J( Au y . (Y. ([ /j 
 
 O/'YYY / YY, 
 

 
 
 
 •> 
 
 
 \ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 t 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 • 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ■ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
( 
 
 A MEMORIAL 
 
 OF 
 
 LEVI LINCOLN 
 
 THE 
 
 GOVERNOR OE MASSACHUSETTS 
 
 FROM 1825 TO 1834. 
 
 B O STO X : 
 
 PRINTED BY J. E. FAR WE EL & COMPANY. 
 
 M D C C C I. X V I I I . 
 
An ^ 
 
 * 0 ? 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 O’NEILL LIBRARY 
 BOSTON COLLEGE 
 
ORDER 
 
 BY THE 
 
 GOVERNOR OF MASSACHUSETTS. 
 
 COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS. 
 
 Executive Department, Boston, May 29, 1868. 
 
 His Excellency the Governor unites with the people of Massa- 
 chusetts in paying the tribute of respect and honor to the Hon- 
 orable Levi Lincoln, who died at his residence in Worcester, on the 
 29th instant. 
 
 His distinguished services as Chief Magistrate of the Common- 
 wealth, his patriotic interest and wide influence in all affairs affecting 
 the welfare of the whole country, his example of scrupulous per- 
 formance of every duty of the citizen, the dignity and grace of his 
 long life closing in the veneration and esteem of all, require public 
 and official recognition. He was one of the foremost of those who 
 have caused this State to be respected. 
 
 His Excellency directs the Adjutant-General to tender to the 
 family of the deceased the escort of the Independent Corps of Cadets, 
 and to order the members of his Staff to he in attendance at his res- 
 idence in Worcester, at 10 o’clock A. M., on the day of the funeral, 
 to accompany him on that occasion. The members of the Honorable 
 Council and the Heads of Departments are invited to be present at 
 the same time and place. The Executive Rooms will be closed, and 
 flags upon the State House and the Arsenal at Cambridge, wall be 
 placed at half-mast on the day of the funeral. 
 
 By order of His Excellency, 
 
 ALEXANDER II. BULLOCK, Governor. 
 
 Oliver Warner, Secretary. 
 

 
 
 
 
 . 
 
PROCEEDINGS 
 
 IN THE 
 
 MASSACHUSETTS LEGISLATURE. 
 
 Boston, Monday, June 1, 18C8. 
 
 Mr. Weston, of Plymouth, introduced an order as follows : 
 
 Whereas, Intelligence has been received of the death of Hon. 
 Levi Lincoln, of Worcester, formerly Governor of the Common- 
 wealth ; and, 
 
 Whereas, The two branches of the Legislature hold in high 
 esteem his many excellent qualities as a citizen, and his dis- 
 tinguished services as Chief Magistrate of the Commonwealth, 
 therefore, 
 
 Ordered, That a committee of five on the part of the Senate, 
 with such as the House may join, be appointed to attend the 
 funeral of the deceased. 
 
 Messrs. Weston, of Plymouth ; Fay, of Worcester ; Sutton, of 
 Essex; Pond, of Worcester; and Gould, of the Island District, 
 were appointed on the part of the Senate, to which the Ilouse 
 joined Messrs. Bates, of Westfield ; Williams, of Worcester ; Wat- 
 son, of Leicester ; Blackington, of Attleboro’ ; Phipps, of Framing- 
 ham ; Allen, of Newton ; McDuffie, of Cambridge ; Howe of 
 Bolton ; and Appleton, of Southboro’. 
 
PROCEEDINGS 
 
 IN THE 
 
 CITY COUNCIL OF WORCESTER. 
 
 At a special meeting of the City Council, assembled in conven- 
 tion May 30, 1868, His Honor Mayor Blake announced in appro- 
 priate terms the death of Hon. Levi Lincoln ; whereupon the 
 following resolutions were offered by Alderman Tolman, and 
 unanimously adopted : — 
 
 Resolved, That the members of the City Government of the 
 City of Worcester have learned with profound regret of the recent 
 death of their distinguished fellow-citizen, Hon. Levi Lincoln, 
 formerly Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and 
 the first Mayor of the City of Worcester. 
 
 Resolved, That by his ability and fidelity in his important 
 public relations to the City, the State, and the Country, he 
 won the respect and confidence of his contemporaries, and fur- 
 nished a noble example for imitation by those who were called to 
 succeed him. 
 
 Resolved, That in his devotion to the interests of agriculture 
 and the various financial and business affairs of this great 
 county, he largely contributed to its substantial growth and pros- 
 perity, and to the character and development of the resources of its 
 people. 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 7 
 
 Resolved, That his fealty to truth, his interest in sound learn- 
 ing and general education, and his deep reverence for the Christian 
 religion manifested in his public and private life, have done much 
 to cultivate and encourage in the community which loved and 
 appreciated him, the traits so cleai'ly visible in him. 
 
 Resolved, That in his generous hospitality, his kindly greeting, 
 and his uniform dignity of life and character, we recognize the true 
 gentleman, combining in himself a just reverence for the past with 
 a due appreciation of the present, and carrying with him to the last 
 an unclouded intellect, and a heart which was always young. 
 
 Resolved, That the sympathy of the members of the City 
 Government is hereby tendered to his family, where his presence 
 was always a benediction, and that a copy of these resolutions be 
 furnished to the family, and also entered upon the records of the 
 City Government as a testimony of our respect and gratitude for 
 his life, character, and services. 
 
 A copy. 
 
 SAMUEL SMITH, 
 
 City Cleric. 
 
 Attest : 
 
the 
 
 FUNERAL. 
 
 The funeral services of the late Hon. Levi Lincoln, LL.D., were 
 held June 2d, and were attended by a large concourse of civil and 
 literary notables from all parts of the State. The day was bright 
 and fair, and the solemn occasion drew together a large collection 
 of the people of the city, and the surrounding towns. The number 
 of aged men about the streets and in attendance on the ceremonies 
 was remarkable. From all the surrounding towns the men of the 
 past generation gathered to pay the last honors to one who from 
 their earlier years they have looked up to as a good and great 
 example. 
 
 A special train bearing Ilis Excellency Gov. Bullock and stall', 
 the Executive Council, a committee of both branches of the Legis- 
 lature, the Independent Corps of Cadets, four companies, and many 
 other distinguished personages, arrived from Boston at 10.25 A.M. 
 
 Private funeral ceremonies were held at the house, Rev. Alonzo 
 Hill, D.D., the pastor of the deceased, officiating. At the con- 
 clusion of these services, a procession of the relatives in carriages, 
 escorted by the Cadets, moved down Elm and through Main street 
 to Dr. Hill’s church, near the court house. All places of business 
 were closed, and thousands of people thronged the sidewalks to view 
 the mournful cortege. 
 
 Prior to the arrival of the procession at the church, seats had 
 been taken by Governor Bullock and staff, members of the council, 
 heads of departments, legislative committees, the past and present 
 members of the city government of Worcester, and members of the 
 American Antiquarian Society, and the bar of Worcester County. 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 9 
 
 The galleries and side pews were filled by citizens who ap- 
 peared deeply interested in the solemnities. The pulpit was very 
 tastefully decorated with beautiful flowers, the lily of the valley 
 predominating, and the casket was also nearly covered with floral 
 decorations. As the remains were brought into the church, the 
 band outside performed a solemn dirge, and every one within stood 
 until the coffin had been placed in front of the pulpit. 
 
 The exercis'es in the church were opened by a brief dirge upon 
 the organ, followed by the chant, “ Lord, Thou hast been our 
 dwelling-place in all generations . ” Rev. Dr. Hill, for forty-one 
 years the pastor of the deceased, read appropriate selections of 
 Scripture, and spoke as follows : — 
 
 REMARKS OF REV. DR. HILL. 
 
 My Friends : — After the heart-thrilling words to which we 
 have just listened, words of unutterable solemnity, so uplifting, 
 soothing, and comforting, I feel how poor and unworthy of an 
 occasion like this is mere human speech. In the presence of the 
 dead, and of such dead as we have borne into this temple, the 
 closed lips and the silent meditation would better become us. We 
 are on our way with our precious burden to the garden of our 
 sepulchres, and pause here where the living form of our departed 
 fellow-worshipper comes so freshly back, that we may gather help 
 to bear the bereavement, which, though long delayed, has now 
 come upon us, lift the cloudy screen that now lies shut down upon 
 this community, and interpret aright the great lesson which Provi- 
 dence is now teaching us. The man who, for two-thirds of a 
 century, has been leader among us, the staff and stay of our 
 Jerusalem, the venerable counsellor in whose wisdom and ex- 
 perience we confided, the earnest watchman that stood upon our 
 towers to give warning of danger, the honorable man who never 
 wavered in his duty, and the eloquent orator, has been taken from 
 
 2 
 
10 
 
 MEMOKIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 us ; and where shall the word be found which shall speak worthily 
 of the greatness of our loss ? Who shall teach us to improve it 
 aright ? There was one once among us who could do this, and 
 we all felt that through his luminous speech and prompt act we 
 were led to think and do that which was worthiest and best. And 
 who of us to-day, that remembers with what finished accomplish- 
 ments he maintained his lot among us, is not ready to exclaim : 
 
 “ 0 for the sound of the voice that is stilled, 
 
 And the touch of a vanished hand.” 
 
 But, friends, there is more here than we hear and see. He 
 who, enclosed in this coffin, has led hither this great funeral train 
 within these portals, comes not to receive our praises, for God 
 alone is here to receive homage, not man, frail like ourselves ; but 
 he comes to give us instruction, to draw us away from the mean- 
 nesses of material things, to quicken our faltering faith, and raise 
 us into the atmosphere of light, and reverence, and devotion. 
 Once he used to speak to us in the thronged assembly ; how 
 eloquently ! and we were moved and persuaded as he spoke, for 
 we revered his wisdom, experience, and power of influence. But 
 to-day he speaks to us as he never spoke before. His last speech 
 is his truest, noblest, and most affecting. True, from under the 
 lid of yonder coffin proceeds no sound. Silent the lips on which 
 hung the dews of persuasion, inactive the brain which made the 
 head throb with its motion ; still, now, the hand which com- 
 manded attention by its wave ; but how much more in the 
 spectacle before us is there to subdue, move and urge us into the 
 ways of right living. What a marvellous change has come over 
 the venerable man whom we so recently saw in our streets, in the 
 places of business, in the retirement of home. Though burdened 
 with the weight of eighty-five years, so erect, so active, so prompt, 
 so faithful in all the duties of his life, now so motionless — the 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 11 
 
 calmness of heaven on his brow, reposing in the arms of death, on 
 his way to join his kindred in their place of rest. What a 
 stupendous change has come over him in a brief period. Now 
 no longer struggling with the weakness of mortality, no longer 
 walking in the midst of these familiar scenes, under the light 
 of the sun, moon, and stars, but ascended to the domains of God, 
 gazing on visions which can fill only with astonishment and 
 delight, — sharing in the companionship of kindred natures, enjoy- 
 ing the Saviour‘’s welcome and the smile of God. I make no 
 
 C* 
 
 attempts to withdraw the veil and disclose the secrets of the 
 spiritual world, but I maintain that he who was just now with us 
 and is now an inhabitant of that world, who has gone the round of 
 our earthly life, grown familiar with all its vicissitudes of joy and 
 grief, and has gazed with fresh wonder and surprise upon the 
 scenes which have burst upon him, so strange — so transporting — 
 must, if we will sympathize and meditate, as we should do who 
 are to pass through a like experience, teach a deeper lesson than 
 any human speech can do. On one occasion, while he was 
 awaiting the summons home, he gazed from his western window 
 upon the setting sun sending up streams of parting glory, illu- 
 minating half the globe and filling it with unspeakable splendor, 
 and said, “Heaven comes down to earth; if such be the glory 
 below, what must it be above?” Who can contemplate the 
 change of worlds but with the deepest interest ? 
 
 I spoke of our venerable friend before us in his lifetime as 
 influential, commanding, occupying during the long years that 
 were allotted him, a position of eminence and doing a work which 
 has rarely been accomplished by a single man. He seemed born 
 for a leader, and used his rich faculties so faithfully and so 
 successfully that the biographer of our times will pronounce him 
 foremost among the men who guided the destiny of this county 
 and this Commonwealth, and won for them a noble distinction. 
 But I must not dwell upon these things here and now. I trust 
 
12 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 on a future occasion to be able to tell what he was and what he 
 did, to walk with you over the familiar fields which he trod, and 
 tell you of the influences which were about him and helped mould 
 him, and how he improved his great gifts and made them instru- 
 mental in improving and perfecting the community with which 
 he was connected. But to-day I can only allude to one character- 
 istic which lay at the heart of him and made him what he was, 
 gave unity of purpose and strength of coloring to his life, and a 
 value to his living example which made it unquestionable. 
 
 I think, beyond most men who have been for so long a period 
 devoted to the public service, he felt his responsibility and was 
 under the influence of profound religious principles. He never 
 was indifferent to those high considerations which connect us with 
 the spiritual world ; he held fast to an enlightened conscience 
 though the world should judge him perverse; though as far as 
 possible removed from the cant of religious pretence, his reverence 
 for the Creator and the grand realities of spiritual things was pro- 
 found. On one or two occasions he spoke to me on these topics 
 with such earnestness and depth of emotion that I could not doubt 
 that subjects connected with the inner life were very dear to him. 
 No man sympathized with the noblest utterances of earnest reli- 
 gious men more sincerely. No man separated with a truer dis- 
 crimination the right from the wrong than he — and when he saw 
 men in public life — men trusted and honored by a confiding 
 people allured away from their high duty and a manly expression 
 of it by their want of principle, their mean cowardice and sordid, 
 selfish apprehensions, even in his sick-room his eye would kindle, 
 his cheek would flush, and the brave utterance that once stirred 
 senators and won the confidence of the great community, would 
 flow from his lips in burning words and tones of indignant rebuke. 
 
 Nor was our venerable friend destitute of those more genial 
 and tender qualities which invest with especial interest the religious 
 character. There is a trait of the Puritan character of New 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 13 
 
 England which is not winning. It has been said of John Quincy 
 Adams, that “in the cold, quiet eye, in the lip and voice, there 
 were signs that assured us of a spirit that all the terrors of earth 
 could not quail, nor all the ordinary seductions of earth 
 move a hair.” With all this inflexible adherence to principle, 
 Gov. Lincoln was of a gentler nature. Firm as adamant when 
 duty demanded, he could be easily moved by appeals to the more 
 tender sensibilities — he was strong in his sympathies and enduring 
 in his friendship, and was easily affected by the common vicissi- 
 tudes and ruptured ties which diversify our lives and touch many 
 so lightly. lie was tender and loving in his affections and was 
 never indifferent to those relations which connected him with his 
 fellow men and with his God. You can bear witness how earn- 
 estly and how faithfully he labored for the good of this community, 
 neglecting no opportunity by which he might help friends, city, 
 state and common country ; and I can bear witness how true he 
 was in his allegiance to the principles of a broad, rational religion, 
 to the traditions of New England, to his Saviour and his God. 
 On one occasion he said to me, with a strength of emotion and 
 expression I can never forget — (it was in one of those rare hours 
 in his sick-room, when all the powers of nature seemed to be 
 giving way, and he apprehended that lie might be wrecked and 
 stranded in mind as well as body), “I have tried to serve God 
 and do good as I have been able — He will not forsake me 
 now.” 
 
 God did not forsake him. He tried him as he tries us all. 
 But in the cross of a fearful, much dreaded disease, so prevalent in 
 our day, and so awful in its effects, lie w r as spared its most'humili- 
 ating consequences. The paralysis which prostrated his active 
 frame and crippled his energies, never reached his mental faculties. 
 There was his intellect, clear, full and unimpaired. There was 
 his conscience as severe and exacting as when ho encountered the 
 temptations of an active, busy life, and resisted them all. There 
 
14 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 was the heart beating in sympathy with all generous emotions, 
 and responsively to all noble endeavors. 
 
 He passed the winter without apparent suffering ; able to trans- 
 act his ordinary business, maintaining a watchful interest in those 
 great public events which have shaken the continent and arrested 
 the attention of the world. The snows of winter lay later on the 
 ground, and the damp, chilly fogs of spring were seldom lifted, and 
 for many weeks he has been no more seen abroad. A mortal 
 weakness came on and spread more and more. Then, too languid 
 to see his friends and to talk with them, he withdrew from the out- 
 ward world. A few days ago he went to his bed, calmly waiting 
 for the release for which he prayed. He was ready to go and why 
 should death delay? It came at last as Heaven’s last merciful 
 interposition. He slept with his people. A great community is 
 bereaved, and another soul, gifted of Heaven, capable of doing a 
 large service, true to his trusts, devoted to his tasks, has ascended. 
 
 “He has gone to his God, he has gone to his home, 
 No more amid peril and error to roam ; 
 
 His eyes are no longer dim, 
 
 His feet will no longer falter ; 
 
 No grief can follow him, 
 
 No pang his cheek can alter. 
 
