allowed to exist in Missouri the rebellion will struggle, not without hope, for its ancient mastery. But let slavery cease at once and all will be changed. There will be no room for controversy or debate with attending weakness; nor can reaction lift its crest. There will be no opportunity to the rebellion, which must cease all effort there, when Missouri can no longer be a slave state. Freedom will become our watchful, generous, and invincible ally, while the well-being, the happiness, the repose, and the renown of Missouri will be established forever.

Thus far, sir, I have presented the argument on grounds peculiar to this case; and here I might stop. Having shown, that as a military necessity, and for the sake of that economy which it is our duty to cultivate, emancipation must be immediate, I need not go further. But I do not content myself here. The whole question is opened between immediate emancipation and prospective emancipation,—or, in other words, between doing right at once and doing right at some future, distant day. Procrastination is the thief, not only of time, but of virtue itself. Yet such is the nature of man that he is disposed always to delay, so that he does nothing to-day which he can put off till to-morrow. Perhaps in no single matter is the disposition more apparent than with regard to slavery. Every consideration of humanity, religion, reason, common sense, and history, all demanded the instant cessation of an intolerable wrong, without procrastination or delay. But human nature would not yield, and we have been driven to argue the question, whether an outrage, asserting property in man, denying the conjugal relation, annulling the parental relation, shutting out human improvement, and robbing its victim of all the fruits of his industry,-the whole to compel work without wagesshould be stopped instantly or gradually. It is only when we regard slavery in its essential elements, and look at its unutterable and unquestionable atrocity, that we fully comprehend the mingled folly and wickedness of this question. If it were merely a question of economy, or a question of policy, then the Senate might properly debate whether the change should be instant or gradual; but considerations of economy and policy are all absorbed in the higher claims of justice and humanity. There is no question whether justice and humanity shall be immediate or gradual. Men are to cease at once from wrong; they are to obey the ten commandments instantly, and not gradually.

Senators who argue for prospective emancipation show themselves insensible to the true character of slavery, or insensible to the requirements of reason. One or the other of these alternatives must be accepted.

Shall property in man be disowned immediately, or only prospectively? Reason answers-immediately.

Shall the conjugal relation be maintained immediately, or only prospectively? Reason recoils from the wicked absurdity of the inquiry.

Shall the parental relation be recognized immediately, or only prospectively? Reason is indignant at the question.

Shall the opportunities of knowledge, including the right to read the Book of Life, be opened immediately or prospectively? Reason brands the idea of delay as impious.

Shall the fruits of his own industry be given to a fellow-man immediately or prospectively? Reason insists that every man shall have his own without postponement.

And history, thank God, speaking by example, testifies in conformity with reason. The conclusion is irresistible. If you would contribute to the strength and honor of the nation, if you would bless Missouri, if you would benefit the slave-master, if you would elevate the slave, and still further, if you would afford an example which shall fortify and consecrate the Republic, making it at once citadel and temple, do not put off the day of freedom. In this case, more than in any other, he gives twice who quickly gives.

NATIONAL CEMETERY AT GETTYSBURG.

EDWARD EVERETT.

November 19, 1863.

Standing beneath this serene sky, overlooking these broad fields now reposing from the labors of the waning year, the mighty Alleghanies dimly towering before us, the graves of our brethren beneath our feet, it is with hesitation that I raise my poor voice to break the eloquent silence of God and Nature. But the duty to which you have called me must be performed;-grant me, I pray you, your indulgence and your sympathy.

It was appointed by law in Athens, that the obsequies of the citizens who fell in battle should be performed at the public expense, and in the most honorable manner. Their bones were carefully gathered up from the funeral pyre where their bodies were consumed, and brought home to the city. There, for three days before the interment, they lay in state, beneath tents of honor, to receive the votive offerings of friends and relatives,-flowers, weapons, precious ornaments, painted vases, wonders of art, which after two thousand years adorn the museums of modern Europe, -the last tributes of surviving affection. Ten coffins of funeral cypress received the honorable deposit, one for each of the tribes of the city, and an eleventh in memory of the unrecognized, but not therefore unhonored, dead, and of those whose remains could not be recovered. On the fourth day the mournful procession was formed: mothers, wives, sisters, daughters, led the way, and to them it was permitted by the simplicity of ancient man

ners to utter aloud their lamentations for the beloved and the lost; the male relatives and friends of the deceased followed; citizens and strangers closed the train. Thus marshalled, they moved to the place of interment in that famous Ceramicus, the most beautiful suburb of Athens, which had been adorned by Cimon, the son of Miltiades, with walks and fountains and columns,-whose groves were filled with altars, shrines, and temples,-whose gardens were kept forever green by the streams from the neighboring hills, and shaded with the trees sacred to Minerva and coëval with the foundation of the city,—whose circuit enclosed

"the olive grove of Academe,

-Plato's retirement, where the Attic bird

Trilled his thick-warbled note the summer long,"

whose pathways gleamed with the monuments of the illustrious dead, the work of the most consummate masters that ever gave life to marble. There, beneath the overarching plane-trees, upon a lofty stage erected for the purpose, it was ordained that a funeral oration should be pronounced by some citizen of Athens, in the presence of the assembled multitude.

