered bad taste to praise them, on
proper occasions. It is impossible for us to look
around and see how great and respectable a nation
we are, how rapidly we have grown in numbers, and
extended in territory; how generally good is the admin
istration of our laws, how small, compared with other
countries, the amount of crime, how general the diffu
sion of education and rehgion, how free from burdens
and grievances and subjects of complaint we are, how
universally prosperous and improving still, and with a
prospect so brilhant before us, that we hardly dare to

30
contemplate it ; it is impossible to look on all this and
consider that it is under such institutions and political
systems as our own, that all this has been accomplish
ed, without an irrepressible desire to give utterance to
our feelings of admiration of them, and to our belief
and confidence in their excellence.
Some things have indeed occurred among us which
we could well have wished had been otherwise — things
to give foreign nations an opportunity to reproach us
and ridicule us, and to make all good men in our own
country heartily ashamed — ^but what people ever had
less of national or popular mistake or wrong to repent ?
While striving to amend every thing of this sort that
may have occurred, we should regret it, more on ac
count of its influence on our own feelings, than for
what others may say or think ; since we are by no
means the originators of national or governmental
ill-doings, and may feel less mortified by the re
proaches bestowed on us than if they came from
sources quite pure themselves. It is not from Euro
pean nations that railings against us, for repudiation,
or slavery, or Lynch law, or murderous outrages,
come with any^ peculiar force. These things will be
neither the more nor the less regretted by us, because
they please or displease abroad.
We would not, of course, be indifferent to the opin
ions of Europe and of the world at large ; we desire
their approbation, but we should not attempt to shape
our conduct with a view particularly to their com
mendation. A repubhc can hardly expect to be very
cordially encouraged or heartily praised by monarch
ies. Our institutions are by no means according to
their ideas, and the results of them, if good, are suffi
ciently unwelcome not to be greatly applauded ; and
if bad, create but little sympathy, because rather in

31
keeping with their predictions or expectations, and
not wholly repugnant to their hopes. We are more
widely severed from Europe by a dissimilarity of po
htical condition than by longitude, and leagues of blue
ocean. This dissimilarity must give rise to a great
many others. It would be in vain, were it desirable,
for us to try to imitate in other matters, while in this
we are so unlike. Instead of looking abroad for a
standard of opinion, let us erect one, and raise it high,
at home.
The American Character is not an imitation, but a
creation, no copy, but an original. It is formed by cir
cumstances and position such as have never before
existed; it grows up under institutions which our
fathers framed and established of themselves, new,
extraordinary, wonderful, and hke no others. We are
here occupying the greater part of a vast continent,
stretching from sea to sea, containing within ourselves
most things that human wants, or arts, or taste can
desire; sufficient to ourselves in all physical things,
and very independent of all other people. We are
making a great experiment of self government by
twenty millions of people, scattered over so vast a
region, that they count their distances a part from
each other by thousands of miles ; we are growing,
expanding, forming ; no one can tell what we may
become. We are no more to be conformed to Euro
pean models, than one of our great mountain pines is
to be cut and trimmed like the boxwood of a flower
garden. Great examples have been given us for the forma
tion of our character by our own fathers. The giants,
whose descendants we are, have strode before us, that
we might look on them ; and He, above all others, He
whose name and whose fame are always in our hearts

32
and on our tongues. He, in whom all human excellen
cies were so combined, he has told us, not in words,
what the American citizen should be. He was an
American citizen whom all people, civilized and sav
age, with one voice, pronounce the first man of the
world. He was American in heart, and thought, and
deed. His virtues and character were American.
He was all American, but his fame, which belongs
to all people and to all times. From him, and the
great patriots and sages who surrounded him, we may
learn how an American citizen may best discharge
his duties to his country and to himself.
There are still other obligations also upon us, the just
performance of which depends on our fidelity to these.
With Washington's example before us, we cannot
be insensible to the obhgations we owe to mankind,
and the general cause of civil liberty. No man can
doubt that the future political condition of the world
depends in a great degree upon the success, or failure
of this experiment of ours. Upon the fate, not of a
small republic, of a free town, or a petty district self
governed, for such have flourished for ages without
influence, but of a great nation, tiying self govern
ment, and showing it to be fit, or otherwise, for the
ordering and welfare of mighty realms and multitudes
of people. If we fail, and break up, and fall into a
divided empire of small states, or are carried into a
military anarchy, like Mexico and the South Ameri
can Repubhcs, with petty generals and miserable
civil feuds, or become corrupt, licentious and disor
derly — good bye to all hopes of the general civil lib
erty of mankind. They sink
"Into the blind cave of eternal night."
But let us succeed, let us prove true to ourselves,

33
our country and the world, and show how a great
people may govern themselves; let us but understand
m what true national glory consists, value true liberty,
and knowledge, and social and rehgious institutions ;
estimate justly courage, manliness, patriotism ; let us
be observant of justice, punctual to engagements,
scrupulous in national faith, united, powerful, moder
ate, and virtuous, embodying chivalry in a national
form, let us be a people before the world " without
fear and without reproach ;" then, then shall we well
fulfil our great mission — then shall our country be the
great example among nations, as her first man was,
and is, among men. Her flag shall wave forever first
and highest — the stars that grace its folds shall shine
while those of Heaven shall cheer the night — her name
shall be another word for honor and renown — we shall
have done our duty.

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