 “ 0 honored, beloved, to earth unconfined 
 Thou hast soared on high, thou’st left us behind, 
 But our parting is not forever ; 
 
 We will follow thee by heaven’s light, 
 Where the grave cannot dissever 
 The souls whom God will unite.” 
 
 Rev. Dr. Ellis, of Charlestown, pronounced the following appro- 
 priate eulogy upon the deceased : 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 15 
 
 “ Having served his generation according to the will of God, 
 he has fallen on sleep.” A sentence of Christian Scripture is 
 most fitting alike for sentiment and words to give direction to our 
 thoughts at the burial rites of one, who, whether in a lofty or a 
 humble sphere, has lived and died a disciple of Jesus Christ. 
 Where our common mortality asserts its power over humanity, the 
 lessons and the hopes which are the most full and the most devout 
 in their substance have power over the largest number of human 
 hearts. 
 
 And so over the remains of this honored and venerated man, 
 judge, governor, and faithful functionary in many exalted trusts, 
 our associate also in the fellowships for all high culture and our 
 esteemed and beloved friend in all relations — we repeat the words 
 — “ Having served his generation according to the will of God, he 
 has fallen on sleep.” There is the substance of biography and 
 the method and rule of true piety in that sentence, and wherever 
 we can truly speak it over the dead we utter through it all that is 
 desirable or becoming as an eulogium on an occasion like this. 
 When in his own or in other private homes, in legislative halls or 
 in the literary associations of which he was a member, he and his 
 life’s work are freely and fully commemorated — there may be said 
 what we withhold now while even his mortal dust is with us. 
 
 He has served three generations. He has long outlived those 
 who invested him with, and those who shared with him, his highest 
 offices. Most of us have known him only as one in retirement 
 from them, valued highly, indeed, because he served as an exam- 
 ple, a model, a memory even, of the old dignity, rectitude and full 
 qualification, personal and professional, associated with the magis- 
 tracies of our beloved Commonwealth. Indeed, the feeling which 
 his presence prompted in many of us was that he was still virtually 
 the representative of all the functions and prerogatives of actual 
 authority and influence in the State ; and this, not because he still 
 appeared in public {daces or in the public press, but because he 
 
16 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 was still a power with us. He had had the discipline and oppor- 
 tunity from his earliest years, domestic, social and professional, to 
 fit him for public life and to hold high trust. The stock of his 
 lineage was that which New England has favored and cultivated 
 as meeting its exigencies in the past, and as most characteristic of 
 its distinctive qualities, most likely to keep for it what it has learned 
 to value as its well proved advantages. As he attained succes- 
 sively the honors conferred upon him, the pride and vanity which 
 they sometimes bring with them had been already chastened by an 
 anticipated familiarity and an instructive warning in which he was 
 privileged through intercourse with many around him, both weak 
 and strong in character. 
 
 How much has entered into the training and the trial of that 
 long and varied and public life ; how much of labor, effort, strug- 
 gle, discipline, energy, fidelity and resolute self-mastery as its 
 forming and guiding influences, and how much of providential 
 mingling and working in the portion and alternation of heart joy 
 and sorrow allotted to him. Many times, on fine autumn days, as 
 he has made me his companion in drives over these circling hills 
 whence we could look either upon the farm region within the wide 
 horizon or down upon the thick clustered dwellings and workshops 
 of this fair city, I have tried through his memory and relations to 
 read your local history in the landscape, and to see and hear the 
 men and women of the past as they moved upon the stage of life. 
 
 He first knew these scenes and localities when, though they 
 had parted with the aspects of a wilderness, they were still invested 
 with the rude simplicity and some of the stern features of a rugged 
 country life. The joys of his childhood were so associated with 
 the objects and interests of a farm, that to the very end of his 
 lengthened days, and most so when nearest to it, he found his 
 occupation and delight in the same cherished pursuits. A guest 
 in his delightful home who had gone to his rest at night as in a 
 city mansion, would awake in early morning to the lowing of kine 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 17 
 
 and the cackling of fowls. Looking from one side of the house 
 he would see the beautiful flower-garden with its conservatory, 
 and on the other the herd going out to pasture and the yoked 
 oxen to their labor. 
 
 And then the Governor would point to his own paternal acres, 
 and tell what was once their value for corn and grass, and what 
 they represented as subdivided and measured by the foot now to 
 their owners, when the river and every thread of running water 
 are turned to such manifold industries. He spoke of men younger 
 than himself as old, while he had no thought of appropriating the 
 epithet. He recalled the line of his contemporaries, and traced 
 the living back through it. Not always, but often, he would 
 begin or end the drive at the cemetery, which he had roamed over 
 as a forest in his boyhood, and into which, having instigated and 
 superintended its present use, he had followed so many friends 
 and associates, and where his own form is to rest at the close of 
 these solemnities. 
 
 His life covers the whole period of our national existence and 
 administration. If what has been in his mind and has passed 
 within his observation were written and printed before us, we 
 should have a sufficient history of times and men, of events and 
 crises, of the principles and issues which have been on trial, and of 
 the parties which represented them. And this we may say — 
 without ascribing to him philosophic profoundness or consummate 
 genius, or passionless impartiality — that no man has lived through 
 our history who would have written it out to all good uses of 
 correct information and fair narration, with the balance of reserve 
 and disclosure about prominent individuals and their motives, 
 better than he would have done. His own official papers must 
 have in them much of that history. 
 
 "W bile he bore from time to time the names of parties, nearly 
 every service which he performed was without any reference to 
 party interests. lie had the rare distinction, shared by only a very 
 3 
 
18 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 few public men among us, of being chosen to his highest offices 
 independently of pai'ty votes, and of being the medium through 
 which old party issues ceased to have any vitality. He was privi- 
 leged in some respects in coming upon times which favored such 
 amities following upon bitter political strifes. But it was not by 
 any weak concessions, nor by any doubtful compliances, that he 
 reconciled the variances of others or secured high popular appro- 
 bation for himself. He had political principles, and he never 
 concealed or yielded them. 
 
 In private life he was pure and faithful, guided by a conscien- 
 tious rectitude in the multiplied duties with which he charged him- 
 self for others, and carrying a scrupulous punctiliousness into every 
 detail. The religious faith which had parted with some of its 
 sterner features of early New England traditions as it presented 
 itself to him in the vigor of his manhood, the faith which he took 
 to his heart in conviction, reverence and full satisfaction, wrought 
 its inward work upon his character. He loved and honored the 
 venerable pastor and teacher under whose ministrations he received 
 what he regarded, in times of heated controversy, as an exposition 
 .of the gospel of Christ most fitted to win and control the affections 
 and the life. 
 
 He represented among us the graces and the courtesies which 
 are the traditions of the last age of the most honored and most 
 accomplished public men. There was a befitting dignity of de- 
 meanor, bearing, and address which marked him in his home as in 
 his official intercourse. His gravity was relieved by a refined 
 urbanity and a thoughtful kindness. He was a careful chooser of 
 right words in his speech, and when in the private circle or in 
 public discussion he had to speak of or to speak to those whom he 
 did not like, or with whom he differed, his self-respect confined 
 him both to the terms and to the sentiments of a refined decorum 
 and a restrained temper. He corrected his public utterances in his 
 thought before they passed into written or spoken language. 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 19 
 
 And now his long life has closed. From home, and street, 
 and sanctuary, his presence will be missed, yet many fond 
 memories and respectful regards will hold him in the hearts of 
 survivors. Many sharp afflictions running through all the periods 
 of his life had come to him in and through that home, but they 
 had still left him its earliest and dearest companion, and other 
 quiet and constant fellowships for the heart. His account and 
 record with his fellow-men were in all things and in all ways such 
 that we may yield him to meet with his own submissive trust the 
 judgment which he looked for from the heavenly Father, the God 
 of his youth and of his age. 
 
 At the close of the address, the hymn by Montgomery, “ There 
 is a calm for those who weep,” was sung by the choir, followed 
 by a prayer by Dr. Hill. A dirge by the choir completed the 
 services. 
 
 A procession was then formed, and proceeded to the Rural 
 Cemetery in the following order : — 
 
 Police. 
 
 Chief Marshal Col. George W. Richardson and Assistant 
 Marshals William Cross, Samuel Woodward, Wm. 
 
 S. Davis, C. B. Pratt, and T. W. Hammond. 
 Independent Corps of Cadets, with arms reversed. 
 
 Body of deceased. 
 
 Bearers: — Ex-Gov. Washburn, Ex-Gov. Clifford, Ex-Gov. 
 Banks, Hon. Josiah Quincy, Hon. B. F. Thomas, 
 
 Hon. Isaac Davis, John Hammond, Esq. 
 
 Benjamin Butman, Esq. 
 
 His Excellency Gov. Bullock and staff. 
 
 Heads of Departments of State and other State authorities. 
 
 Committee of the Legislature. 
 
 Family and friends of the deceased. 
 
20 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 Worcester City Government, present and past. 
 
 American Antiquarian Society. 
 
 Bar of Worcester County. 
 
 Worcester Light Infantry, with arms reversed. 
 
 State Guard, in citizens’ dress. 
 
 Citizens. 
 
 The cortege was extremely long, and on the arrival at the 
 cemetery, made almost a complete circuit of the grounds, and the 
 larger part of the cortege was obliged to remain in line in the 
 avenues during the interment. 
 
 At the close of the ceremonies the State authorities and the 
 military escort proceeded to the residence of Gov. Bullock, where 
 they partook of a collation before returning to Boston, and the local 
 organizations returned to the City Hall. 
 
 During the exercises business was generally suspended, and 
 the whole people united in paying homage to the memory of the 
 lamented dead. 
 
FULL OF DAYS, RICHES AND HONOR, 
 
 A Discourse preached "before the Second Congregational Society in 
 Worcester, June 7, 1868, the Sunday after the burial of the 
 
 HON. LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 BY ALONZO HILL. 
 
 “ And he died in a good old age, full of days, riches and 
 honor.’ 7 — 1 Chronicles 29: 28. 
 
 This language of the chronicler, employed to describe the 
 prospered condition and happy death of David, will apply with 
 singular truthfulness to that honored man whose well-rounded 
 life has just been brought to a close, and whose body we bore 
 the last week, with more than wonted solemnity, to the tomb. The 
 son of Jesse reigned over Israel forty years — seven years in 
 Hebron and thirty-three years in Jerusalem. Our venerated 
 friend bore a social and moral sway longer than that ; and who 
 shall take up his crown and reign in his stead ? In paying him the 
 brief tribute which we did the other day, I promised a more 
 extended notice, and to lay before you some of the characteristics 
 which distinguished him, gave him his great and enduring influ- 
 ence, and have secured for him an exalted place in our annals. 
 He lived and died with no spot upon his fame ; and, what is espe- 
 cially to be noticed, he retained his noble moral position and 
 unbounded moral influence unto the end. Other men, eminent 
 in their day, when they have retired from active business and the 
 conspicuous acts of official serving, have fallen into a state of 
 partial obscurity, and cut off from intercourse with passing genera- 
 
 ( 21 ) 
 
22 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEYI LINCOLN. 
 
 tions, have been remembered only in their tradition. But Gov. 
 Lincoln, though he survived for fifteen years the allotted age of 
 man, though engrossed in his private affairs, the cares of his farm, 
 the nursing of his estate and his building, — no more heard in pub- 
 lic debate and seldom seen away from his home, — was still a felt 
 power, a living influence in city, and county, and state. In critical 
 times, when human passions were aroused, when there were no pre- 
 cedents to guide, and a false step would bring peril to the Common- 
 wealth, he was the Nestor to whose wisdom and experience there 
 was constant appeal ; and he ruled more absolutely by his private 
 counsel and expressed opinions than when he sat in the chair of 
 state and commanded the resources of a loyal people. 
 
 A man like this, whose opportunities and position have been 
 so exalted, who retained to the last such influence, and won for 
 himself such confidence, respect and reverence in the heart of 
 this community, should not be suffered to pass away without being 
 closely studied, in order that we may learn the great lesson which 
 he teaches. IV e would contemplate anew his outer life, so for- 
 tunate and favoring in all its circumstances, to the end that we 
 may more fully comprehend the inward life, which was the strength 
 of him, his riches and honor. For how propitious soever may be 
 these circumstances, unless there be the man beneath, whom they 
 may reach and help mould, they are worthless ; they only serve to 
 render more conspicuous the inward poverty. 
 
 Levi Lincoln inherited a name that has long been illustrious 
 in our annals. The eminent Major-Gen. Lincoln, of our revolu- 
 tionary times, was of his lineage. His father, Levi Lincoln, Sr., 
 was a man of distinction, — eminent for his ability and accomplish- 
 ments, Lieutenant-Governor of the Commonwealth and Attorney- 
 General of the United States, — a man whose influence was marked 
 on his generation and could not fail to be very great on the 
 character of his oldest son, who, born in this town, October 25th, 
 1782, always made this his home and knew no other. He lived 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 23 
 
 on land which he obtained from members of his family, and was 
 buried on a spot bequeathed to the city for burial purposes by one 
 of his kindred. 
 
 He was a man of varied and generous endowments. We do 
 not claim for him pre-eminent ability. He possessed none of that 
 creative genius which startles the world by its inspirations, lifts it 
 up by its rare fancies, and enriches it by its inventions and discov- 
 eries. His was not the poetic element which revels in strangely 
 brilliant fancies, and charms by its new and wonderful combina- 
 tion of thought. He was no lover of other men’s poetry, and 
 rarely, if ever, read a work of fiction. Indeed, he was not a large 
 reader of books, and with books of high art or of humble literature, 
 his sympathies were few. His talents and tastes were of another 
 kind. His gifts were eminently practical. He was no classical 
 scholar nor profound metaphysician, as his father was ; but he pos- 
 sessed pre-eminently that rarest of all God’s gifts to man, common 
 sense, — that power of discrimination which, by a sort of instinct, 
 sees things as they are, grasps them with a keen insight, and 
 escapes the vagaries of the imagination and the influence of the 
 passions, — the power out of which proceed good judgment and 
 practical skill, the confidence of men and public and private au- 
 thority. Then there was an inborn energy of character, a com- 
 manding will, a persistency, self-reliance, and ability to work, and 
 a noble ambition out of which strong and valorous men have 
 grown. There was a nice observance of the forms of society, a 
 refined courtesy of manners, a grace of utterance, a rare fluency 
 of speech, a singular power of combining his thoughts and mar- 
 shalling his words, which won the ear and commanded the atten- 
 tion of all who heard. In a word, there was in him that power 
 and disposition to excel, that ambition to act widely and put forth 
 large social influences, that integrity of purpose, that reverence for 
 truth and right, and that noble desire to serve his day and genera- 
 tion which gained for him a willing adherence, and made him the 
 
24 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 leading man among us. He who had studied him ever so superfi- 
 cially, could not fail to recognize these among his prominent traits. 
 
 These and others among the marked features of his character 
 were formed and developed by the subtle jiersuasions of that home 
 where he was born, and in which he was reared, and which could 
 iot but leave lasting impressions upon all who came within its 
 reach. They were distinct, and they were life-long. Moulded 
 after the pattern of the better classes of New England homes, it 
 sent forth marked New England influences. I essav to bring it 
 back in imagination in the vivid colors in which it appeared to the 
 boy whose lot was cast, and who received there his earliest stamp 
 upon the character. I look from my chamber window upon a 
 morning like this, and my eyes, with the utmost stretch of vision, 
 cannot take in the acres which are around and make a part of that 
 home. There are the varied labors of the farm and the household, 
 each in their season — the spring sowing, and the autumn harvest 
 ing — the latest improvements in agriculture, the best breeds of 
 horses and oxen and sheep, the varied rural sights and sounds 
 which cannot fail to arouse the enthusiasm and form the life-long 
 tastes of the young boy. Wonder you that he grew up with a love 
 of agricultural pursuits, which no length of years, no habits of 
 study, no political successes could abate — a love that has brought 
 a fresh charm as his days have worn away and other pleasures 
 have retired ! 
 
 This home, so like an English manor in its dignity and hospi- 
 tality and the variety and extent of its occupations, so like a New 
 England farm in the homeliness of its daily employments, exerted 
 its moulding power. The father, however, a large cultured man, 
 engaged in a large practice at the bar, and a leading politician in 
 the County and State; and the mother, burthened with the mani- 
 fold cares of the household of which modern wives and mothers 
 ai'e, to a great extent, relieved, could bestow upon their son but 
 slight attention ; and yet their influence upon him was deep and 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 25 
 
 abiding. Though reared from his childhood in public and private 
 schools, and prepared for college in the grammar school of the 
 town ; from his father he acquired those refined tastes, that am- 
 bition to excel, and that yearning after the occupations and excite- 
 ments of public life for which we have known him — and from his 
 mother, those habits of industry, that perseverance and conscien- 
 tious devotion to truth and duty which were characteristic of him, 
 and from both that reverence for forms which Prescott says are 
 “ guardians of liberty,” and that courtesy of manners “ which pro- 
 tects courtesy of heart.” In stating the influences which helped 
 form his opinions and mould his early habits, I may add that no 
 one contributed more than my venerable predecessor and colleague, 
 Dr. Bancroft. The minister of his youth, the confidential adviser 
 of his maturer years, the faithful friend to the close of his life, his 
 unconscious power over him was very great; and, in consequence, 
 Gov. Lincoln’s reverence for him was entire. For many years he 
 used to be one of a select company of his parishioners that sought 
 him in his home on Sunday evenings, and labored with him for the 
 interests of good learning in the town. He listened with ever fresh 
 interest to his preaching, felt the value of his expositions of Scrip- 
 ture, and gratefully acknowledged the worth of his word, and life, 
 and character, in forming his own. 
 
