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62. Conclusion of Webster's Plymouth Discourse.

The hours of this day are rapidly flying, and this occasion will soon be passed. Neither we nor our children can expect to behold its return. They are in the distant regions of futurity, they exist only in the all5 creating power of God, who shall stand here a hundred years hence, to trace through us, their descent from the Pilgrims, and to survey, as we have now surveyed, the progress of their country, during the lapse of a century. We would anticipate their concurrence with us in our 10 sentiments of deep regard for our common ancestors. We would anticipate and partake the pleasure with which they will then recount the steps of New-England's advancement. On the morning of that day, although it will not disturb us in our repose, the voice of acclama15 tion and gratitude, commencing on the rock of Plymouth, shall be transmitted through millions of the sons of the Pilgrims, till it lose itself in the murmurs of the Pacific seas.

We would leave for the consideration of those who 20 shall then occupy our places, some proof that we hold the blessings transmitted from our fathers in just estimation; some proof of our attachment to the cause of good government, and of civil and religious liberty; some proof of a sincere and ardent desire to promote 25 every thing which may enlarge the understandings and improve the hearts of men. And when, from the long distance of an hundred years, they shall look back upon us, they shall know, at least, that we possessed affections, which running backward, and warming with 30 gratitude for what our ancestors have done for our happiness, run forward also to our posterity, and meet them with cordial salutation, ere yet they have arrived on the shore of being.

Advance, then, ye future generations! We would 35 hail you as you rise in your long succession, to fill the places which we now fill, and to taste the blessings of existence, where we are passing, and soon shall have passed our own human duration. We bid you welcome to this pleasant land of the fathers. We bid you

40 welcome to the healthful skies, and the verdant fields of New England. We greet your accession to the great inheritance which we have enjoyed. We welcome you to the blessings of good government and religious liberty. We welcome you to the treasures of science, and 45 the delights of learning. We welcome you to the transcendent sweets of domestic life, to the happiness of kindred, and parents, and children. We welcome you to the immeasurable blessings of rational existence, the immortal hope of Christianity, and the light of everlast50 ing truth.

63.

Address to the Patriots of the Revolution.

VENERABLE MEN! you have come down to us, from a former generation. Heaven has bounteously lengthened out your lives, that you might behold this joyous day. You are now, where you stood fifty years ago, 5 this very hour, with your brothers, and your neighbors, shoulder to shoulder, in the strife of your country. Behold how altered! The same heavens are indeed over your heads, the same ocean rolls at your feet. But all else, how changed! You hear now no roar of 10 hostile cannon, you see no mixed volumes of smoke and flame rising from burning Charlestown. The ground strewed with the dead and the dying; the impetuous charge; the steady and successful repulse; the loud call to repeated assault; the summoning of all that is 15 manly to repeated resistance; a thousand bosoms freely and fearlessly bared in an instant to whatever of terror there may be in war and death :-all these you have witnessed, but you witness them no more. All is peace. The heights of yonder metropolis, its towers 20 and roofs which you then saw filled with wives and children and countrymen in distress and terror, and looking with unutterable emotions for the issue of the combat, have presented you to-day with the sight of its whole happy population, come out to welcome and 25 greet you with an universal jubilee. Yonder proud ships, by a felicity of position appropriately lying at the

foot of this mount, and seeming fondly to cling around it, are not means of annoyance to you, but your country's own means of distinction and defence. All is 30 peace; and God has granted you this sight of your country's happiness, ere you slumber in the grave forever. He has allowed you to behold and partake the reward of your patriotic toils; and he has allowed us, your sons and countrymen, to meet you here, and in the 35 name of the present generation, in the name of your country, in the name of liberty, to thank you!

But, alas! you are not all here! Time and the sword have thinned your ranks. Prescott, Putnam, Stark, Brooks, Read, Pomeroy, Bridge! our eyes seek 40 for you in vain amidst this broken band. You are gathered to your fathers, and live only to your country in her grateful remembrance, and your own bright example. But let us not too much grieve, that you have met the common fate of men. You lived, at least, long 45 enough to know that your work had been nobly and successfully accomplished. You lived to see your country's independence established, and to sheathe your swords from war. On the light of Liberty you saw arise the light of Peace, like

'another morn,

Risen on mid-noon;'

and the sky on which you closed your eyes, was cloudless. Webster.

