609. NATIONAL UNION. Do not, gentlemen, suffer the rage of passion to drive reason from her seat. If this law be indeed bad, let us join to remedy its defects. Has it been passed in a manner which wounded your pride, or roused your resentment? Have, I conjure you, the magnanimity to pardon that offence. I entreat, I implore you, to sacri fice those angry passions to the interests of our country. Pour out this pride of opinion on the altar of patriotism. Let it be an expiatory libation for the weal of America. Do not suffer that pride to plunge us all into the abyss of ruin. Indeed, indeed, it will be but of little, very little avail, whether one opinion or the other be right or wrong; it will heal no wounds, it will pay no debts, it will rebuild no ravaged towns. Do not rely on that popular will, which has brought us frail beings into political existence. That opinion is but a changeable thing. It will soon change. This very measure will change it. You will be deceived. Do not, I beseech you, in reliance on a foundation so frail, commit the dignity, the harmony, the existence of our nation to the wild wind. Trust not your treasure to the waves. Throw not your compass and your charts into the ocean. Do not believe that its billows will waft you into port. Indeed, indeed, you will be deceived. Cast not away this only anchor of our safety. I have seen its progress. I know the diffi culties through which it was obtained. I stand in the presence of Almighty God and of the world. I declare to you, that if you lose this charter, never, no never, will you get another. We are now perhaps arrived at the parting point. Here, even here, we stand on the brink of fate. Pause, then-pause. For Heaven's sake, pause.-Morris. ATHEIST AND ACORN. "Methinks the world-seems oddly made, Its ill contrivance knows. My better judgment-would have hung No more-the caviler could say, No further faults descry; For, upwards gazing, as he lay, An acorn, loosened from its spray, Fell down upon his eye. The wounded part-with tears ran o'er, Fool! had that bough--a pumpkin bore, MY COUNTRY. I love my country's pine-clad hils, In wild fantastic forms. I love her rivers, deep and wide, The haunts of peaceful rest. I love her forests, dark and lone, In varied colors bright. Her forests and her valleys fair, Her flowers, that scent the morning air, Have all their charms for me; But more-I love my country's name, Those words, that echo deathless fame, "The land of LIBERTY."-Anon. 610. SUBLIMITY OF MOUNTAIN SCENERY. the eye, and mind of man, mountains-have Of all the sights, that nature offers te always stirred my strongest feelings. I have the bottom by tempest, and noon-was like seen the ocean, when it was turned up from night, with the conflict of the billows, and the storm, that tore, and scattered them, in mist and foam, across the sky. I have seen the desert rise around me, and calmly, in the midst of thousands, uttering cries of horror, and paralysed by fear, have contemplated the sandy pillars, coming like the advance of some gigantic city of conflagration-flying across the wilderness, every column glowing with intense fire, and every blast-death; the sky-vaulted with gloom, the earth-a furnace. But with me, the mountain, in tempest, or in calm, the throne of the thunder, or with the evening sun, painting its dells and declivities in colors dipped in heaven-has been the source of the most absorbing sensations. There stands magnitude, giving the instant impression of a power above man-grandeur, that defies decay-antiquity, that tells of ages unnumbered-beauty, that the touch of time makes only more beautiful--use, ex haustless for the service of man-strength imperishable as the globe; the monument of eternity, the truest earthly emblem of that ever-living, unchangeable, irresistible Majesty, by whom and for whom, all things were made!-Croly. The time shall come, the fated hour is nigh. A mere anatomy, a mountedank, False pleasure-from abroad her joys imparts. READINGS AND RECITATIONS. 611. THE MURDERER: KNAPP'S TRIAL. Though I could well have wished to shun this occasion, I have not felt at liberty, to withhold my professional assistance, when it is supposed, that I might be, in some degree, useful-in investigating, and discovering the truth, respecting this most extraordinary murder. It has seemed to be a duty, incumbent on me, as on every other citizen, to do my best, and my utmost, to bring to light the perpetrators of this crime. Against the prisoner at the bar, as an individual, I cannot have the slightest prejudice. I would not do him the smallest injury or injustice. But I do not affect to be indifferent to the discovery, and the punishment, of this deep guilt. I cheerfully share in the opprobrium, how much soever it may be, which is cast on those, who feel, and manifest, an anxious concern, that all who had a part in planning, or a hand in executing, this deed of midnight assassination, may be brought to answer for their enormous crime, at the bar of public justice. Gentlemen, it is a most extraordinary case. In some respects, it has hardly a precedent anywhere; certainly none in our New England history. This bloody drama exhibited no suddenly excited, ungovernable rage. The actors in it were not surprised by any lion-like temptation, springing upon their virtue, and overcoming it, before resistance could begin. Nor did they do the deed to glut savage vengeance, or satiate long-settled, and deadly hate. It was a cool, calculating, money-making murder. It was all "hire and salary, not revenge." It was the