 At the age of sixteen he entered Harvard College, and became 
 a member of the class so celebrated in the annals of the college, 
 of which Levi Frisbie, Samuel Hoar, Ichabod Nichols, and 
 Leverett Saltonstall, were also members, — a class of rare ability, 
 which, in rare numbers, in after years, rose to eminence and did 
 good service to the Commonwealth and the country. He was not 
 distinguished for his scholarshp, but he was distinguished for those 
 sifts and attractions for which we have known and revered him. 
 Though the youngest of his class, his influence over others was not 
 inferior to that of the oldest. The fervid eloquence with which he 
 then could speak, the kindness and courtliness of his manners, the 
 4 
 
26 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 sincerity of his attachment to his associates, all drew them toward 
 him. He loved them with the fresh love of boyhood, and for half 
 a century, year after year, he used to meet them with rare, 
 deepening affection, until their ranks had become so thinned that 
 the meeting gave more of pain than of pleasure. And now of 
 those sixty young men, gathered together in the fair morning of 
 life, in the college halls, entering on life’s battles so bravely, and 
 hallowing their young friendship by their life-long devotion, only 
 four survive, — James T. Austin, Jacob Newman Knapp, William 
 Minot, and William Allen, infirm old men, too feeble to share in 
 the last offices of respect for their companion, not the least dis- 
 tinguished of their numbers^ It is, my friends, when we bring 
 before us contrasts like these, we are made to realize the frailty of 
 our mortal lives, and feel the beauty and sanctity of those affec- 
 tions, which connect us heart with heart, and all hearts with God. 
 
 On leaving college, Mr. Lincoln chose the profession of the 
 law, entered as a student his father’s office, and was admitted to 
 the bar in 1805. Eminently fitted for the profession, fluent, as 
 we have intimated, graceful, self-possessed, discriminating in 
 his faculty, quick in the grasp with which he would seize the 
 salient points of a case, and thorough in his preparation, he at 
 once took the first rank as an advocate ; business more than he 
 could do, flowed in upon him ; and in a few years he was the 
 acknowledged head of his profession in the county, if not in the 
 Commonwealth. I never knew him simply as a lawyer. I never 
 heard him at the bar. But I have heard others, after the lapse of 
 half a century of years, repeat portions of his arguments, and 
 quote at length his telling words, so vivid was the impression 
 which they made. His style was strong rather than ornate, and 
 modelled more after that of Pitt than Curran. Of Pitt it has been 
 said, he had not much of pathos and but little play of fancy, but 
 “ his eloquence consisted mainly in his talent for sarcasm and for 
 sounding amplification.” Air. Lincoln was often sharp in his 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 27 
 
 
 [; o i 
 
 replies, I am told ; and, as was said of another celebrated Eng- 
 lish advocate, “ he would plunge into the midst of a long, compli- 
 cated sentence with reckless unconcern, but be sure to find his way 
 out at last.” In spite of the apprehensions he would awaken, he 
 was a very effective speaker. Nor did he become all this without 
 intense application. He has often told me of the overwhelming 
 labor which his successes cost him ; how he would watch the night 
 out in the study of his cases, and then go in the morning into the 
 court room, with a throbbing brain and sharp sickness, and speak 
 for hours, while the film would gather over his eyes, and he 
 would reel from very exhaustion ; and yet he must speak on — 
 the crowd that listened, meanwhile, unconscious of the effort 
 which it cost, sitting in admiration of the ease and grace and 
 power of his speech. Had he confined himself to his profession 
 his name might have been enrolled among the most eminent of our 
 jurists, — whose associate he was for a brief time, — and he might 
 have contributed with the ablest of them to build up our judicial 
 fabric. 
 
 But his talents and tastes led him to another kind of service. 
 In 1812, at the early age of thirty, only seven years after he was 
 admitted to the bar, he was chosen a member of the Massachusetts 
 Senate ; and from that day devoted his rare gifts to the Common- 
 wealth and the country, in their political and administrative rela- 
 tions. For more than thirty-six years of his life he was engaged 
 in public duties, passing thus in succession all the more public 
 offices of the state, — a member and speaker of the House of 
 Representatives, a second time a member and President of the 
 Massachusetts Senate, a member of the Convention to revise the 
 Constitution, Governor of the Commonwealth for nine successive 
 years, a member of Congress, Collector of the Port of Boston, 
 and first Mayor of the city of Worcester. With the last office, 
 which he held in 1848, he ended his public service and went into 
 retirement, which remained unbroken, except in a single instance, 
 
MEMORIAL OE LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 / (i ' ( li U 0 7 . r 
 
 )■ ( 
 
 28 
 
 when he was chosen with the body of Electors to cast the vote of 
 Massachusetts for President of the United States four years ago ; 
 and he spoke of the pleasure which the appointment gave him, in 
 the opportunity that it afforded to express so publicly and emphati- 
 cally his admiration of Abraham Lincoln, and to renew the intima- 
 cies of earlier years with his distinguished colleagues. 
 
 I have referred to the various public offices held by Gov. Lin- 
 coln. But when I have named them all I have scarcely suggested a 
 tithe of the service which he has rendered us. For when his official 
 duties were most onerous, he never shrunk from the hard labor and 
 careful oversight required by our literary, charitable, and religious 
 institutions. He was most scrupulous in attending their appointed 
 meetings, and always ready to apply his clear mind to the little 
 details out of which final success comes. For many years he was 
 one of the Board of Overseers of Harvard College, one of the 
 Trustees, and President of the Board of Leicester Academy, Presi- 
 dent of the Worcester County Agricultural, and Vice-President of 
 the American Antiquarian Society. Indeed we could scarcely un- 
 dertake and pursue any great enterprise, touching the material and 
 spiritual welfare of this people, without him ; although burthened 
 with the cares of State, he would give himself with unrelaxing 
 fidelity to the examination of a district school, of the accounts of 
 a corporation, or the ordinary votes of a church. Like the 
 builders in the elder days of art, “ he wrought with greatest care 
 each minute and unseen part.” And when he had found his coveted 
 retirement, at the age of seventy, he did not find idleness, nor 
 obtain unbroken I’est ; but was as vigilant over the public interests, 
 as active in promoting public improvements, in enriching and 
 embellishing the city, in adding to the happiness of the living and 
 in caring for the final repose of the dead, as the ablest and most 
 devoted among us. It was he who, through his official influence, 
 placed our State Hospital upon yonder eminence, and procured 
 the charters for the earliest Savings Bank, took a prominent part in 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 29 
 
 the re-organization of our public schools, and gave the largest im- 
 pulse to the planting of shade trees, which adorn our avenues and 
 make our city so inviting. And he it was who led in the formation 
 of our two beautiful cemeteries, interpreted for us their sacred 
 meaning at their dedication, and has watched over them with an 
 interest and labored for them with a devotion that has known no 
 weariness. Only during the present year, when his increasing 
 infirmities forbade his personal supervision, did he relinquish his 
 official relation to them. Indeed, who of us will not respond with 
 the heart to the language of eulogy, addressed by Judge Thomas 
 to the members of the Antiquarian Society, on the day of his 
 burial. “As I came home,” he says, “ to this beautiful city and 
 saw it in the freshness and beauty and glory of the spring-time — 
 these rounded hills — this lovely valley, which nature and art had 
 combined to make attractive, one thing was wanting, as the mate- 
 rial wants the inspiration of the spiritual.” The soul of all this 
 was not here. 
 
 But, my friends, it is little to say of one, that he has grown 
 up in strength and gone the round of public offices, — it is little to 
 say, that the circumstances into the midst of which he was thrown 
 were most felicitous, that he enjoyed rare opportunities, if we may 
 not add that he improved his opportunities, and was faithful to his 
 trusts. Firmness, energy, integrity, and fidelity in his public and 
 private relations were the most conspicuous traits of his character. 
 He had ambition — “ that infirmity of noble minds ; ” but it was, 
 as he once expressed it in a favorite quotation to a friend many 
 years ago, it was the desire to have “the respect of the good 
 and wise.” He loved popular esteem ; and if disappointment 
 sometimes gave him chagrin and awoke a momentary bitterness, it 
 never betrayed him into falseness or moral weakness. He would 
 stand stoutly for the right. He would do his duty though friends 
 should forsake and enemies revile, and the whole current of 
 popular favor run against him. Here lay the real strength of the 
 
30 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 man ; and this was the reason why the popular vote of the two 
 great parties that divided the Commonwealth year after year went 
 for him. This was the reason why, instead of being dropped, as 
 others have been, he was left to ask, like the old Roman com- 
 mander who saved his country, for leave to retire to his farm. 
 The people had seen him tempted, flattered, abused ; but they had 
 never seen him weakly yield to the temptation, the flattery, and 
 the abuse. They had seen him resist them all, — resist the power 
 of rich corporations, and compel them by his veto to abstain from 
 the wrong when vetos were not common, and vindicate on one 
 occasion, at least, the acts of his political opponents, because they 
 were just, though his party friends opposed and scouted his 
 scrupulous adherence to principle, as perverse. But the con- 
 spicuous act of his public life, one which we would have last 
 forgotten, was his nomination of the chief justice of the Common- 
 wealth. In what severe contrast does it stand with the self- 
 seeking, weak policy, and wavering counsels which have marked 
 our times, and brought into contempt our public affairs. Here is 
 a lesson which should be written in letters of gold, and which we 
 do well to bring home to our hearts. How grand the illustration 
 of the character of our venerable townsman ! In the Hindoo Vedas 
 it is said : “A ruler who appoints any man to an office when there 
 is another man in his dominions better qualified for it, sins against 
 God and against the state.” When thirty-seven years ago there 
 was a vacancy on the bench of the Supreme Court, and the appoint- 
 ing power was vested in the hands of our revered friend, the then 
 governor of the Commonwealth, I well remember the anxiety, the 
 expectation, the personal feeling which agitated the public mind in 
 respect to the issue of the appointment. The amiable and accom- 
 plished Chief-Justice Parker had just gone to his rest. His grace- 
 ful form, and gentle bearing, and chaste eloquence were familiar 
 among men. The light of his rare intellect was quenched, the 
 garland was yet fresh on his grave : and who should be selected to 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 31 
 
 fill the vacant chair, so honored and so hallowed, was the great 
 question of the hour. There was the old rule of succession. It 
 had never been broken but in a single instance. According to the 
 rule, the office clearly belonged to the senior associate judge ; 
 powerful interest was summoned in his behalf, — the solicitations 
 of old friends, the pleadings of ancient intimacy, the wounds of 
 disappointed expectation which never could be healed, — all the 
 interests to which less of conscience and less of firmness must have 
 yielded. But there was the text, old as the Bible, written on the 
 faithful Christian heart — “A ruler who appoints any man to an 
 office 'when there is a better man in his dominion, sins against God 
 and against the state.” Lemuel Shaw, a simple lawyer in Boston, 
 was believed to be the better man, and was appointed to the place ; 
 and thirty years of unwavering fidelity and unmeasured success, 
 and the authority of the judicial reports of Massachusetts all over 
 enlightened Christendom, have justified the appointment. My 
 friends, on what little things do the events, the successes or failures 
 of our lives depend ! The opportunity comes — there is the pres- 
 sure of conflicting and opposing influences. The choice must be 
 made ; and then will follow the life-long satisfaction or the life- 
 long regret. And how comforting it must have been to the de- 
 clining years of an honored life to know, that the selection made 
 under a sense of individual responsibility, or the strength of indi- 
 vidual conviction, and in spite of the claims of personal regard, 
 and of the urgency of interested friends, has with the passing time 
 received the signal approval of all good men, and won dignity and 
 undying honor for the State. 
 
 In the remarks which I submitted to you, my hearers, when 
 we last met in presence of a great company of mourners, and of 
 him for whom they mourned, I spoke of a vital religious principle 
 as the central power which governed his life and prompted the 
 noble acts by which it was illustrated. His faith in the acknowl- 
 edged virtues of Christianity was sincere and unwavering, and the 
 
32 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 hearty genuineness and consistency of his life the legitimate fruits 
 of his conviction. His belief in the supernatural origin of our 
 religion, the truth and grandeur of its revelations, the supremacy 
 of its authority, the worth of its institutions and ordinances, and 
 the soothing and refining influences of its spirit, was entire. You 
 remember, you cannot have forgotten, the affectionate communica- 
 tion "which he made to us less than two years ago, vindicating the 
 claims of this religion on our allegiance, sympathy, and support, — 
 a communication as remarkable for the tenderness and beauty of 
 its language, as for the depth and sincerity of its utterance, 
 written as it was by an old man of eighty-five years. “ The 
 worship of God,” he says, “is the impulse of a man’s nature. 
 Public religious service is the very need of society. It may be 
 doubted whether social order could well be preserved without it. 
 All the duties of life are best performed under religious sanctions. 
 The domestic relations demand them. The administration of 
 government and law is sustained by them. The world over, 
 religious observances give law to civilization, and individual man 
 cannot dispense with them. In this Christian land, the bleeding 
 heart of bereavement and affliction will not be content without the 
 ministrations of religious consolation, nor will receive comfort and 
 solace from those with whom it has no sympathy in religious feel- 
 ing and sentiment. The pastoral office can only be maintained in 
 connection with a preached gospel, and those who, in the hour of 
 suffering and of trial, would regard the communings of the spirit 
 with the deep thoughts of the future and the infinite as the most 
 precious enjoyment, will find the privation of opportunities for con- 
 solation and prayer with an affectionate and beloved guide, 
 teacher, and friend, the most deplorable of misfortunes. The 
 ministerial office is for more purposes than the public ministrations 
 of the pulpit. Many feel its influences who may but rarely attend 
 the sendees of the sanctuary. The aged, the feeble, the sick, find 
 in the good pastor the most welcome of visitants, and from his 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 33 
 
 counsels and instructions derive the most tender and soothing 
 lessons of faith, and hope, and patient submission.” My friends, 
 now that the mind which conceived these pregnant words is gone, 
 the heart that prompted them has ceased its beating, and the hand 
 that wrote them moulders in the dust, shall we not ponder them 
 once more as the legacy of our aged parishioner to this congrega- 
 tion that he loved? Born before this parish was formed, 
 acquainted with the venerable men by whom it was founded, 
 familiar with its history, trained amidst its benignant influences, its 
 prosperity was dear to him, and he watched over it with an interest 
 that never abated. This was his religious home, and while the 
 strength was given him he came here, summer and winter, fore- 
 noon and afternoon, as to the place of his rest. Who can forget 
 the slender, elastic form, unbent by age, still youthful in appear- 
 ance, that used to enter so habitually these portals and occupy 
 yonder pew so reverently, scorning the conveyance of carriage, or 
 the aid of staff, always making on foot, with light, buoyant step, 
 his Sabbath day’s journey? Honor to the man who could com- 
 prehend the worth of these religious institutions, who hallowed by 
 his observance religious services, and spared no pains, no labor, 
 nor sacrifice, that they might be sustained. 
 
 Nor was his allegiance to our religious services merely formal, 
 and for example’s sake. Though he attached no slight importance 
 to this, still he loved them, and sought their hallowing influence 
 for his own good, because he felt the need of them like the rest of 
 us. Entering upon his life’s work at a time when society was 
 agitated and rent by religious controversies, an admirer of Dr. 
 r Channing, brought up at the feet of Dr. Bancroft, whose trumpet 
 uttered no uncertain sound, he early formed his religious opinions, 
 and based and built upon them his religious character. They were 
 liberal, well-defined, and deep; and, if sometimes impatient of the 
 skepticism and vagaries of the present day, they were held without 
 wavering, and maintained with a noble consistency and a pure 
 6 
 
34 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 faith and charity that are of the heart. He revered the practices 
 of New England, and held to the simple doctrines in which he had 
 been reared, and was most scrupulous in giving public testimony to 
 the worth of his belief, when others under like circumstances have 
 been false and faithless. Though he was fond of popular esteem, 
 and would do much to secure it, he never would be untrue to his 
 settled convictions for the sake of popular impression. When he 
 was governor, he worshipped at Brattle street, in Boston, because 
 his predecessors in office had always worshipped there, and because 
 the broad faith maintained there and the liberal practices of the 
 church were most consonant with his own. And when he was a 
 member of congress, in Washington he did not attend the court 
 services of the capitol, so unsatisfactory to the heart’s reverence 
 through their unhallowed associations ; nor did he go to {lie popular 
 church where power and fashion are wont to throng ; but he would 
 turn from these, and in company with that noble man, the embodi- 
 ment of our modern puritanism, John Quincy Adams, seek the 
 plain, uninviting, neglected meeting-house, because he found prin- 
 ciples and practices there most in harmony with those for which he 
 had avowed his preference at home. 
 
