CCLXIV.

SUMNER'S FIRST SPEECH IN THE SENATE.

SUMNER'S first great speech upon the repeal of the Fugi

tive Slave Law was the most significant event in the Senate since Mr. Webster's reply to Hayne, and an epitome of his whole career. It was one of the words that were events, and from which historical epochs take their departure.

The delivery of this speech was the very service that the country needed at that time; and that no dramatic effect should be wanting, as Henry Clay had left the Senate for the last time on the day that Mr. Sumner was sworn in, so, as he is making his first great plea for justice under the Constitution, his predecessor, Daniel Webster, then Secretary of State, came into the Chamber, and also for the last time.

I know no more impressive scene. There is the old Senator, then the chief figure in America, who, a year before, on the 7th of March, had made his last speech supporting the policy of the Fugitive Slave Bill, and against the Wilmot Proviso. Worn, wasted, sad, with powers so great and public services so renowned, the Olympian man who had sought so long, so ably, so vainly, to placate the implacable, his seventy years ending in baffled hopes and bitter disappointment and a broken heart, gazed with those eyes of depthless melancholy upon his suc

cessor.

And here stands that successor, with the light of spotless youth upon his face, towering, dauntless, radiant; the indomitable Puritan, speaking as a lawyer, as a statesman, and a man, not for his State alone, nor for his country only, but for human rights everywhere and always, forecasting the future, heralding the new America. As Webster looked and listened, did he recall the words of that younger man seven years before in Faneuil Hall, where he prayed the party that Webster led to declare for emancipation? Did he remember the impassioned appeal to himself, that as he had justly earned the title of Defender of the Constitution, so now he should devote his marvellous powers to the overthrow of slavery, and thereby win a nobler name? Alas! It was demanding dawn of the sunset. It

was beseeching yesterday to return to-morrow. ing Daniel Webster to be Charles Sumner.

66

It was implor

No, fellow-citizens, in that appeal Sumner forecast his own glory. Assume, then," cried he, "these unperformed duties. The aged shall bear witness to you; the young shall kindle with rapture as they repeat the name of Webster; the large company of the ransomed shall teach their children and their children's children to the latest generation to call you blessed, and you shall have yet another title, never to be forgotten on earth or in heaven, Defender of Humanity.”

G. W. Curtis.

WHAT

CCLXV.

OUR REFORMERS.

HAT to-day is the position of the men who, for the past thirty years, have worked to bring our practice into conformity with the principles of the Government, and who, in the struggle against established and powerful interests, have accepted political disability and humiliated lives? Have any of these been put in governing places where their proved fidelity would guarantee the direct execution of what is to-day the nearly unanimous will of the people? Certainly not yet. So far, the virtue of the reformers is its own reward. While they are yet living, their mantles have fallen upon the shoulders of others to whom you have given high position, but they are still laboring in narrow paths - broadening, to be sure, and brightening — for the rough ground is passed, and their sun of victory is already rising. We give deep sympathy and honor to the men who, in the interests of civilization, separated themselves from mankind to penetrate the chill solitudes of the Arctic regions. Their names remain an added constellation in polar skies. But, we know that bitter skies and winter winds are not so unkind as man's ingratitude. And why, then, do we withhold sympathy and honor from these men who have so unflinchingly trod their isolated paths of self-appointed duty, accepting political and social excommunication - these heroes of the moral solitudes ? But even as it is, our reformers have a better lot than history usually records for such; they have the satisfaction not only to see but to enter, with the people whom they led, into the promised land.

And perhaps they are well satisfied to repose, and to rest upon their finished work, feeling surely that they have been faithful servants and that their country will yet say to them, "Well done!"

-

Sometimes, in unfamiliar countries, the traveller finds himself shrouded in fog and the way so hidden, the features of the country so singularly changed from the reality, that he cannot safely move. But if some friendly mountain side lets him ascend a few hundred feet above, he finds himself suddenly in a clear atmosphere with a blue sky and a shining sun. Below him the smaller objects that misled and bewildered him lie hidden ; before him stand out, salient and clear, the leading ridges and great outlines of the country which point out to him the right way, and show him where he may reach a place of security and repose for the night, and he goes on his journey confidently. And so it is with those men who devote their lives, unflinchingly and singly, to the public good to the maintenance of principles and the advocacy of great reforms. They live in a pure atmosphere. And such ought also to be the character of the men whom we elevate to our high places. Raised into that upper air, and charged with the general safety, they are expected to be impersonal; they are expected to see over and beyond the personal ambitions and individual interests which of necessity influence men acting individually; their horizon is universal, and they see broadly defined the great principles which lead a nation continuously on to a settled prosperity and a sure glory. And as a condition of our material safety we should see to it that only such men are put in such places. Men capable of receiving a conviction and realizing a necessity - men able to comprehend the spirit of the age and the country in which we live, and fearless in working up to it.

