such as I have suggested—and I ask you if it is possible for you to doubt that the final but perhaps distant termination of the whole will be some despot treading down the liberties of the people? - that the final result will be the extinction of this last glorious light which is leading all mankind, who are gazing upon it, to cherish hope and anxious expectation that the liberty which prevails here will sooner or later be advanced throughout the civilized world? Can you lightly contemplate the consequences? Can you yield yourself to a torrent of passion, amidst dangers which I have depicted in colors far short of what would be the reality, if the event should ever happen? I conjure gentlemen- whether from the South or the North, by all they hold dear in the world— by all their love of liberty - by all their veneration for their ancestors by all their regard for posterity-by all their gratitude to Him who has bestowed upon them such unnumbered blessings-by all the duties which they owe to mankind, and all the duties which they owe to themselves - by all these considerations I implore them to pause-solemnly to pause at the edge of the precipice, before the fearful and disastrous leap is taken in the yawning abyss below, which will inevitably lead to certain and irretrievable destruction. And, finally, I implore, as the best blessing which heaven can bestow upon me upon earth, that if the direful and sad event of the dissolution of the Union shall happen, I may not survive to behold the sad and heart-rending spectacle.

XLII. THE PRESERVATION OF THE UNION.

DANIEL WEBSTER.

I. I PROFESS, sir, in my career hitherto, to have kept steadily in view the prosperity and honor of the whole country, and the preservation of our Federal Union. It is to that Union we owe our safety at home, and our consideration and dignity abroad. It is to that Union that we are chiefly indebted for whatever makes us most proud of our country. That Union we reached only by the discipline of our virtue, in

the severe school of adversity. It had its origin in the necessities of disordered finance, prostrate commerce, and ruined credit. Under its benign influences, these great interests immediately awoke, as from the dead, and sprang forth with newness of life. Every year of its duration has teemed with fresh proof of its utility and its blessings; and although our country has stretched out, wider and wider, and our population stretched farther and farther, they have not overturned its protection, or its benefits. It has been to us all a copious fountain of national, social, and personal happiness.

2. I have not allowed myself, sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed the chances of preserving liberty, when the bonds that unite us together shall be broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hang over the precipice of disunion, to see whether, in my short sight, I can fathom the depth of the abyss below; nor could I regard him as a safe counsellor, in the affairs of this government, whose thoughts should be mainly bent on considering, not how the Union should be best preserved, but how tolerable might be the condition of the people when it shall be broken up and destroyed.

3. While the Union lasts, we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us, for us and our children. Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant that, in my day at least, that curtain may not rise. God grant that on my vision never may be opened what lies behind. When my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on States dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and lingering glance, rather, behold the gorgeous ensign of the Republic, now known and

honored throughout the earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their original lustre, not a stripe erased or polluted, not a single star obscured; bearing for its motto, no such miserable interrogatory as, What is all this worth? Nor those other words of delusion and folly liberty first and union afterwards-but everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing on all its ample folds as they float over the sea and over the land, and in every wind under the whole heavens, that other sentiment dear to every true American heart-liberty and union, now and forever, one and inseparable.

XLIII. DUTY OF AMERICA.

DANIEL WEBSTER.

NEITHER individuals nor nations can perform their part well, until they understand and feel its importance, and comprehend and justly appreciate all the duties belonging to it. It is not to inflate national vanity, nor to swell a light and empty feeling of self-importance, but it is that we may judge justly of our situation, and of our duties, that I earnestly urge this consideration of our position, and our character, among the nations of the earth. It cannot be denied, but by those who would dispute against the sun, that with America, and in America, a new era commences in human affairs. This era is distinguished by free representative governments, by entire religious liberty, by improved systems of national intercourse, by a newly awakened and unconquerable spirit of free inquiry, and by a diffusion of knowledge through the community, such as has been before altogether unknown and unheard of. America, America, our country, our own dear and native land, is inseparably connected, fast bound up, in fortune and by fate, with these great interests. If they fall, we fall with them; if they stand, it will be because we have upholden them. Let us contemplate, then, this connection, which binds the prosperity of others to our own; and let us

manfully discharge all the duties which it imposes. If we cherish the virtues and the principles of our fathers, Heaven will assist us to carry on the work of human liberty and human happiness. Auspicious omens cheer us. Great examples are before us. Our own firmament now shines brightly upon our path. Washington is in the clear upper sky. There other stars have now joined the American constellation; they circle round their centre, and the heavens beam with new light. Beneath this illumination, let us walk the course of life, and at its close devoutly commend our beloved country, the common parent of us all, to the Divine Benignity.

XLIV. TREATMENT OF THE AMERICAN COLONIES.-CHATHAM.

I. MY LORDS, - I rise with astonishment to see these papers brought to your table at so late a period of this business; papers, to tell us what? Why, what all the world knew before; that the Americans, irritated by repeated injuries, and stripped of their inborn rights and dearest privileges, have resisted, and entered into associations for the preservation of their common liberties.

2. Had the early situation of the people of Boston been attended to, things would not have come to this. But the infant complaints of Boston were literally treated like the capricious squalls of a child, who, it was said, did not know whether it was aggrieved or not. But full well I knew at that time that this child, if not redressed, would soon assume the courage and voice of a man. Full well I knew that the sons of ancestors, born under the same free constitution, and once breathing the same liberal air, as Englishmen, would resist upon the same principles and on the same occasions.

3. What has government done? They have sent an armed force, consisting of seventeen thousand men, to dragoon the Bostonians into what is called their duty; and, so far from once turning their eyes to the impolicy and destruc

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tive consequence of this scheme, are constantly sending out more troops. And we are told, in the language of menace, that, if seventeen thousand men won't do, fifty thousand shall. It is true, my lords, with this force they may ravage the country, waste and destroy as they march; but in the progress of fifteen hundred miles, can they occupy the places they have passed? Will not a country which can produce three millions of people, wronged and insulted as they are, start up, like hydras, in every corner, and gather fresh strength from fresh opposition? Nay, what dependence can you have upon the soldiery, the unhappy engines of your wrath? They are Englishmen, who must feel for the privileges of English men. Do you think that these men can turn their arms against their brethren? Surely not. A victory must be to them a defeat; and carnage, a sacrifice.

4. But it is not merely three millions of people, the produce of America, we have to contend with in this unnatural struggle; many more are on their side, dispersed over the face of this wide empire. Every Whig in this country and in Ireland is with them. Who, then, let me demand, has given, and continues to give, this strange and unconstitutional advice?

5. I do not mean to level at any one man, or any particular set of men; but thus much I will venture to declare, that if His Majesty continues to hear such counsellors, he will not only be badly advised, but undone. He may continue, indeed, to wear his crown; but it will not be worth his wearing. Robbed of so principal a jewel as America, it will lose its lustre, and no longer beam that effulgence which should irradiate the brow of majesty.

6. In this alarming crisis, I come, with this paper in my hand, to offer you the best of my experience and advice; which is, that an humble petition be presented to His Majesty, beseeching him, that, in order to open the way towards a happy settlement of the dangerous troubles in America, it