 But I must here pause and bring our grateful reminiscences 
 to a close. Such was our honored and revered fellow-worshipper. 
 “ He died in a good old age, full of days, and riches, and honor.” 
 He has gone to join that goodly company of cotemporaries, neigh- 
 bors and friends, who once filled these courts and gave dignity and 
 influence to this congregation. I look down from this pulpit upon 
 the spot which he occupied for so many years, and search for the 
 graceful form, the marked features of that countenance, and that 
 searching look that once gave attention and encouragement to the 
 preacher, — and he is not there. I extend my eye down the aisle 
 which used to echo with his footstep, and seek for his old com- 
 panions and fellow-worshippers, those who sat there, before and 
 behind, — a wonderful body of men, — and they are not there. 
 And when I remember who and what friends they were — as true, 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 35 
 
 and kind, and devoted, as were ever accorded to any man — and 
 now look upon the vacancy no more to be filled by these familiar 
 shapes, I am appalled at the spectacle ; and were it not for the 
 faith which I hold, and the trust in God which we have learned 
 here together, my heart would break. But, Brethren, when I 
 reflect that our friends have gone in a good old age, full of riches 
 and honor, leaving a finished work and precious memories and im- 
 mortal hopes behind them, I feel that we can only utter a voice of 
 cheerful acquiescence and sing a song of gratitude to-day, — should 
 pause no longer than to gather up our scattered memorials, and 
 then with shoes on our feet, and a staff in our hand, press on in 
 our journey. For they who have helped us thus far by their liv- 
 ing influence, their wisdom, fidelity, and devotion, will help us 
 still. Though dead they will yet speak to us; though sleeping in 
 the grave they will assist us the more by their noble example and 
 the spirit of their lives which they have left behind. 
 
 Why weep ye then for him who, having won 
 The bound of man’s appointed years, at last, 
 
 Life’s blessings all enjoyed, life’s labors done, 
 
 Serenely to his final rest has passed ; 
 
 While the soft memory of his virtues yet 
 
 Lingers like twilight hues, where the bright sun is set ? 
 
 But, Brethren, while we cast our garlands and immortelles on 
 his tomb, we will not forget that there are individual bereavements 
 here hard to bear and bitter to the soul. The hospitable home has 
 been overshadowed, the sacred ties of the household, made fast by 
 a hallowed union of more than sixty years, have been rent, and the 
 staff for leaning upon has been broken, and the silver bowl at the 
 fountain that brought refreshment, has been dashed in pieces. 
 Yield, then, dearly beloved, in this hour of God’s visitation, your 
 heartfelt sympathy for the stricken, and offer your united prayers 
 that the light of God’s truth and peace may shine in upon the 
 darkness, and out of the trial may come forth a deeper tranquillity 
 and more disinterested love, and a fuller blessedness for us all. 
 
PROCEEDINGS 
 
 OP THE 
 
 COURT AND BAR. 
 
 SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT. — TRIBUTE TO EX- 
 GOVERNOR LINCOLN. 
 
 The adjourned session of the Supreme Judicial Court, for the 
 trial of the parties in jail in this county indicted for murder, com- 
 menced yesterday afternoon. 
 
 The court came in at half-past two o’clock, Chapman, Ch. J., 
 and Colt, Foster, and Wells, JJ., present. 
 
 Preliminary to the commencement of the trials, Hon. Charles 
 Allen, Attorney General, presented to the court the resolutions of 
 the bar of this county on the death of Hon. Levi Lincoln : 
 
 Resolved , That the recent death of the Hon. Levi Lincoln, one 
 of the most eminent men whose names are found on the rolls of 
 this bar, and who by his learning and great ability conferred honor 
 and distinction upon the profession of law, affords an occasion we 
 cannot allow to pass, without an expression of our high appreciation 
 of his life and character, and of our sorrow that we shall no more 
 see his venerable form among us, nor hear again from him his 
 accustomed words of eloquence and wisdom. 
 
 Resolved, That the record of his long: and honorable career of 
 public service and duty, is illustrated by the highest virtues that 
 ennoble human conduct ; that he was a wise and safe counsellor, 
 an eloquent advocate, a learned judge, a chief magistrate of un- 
 surpassed executive ability, accompanied by a courage that shrank 
 
 ( 36 ) 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 37 
 
 from no responsibility or duty ; that to sustain the just and firm 
 administration of the criminal law, and to give strength to the 
 judiciary, he disregarded the claims and persuasions of friendship, 
 and looked only to the common weal ; that as a legislator, state 
 and federal, he. was governed by the principles of a broad and 
 patriotic statesmanship, and never surrendered himself to the 
 demands of mere local interests or narrow partisanship ; and that 
 so long as eminent talent, never-failing fidelity, and incorruptible 
 integrity are deemed virtues in public life, the name and memory 
 of Levi Lincoln will be cherished among the choice possessions of 
 his native State, and of the whole republic. 
 
 Resolved , That while we remember with admiration those 
 more conspicuous virtues with which he illustrated the many high 
 stations of public trust to which he was called, we can never forget 
 the less conspicuous virtues, graces, and unrivalled accomplish- 
 ments, with which he adorned every walk of private life, nor those 
 works of usefulness, with which he occupied every day of a serene 
 and honorable old age. 
 
 Resolved, That the Attorney General of the Commonwealth be 
 requested to present these resolutions to the Supreme Judicial 
 Court, at its special session to be held in this county on Monday 
 next, with the request that they be entered on the records of the 
 court. 
 
 Resolved, That the clerk be requested to communicate a copy 
 of these resolutions to Mrs. Levi Lincoln, with the respectful 
 sympathy of the bar. 
 
 After reading the resolutions, the Attorney General said : 
 
 May it please your Honors : It is fitting that we should pause 
 before entering upon the solemn and important duties which have 
 brought us together to pay our tribute of respect to the illustrious 
 dead. 
 
38 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEYI LINCOLN. 
 
 Within the past year this bar has already lost one among 
 their older and worthy members — the venerable Judge Barton. 
 On the occasion of his last appearance before your Honors, in 
 October, 1865, his affecting eloquence in discussing a constitu- 
 tional question growing out of the war, moved many to tears, and 
 led all to regret that he would so seldom leave his voluntary 
 retirement and take part in the argument of causes in this Court. 
 
 And now to-day, the whole Commonwealth unites with the bar 
 and people of this county in paying honors to the memory of Gov. 
 Lincoln. The present generation of lawyers do not remember the 
 time when, having attained the high honor of a seat upon the 
 bench of this Court, he was called from the profession into 
 political life by the spontaneous, united voice of the whole people. 
 Yet how fondly he continued, even to the last, to linger about 
 these halls of justice, and how cordially he greeted the bench and 
 the bar upon each recurrence of the annual law terms of this Court, 
 who of us can ever forget? 
 
 It is not for me to dwell upon his life and character. But 
 when the history of the admirable bar of this county comes to be 
 written, (as for the credit of the Commonwealth I trust it soon 
 will be,) even from the beginning to the present time, then it will 
 partly appear how much they are indebted for the proud position 
 which they have always occupied, to the example, and teachings, 
 and influence of Levi Lincoln. 
 
 Fortunate is that county which possesses such an example, 
 and is able to furnish such imitators. 
 
 Felix prole virum. 
 
 Laeta deum partu : centum complexa nepotes. 
 
 Omnes coelicolas omnes supera alta tenentes. 
 
 Hon, Isaac Davis seconded the resolutions in some remarks of 
 great interest and appositeness, and was -followed by Hon. Henry 
 Chapin, who spoke briefly but with much feeling and eloquence. 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 39 
 
 Hon. Peter C. Bacon then rose and said : 
 
 Truly a great and good man has passed away — one of the 
 greater lights has been extinguished — one of the pillars has fallen. 
 Governor Lincoln has gone, — we shall see him no more forever. 
 We can hardly appreciate the length of his days. He constitutes 
 the link not only between this generation and the last, but between 
 this and the two or three preceding. A man older by seven years 
 than our nation (for he was born in 1782, and we became a na- 
 tion in fact only on the adoption of the Federal Constitution, in 
 1789), he lived through Shay’s rebellion, through the threatened 
 if not actual war with France, through the second war with Great 
 Britain, the Mexican war, in which he was called to give up his 
 brave and gallant son, and his later years were saddened by the 
 war of the Great Rebellion. 
 
 Privileged as he had been with his acquaintance for more than 
 forty years, — his next door neighbor for more than a score of 
 years, — having known him as a representative in Congress, and 
 in all his official life, the speaker said he felt it fitting that he 
 should offer some tribute to the memory of Governor Lincoln. 
 
 His manners were elegant and courteous. There was a no- 
 bility about his person and carriage that language cannot express. 
 I have never seen it equalled. His diction was admirable beyond 
 measure. Most felicitous in the choice of words, the right word 
 was always in the right place, and on the right occasion. I never 
 saw a man who had such an appi'eciation of the proprieties of life. 
 No man could appreciate it who had not seen him on a festive 
 occasion. The speaker remembered one, at the time when C. J. 
 Shaw took his seat on the bench, at which Governor Lincoln pre- 
 sided with even more than his accustomed grace and felicity. He 
 was a man of remarkable intelligence, and of unbending integrity. 
 No man was so scrupulous as he in doing just what was right. 
 
 He was always kind, always courteous, always received you 
 
40 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 in such a manner that you regretted you had not oftener availed 
 yourself of his hospitality. Mr. Bacon said it had not been his 
 privilege to see Governor Lincoln at this bar in the trial of causes, 
 though as a student at law in the office of Governor Davis and 
 Mr. Allen, he became familiar with the reputation which he left 
 behind on his entrance into public life. He stood from the first at 
 the head of the bar, though among his competitors were the two 
 Uphams, the three Bigelows (of one of whom, Timothy Bigelow, 
 a wmnderful man, it was said that when a member of the General 
 Court he was able, on the second morning of the session, to call 
 by name every one of the five or six hundred members), Francis 
 Blake, and John Davis. 
 
 The reported decisions of this Court show where he stood. 
 From the fifth volume to the twenty-third, in every important case 
 his name appears on one side or the other. That he did so much 
 was owing to his industry and system. 
 
 He was more particularly known and respected as a public 
 man. He was a popular Governor, not in the common accepta- 
 tion of the term, but he was respected because he did in every case 
 what he believed was for the public good. He regarded an office 
 as a sacred trust, and would never shrink from the performance of 
 duty whatever might be the consequence, taking no thought for 
 the criticism of friends or the threats of enemies. To that con- 
 scientiousness we owe the appointment of that eminent judge who 
 so long illustrated this bench. It is well known that he had to 
 disregard life-long friendships. 
 
 He was a friend and supporter of our militia system. Soon 
 after the close of the war of 1812, the war spirit died out. Gov- 
 ernor Lincoln protested against the abandonment of the militia, 
 and we owe it more to him than to any other man, that at the out- 
 break of this war we had an organization capable of doing the 
 country some service. He was always vigilant — “we quid detri- 
 menti rcspublica capiat." 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 41 
 
 Mr. Bacon spoke at considerable length, and with great 
 earnestness, of Gov. Lincoln’s zeal and labors for the advancement 
 of learning, for the prosperity of this city and county, and of his 
 patriotism and faith during the recent Rebellion. His remarks 
 were very impressive, and were listened to with great interest. 
 
 His Honor, 0. J. Chapman, responded to the resolutions of the 
 bar, as follows : — 
 
 The court have listened with deep interest to the resolutions 
 that have been offered, and to all that has been said in support of 
 them. They constitute a well-deserved tribute to the memory of 
 one who has lived a long life, and devoted much of it to the service 
 of the public in honorable and eminent positions, and closed it in 
 circumstances of prosperity and peace ; and who has left behind 
 him, both in public and private, the record of an unblemished 
 character. The eulogies that have been bestowed upon him recall 
 to our minds nothing by way of contrast, that we could desire to 
 blot out as a stain upon his memory. And this is much to say of 
 any one who has mingled so long and so earnestly in public and 
 political affairs. 
 
 Before I knew much of this court he had left it, and had left 
 behind him a high reputation as an eloquent advocate, and an 
 upright, courteous, and able judge, and had become the Governor 
 of the Commonwealth. He had been elected to that office, not by 
 a party, but by the people of all parties, to represent them in what 
 is still known as “the era of good feeling” in politics. He was 
 a fit representative of the policy of such an era. Not only was his 
 integrity above suspicion, but he was animated by a spirit of im- 
 partial good will and a regard for the welfare of all. It cost him 
 no effort, therefore, to administer the government of the State for 
 the equal benefit of all the people. History will make honorable 
 mention of his name, and class him among those governors of 
 6 
 
42 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 States who have administered our republican institutions in their 
 true spirit. 
 
 When his services were transferred from the councils of the 
 State to the councils of the nation, he soon acquired a national 
 reputation as a high-minded statesman. After he retired from 
 political life lie continued to be known throughout the Common- 
 wealth, especially as a promoter of learning and of agricultural 
 industry. Even in advanced age he was not forgotten, and did 
 not sink into obscui'ity. He has received repeated testimonials of 
 the confidence and respect of the public, and in his old age the 
 sentiment of respect ripened into a sentiment of veneration. 
 
 We do well to honor the memory of such men; for the 
 example and influence of great and good men is public property, 
 and is among the richest treasures that the State possesses. Their 
 influence continues to live in the very soil and atmosphere ; and in 
 after times those who dwell upon the same soil, and breathe the 
 same air, feel this influence as an elevating power. It is especially 
 becoming in the bar and the bench to place on record a testimony 
 of their appreciation of such a man as Governor Lincoln. The 
 resolutions will be placed on record, agreeably to the motion. 
 
PROCEEDINGS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 AMERICAN ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY. 
 
 At a meeting of the American Antiquarian Society, held at 
 their rooms in Worcester, Tuesday morning, the President, lion. 
 Stephen Salisbury, delivered a eulogy, rehearsing the services 
 rendered and the offices held in the society by the deceased, and the 
 following resolutions were adopted : — 
 
 Resolved, That we consider, with sorrow and deep concern, 
 that a pillar which has sustained our association for fifty-six years 
 has been removed by the providence of God, in the death of our 
 senior vice-president, who was the survivor of our fathers, named 
 in our act of incorporation, and who was second only to our 
 honored founder, Dr. Josiah Thomas, in his good works and good 
 influences for the prosperity of our society. 
 
 Resolved , That we will cherish the memory of our revered 
 associate in his many good examples, in his w r ise liberality and 
 watchful exertions to promote the common objects of which we 
 have here assumed the responsible care ; in his devoted and pro- 
 gressive patriotism; in his punctual, earnest, and unsparing labors 
 for the furtherance of every good object, whether it was deemed 
 great or small; in the agreeable courtesy, the ready sympathy, 
 and the never-forgotten dignity, which made his presence welcome 
 in all his social intercourse ; in his purity of life and his consci- 
 entious regard of Christian observances ; in his fearless vindication 
 
 ( 43 ) 
 
44 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 of the right and the true, and in the root and source of his noble 
 character, his Christian fidelity. 
 
 Resolved, That while we mourn for ourselves, we contemplate 
 with joy and hope the departure of our friend, who at the end of 
 his active usefulness on earth has so passed the bounds of time ; 
 and as he verified in life the promise that he, “ who hath been 
 faithful over a few things, shall be ruler over many things,” we 
 trust in the mercy of God that he has received the welcome 
 annexed to that promise, “ Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.” 
 
 Resolved, That we offer to Mrs. Lincoln and her children our 
 sincere sympathy in their great loss, and we commend them to the 
 consolation of grateful memories and Christian hopes. 
 
 Resolved, We will express our respect for our distinguished 
 associate by attending his funeral as a society. 
 
 Resolved, That a copy of this memorial be communicated to 
 Mrs. Lincoln by the recording secretary. 
 
PROCEEDINGS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 DIRECTORS OF WORCESTER NATIONAL BANK. 
 
 At a special meeting of the board of directors, called to take 
 action in reference to the decease of the senior director, the follow- 
 ing preamble and resolutions, offered by the vice-president, were 
 unanimously adopted : 
 
 Inasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God to receive into his 
 nearer presence our venerated and distinguished associate, the 
 Honorable Levi Lincoln, who has been connected with the direc- 
 tion of this bank, excepting the few years while public duty 
 required his absence from this place of his residence, since his first 
 election, October 3d, 1810 — 
 
 Resolved, That it is fitting that to the records of the bank, 
 which bear so full and so constant testimony to the faithfulness 
 with which he has discharged the duties imposed upon him by 
 these several generations of stockholders, during the long period of 
 fifty-eight years, should now be added the grateful tribute to his 
 memory, which, as their representatives, we desire to express. 
 
 We recall with pride the many high positions he has filled in 
 the service of the State, and of this city of his birth, and that this 
 more private office has been adorned, and the name of this ancient 
 corporation more respected by his association with its history. 
 
 In his exertions to secure a continuance of its charter, in the 
 early years of his directorship, we see the same sagacious foresight 
 and readiness to advance the prosperity of the people of all classes, 
 in this county, that he has ever manifested through all the years of 
 his service. 
 