As

Such were the tokens of respect required to be paid at Athens to the memory of those who had fallen in the cause of their country. For those alone who fell at Marathon a peculiar honor was reserved. the battle fought upon that immortal field was distinguished from all others in Grecian history for its influence over the fortunes of Hellas, -as it depended upon the event of that day whether Greece should live, a glory and a light to all coming time, or should expire, like the meteor of a moment; so the honors awarded to its martyr-heroes were such as were bestowed by Athens on no other occasion. They alone of all her sons were entombed upon the spot which they had forever rendered famous. Their names were inscribed upon ten pillars erected upon the monumental tumulus which covered their ashes (where, after six hundred years, they were read by the traveller Pausanias), and although the columns, beneath the hand of time and barbaric violence, have long since disappeared, the venerable mound still marks the spot where they fought and fell,—

"That battle-field where Persia's victim-horde

First bowed beneath the brunt of Hellas' sword."

And shall I, fellow-citizens, who, after an interval of twenty-three centuries, a youthful pilgrim from the world unknown to ancient Greece, have wandered over that illustrious plain, ready to put off the shoes from off my feet, as one that stands on holy ground—who have gazed with respectful emotion on the mound which still protects the dust of those who rolled back the tide of Persian invasion, and rescued the land of popular liberty, of letters, and of arts, from the ruthless foe-stand unmoved over the graves of our dear brethren.

who so lately, on three of those all-important days which decide a nation's history-days on whose issue it depended whether this august Republican Union, founded by some of the wisest statesmen that ever lived, cemented with the blood of some of the purest patriots that ever died, should perish or endure-rolled back the tide of an invasion, not less unprovoked, not less ruthless, than that which came to plant the dark banner of Asiatic despotism and slavery on the free soil of Greece? Heaven forbid! And could I prove so insensible to every prompting of patriotic duty and affection, not only would you, fellow-citizens, gathered many of you from distant states, who have come to take part in these pious offices of gratitude-you. respected fathers, brethren, matrons, sisters, who surround me-cry out for shame, but the forms of brave and patriotic men who fill these honored graves would heave with indignation beneath the sod.

We have assembled, friends, fellow-citizens, at the invitation of the Executive of the great central State of Pennsylvania, seconded by the Governors of seventeen other loyal states of the Union, to pay the last tribute of respect to the brave men who, in the hard-fought battles of the first, second, and third days of July last, laid down their lives for the country on these hillsides and the plains before us, and whose remains have been gathered into the cemetery which we consecrate this day. As my eye ranges over the fields whose sods were so lately moistened by the blood of gallant and loyal men, I feel, as never before, how truly it was said of old that it is sweet and becoming to die for one's country. I feel, as never before, how justly, from the dawn of history to the present time, men have paid the homage of their gratitude and admiration to the memory of those who nobly sacrificed their lives that their fellow-men may live in safety and in honor. And if this tribute were ever due, to whom could it be more justly paid than to those whose last resting-place we this day commend to the blessing of Heaven and of men?

For consider, my friends what would have been the consequences to the country, to yourselves, and to all you hold dear, if those who sleep beneath our feet, and their gallant comrades who survive to serve their country on other fields of danger, had failed in their duty on those memorable days. Consider what, at this moment, would be the condition of the United States, if that noble Army of the Potomac, instead of gallantly and for the second time beating back the tide of invasion from Maryland and Pennsylvania, had been itself driven from these well-contested heights, thrown back in confusion on Baltimore, or trampled down, discomfited, scattered to the four winds. What, in that sad event, would not have been the fate of the monumental city of Harrisburg, of Philadelphia, of Washington, the capital of the Union, each and every one of which would have lain at the mercy of the enemy, accordingly as it might have pleased him, spurred by passion, flushed with victory, and confident of continued success, to direct his course?

For this we must bear in mind-it is one of the great lessons of the war, indeed of every war, that it is impossible for a people without military organization, inhabiting the cities, towns, and villages of an open country, including, of course, the natural proportion of noncombatants of either sex and of every age, to withstand the inroad of a veteran army. What defence can be made by the inhabitants of villages mostly built of wood, of cities unprotected by walls, nay, by a population of men, however high-toned and resolute, whose aged parents demand their care, whose wives and children are clustering about them, against the charge of the war-horse whose neck is clothed with thunder-against flying artillery and batteries of rifled cannon planted on every commanding eminence-against the onset of trained veterans led by skilful chiefs?

No, my friends, army must be met by army, battery by battery, squadron by squadron; and the shock of organized thousands must be encountered by the firm breasts and valiant arms of other thousands, as well organized and as skilfully led. It is no reproach, therefore, to the unarmed population of the country to say, that we owe it to the brave men who sleep in their beds of honor before us, and to their gallant surviving associates, not merely that your fertile fields, my friends of Pennsylvania and Maryland, were redeemed from the presence of the invader, but that your beautiful capitals were not given up to the threatened plunder, perhaps laid in ashes, Washington, seized by the enemy, and a blow struck at the heart of the nation.

Who that hears me has forgotten the thrill of joy that ran through the country on the fourth of July-auspicious day for the glorious tidings, and rendered still more so by the simultaneous fall of Vicksburg-when the telegraph flashed through the land the assurance from the President of the United States that the Army of the Potomac, under General Meade, had again smitten the invader? Sure I am, that with the ascriptions of praise that rose to Heaven from twenty millions of freemen, with the acknowledgements that breathed from patriotic lips throughout the length and breadth of America, to the surviving officers and men who had rendered the country this inestimable service, there beat in every loyal bosom a throb of tender and sorrowful gratitude to the martyrs who had fallen on the sternly-con. tested field.

Let a nation's fervent thanks make some amends for the toils and sufferings of those who survive. Would that the heart-felt tribute could penetrate these honored graves!

In order that we may comprehend, to their full extent, our obligations to the martyrs and surviving heroes of the Army of the Potomac, let us contemplate for a few moments the train of events which culminated in the battles of the first days of July. Of this stupendous rebellion, planned, as its originators boast, more than thirty years ago, matured and prepared for during an entire generation, finally