weighing of money against life: the counting out of so many pieces of silver, against so many ounces of blood. An aged man, without an enemy in the world, in his own house, and in his own bed, is made the victim of a butcherly murder, for mere pay. Truly, here is a new lesson for painters and poets. Whosoever shall hereafter draw the portrait of Murder, if he will show it as it has been exhibited in one example, where such example was last to have been looked for, in the very bosom of our New England society, let him not give the grim visage of Moloch, the brow, knitted by revenge, the face, black with settled hate, and the blood-shot eye, emitting livid fires of malice. Let him draw, rather, a decorous, smoothfaced, bloodless demon; a picture in repose, rather than in action; not so much an example of human nature, in its depravity, and in its paroxysms of crime, as an infernal nature, a fiend, in the ordinary display, and development of his character." The deed was executed with a degree of self-possession and steadiness, equal to the wickedness with which it was planned. The circumstances, now clearly in evidence, spread out the whole scene before us. Deep sleep had fallen on the destined victim, and on all beneath his roof,-a healthful old man to whom sleep was sweet;-the first sound slumbers of the night held him in their soft but strong embrace. The assassin enters, through the window already prepared, into an unoccupied apartment. With noiseless foot he paces the lonely hall, half-lighted by the moon; he winds up the ascent of the stairs, and reaches the door of the chamber. Of this he moves the lock, by soft and continued pressure, till it turns on its hinges without noise; and he enters, and Ah! gentlemen, that was a dreadful mistake. A vulture is devouring it, and it can ask no or earth. The secret, which the murderer assistance, or sympathy, either from heaven, possesses, soon comes to possess him; and, like the evil spirits, of which we read, it overcomes him, and leads him whithersoever it will. He feels it beating at his heart, rising to his throat, and demanding disclosure. He thinks the whole world sees it in his face, reade it in his eyes, and almost hears its workings in the very silence of his thoughts. It has become his master. It betrays his discretion, it breaks down his courage, it conquers his prudence. When suspicions from without begin to embarass him, and the net of circumstance to entangle him, the fatal secret struggles, with still greater violence, to burst forth. It must be confessed, it will be confessed, there is no refuge from confession, but suicide, an 1 suicide is confession. 612. ANTONY'S ORATION OVER CESAR. And grievously-hath Cesar answered it. He hath brought many captives home to Rome, When that the poor have cried, Cesar hath wept; I speak not to disprove-what Brutus spoke, Have stood against the world! now, lies he there, And none so poor-to do him reverence. Unto their issue. If you have tears, prepare to shed them now For when the noble Cesar-saw him stab, (Which all the while ran blood) great Cesar-fell. They, that have done this deed, are honorable; But, as you know me all, a plain-blunt man, And Brutus-Antony, there were an Antony- 613. THE INVALID ABROAD. It is a sad thing, to feel that we must die, away from our own home. Tell not the invalid, who is yearning after his distant country, that the atmos phere around him is soft, that the gales are filfed with balm, and that the flowers are spring. ing from the green earth; he knows, that the softest air to his heart, would be the air, whicn hangs over his native land; that, more gratefully than all the gales of the south, would breathe low whispers of anxious affection, that the very icicles, clinging to his own eaves, and snow, beating against his own windows, would be far more pleasant to his eyes, than the bloom and verdure, which only more for. cibly remind him, how far he is from that one spot, which is dearer to him, than all the world beside. He may, indeed, find estimable friends, who will do all in their power to pronote his comfort, and assuage his pains: they cannot supply the place of the long known and long loved; they cannot read, as in a book, the mute language of his face; they have not learned to wait upon his habits, and anticipate his wants, and he has not learned to communicate, without hesitation, all his wishes, impressions, and thoughts to them. He feels that he is a stranger; and a more desolate feeling than that, could not visit his soul. How much is expressed, by that form of oriental benediction, "May you die among your kindred.”—Greenwood. All, who joy would win, Must share it, happiness-was born a ten He is unhappy, who is never satisfied. READINGS AND 614. THE LIFE OF A DRUNKARD. If you But let us follow some of them home, from Enter that family circle. Behold those aged She can conceal the well known cause no 615. SERPENT OF THE STILL. Y RECITATIONS. They tell me, that, in Italy, And dooms the victim dead. More fatal-than the whole, "Tis found almost o'er all the earth, Save Turkey's wide domains; "Tis kept in mercy's chains. THE WORLD AT A DISTANCE. 