 ( 45 ) 
 
46 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 We bear our testimony to his willingness, in latter years, to 
 render the aid of the bank to all enterprises which have advanced 
 the growth and the wealth of this community ; to his judicious 
 liberality in granting its accommodations to honest and deserving 
 business men ; and to his wise counsels and energetic action in 
 times of civil commotion, or of monetary panic and mercantile 
 distress. 
 
 We remember, affectionately, the urbane dignity, combined 
 with genial suavity, which, at this board, as everywhere, com- 
 manded the reverence due to age, while it permitted the freedom 
 and sympathy of his younger associates. And we mourn that he 
 will meet with us no more. 
 
 We rejoice that his gradual decline and his last illness have 
 been attended with little suffering, and with scarcely abated mental 
 vigor ; and that he has passed away as he would have wished to 
 go, with the consciousness of a long life’s work well done, and 
 awaiting the summons hence “ as one who wraps the drapery of 
 his couch about him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.” 
 
 We commend his example, of patient fidelity in all the duties 
 of life, however lofty or however humble, to our own remem- 
 brance, to the young men who are officially connected with the 
 bank, and to all who shall come after us in its management or its 
 service. 
 
 And we offer to Madam Lincoln, and to the family of our late 
 associate, the assurance of our tender respect for his memory, and 
 of our sincere sympathy with them in their bereavement. 
 
 Resolved , That the bank be closed on the day of the funeral, 
 and that the directors and officers will attend the funeral services. 
 
 Resolved, That these resolutions be entered upon the records 
 of the Worcester National Bank, and that the cashier be directed 
 to transmit a copy thereof to the family of Governor Lincoln. 
 
 From the records. 
 
 A copy. Attest : CHARLES B. WHITING, 
 
 Cashier. 
 
PROCEEDINGS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 BUNKER HILL MONUMENT ASSOCIATION. 
 
 The undersigned, a committee appointed at the annual meeting 
 of the Bunker Hill Monument Association, held on the lTth instant, 
 to propose resolutions in honor of the memory of the late Ex-Gov- 
 ernor Lincoln, report the enclosed, as the result of their action 
 on the subject. 
 
 THOMAS ASPINWALL, 
 JAMES W. SEVER, 
 
 F. W. LINCOLN, Jr. 
 
 Boston, June 22, 1868. 
 
 The Bunker Hill Monument Association, sharing in the ear- 
 nest desire of the whole community to pay signal honor to the 
 memory of the Honorable Levi Lincoln, late a member, and 
 formerly president of the association, have 
 
 Resolved , That this association is justly proud that his dis- 
 tinguished and revered name stands upon our rolls ; and we avail 
 ourselves of this occasion to express our grateful remembrance of 
 his services in this body, and also of his exact and conscientious 
 fulfilment of all duties, domestic, social, or public, throughout a 
 long life, constantly and wisely devoted to the diffusion of happi- 
 ness among those around him, and to the promotion of the best 
 and truest interests of his State and country. 
 
 Resolved , That in all civil stations, whether in a judicial 
 
 ( 47 ) 
 
48 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 capacity, in the State or national legislature, or in the chief 
 magistracy of our own Commonwealth, in which he was placed and 
 constantly sustained by well-merited public favor, his conduct was 
 uniformly guided by pure, generous, and elevated sentiments and 
 principles, combined with a profound sense of moral obligation that 
 allowed no sacrifice of the public welfare to mere personal or party 
 considerations. 
 
 In his life and character, perhaps as nearly exempt from faults 
 as erring humanity admits of, he has left an example to be fol- 
 lowed, a valuable legacy for the instruction and guidance of those 
 who survive him, and of generations to come. 
 
 Resolved, That these resolutions be placed upon the records of 
 the association, and a copy thereof be forwarded to the family of 
 the deceased, with the expression of our sincere sympathy in their 
 bereavement. 
 
 A true copy. 
 
 Attest : S. F. McCLEARY, 
 
 Secretary of Bunker Hill Monument Association. 
 
THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE, 
 
 WRITTEN BY 
 
 DELANO A. GODDARD, Esq. (formerly of Worcester,) 
 
 IS TAKEN FROM THE 
 
 BOSTON DAILY ADVERTISER. 
 
 Ex-Governor Levi Lincoln died at his residence in Worcester, 
 Friday morning, at the age of eighty-five years. Pie had suffered 
 from failing health, more perceptible to himself than to others, for 
 two years past. But his remarkable vitality, which had so long 
 spared him the usual infirmities of old age, still enabled him to 
 bear the approaches of disease without appearing to yield to them. 
 He was confined to his house but a few weeks, where he continued 
 to give those who saw him the impression of health not greatly 
 impaired, until near the last, when he fell into a more rapid 
 decline, and passed away about seven o’clock on Friday morning. 
 His death removes one of the last of a generation of public men 
 who in the first half of this century gave to the political history of 
 Massachusetts its distinction and its character ; and among whom 
 Governor Lincoln, during the whole active period of his life, 
 exercised a conspicuous influence in positions of eminent usefulness 
 and honor. 
 
 He inherited from his distinguished father a singular capacity 
 for public affairs, which he had ample opportunity to cultivate 
 under the influence of fortunate associations into which he was 
 
 ( 49 ) 
 
 7 
 
50 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEYI LINCOLN. 
 
 early thrown. The elder Lincoln, the third son of Enoch Lincoln, 
 of Hingham, pushed his own fortunes with great success, selecting 
 under the inspiration of the eloquence of John Adams the pro- 
 fession in which he became eminent, taking part with manly enthu- 
 siasm in the discussions and events of the Revolution, contributing 
 by tongue and pen to the formation of the public opinion which 
 sustained the cause in its adversity, and brought order out of the 
 chaos which immediately followed the war. He began the practice 
 of his profession at Worcester in 1775, when John Sprague, of 
 Lancaster, and Joshua Upham, of Brookfield, were the only 
 lawyers whom the violent changes of the period left at the bar of 
 the county, — the rest having deserted the country or been driven 
 from their homes. His superior talents and address not only 
 opened the way at once to a lucrative practice, but singled him out 
 for the public service. He passed successively through nearly all 
 the grades of public duty, devoting himself at the same time to the 
 requirements of his profession, and in the intervals of his absorbing 
 labor contributing to the journals the most effective controversial 
 papers on the topics of the day. On the accession of Mr. Jeffer- 
 son to the presidency, he was called from the Seventh Congress, of 
 which he was a member, to a seat in the cabinet as Attorney- 
 General of the United States. He was subsequently Counsellor, 
 Lieutenant-Governor, and, upon the death of Governor Sullivan, 
 Governor of Massachusetts. He enjoyed not only the intimacy and 
 warm personal friendship of Jefferson, but was consulted by the 
 foremost men of the nation under the administrations of Adams 
 who preceded, and of Madison who followed him. 
 
 The younger Lincoln was born on the 25th of October, 
 1782; was graduated at Harvard University in 1802; was ad- 
 mitted to the bar and began the practice of law in his native town 
 three years later; was a member of the State Senate in 1812, and 
 from 1814 to 1822 represented the town in the House of Repre- 
 sentatives ; was a member of the constitutional convention of 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 51 
 
 1820 ; was Speaker of the House in 1822, when a majority of the 
 members were opposed to him in political sentiments ; was 
 Lieutenant-Governor in 1823 ; Associate Justice of the Supreme 
 Court in 1824 ; Governor from 1825 to 1834 ; Representative in 
 Congress from 1835 to 1841 ; Collector of the port of Boston 
 under President Harrison ; and subsequently in various places of 
 duty and service for the State and the city to which he belonged. 
 But this catalogue of official titles and dates gives only the husks 
 of his real service. He was profoundly interested in the political 
 questions involved in the war of 1812, and drew, and with 
 Benjamin Crowinshield, presented the answer of the Senate of that 
 year to the speech of Governor Strong, who represented those who 
 were hostile to the war. Two years later, when a member of the 
 other branch of the legislature, he wrote the famous protest of the 
 minority to the act authorizing the Hartford Convention. He was 
 thus separated from the large number of able men who participated 
 in that movement ; but his sagacity was approved by his constitu- 
 ents, and the controlling sentiment of the State was soon on his 
 side. In the convention of 1820, which contained the flower of 
 the talent of the Commonwealth, others bore a more active, but 
 none a more creditable part. He spoke without ornament or pre- 
 tension, always with clearness and to the point. He belonged at 
 that time to the advance guard, and whatever promised improve- 
 ment in a reasonable and enlightened way, excited his sympathy 
 and commanded his aid. 
 
 The period during which he administered the State govern- 
 ment is often referred to as one of the highest political felicity. 
 He was chosen by the concurrence of all parties, when the singular 
 desire prevailed that the best men should be selected for office 
 without reference to names that had lost their meaning. It was 
 common to address the calls for local meetings to “ all who were in 
 favor of the unanimous election of Lincoln and Morton ; ” and, in 
 theory at least, reference was had to the old divisions only so far 
 
52 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEYI LINCOLN. 
 
 as to see that the sensitiveness of neither party was wounded by neg- 
 lect in the distribution of favors. Where the memory of the old his- 
 torical associations lingered behind the march of events, and candi- 
 dates were chosen with reference to them, as continued to be the case 
 to an extent which made the judicious grieve, the selection had no 
 bearing upon particular measures to be carried out. But whatever 
 local diversions occurred, Governor Lincoln kept the confidence of 
 the people year after year, and year after year commanded their 
 nearly unanimous support. New parties sprung into existence ; 
 but the initiative of opposition to the governor was a step too bold 
 to be taken. Questions of internal policy divided the opinions of 
 the Commonwealth, upon which the governor held no doubtful 
 opinions. But when election day came round, the dissenters 
 buried their griefs and helped to swell the current of public ap- 
 proval. And when he retired from the office it was the universal 
 testimony that Massachusetts had never had a better chief magis- 
 trate. He never hesitated to assume the proper responsibility of 
 his office ; was not in the habit of qualifying his own views of par- 
 ticular measures, as in the controversy about manufacturing cor- 
 porations and the introduction of the railroad system into Massa- 
 chusetts against an opposition which at this time seems scarcely 
 credible ; was scrupulously careful of the dignity of his station, 
 but by his urbanity and condescension made himself accessible to 
 every citizen; and managed, in the midst of conflicting opinions, 
 to give satisfaction to all parties, and make the people see that 
 their affairs were attended to in precisely the manner in which they 
 wished to have them discharged. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln’s retirement from public life was not made an 
 excuse for abandoning labor, where his experience, judgment, and 
 unimpaired energy could be of service. When the town of Wor- 
 cester became a city in 1848, the first citizen was naturally selected 
 as the first mayor, and its requirements were met with unfailing 
 zeal and fidelity. He took a warm personal interest not only in 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 53 
 
 institutions designed for the benefit of the living, but in the resting- 
 places for the dead. He devoted time, thought, and care, not 
 only to learned and charitable societies to which he belonged, but 
 with equally assiduous zeal gave his best efforts to surrounding 
 with appropriate beauty the grounds where his neighbors and 
 friends might sleep hereafter. He was for many years president 
 of the Worcester Agricultural Society, a regular exhibitor at its 
 annual fairs, and a constant friend of the agricultural interests of 
 the Commonwealth. He was a Fellow of the American Academy 
 of Arts and Sciences, a member and counsellor of the American 
 Antiquarian Society, and a member of the Massachusetts Historical 
 Society. Harvard University and Williams College each conferred 
 on him the degree of Doctor of Laws. He also served as officer 
 or counsellor of many other associations for literary, educational, 
 or charitable purposes. He kept to the last a liberal and watchful 
 interest in the affairs of the community where he resided, and 
 whose respect he enjoyed. The last office of a public nature which 
 he consented to perform was to give one of the electoral votes of 
 Massachusetts for Abraham Lincoln in 1864, when the exigencies 
 of the country seemed to have renewed his youth, and to have 
 stimulated anew the patriotism which neither time nor his long 
 retirement from its affairs had begun to extinguish. 
 
 The good fortune which seemed to wait on him in the earlier, 
 continued with him through the later period of his life. The hand 
 of time rested lightly on him ; and till the sharp warning came to 
 remind him of the change he was approaching, he preserved an 
 elasticity of mind and body suggestive of perpetual youth. He 
 had the happiness also of receiving, wherever he went, the visible 
 manifestations of the respect of a generation with whom the active 
 period of his own life was little more than a tradition. The con- 
 troversies in which he had borne no indifferent part were forgotten ; 
 and his fellow-citizens only remembered his eminent public serv- 
 ices, his faithful attention to the duties of a good citizen, and the 
 excellencies of his Christian character. 
 
THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE, 
 
 
 WRITTEN BY 
 
 HON. CHARLES C. HA SEWELL, 
 
 IS COPIED FROM 
 
 THE BOSTON JOURNAL. 
 
 DEATH OF EX-GOVERNOR LINCOLN. 
 
 Massachusetts has lost one of the most eminent of her sons, 
 through the death of Levi Lincoln, at the very advanced age of 
 eighty-five years. He died at Worcester on Friday, after a brief 
 illness. Mr. Lincoln belonged to a family which has been dis- 
 tinguished for a century by the talents of many of its members, 
 and the eminence of their public services. His father, Levi 
 Lincoln, a distinguished statesman of the first age of the Republic, 
 was born at Hingham, in “ the Old Colony,” in 1749. Through 
 his own exertions he obtained a regular education, and was grad- 
 uated in Harvard College in 1772, with high honors. He chose 
 the law for his profession, and was studying for the bar in the 
 office of the celebrated Joseph Hawley of Northampton, when 
 the Revolutionary war began, at Lexington, upon which he 
 volunteered, and served for some time with the army that finally 
 drove the English from Boston. He selected Worcester for his 
 residence, and was admitted to practice in 1775, and immediately 
 attained to distinction. In 1778 he conducted the defence of Mrs. 
 Bethsheba Spooner and others, who were tried and convicted on 
 the charge of murdering Mrs. Spooner’s husband. This was the 
 first capital trial in the State of Massachusetts, and there has 
 been nothing in our criminal history like it since. It is the most 
 sensational of all our celebrated causes, and the history of it can 
 
 ( 54 ) 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 55 
 
 even now be read with painful interest. Mr. Lincoln had a hope- 
 less case on his hands, and he knew it ; but he contended manfully 
 and ably for his clients, showing great ingenuity and power of argu- 
 ment. The manuscript notes of his plea are yet in existence. An 
 active patriot, Mr. Lincoln was novv called to office. He was 
 made Judge of Probate, and chosen a delegate to the convention 
 which made the constitution of Massachusetts. He served in the 
 Legislature, and was elected to the Continental Congress, but 
 declined the latter post. He was a member of both branches of 
 the Legislature after the adoption of the Constitution of the United 
 States, and was elected to Congress in 1800. In 1801 he received 
 the appointment of Attorney-General of the United States, from 
 President Jefferson, and held the office until 1805, when he volun- 
 tarily left it. Chosen a State Councillor of Massachusetts in 1806, 
 and Lieutenant-Governor in 1807 and 1808, he became Governor 
 in the latter year, on the death of Governor Sullivan. In 1811 
 President Madison made him an Associate Justice of the Supreme 
 Court of the United States, but the state of his health did not 
 allow of his accepting the station. The remainder of his life was 
 passed in retirement, and was devoted to agriculture and study. 
 He died on the 14th of May, 1820. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln married Miss Waldo, daughter of a distinguished 
 citizen of Boston, in 1781. The eldest son of this marriage was 
 the gentleman just deceased. He was born in Worcester on the 
 25th of October, 1782. At twenty-one he was graduated at 
 Harvard College, and selected his father’s profession, studying in 
 his office until 1805, and commencing professional life that year 
 at Worcester. He became an ardent politician, and was a rec- 
 ognized leader of the Jeffersonian Democratic party, which was 
 successful on several occasions in Massachusetts in those days, 
 the State voting for Mr. Jefferson’s re-election, and later, electing 
 Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Gerry to the Governorship. In 1812 he 
 was a member of the Massachusetts Senate, and drew up the 
 
56 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 answer of that body to the speech of Governor Strong. Party 
 spirit then ran very high, and Governor Strong stood at the head 
 of those who were opposed to the war with Great Britain. Mr. 
 Lincoln was a firm supporter of the war, and opposed the course 
 of the majority here with indomitable courage, but always main- 
 tained the courtesies of political warfare. He was elected a member 
 of the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1814, the ses- 
 sion of which year was the most remarkable one in our legislative 
 history. The Hartford Convention was then resolved upon by 
 our Legislature. Mr. Lincoln vigorously opposed this project, 
 but the Federalists were overwhelmingly strong and carried their 
 point. He then drew up the well-known protest against that 
 Convention, which was signed by seventy-six members. This 
 paper was published, and sent to every part of the country ; and 
 it had the effect of gaining for its author a national reputation. 
 He continued to serve in the House of Representatives for several 
 
 years, until the close of 1822. In his last year he was chosen 
 
 Speaker, though the majority of the members were opposed to 
 him in political opinions, a tribute of respect that is vex - y seldom 
 
 paid to a public man in America. No man ever left behind 
 
 him a higher reputation in the Massachusetts Legislature than 
 the second Levi Lincoln. 
 