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ROMANS, Countrymen, and lovers, hear me for my cause; and be silent that you may hear. Believe me for mine honor; and have respect to mine honor, that you may believe. Censure me in your wisdom; and 5 awake your senses, that you may the better judge.—If there be any in this assembly, any dear friend of Cæsar's, to him I say, that Brutus' love to Cæsar was no less than his. If, then, that friend demand why Brutus rose against Cæsar, this is my answer: Not that I loved 10 Cæsar less, but that I loved Rome more. Had you

rather Cæsar were living, and die all slaves: than that Cæsar were dead, to live all freemen? As Cæsar loved

me, I weep for him; as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it, as he was valiant, I honor him; but as he was 15 ambitious, I slew him. There are tears, for his love; joy, for his fortune; honor for his valor; and death, for his ambition.-Who's here so base that would be a bondman? if any, speak; for him have I offended. Who's here so rude, that would not be a Roman? if 20 any, speak; for him have I offended. Who's here so vile, that will not love his country? if any, speak; for him have I offended, -I pause for a reply :

None! Then none have I offended.-I have done no more to Cæsar than you shall do to Brutus. The ques25 tion of his death is enrolled in the capitol; his glory not extenuated, wherein he was worthy; nor his offences enforced, for which he suffered death.

Here comes his body, mourned by Mark Antony; 30 who, though he had no hand in his death, shall receive -the benefit of his dying-a place in the commonwealth; as which of you shall not?-With this I depart; that, as I slew my best lover for the good of Rome, I have the same dagger for myself, when it shall please 35 my country to need my death. Shakspeare.

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Almost for the last time, lord Chatham displayed his admirable eloquence in opposing the address moved in the house of lords, on his late majesty's speech from the throne in 1778. Some censure having been ex5 pressed on the employing of savages against the armies of the insurgent Americans, the measure was defended by his majesty's ministers; and the pompous Suffolk, as he is described by Junius, declared that administration would have been highly reprehensible, if, en10 trusted as they were with the suppression of so unnatural a rebellion, they had not used all the means to suppress it which God and Nature had put into their hands."-Lord Chatham rose, and said:

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My lords, I cannot,-I will not join in congratula

15 tion on misfortune and disgrace. This is a perilous and tremendous moment-it is not a time for adulation -the smoothness of flattery cannot save us in this rugged and awful crisis. It is now necessary to instruct the throne in the language of truth. We must, if pos20 sible, dispel the delusion and darkness which envelope it; and display, in its full danger and genuine colors, the ruin which is brought to our doors. Can ministers

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still presume to expect support in their infatuation? Can parliament be so dead to their dignity and duty, 25 as to give their support to measures thus obtruded and forced upon them? Measures, which have reduced this late flourishing empire to scorn and contempt.

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But, who is the man, that in addition to the disgra ces and mischiefs of the war, has dared to authorize and 30 associate to our arms the tomahawk and scalping-knife of the savage; to call into civilized alliance the wild and inhuman inhabitant of the woods? to delegate to the merciless Indian the defence of disputed rights and to wage the horrors of his barbarous war against our 35 brethren? this barbarous measure has been defended, not only on the principles of policy and necessity, but also on those of morality; for it is perfectly allowable,' says lord Suffolk, to use the means God and Nature have put into our hands!' I am astonished, I am 40 shocked to hear such principles confessed, to hear them avowed in the house, for this country. My lords, I did not intend to encroach so much on your attention; but I cannot repress my indignation; I feel myself impelled to speak. We are called upon as members of this house, 45 as men, as Christians, to protest against such horrible barbarity that God and nature have put into our hands!' What ideas of God and Nature that noble lord may entertain, I know not; but I know that such detestable principles are equally abhorrent to religion 50 and humanity. What! to attribute the sacred sanction of God and Nature to the massacres of the Indian scalping-knife! to the cannibal savage, torturing, murdering, devouring, drinking the blood of his mangled victims! Such notions shock every precept of morality,

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