J. C. Fremont.

CCLXVI.

PUBLIC RUMOR.

THE counsel for the prosecution has said that if the Reverend defendant has not been duly charged with heretical teachings by actual evidence, he has been so charged by public rumor; and he gravely contends that a clergyman charged by public

rumor may be required to exculpate himself before an ecclesiastical council.

There is a passion known among men as the most eager, implacable, remorseless of passions, a moral curiosity, named by psychologists the odium theologicum. It thrives on the slightest possible food. It lives on air. Public rumor is substantial enough for its richest diet. Public Rumor! I was educated to despise it. An established public opinion, we must treat with due respect, but disparaging rumor, however public, I should be ashamed to own as a motive for one action of my life. When the counsel for the prosecution passed his eulogy on the memory of Dr. Croswell, I could not but think what a rebuke his whole life was to public rumor. If ever man was the destined victim of public rumor, that man was WILLIAM CROSWELL. Not left to its low haunts, but elevated by Episcopal sanction, promulgated by Episcopal proclamation, it charged him with teaching doctrines and observances " degrading to the character of the Church and perilling the souls of the people." But in patience and confidence he lived it all down. He went forward in the discharge of his noble duties, in daily prayers, daily public service, daily ministrations to the poor, sick and afflicted, not without much suffering from the relentless attacks of party spirit, sufferings which shortened his days on earth, and the daily beauty of his life made ugly the countenance of detraction and defamation. Public confidence, a plant of slow growth, grew about him. Public justice was rendered to him without a movement of his own. He fell, at his posɩ, with all his armor on. At the time of the evening sacrifice, the angel touched him and he was called away. He fell, with his face to the altar, with the words of benediction on his lips, surrounded by a devoted congregation, mourned by an entire community. All men rose up and called him blessed. From the distinguished Rector of St. Paul's, exclaiming, in the words of the prophet, "My father, my father, the chariots of Israel and the horsemen thereof!" to the humble orphan child in the obscure alley, who missed his daily returning visit, all, all, with one accord, sent up their voices as incense to Heaven.

I had the privilege to be one of the number who received him on his entrance into this city, to take charge of his newly formed parish. I am proud and grateful to remember that I was one

of those on whom, in his long struggle, in a measure, according to my ability, he leaned for support. And after seven years, I believe seven years to the very day that we received him, I had the melancholy privilege, with that same company, of bearing his body up that aisle which he had so often ascended in his native dignity and in the beauty of holiness.

I should be an unworthy parishioner, pupil, I may say friend of his, if I allowed myself to defer for a moment to public rumor on a question of character or principle. I should be forgetful of his example if I permitted any one to do so who looked to me for counsel or direction. No, gentlemen, let us all, laymen or clergymen, call to mind his life and his death, and let public rumor blow past us as the idle wind.

R. H. Dana, Jr.

CCLXVII.

THE EDUCATION OF THE WAR.

OVER and above the ordinary and universal means of intel

lectual development, the Divine Providence, now and then, prepares extraordinary means to the same end, in those social convulsions and calamities that shake whole nations with the mighty upheavals of thought and passion. A war of secession and disintegration is upon us. The nation's integrity and its very life are at stake. It is an epoch that the most sluggish minds cannot sleep through. They who never thought before must think now. They who never felt before must feel now. The intellect of the nation is aroused in the presence of this immense issue. It is an educational epoch. Its perils, trials, sacrifices, are the school-discipline of God. The mind of the people grows up whole cubits of stature in a short time. The heart of the people is moved to its deepest depths, of all classes, but most of the most numerous and the governing class, the agricultural. And the heart is always the head's best ally. Deep feeling begets strong thinking. Sentiments of patriotism and loyalty, newborn and fervid, awaken and reinforce the intellect, raise up character, enlarge the whole man. And this reviving and reinvigorating influence will not pass away with the trials that produced it. When God educates, it is not for a day, but for generations. When He quickens a new life in the soul