 A constitutional convention was called in 1820, to revise the 
 State Constitution, and Mr. Lincoln was chosen one of the dele- 
 gates from Worcester. His colleagues were Abraham Lincoln 
 and Edward D. Bangs. He was one of the most prominent 
 members of the Convention, and ever supported liberal doctrines 
 or liberal measures, as a delegate ; and some of the wisest changes 
 made in the State Constitution were largely due to his influence 
 and exertions. Some of his remarks on representation were quite 
 as advanced as anything that is known at the present day. In 
 the debate on the apportionment of the Senate, held on the 13th 
 of December, 1820, he said — “Our government is one of the 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 57 
 
 people, not a government of property. Representation is founded 
 on the interests of the people. It is because they have rights 
 that they have assumed the power of self-government. Property 
 is incompetent to sustain a free government. In a government of 
 freemen, property is valuable only as the people are intelligent. 
 'Were it not for a government of the people, the people would be 
 without property. But it is contended that this system is justified 
 by another principle. Representation and taxation have been de- 
 scribed as twin brothers. But this principle has not been fully 
 understood. It does not follow that there shall be an unequal 
 representation, that taxation may be represented. It is only ne- 
 cessary that all who are taxed should be represented, and not 
 that they should be represented in proportion to their tax.” These 
 views would be considered liberal even by the radicals of this 
 time, and they are applicable to some of our existing disputes. 
 He spoke with much spirit on the 30th of December, when the 
 independence of the judiciary w r as under discussion. After show- 
 ing the little likelihood there was that four co-ordinate branches 
 of the Government — the House of Representatives, the Senate, 
 the Governor, and the Council — should conspire to remove a 
 Judge without cause, he proceeded to observe: “But it was 
 
 argued that future legislatures might be corrupt. This was a 
 monstrous supposition. He would rather suppose that a Judge 
 might be corrupt. It was more natural that a single person 
 should be corrupt than a numerous body. The proposed amend- 
 ment was said to be similar to provisions of other Governments. 
 There was no analogy — because other Governments are not con- 
 stituted like ours. It was said that the Judges have estates in 
 their offices — he did not agree to this doctrine. The office was 
 not made for the Judge, nor the Judge for the office; but both 
 for the people. There was another tenure — the confidence of 
 the people. It was that which has hitherto occurred here. Have 
 we then less reason to confide in posterity than our ancestors had 
 to confide in us ? ” 8 
 
58 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 Under the act for the separation of Maine from Massachusetts, 
 Mr. Lincoln was appointed one of the Commissioners to divide and 
 apportion the public property. He was Lieutenant-Governor of 
 Massachusetts in 1823 ; and in February, 1824, he was appointed 
 an Associate Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court. This office he 
 held but a short time, for in 1825 he was nominated for the office 
 of Governor of Massachusetts by both political parties, and chosen 
 without opposition to speak of. That time was the close of “ the 
 era of good feeling,” which was soon to be followed by new party 
 divisions. In the re-formation of parties that took place after the 
 election of Mr. J. Q. Adams to the presidency, Governor Lincoln 
 became a leader of that organization which ultimately was so 
 renowned under the Whig name. By this party he was repeatedly 
 re-elected to the executive chair, — or, it would be more proper to 
 say, he was re-elected by the people, as the opposition made to his 
 re-election was often but nominal. He was Governor of Massa- 
 chusetts nine years in succession, a circumstance without parallel in 
 our history ; and his retirement was voluntary. The period of his 
 governorship was one of the most prosperous that the State has 
 ever known, and is often looked back to as a golden time, when 
 men were better than they are now, and when sound principles 
 were held in higher veneration than they are by the existing gener- 
 ation. In all respects Governor Lincoln was a model magistrate. 
 He was universally respected, as well by political foes as by 
 political friends, and this consideration was the just result of his 
 conscientious and most careful discharge of the various and difficult 
 duties of his high station. The first veto message ever submitted 
 to the Legislature of the State came from Governor Lincoln. 
 
 The same year that he left the office of Governor (1834), 
 Mr. Lincoln was chosen a representative in congress, from the 
 Worcester district. He succeeded Mr. John Davis as representa- 
 tive, as Mr. Davis had succeeded him as governor. He remained 
 in the House of Representatives, by successive re-elections, until 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 59 
 
 1841. His course as a member of congress was high-minded and 
 honorable, and won for him the good opinion of all. Though 
 strictly faithful to his party and its principles, he had a scorn for 
 the work of mere faction that sometimes found effective expression. 
 An instance of this occurred during the exciting presidential con- 
 test of 1840. Mr. Ogle, of Pennsylvania, made a speech, in 
 which he assailed President Van Buren for having, as he said, 
 been extravagant in furnishing the White House. There was 
 much vulgarity in the speech, and Mr. Lincoln, though a strong 
 supporter of Gen. Harrison, replied to Mr. Ogle with so much 
 effect that the Democrats printed and circulated his speech as a 
 campaign document. 
 
 When the Whigs came into power, in 1841, Mr. Lincoln was 
 appointed Collector of the port of Boston, succeeding Mr. Bancroft. 
 He remained in that office until the latter part of 1843, when he 
 was removed by President Tyler, who was then intriguing for the 
 Democratic nomination, and therefore was making use of “ the 
 spoils ” to buy up active politicians. This was the only occasion 
 on which Mr. Lincoln ever left office otherwise than by his own 
 act, and the change in this instance was honorable to him. He 
 was immediately chosen to the State Senate, and re-elected the 
 next year, when he was made president of that body. In 1848 he 
 was one of the presidential electors on the Whig ticket, and pre- 
 sided over the Electoral College when its vote was cast for Taylor 
 and Fillmore. He was chosen first mayor of the city of Wor- 
 cester, and served his immediate fellow-citizens with the same zeal, 
 intelligence, and fidelity that ever had marked his course in higher 
 positions. He gave his services to several societies, corporations, 
 and academies, and acted as trustee, treasurer, or president, in 
 them all, repeatedly. He took a great interest in agriculture, and 
 was for many years president of the Worcester Agricultural 
 Society. He was also a Vice-President of the American Antiqua- 
 rian Society, and Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and 
 
60 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LETT LINCOLN. 
 
 Sciences. He served as one of the members of the Board of 
 Overseers of Harvard College, and by that learned body he was 
 made a doctor of laws. A similar honor was conferred on him 
 by Williams College. His last public post was that of presidential 
 elector in 1864, on the Republican or Union ticket. He was 
 present at the opening of the Massachusetts Legislature in 1 866, 
 to witness the inauguration of his neighbor and fellow-townsman, 
 Governor Bullock, though at that time considerably advanced 
 toward his eighty-fourth year. It will be observed that he was 
 born the same year with Webster, Calhoun, Cass, Van Buren, 
 and Benton. 
 
 A younger brother of Mr. Lincoln, — Enoch Lincoln, born 
 in 1788, — was a man of great abilities and possessed remarkable 
 acquirements. He was a student of Harvard College, studied law 
 with his elder brother, and was admitted to the bar in 1811. 
 Settling at Fryeburg, in the then district of Maine, in 1812, he 
 gave much of his attention to the Indian history of that part of the 
 country ; and he wrote poems of much merit concerning the modes 
 of life then prevalent in the country of the Saco. He removed to 
 the town of Paris in the year 1819, and was elected to the United 
 States House of Representatives, in which he remained until 1826, 
 when he became Governor of Maine. The two brothers were 
 governors at the same time, and the two States had at one time 
 formed the single State of Massachusetts. He was three times 
 Governor of Maine, and declined a fourth time, purposing to 
 devote himself to literature, science, and agriculture, in all of 
 which he was well-fitted to shine; but his death, in 1829, when in 
 his forty-first year, put an end to what would have been a brilliant 
 life. He contemplated an extensive work on Maine, the materials 
 for which he had collected. 
 
 Captain George Lincoln, son of the late Governor Lincoln, 
 was a young man of much promise. He left college at the age of 
 and turned his attention to maritime pursuits, for which he 
 
MEMORIAL OP LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 61 
 
 showed much fitness. He then entered the regular army of the 
 United States, and served in the Florida war. Sent to Texas in 
 1845, he was present in the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la 
 Palma; and was appointed assistant adjutant general. He was 
 attached to the staff of General Wool at the battle of Buena Vista, 
 and fell at the crisis of that hard-fought action, in which victory so 
 
 long remained in doubt. The highest tributes were paid to him in 
 
 ✓ 
 
 general orders, and were ratified by the testimony of his brother 
 /A officers. He fell in his thirty coeimd year. Had he lived, he 
 would have won distinction in the secession war, as he had the true 
 spirit of the soldier, and was steadily rising in the army. At the 
 time of his death the rank of captain had been conferred upon him, 
 though he was not aware of the fact. His remains were removed 
 from Mexico when our army left that country, and now repose in 
 the beautiful cemetery at Worcester. Major Frye, of the Ken- 
 tucky Volunteers, said of him: “ By his noble bearing and kind- 
 ness of heart, he won our affections completely. We looked upon 
 him as upon a brother, and when we were leaving the country we 
 could not consent to leave his remains behind us.” 
 
 The death of Mr. Lincoln, though not without warning, has 
 taken him from the community by which he was beloved, before 
 age had made life burdensome, or impaired mental faculties had 
 weakened his interest in the affairs of his native State. During the 
 Rebellion, his pen on more than one occasion, and his voicd when 
 opportunity presented itself, told of the patriotic emotions which he 
 experienced, and the interest he felt in the cause of humanity. 
 H is life record forms a chapter in our local history illustrating the 
 beauty of a career in which devotion to great public interests was 
 happily blended with the purest Christian motives, and the most 
 spotless personal integrity. Though he had attained to a vener- 
 able age, he had not outlived the remembrance of his good deeds 
 performed in the vigor of his manhood. Now that he has passed 
 away, the people of the whole Commonwealth will revere his 
 memory. 
 
EXTRACT FEOM AN ARTICLE 
 
 IN THE 
 
 WORCESTER PALLADIUM, 
 
 BY HON. J. S. C. KNOWLTON. 
 
 Massachusetts never had a more-efficient, pains-taking, prompt 
 governor, than was Governor Lincoln. He made himself familiar 
 with the affairs of the Commonwealth, and devoted himself assid- 
 uously to the promotion of its interests, and the protection of its 
 ■welfare and honor ; never allowing his private affairs a precedence 
 over the claims which he considered the State had upon his time 
 and attention. 
 
 Among the questions of State policy that engaged his attention 
 as Governor, was that of internal communication of the seaboard 
 with what are now the great and powerful States of the West, but 
 which then had scarcely given promise of what they have since 
 become. He favored a survey for a canal from the Hudson River 
 to Boston Harbor, — the precursor to the survey for the railroad 
 that was afterwards constructed. 
 
 Gov. Lincoln was elected a representative in Congress in Feb- 
 ruary, 1834, upon the election of John Davis as governor ; and 
 was chosen again in November of the same year ; again in 1836 ; 
 and still again in 1838 ; and in 1840. In that position he was 
 a faithful and honorable member ; on some occasions showing that 
 he held truth and honor as of higher moment than fealty to party ; 
 though Gov. Lincoln never had any concealment of his political 
 sentiments, nor afforded, on any occasion, any apology even for an 
 allegation of political duplicity. The political views which he 
 accepted in early life, carried him, without indirection, into the 
 Republican Party ; and induced him to speak and act, so far as his 
 
 ( 62 ) 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 63 
 
 age would permit, in support of the National Union, and in rebuke 
 and condemnation of every effort, by whomsoever made, to break 
 up and destroy the government. 
 
 Upon the incorporation of Worcester as a city, in 1848, Gov. 
 Lincoln was nominated by the citizens, without distinction of party, 
 for its first Mayor, — a befitting compliment to one whose whole 
 life had been identified with the growth and prosperity of the mu- 
 nicipality. He accepted the position only for a single year. 
 
 It would scarcely be hyperbole to say of Gov. Lincoln, that lie 
 was one of the institutions of Worcester, so intimately was he con- 
 nected with all its material, intellectual, and moral interests — 
 its means for industrial, social, and general development and 
 progress. 
 
 Gov. Lincoln retained his faculties, with much of their vigor, 
 to the close of his life, even after a partial paralysis had deprived 
 him of the ability to enjoy the activity which was ever one of his 
 distinguishing characteristics. 
 
 The life of a citizen, so widely known, and so intimately 
 blended with the present, the gone, and the coming, gives per- 
 tinency to Coleridge’s inquiry : — 
 
 “ Hath he not always treasures, always friends, 
 
 The good great man ? Three treasures — love and light, 
 
 And calm thoughts, equable as infant’s breath ; 
 
 And three fast friends, more sure than day or night — 
 
 Himself, his Maker, and the angel Death.” 
 
 The death of Gov. Lincoln produced a sensation of sadness, — 
 not merely among the older residents, but also among the masses 
 of the dwellers of the city, many of whom might never have known 
 aught of him but his reputation as a useful and honorable citizen ; 
 spared to a great age as an exemplar of manly virtues ; and clos- 
 ing his long and useful life only at that day, when, as the sacred 
 writer expresses it, 11 the strength of the hearers of burdens is 
 decayed .” 
 
THE FOLLOWING EXTRACT 
 
 FROM A NOTICE IN THE 
 
 WORCESTER DAILY SPY, 
 
 IS UNDERSTOOD TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN BY 
 
 HON. HENRY CHAPIN. 
 
 Governor Lincoln was a man of rare executive ability and un- 
 bending integrity. He possessed that kindness of heart and urban- 
 ity of manner which characterize the true man. He was a splendid 
 specimen of a gentleman of the old school. No man welcomed the 
 coming or sped the parting guest more gracefully than he. His 
 home was always fragrant with the flavor of hospitality, while true 
 dignity and grace always seemed a part of his nature. As he 
 walked the streets up to the time of his last sickness, with form 
 erect and with eye undimmed, no stranger ever met him without 
 feelinar that he was a remarkable man. 
 
 o 
 
 Until the last year of his life he walked a mile to church in pref- 
 erence to riding in his carriage, and always did his part apparently 
 with the vigor of a man of fifty. Visitor’s at our agricultural fair 
 last fall remember with pleasure the cordial greeting of this erect 
 octogenarian, as he walked about the grounds and expressed his 
 admiration at the unusually fine exhibition of stock. He possessed 
 an eloquence of speech and a purity of diction rarely equalled and 
 seldom surpassed, and whatever he undertook to perform we knew 
 would be done gracefully and well. The truthfulness and honesty 
 of his nature were peculiarly manifested during the last years of his 
 life, when casting from him any feeling of jealousy towards men 
 
 ( 64 ) 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 65 
 
 younger and less talented than himself, whose views had at times 
 differed materially from his own, he stood up firm and fearless for 
 the right, regardless alike of any anxiety as to whether he led or 
 followed. No truer republican lived among us, and his devotion 
 to the principles of the party upon which the salvation of the coun- 
 try seemed to depend, was alike honorable to his head and his 
 heart. 
 
 A new generation has come upon the stage since his name was 
 surrounded with a sort of halo of professional success ; but this 
 community, which loved and honored him, not only for his remark- 
 able ability, but for the noble consistency of his daily life, will 
 cherish his memory with respect and affection, and will long refer 
 to him as the gentleman of ripe age and culture whose heart was 
 always young, and who to the last day of his long and useful life, 
 loved the home of his childhood and his friends and neighbors with 
 a fidelity and earnestness of affection which sickness could not 
 change, and which death cannot have terminated. 
 
 9 
 
PROCEEDINGS 
 
 OF THE 
 
 WORCESTER AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY, 
 
 AT ITS 
 
 SEMI-CENTENNIAL ANNIVERSARY, 
 
 SEPTEMBER 17, 1868. 
 
 The President, Solomon H. Howe, Esq., alluding to Ex-Gov- 
 ernor Lincoln, as the deceased founder of the Society, introduced 
 His Excellency, Governor Bullock, who spoke as follows : 
 
 EULOGY BY GOVERNOR BULLOCK. 
 
 Mr. President : In offering for the consideration of the 
 society the resolutions which I hold in my hand, I almost deem it 
 unnecessary to say that he who is the subject of them bore an 
 active part fifty years ago in the organization of this institution. 
 He was one of its first board of officers under his father, the senior 
 Governor Lincoln, as president. He delivered the inauguration 
 address before the society at its first public exhibition forty-nine 
 years ago. Five years later he was chosen its president, and con- 
 tinued to hold the office, without interruption, for the period of 
 nearly thirty years, when of his own choice he retired. I propose 
 his memory, to-day, accompanied with no other thoughts or reflec- 
 tions than such as flow from the present occasion, and from his 
 relations to this association. His career in public life and political 
 station, and all his connections with other objects and organiza- 
 tions, I pass over, and ask you to remember him as long time the 
 
 ( 66 ) 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEYI LINCOLN. 
 