'Tis pleasant-through the loopholes of retreat, He travels, and expatiates; as the bee, Hed battle stamps his foot, and nations feel the shock In their day, and generation, they served, and honored the country, and the whole country, and their renown is of the treasures of the whole 616. EULOGIUM ON THE SOUTH. If there be | the pride of her great names. I claim them for one state in the union, Mr. President, (and I say countrymen, one and all-the Laurens, the Rutit not in a boastful spirit) that may challenge ledges, the Pinckneys, the Sumpters, the Maricomparison with any other, for a uniform, zeal-ons-Americans all-whose fame is no more to ous, ardent, and uncalculating devotion to the be hemmed in by state lines, than their talents union, that state-is South Carolina. Sir, from and patriotism, were capable of being circumthe very commencement of the revolution, up to scribed, within the same narrow limits. this hour, there is no sacrifice, however great, she has not cheerfully made; no service, she has ever hesitated to perform. She has adhered to you in your prosperity; but, in your adversi-country. Him, whose honored name the gentlety, she has clung to you, with more than filial affection. No matter what was the condition of her domestic affairs, though deprived of her resources, divided by parties, or surrounded by difficulties, the call of the country, has been to her, as the voice of God. Domestic discord ceased at the sound, every man became at once reconciled to his brethren, and the sens of Caro-creased gratification, and delight, rather. Sir, I lina were all seen, crowding together to the temple, bringing their gifts to the altar of their common country. man himself bears-does he suppose me less capable of gratitude for his patriotism, or sympathy for his sufferings, than if his eyes had first opened upon the light in Massachusetts, instead of South Carolina? Sir, does he suppose it in his power, to exhibit a Carolina name so bright, as to produce envy in my bosom? No, sir, in thank God, that, if I am gifted with little of the What, sir, was the conduct of the south during the revolution? Sir, I honor New England for her conduct in that glorious struggle. But, great-let me indulge in refreshing remembrances of as is the praise, which belongs to her, I think at least, equal honor is due to the south. They espoused the quarrel of their brethren, with a generous zeal which did not suffer them to stop to calculate their interest in the dispute. Favorites of the mother country, possessed of neither ships, nor seamen, to create commercial rivalship, they might have found, in their situation, a guarantee, that their trade would be forever fostered, and protected by Great Britain. But, trampling on all considerations, either of interest, or safety, they rushed into the conflict, and, fighting for principle, perilled all in the sacred cause of freedom. Never-were there exhibited, in the history of the world, higher examples of noble daring, dreadful suffering, and heroic endurance, than by the whigs of Carolina, during the revolution. The whole state, from the mountains to the sea, was overrun by an overwhelming force of the enemy. The fruits of industry-perished on the spot where they were produced, or were consumed by the foe. "The plains of Carolina" drank up the most precious blood of her citizens! Black, and smoking ruins-marked the places which had been the habitations of her children! Driven from their homes, into the gloomy, and almost impenetrable swamps, even there-the spirit of liberty survived; and South Carolina, sustained by the example of her Sumpters, and Marions, proved, by her conduct, that though her soil might be overrun, the spirit of her people was invincib e.-Hayne. the past-let me remind you, that in early times, no states cherished greater harmony, both of principle, and of feeling, than Massachusetts and South Carolina. Would to God, that harmony might again return. Shoulder to shoulder they went through the revolution-hand in hand, they stood round the administration of Washington, and felt his own great arm lean on them for support. Unkind feeling, if it exist, alienation and distrust, are the growth, unnatural to such soils, of false principles since sown. They are weeds, the seeds of which that same great arm neve scattered. Mr. President, I shall enter on no encomium upon Massachusetts-she needs none. There she is-behold her, and judge for yourselves. There is Boston, and Concord, and Lexington, and Bunker Hill; and there they will remain, forever. The bones of her sons, fallen in the great struggle for independence, now lie mingled with the soil of every state, from New England to Georgia; and there they will lie-forever. And, sir, where American liberty raised its first voice, and where its youth was nurtured and sustained, there it still lives, in the strength of its manhood, and full of its original spirit. If discord, and disunion shall wound it-if party strife, and blind ambition shall hawk at, and tear it; if folly and madness, if uneasiness under salutary and necessary restraint, shall succeed to separate it from that union by which alone, its existence is made sure, it will stand, in the end, by the side of that cradle in which its infancy was rocked; it will stretch forth its arm, with whatever of vigor it may still retain, over the friends who gather around it; and it will fall at last, if fall it must, amidst the proudest 617. EULOGIUM ON THE NORTH. The eulogium pronounced on the character of the state of South Carolina, by the honorable gentleman, for her revolutionary, and other merits, meets mylearty concurrence. I shall not acknowl-monuments of its own glory, and on the very edge, that the honorable member is before me, in regard for whatever of distinguished talent, or distinguished character, South Carolina has proAuced. I claim part of the honor: I partake in spot of its origin.—Webster. The sweetest cordial-we receive at last, |