 67 
 
 president and at all times the friend of the Worcester Agricultural 
 Society. I offer the following resolutions : 
 
 Resolved, By the members of the Worcester Agricultural 
 Society, that we share with the general public in deploring the 
 decease of Levi Lincoln ; whose life, character and reputation 
 were cherished by all the people of this Commonwealth, and were 
 especially near and dear to his fellow citizens and neighbors in the 
 city and county of his nativity and residence. 
 
 Resolved, Especially, that we desire to make enduring record 
 of our appreciation of the service he rendered to this society 
 through the uninterrupted period of half a century ; one of its orig- 
 inators and organizers, its first recording secretary, its president 
 for twenty-eight years, at all times and in all seasons its eloquent 
 advocate, constant contributor, and devoted friend. 
 
 Resolved, That we hold out to our members and to all whom 
 our influence may reach, the worthy and brilliant example of our 
 lamented friend, as an illustration of the honor and dignity which 
 may be attained, beyond all distinction of office or station, by a 
 just and pure life passed amid rural pursuits, and in the cultiva- 
 tion of the higher sentiments of human nature. 
 
 Mr. President, the present season is an eminently proper 
 occasion for recalling to the attention and gratitude of those now 
 living the services of that class of gentlemen, of whom our late 
 townsman remained latest among us, who in the early years of the 
 present century conferred a lasting benefit upon the whole com- 
 munity, by organizing the first agricultural societies. I have been 
 invited to attend, during this month, the half century commemora- 
 tion of three of the original and largest of these societies. I refer 
 to Worcester, Essex and Hampshire. One of these finds its own 
 existence interwoven with the life of Timothy Pickering, and the 
 associates of his time in the east ; another cannot write its history 
 without contributing to the biography of Gov. Strong, the Millses, 
 
68 
 
 MEBIORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 the JBateses, and the Allens so well known as the river-gods of the 
 Western valley; and the third, our own society, in setting up a 
 stone to mark the stage of fifty years, would be guilty of unnat- 
 ural neglect if it were not to inscribe most prominent the name 
 of Governor Lincoln as its founder and steadfast patron and 
 friend. 
 
 There are those now present who can bear witness to the 
 comprehensive views he took of the whole field of agriculture, and 
 the freedom with which he discussed them and impressed them 
 upon others. The characteristics of the soil, and the modern arts 
 and methods of developing and improving them ; the rotation of 
 crops, and their several adaptations to particular localities ; the 
 kinds of animals fitted to the varying towns of this entire section 
 of the State, and the history of their introduction, crossing and 
 improvement ; these and kindred topics were quite at his com- 
 mand, and he treated them so frequently and so well as to become 
 the best educator we have ever had in the county for all that 
 appertains to the business of an agricultural society. 
 
 He once gave me in private conversation an historical account 
 of the “ short horn,” occupying half an hour, and fit to have been 
 taken down by a reporter for preservation. If there be any man 
 in the State who is better informed than he was upon this class of 
 subjects, I know not where he may be found. His power of prac- 
 tical generalization was displayed in this field of inquii’y, and he 
 so classified and arranged the topics as to bring the whole together 
 into a noble system of organic husbandry. We always felt, when 
 listening to his talk upon these things here and elsewhere, that he 
 dignified what we call agriculture, and raised our thoughts of it, 
 as of something greater and higher than a mere mechanical neces- 
 sity for subsisting the human family. 
 
 It must be pleasant to a great many persons now living, to 
 remember this Worcester Society, as it comes back to them from 
 the days of his presiding ; and it is no disparagement of any of his 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 69 
 
 successors if some of us cannot make the association seem quite 
 the same thing that it was to us under his control and manage- 
 ment. My early recollections of a cattle show are of coming 
 hither as a boy, nearly forty miles, and witnessing the dignity and 
 affability with which he presided, and the interest with which he 
 inspired all who were around him. Many of you know how 
 patient, in that relation, he was of every detail, so that it appeared 
 that he could not formerly have been more painstaking in adminis- 
 tering the affairs of the Commonwealth than afterwards in directing 
 these. His hospitality after the labors of the show-day were over, 
 when committee-men assembled under his roof to condense, in the 
 fellowship of the evening, the somewhat diversified, and perhaps 
 somewhat incoherent lessons of the field and pens, will long be 
 remembered by every one who ever shared it. The best farmers 
 from distant towns went away with an enlarged sense of the eleva- 
 tion and importance of their vocation, and felt encouraged to strive 
 more stoutly in the next year’s competition. I make much allow- 
 ance for the large increase in the number of these societies, and the 
 consequent reduction of the power of the old ones, — and more still 
 for the modern hoi'se furor, which carries all before it, and to which 
 those who would not, nevertheless do yield, for the sake of the 
 receipts ; and yet even more for the overshadowing predominance 
 of the modern mechanic arts over the smaller department of agri- 
 culture ; and after all these allowances, I have an opinion that our 
 friend could accomplish more and better results than any man 
 I ever knew in keeping up the influence of an agricultural society 
 upon the basis of its original design. 
 
 You and I know with what reluctance he gave up his opposi- 
 tion to the introduction of the trial of the speed of horses as a 
 prominent item in the programme of our institution, — for he 
 knew, as he once said to me, that the incident would in due time 
 become the principal. Let us respect him for that, even while we 
 give way to the fulfilment of his prediction, which subordinates 
 
70 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 to-day, that is assigned for the cattle, below to-morrow, which be- 
 longs to the horses. I will not raise the question which of the two 
 we ought to respect the more highly in the peerage of the race, — 
 whether it should be Devon or Derby. That you may answer each 
 one for himself. For myself, amid all the excitement of cable dis- 
 patches from the English course, announcing silver plate and fabu- 
 lous wagers, won or lost, according to the infinitesimal part of a 
 second of time, achieved by the fleetest hoof, with the name of the 
 progenitor sire annexed, I like to repeat what Mr. Webster, standing 
 in the centre of his herd at Marshfield, twenty years ago, told me 
 the Duke of Devon had said to him : “ Politically my domain may 
 cease to endure, perhaps sooner than I could wish ; but I console 
 myself with the reflection that my name shall be respected so long 
 as the noble race of cattle which bears it shall continue to exist in 
 England.” 
 
 The farmer of Marshfield and the farmer of Worcester, con- 
 temporaries and friends in almost all other things, were assimilated 
 in the possession and cultivation of this instinct and taste. On the 
 day already referred to, when, with a party of friends, Mr. Web- 
 ster had perambulated his twelve hundred acres, and had shown to 
 us his fields, his cattle, and his barns, we noticed the stable well 
 stocked with horses, and asked that we might not fail to see them. 
 “ Certainly,” he said, “ here are some horses, quite handsome and 
 excellent, I believe, which have been presented to me by generous 
 friends. Look at them and judge. I profess to know how to 
 build a barn, and to understand the best cow in an hundred ; but 
 these horses are a little out of my line.” And you remember that, 
 as his last days on earth approached, he requested that he might be 
 propped up in his chair by the window, and that his cattle should 
 be driven up before him for his last inspection. It was a review, 
 true to nature, just prior to his final departure. He liked those 
 faces, and turned his own towards them with a confidence which 
 the last hours of a man make solemn and worthy of respect. 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 71 
 
 In the exercises at yonder church in funeral honor to Gover- 
 nor Lincoln, my greatly esteemed friend, the Reverend Dr. Ellis, 
 — who had been, long time, an intimate in the family, and who 
 better than most persons was fitted to speak of the departed, — 
 with his quick sagacity as to the features of urban and rural life, 
 made special mention of this point in the life of the good Gover- 
 nor. He said : 
 
 “ The joys of his childhood were so associated with the 
 objects and interests of a farm that, to the very end of his length- 
 ened days, and most so when nearest to it, he found his occupation 
 and delights in the same cherished pursuits. A guest in his de- 
 lightful home, who had gone to his rest at night as in a city man- 
 sion, would awake in early morning to the lowing of kine and 
 the cackling of fowls. Looking from one side of the house, he 
 would see the beautiful flower-garden with its conservatory, and on 
 the other the herd going out to pasture, and the yoked oxen to 
 their labor.” 
 
 To me, living directly opposite his residence and observing for 
 many years his daily ways, this picture of the governor, by Dr. 
 Ellis, was peculiarly truthful and charming. Looking out from 
 my chamber window at an early hour in the summer mornings, I 
 used to call attention to the Governor emerging from his dwelling, 
 a little in advance of the rest of us, to review his line of Ayrshires 
 as they passed by him to the green fields beyond. His fondness 
 and knowledge of good stock found expression in as choice words 
 as could be bestowed upon a fine landscape. In this particular he 
 was one of the pioneers of the present era of taste and sentiment 
 for the higher grades of the animals which is ennobling the people 
 of this Commonwealth. From the day of Edmund Burke, who, 
 amid the thickening of the terrible public drama of that time, found 
 solace and invigoration among his herd at Beaconsfield, there has 
 been nothing better in the education and exaltation of the mass of the 
 community than is exhibited now in the care and fondness bestowed 
 
72 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEYI LINCOLN. 
 
 by the people of Massachusetts upon the improved kinds of ani- 
 mals. And I have not met with any one who engaged in this 
 method of promoting the general welfare and making the cultiva- 
 tion of live stock almost an ideal employment, with more genuine 
 sentiment than our departed friend and president. 
 
 He was thoroughly in sympathy with all the growths and 
 symbols of beauty in nature. Of course he was a lover of trees. 
 I make this one of the tests of a true and sympathetic man. In 
 the matter of our sensibilities the poet has given undue precedence 
 to sound over sight. I do not know but every stranger to the 
 “concord of sweet sounds” should be given over to “treason, 
 stratagems and spoils certainly, at least, this rhapsody of 
 Shakespeare on music, as some one has said, has furnished every 
 vacant fiddler with something to say in defence of his profession. 
 But what do you say of a man or woman that does not warm under 
 the concord of sweet sights — of trees and flowers. In the life- 
 time of the late Governor we were wont to indulge in facetiousness 
 over his position of championship and antagonism in the behalf of 
 all standing trees. So far as I am aware, lie was never known to 
 be willing that one should be taken down unless under authority 
 almost equivalent to the exercise of the right of eminent domain. 
 He knew the ages and could verify the concentric rings of most of 
 the trees in our neighborhood. A generation ago he cut the finest 
 private avenue of the city, and planted his home on it, then quite 
 remote from the street, and called Oregon, saving old trees and 
 planting new ones, now old. As a consequence, in later years new 
 comers found the ash, the maple, and the elm, in the centre of the 
 brick sidewalks ; the municipal authorities did not like to cross his 
 feeling ; and artifice had to be resorted to, in some instances, to 
 clear the incumbrance from the walks. He believed in front yards, 
 and ample lawns, and green leaves. 
 
 Flowers, too, he appreciated beyond most men, and guarded 
 them to their tenderest roots. There was most excellent sentiment 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 73 
 
 in him for these, though no overflow of sentimentality. He could 
 not translate the technical language of flowers like Van Buren, but 
 he enjoyed and cultivated them as ministers and agents in the 
 divine poetry of human life. I dwell upon this because, in my 
 judgment, it ought to pass for much in the estimation of a real 
 country gentleman. He manifested this taste at festive boards, 
 and observing beautiful groups of vine and blossoms depending 
 from the stand, he would say that it must have cost the gardener a 
 pang to cut such clusters. He reminded me of the late Mr. 
 Choate, who was known to carry back a bough to the trunk from 
 which he had torn it, in the belief, as he said, that possibly, there 
 might be some yearning between the parent stock and the disrup- 
 ted shoot. Such men, by their natural sympathies, expressed in 
 courtly words, make the world attractive to others. 
 
 But trees, above all things, Governor Lincoln believed in and 
 admired. He had inherited from his birth in this interior county 
 an appreciation of out-door life and the manly and healthful pur- 
 suits of the country. His father’s house was amid original groves. 
 He, himself, had been born upon the verge of the modern clearing, 
 and on the margin of the later civilization. By nature and right he 
 retained unto the end his love of the rural scenes in which he had 
 been cradled. The relations of his family carried him backward to 
 the days of Worcester county colonization, and he kept this mem- 
 ory fresh and practical. These clay hills of Worcester, unchanged 
 since the creation, covered largely until within my recollection with 
 the primeval woods ; the sublime grouping of the Monadnock and 
 the Wachusett, and the smaller ranges and spurs intervening 
 between them and us ; the spring verdure on the plains deepened 
 and enriched all the way for forty miles around with gleam of 
 water and graver shade of embowering forests ; the richest variega- 
 tion of the autumn and winter, comprising the hues of October and 
 the leafless branches of December ; the wooded and icy galleries of 
 January and February, extending through all the country from this 
 10 
 
74 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 town to the White Hills ; the perennial banners of pine, and hem- 
 lock, and fir, that hung out over all this northerly circuit, so much 
 observed and admired by our fathers ; — these had for nim the 
 sanction of the lords of the soil of a former generation, and re- 
 ceived his life-long love and respect. 
 
 “In such green palaces the first kings reigned, 
 
 Slept in their shades, and angels entertain’d ; 
 
 With such old counsellors they did advise, 
 
 And, by frequenting sacred groves, grew wise.” 
 
 It seemed to me that Governor Lincoln kept off old age by 
 renewing his youth in sympathy with each recurring spring and 
 summer. In my last visit to his chamber, only a short time before 
 his death, he said that, until within a year, he had never thought 
 or felt that he was an old man. And some of you must have 
 noticed, as I frequently have within the past ten years, that, on 
 public occasions, any allusion to him as aged or venerable, evi- 
 dently was not relishable to him. Old age in him was not churlish, 
 or querulous, or so unresponsive as with many men at his time of 
 life*. He appeared proud to show that he believed in that age 
 whose pillars are raised on the foundations of youth. To him this 
 felicity came in great part from being constantly in communion 
 and intercourse with the outward and visible world. He meant to 
 know what was going on, to the end. No person knew better than 
 he, every year until the last, what was exhibited here ; and from 
 what tow r n and farm ; and how and by whom raised ; and by what 
 process brought into a condition fit for this exhibition of the won- 
 ders of the earth. He was, all his life, awake and sensitive to 
 the growth and expansion of his country; and, true to the senti- 
 ments which had descended to him from his ancestors, he stood by 
 his country’s colors bravely through three wars, and never more 
 gallantly than in the last. By unintermitted familiarity with the 
 life of society, and with the ceasless activities of the animal and 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 75 
 
 vegetable kingdom, he kept his own being vital and fresh, as if 
 supplied from the sources of perpetual youth. Accordingly, 
 instead of trying to think that he was neglected, or that his day 
 had gone by, — as old folks are too apt to say, — he knew better, 
 and gratefully realized in every day’s experience that he was in the 
 full enjoyment of 
 
 “ that which should accompany old age, 
 
 As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends.” 
 
 The last years of his life were marked by something of the ancient 
 patriarchal serenity, and would stand the test of the best sentiment 
 and style of Cicero’s philosophy for old age. 
 
 And thus, Gentlemen of the Worcester Agricultural Society, 
 as your president drew nearer and nearer the goal, he illustrated 
 that law of our existence, which, I have sometimes thought, accor- 
 ding to all just conceptions of our human lot, is as unerring as the 
 law of gravitation, — the rule of the sympathy and affinity of man 
 to the earth whence he sprang and to which he must return. 
 Above all others, those who are engaged in the cultivation of the 
 soil, and are in daily observation and study of the miracles of the 
 natural world, alike perceive and exemplify this law. So did he in 
 a large and appreciable sense. The last labors and the last thoughts 
 of such are in tranquil association with the myriad lessons coming 
 from this common mother earth to which the mortal part of us must 
 go back to find its rest. Even under the heathen philosophies the 
 advanced stage of human life found its keener pleasures in pursuits 
 relating to the culture of the soil. Under the Christian dispensa- 
 tion this tie is more bright and vital, and vibrates with grander 
 thoughts and joys. The higher aspects of the contemplation and 
 cultivation of the land, break to the gaze of the Christian agricul- 
 turist, “as he moves forward to the great crisis of his being, 
 catching an intelligent glimpse of the grand arcana of nature 
 exhibited in the creative energy of the terrestrial elements ; the 
 
70 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 suggestive mystery of the quickening seed and the sprouting plant ; 
 the resurrection of universal Nature from her wintry grave.” 
 
 And so he died. A few months after his last visit to these 
 grounds, and in fond remembrance of the benefit and the blessing 
 he had learned and taught through the long time of fifty years, he 
 himself was “ sown a natural body,” to be “ raised a spiritual body.” 
 The analogies of growth, and ripening, and decadence, which had 
 crowded on his thought and study for half a century, followed him 
 in happy fruition to the spot, where, under his own hemlocks, and 
 amid the first leaves of June, we laid him in the cemetery which 
 his eloquence had consecrated a generation before with pathos and 
 splendor. And so he went away from our presence. 
 
 “ Of no distemper, of no blast he died, 
 
 But fell like Autumn fruit that mellowed long ; 
 
 Even wondered at because he dropt no sooner. 
 
 Fate seemed to wind him up for fourscore years ; 
 
 Yet freshly ran he on six winters more ; 
 
 Till, like a clock worn out with eating time, 
 
 The wheels of weary life at last stood still.” 
 
ADDRESSES 
 
 MADE AT THE MEETING OF THE 
 
 AMERICAN ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY, 
 
 JUNE 2, 1 8 68. 
 
 At a special meeting of the American Antiquarian Society, at 
 Antiquarian Hall, in Worcester, on Tuesday, the second day of 
 June, 1868, at nine o’clock, A. M., to take notice of the death of 
 Hon. Levi Lincoln, their senior Vice-President : 
 
 The President, Hon. Stephen Salisbury, occupied the chair, and 
 addressed the Society as follows : — 
 
 Brethren of the American Antiquarian Society : 
 
 The last survivor of the Founders of our Society, whose life 
 was full of wholesome instruction, has given to us his last lesson 
 in the maturity and dignity of his death. At seven o’clock of the 
 morning of May 29, 1868, Hon. Levi Lincoln, our senior Vice- 
 President, died at his residence in Worcester, at the age of eighty- 
 five years, seven months, and four days. lie retained the enter- 
 prise and activity of early manhood with little abatement until 
 about a year ago, when he had a slight shock of disease that im- 
 paired his bodily strength, and he at once acknowledged the warn- 
 ing that his earthly work must soon end. Iiis strong wish was 
 gratified in the continuance of his power to be wise and useful to 
 the last. He endured the increasing decay of his bodily powers 
 with patient resignation, and measured the descending steps with 
 
 ( 77 ) 
 
78 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 calmness. In the last three weeks he expressed opinions on public 
 affairs and private business which were marked with the clearness 
 and strength of his best days. He has held important offices in 
 our Society from the first, but he was never willing to take the 
 office of President. In 1812, he was the Treasurer. From 1817 
 to 1854 he was an elected member of the Council, and from 1854 
 to his death he was one of the Vice-Presidents. At the meetings 
 of the Society and of the Council, he constantly attended and gave 
 most efficient aid in furthering scientific operations as well as 
 ordinary business. He enriched our library with frequent, large, 
 valuable, and appropriate gifts of books and manuscripts, and he 
 was one of the largest donors of the Publishing Fund. There is 
 no part of our publications that has raised the character and pro- 
 moted the success of our Society to a greater degree, than the 
 graceful and spirited addresses and resolutions which he has fre- 
 quently offered. 
 
 His conduct toward our Society is accordant with the ordinary 
 course of his life, and is the result of the peculiarity of his char- 
 acter and the source of his power, — his faithfulness. This attri- 
 bute can be traced from his early youth, when he was a classmate 
 of the Harvard graduates of 1802, a class not excelled in character, 
 influence, and power, by the alumni of any year in any college of 
 our country. Among such associates he was not distinguished for 
 genius or learning at college, but he was not second to the most 
 gifted of them in the power, usefulness, and honor of his mature 
 life. He was not more remarkable for his capacity and his love 
 for labor, than for the wise direction of his efforts and for his desire 
 to obtain respect and dignity for the object with which he was 
 entrusted. A stranger might impute to him a love of display, but 
 those who saw him devote the same thoroughness in the privacy of 
 a social meeting for a local improvement, as he used in a measure 
 of national importance, will give him credit for higher motives. 
 He was not a man of books or of systematic study, but he never 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 79 
 
 presented his thoughts in public without giving evidence that he 
 had learning at his command. He was not so distinguished for 
 genius or the prominence of any intellectual faculties, as for his 
 perfect command of the operations of his own mind. His great 
 facility of language and the fascination of his eloquence did not 
 mislead him, and many will bear witness that he was able, when 
 suddenly called to take part in an important debate, to carry on 
 mental investigation while he was speaking, so that he made an 
 impression, of which the beginning of his discourse gave no inti- 
 mation. With his faithfulness a kindred virtue was associated — 
 his moral courage — which was more extraordinary, as it was 
 combined with great love of approbation. I think he would have 
 assented to the apothegm of Pindar, that the next best thing to the 
 performance of a good deed is the glory of it. Yet his biography 
 will recount as we cannot at this time, how for the vindication of 
 political principles and measures which he deemed important, for 
 sustaining the criminal law, for giving the greatest strength to the 
 Judiciary, and for other lesser exigencies of justice, truth, and the 
 common weal, he disregarded the claims of friendship, the per- 
 suasions of those whom he most respected, and fierce threats of 
 political disgrace and ruin. His faithfulness enabled him to main- 
 tain his pure character and the Christian observances which he 
 approved, not only in the peacefulness of his home, but as well 
 under the withering indifference and scorn of fashion. His social 
 sympathy was ready and strong, and it prompted him to exercise 
 the generosity and kindness which gave such grace and influence to 
 his life and caused such general regret at his departure. It will 
 be appropriate to others, who mourn for this loss, to speak of the 
 number and the importance of his public services, of his agency in 
 originating and maintaining good and wholesome laws, of his wise 
 efforts to give extent as well as completeness to public education, 
 of his active exertions to develop the industry and the resources of 
 our country and the character of our people, to promote the spread 
 
80 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 of Christian truth and Christian morality, and to secure rights of 
 Christian worship, and provide for its support. 
 
 All these topics we must pass by. We have met for a short 
 hour to consider him as a Father of our literary association, and in 
 this view we dwell on his character, as a part of our treasures not 
 less than his gifts, large, and frequent, and his personal exertions 
 for our common object. But, the element of character so strongly 
 predominates in his last public serviee, that its mention here would 
 be permitted, if it were not required by justice and' gratitude. I 
 allude to the cordial and patriotic support which, in his retirement, 
 he gave to the government of our country through the discourage- 
 ments and perils of the last eight years, with a candid allowance 
 for the difficulties of the time. Though this support was rendered 
 with few public and unobtrusive statements of his opinions, it had 
 the strongest influence to inspire confidence and patience in men of 
 cautious and conservative sentiments, while it gave a safe direction 
 to those who were more bold and adventurous. 
 
 The brief time that can be allowed for this meeting will not 
 permit me to pursue these interesting topics. Official duty re- 
 quired me to present our object with more regard to the oppor- 
 tunity of others to address you, than to the completeness of that 
 which I can offer. The hand of friendship has not the skill to 
 draw the portrait of such a man. While I perform this solemn 
 and honorable task, I must look toward our Society as steadily as 
 I may, and forget for the moment that he whom I invite you to 
 honor, is one of the small and decreasing number of relatives, who 
 remain to me ; one to whom I have looked for social happiness and 
 wise counsels through my life, and from whom I have received 
 expressions of affection and kind consideration, which I cannot 
 impute to my own merit, as they were evidently a transmitted gift 
 of my inheritance from my own respected father. 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 81 
 
 Hon. Emory Washburn spoke as follows : — 
 
 Mr. President : 
 
 This is no time, nor is there any occasion for eulogy, when 
 preparing to pay our last tribute of respect to one whom we, and 
 the people of this Commonwealth, have known so long, and so 
 well. Eulogies by the living for the dead are indeed appropriate, 
 where the sphere in which one has moved has been outside of the 
 great centres and thoroughfares of active life, and there is danger, 
 otherwise, of the world’s losing the benefit of the lessons which are 
 to be drawn from the example of a good man’s life. But in the 
 case of our late lamented associate, Gov. Lincoln, it needs no 
 eulogy on our part to I'ender his name more honored, or his fame 
 more illustrious. He has just closed a long life of actual useful- 
 ness, during a large portion of which he has stood out before the 
 people of the Commonwealth, and the country, in places of dis- 
 tinguished trust and honor. Few are spared to more than four- 
 score years of uninterrupted activity ; and still fewer have ever 
 shared in public life the unbroken confidence, for so many of those 
 years, which his fellow citizens accorded to him with almost un- 
 exampled unanimity. 
 
 Scarcely any of us can go back in memory to the earlier 
 stages of his distinguished career. And no one can remember the 
 time when he did not, by his conduct and example, exhibit the 
 same characteristic claims upon the respect of every good citizen 
 which, in later life, won the esteem and confidence of such as had 
 known him for the first time, when the temptations of ambition, if 
 they had ever existed, had passed away, and the desire of popular 
 favor had ceased to be an imputed motive to action. In briefer 
 terms, his has been a life in which have been exemplified a con- 
 sistency of motive and a singleness of purpose which have rarely 
 been witnessed in the career of any one who has shared, as he did, 
 such marked expressions of popular favor. 
 
 I should fear that I was trespassing upon the province of 
 ll 
 
 
82 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 others, in venturing to speak more at large, of the character of one 
 so much honored in this community, if I did not recall that it is 
 now almost fifty years since my relations to him began to be more 
 or less intimate, and that, during that time, I have often been 
 favored by expressions on his part, of a kindly regard, botli in 
 public and in private, by letter and in the unreserved intercourse of 
 personal friendship ; and if I did not feel, too, that I might assume 
 to know something of the inner life and motives of one whose 
 character I had so often studied, and of whose example I had so 
 long been an interested observer. 
 
 While, therefore, I shall not attempt to allude, in anything 
 like detail, to the leading events in a life which has been inti- 
 mately associated with the history of the Commonwealth for more 
 than half a century, I have little hesitation in saying, that I have 
 never known one whose life and character had more of complete- 
 ness in its composition than his. I arrogate perfection for no 
 man. But for a uniform and harmonious consistency in its sev- 
 eral parts, there are few lives with whose private history we are 
 familiar, which have higher claims upon our admiration and re- 
 spect than his whom we have met to honor. As we study it, 
 whether as a whole or in detail, we find in every stage of it cer- 
 tain characteristics which are the guaranties of success, wherever 
 they are united. Among these were a steadiness of purpose, a 
 quickness in expedients, a judgment cool and well balanced, dis- 
 criminating wisely in the selection of agents and the application 
 of means, and, withal, a courage that shrunk from no responsi- 
 bility, and an industry that was alike incessant and unwearied. 
 And it was by these and similar elements of success that he 
 achieved the rank which he sustained among the distinguished 
 men of Massachusetts, with whom he had been cotemporary. 
 
 He was early called into the arena of politics, but though 
 surrounded by the temptations which ambition holds out to its vo- 
 taries iu its honors and rewards, he did not suffer himself to be 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 83 
 
 withdrawn from the duties and labors of an honorable but ardu- 
 ous profession, to which he had been educated, with its less daz- 
 zling' but more permanent rewards, until he had won for himself 
 a foremost rank at the bar, and achieved a position of personal 
 independence which raised him above suspicion of sordid or mer- 
 cenary motives. And few triumphs have been more signal or 
 gratifying, than that by which, after all the censure and sharp 
 criticism which political controversies are sure to excite, the root 
 of bitterness which had poisoned the harmony of neighborhoods 
 and families, was laid aside, and he himself made the organ and 
 representative, by common consent, of both parties, and the ex- 
 ponent of a broader and more liberal policy in the councils of 
 the Commonwealth. 
 
 The political career of Governor Lincoln must, for obvious 
 reasons, stand out more prominently than any other period in the 
 history of his life. In the first place it covered the almost un- 
 precedented term of more than thirty years. And as we recur 
 to it at a time when scandal has been busy with the fame of so 
 many in high places, we may feel a just sense of pride in his 
 behalf who had passed through so long an ordeal, as we unroll 
 the record of that thirty years, and find no blot or stain upon 
 the fair page upon which it has been written. It is the record 
 of one, who, to the character of the upright citizen and firm and 
 patriotic magistrate, added the no less honorable claim to vener- 
 ation and respect, of being, in all things, an honest man. 
 
 Next to the eminent distinction which he won in the various 
 political offices which he was called to fill, was that which he 
 achieved at the bar and upon the bench. It required talents and 
 industry of a high order to attain to the rank which he held at 
 this bar, then hardly second to any in the Commonwealth, against 
 such competitors as Jabez Upham, Francis Illake, and John Da- 
 vis, to say nothing of younger members of the profession, and the 
 able and distinguished advocates from other counties who often 
 
84 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 attended the courts here. To the affluent command of ready and 
 appropriate language, the clearness of statement and the impres- 
 sive eloquence which distinguished all his addresses, whether at 
 the bar or before public assemblies, he added a thoroughness of 
 preparation and an earnestness in the presentation of his causes 
 which gained for him a large practice in his profession, as well 
 as the reputation of a learned and able advocate which was sec- 
 ond to none in the county, and to few, if any, in the Common 
 wealth. 
 
 And when he was transferred from the bar to the bench of 
 the Supreme Court, he gave, at once, an earnest of a like suc- 
 cess in a new career, from which he was, however, very early with- 
 drawn by an election to the Chief Magistracy. Nor can I properly 
 omit to allude in this connection to that dignity and scrupulous 
 courtesy of manner which mark the high bred gentleman, and 
 which he always evinced as well in private life as in his public 
 ministrations. 
 
 Of his public and enlightened zeal as a citizen in promoting 
 whatever could advance the interests of the Commonwealth and his 
 own county and town, he has left too many visible memorials to 
 require me to speak of these in detail. To eveiy such measure 
 as offered a reasonable ground for confidence in its ultimate suc- 
 cess, he lent a willing ear and a helping hand. 
 
 The military organizations of the Commonwealth always found 
 in him an active and earnest supporter. He was an early and 
 consistent advocate of those measures which had their origin durum 
 
 O o 
 
 his administration, for developing and bringing into action the 
 industrial resources and pursuits of the State. He was a prac- 
 tical promoter as well as an intelligent advocate of agriculture, 
 as a business and liberal science, and, for many years, infused his 
 own spirit into the community around him by his efficiency as 
 President of the original Agricultural Society of Worcester Coun- 
 ty. And both the county and the Commonwealth are in danger 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 85 
 
 of losing the consciousness of what they owe to his zeal and gener- 
 ous public spirit, for the high condition of her industrial and econ- 
 omical interests. 
 
 This same desire to promote the prosperity of everything 
 around him, was evinced in his efforts to advance the beauty, in- 
 terests, and importance of his native town. His own house was 
 always the centre of a generous and elegant hospitality, and with 
 its surroundings was one of the most attractive objects in the then 
 village in which it was situated. And the mansion in which he 
 spent his years of dignified retirement was almost the pioneer, 
 outside of the limits of that village, of those more stately and pala- 
 tial residences which look out upon the busy streets and widen- 
 ing expanse of the city into which it has been changed by the 
 magic power of industry and intelligent labor. 
 
 One characteristic of the public life of Governor Lincoln 
 which was, perhaps, more marked than any other, was the uni- 
 form thoroughness, assiduity, and completeness, with which he 
 performed every duty required of him by the place he was called 
 to fill. He neglected no service because it wanted the prestige 
 of dignity. He omitted no office of courtesy or propriety be- 
 cause it was unknown, and might pass unnoticed by others. He 
 dignified every place lie occupied, and so conducted himself in it, 
 that it dignified him in return. And however high might be its 
 requirements, he was able to bring to it at all times, powers and 
 capacities adequate to all its reasonable demands. 
 
 I have scarcely, as yet, spoken of Governor Lincoln in 
 his relations in private life. I can hardly hope to do it justice 
 in such a presence, and before the echoes have died away of 
 that cheerful and cordial greeting with which he always met 
 and welcomed his friends and neighbors. And while I need not 
 dwell upon these to you who have known him, to such as did 
 not know him, I could at best indulge only in general terms when 
 attempting to speak of him in his home, in the social intercourse 
 
86 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 with friends, and in the amenities of manner, which always marked 
 him as the gentleman of the old school. And yet I ought to 
 say a single word of his character as a man of thrift and busi- 
 ness, in this age of universal haste to be rich. In all his varied 
 transactions as a professional man and a citizen, which were often 
 widely extended, no imputation of unfairness in his dealings, no 
 disposition to take advantage of the necessities of others, or to 
 withhold a generous forbearance, and no reluctance to do exact 
 justice, ever rested upon his name. His word was as trustworthy 
 as his bond, nor did he ever meet with a deserving object of char- 
 ity in his walks, whom he passed by on the other side. 
 
 Had proof been wanting of his ardent love of country, in 
 the long life which he had been so ready to devote to her cause, 
 it would have been more than supplied by the singleness of pur- 
 pose and ardor of zeal with which he lent his personal effort, as 
 well as influence, to maintain the integrity of the Union when 
 the life of the nation was in danger. The call of the country 
 upon her sons in that fearful struggle, found no livelier, or more 
 unselfish response, than in the sacrifices and stirring appeals of 
 this eloquent old man of fourscore. 
 
 And the part which he took in casting the vote of Massa- 
 chusetts in the last Presidential election, for him who, under Prov- 
 idence, had led us as a people through that fiery trial, was a 
 fitting act to crown a public life of so much usefulness and 
 honor. 
 
 I would gladly, if my time permitted, allude also to the con- 
 nection which our friend had so long maintained with the cause 
 of education and the institutions of learning in the Common- 
 wealth. His relation to Harvard College from the time of his 
 graduation in 1802, was always that of a patron and efficient 
 friend. He was many years a trustee of Leicester Academy ; and 
 of the various charitable and religious associations, as of the church 
 and society in which he worshipped, with which he was connected, 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 87 
 
 he was ever a steady and consistent supporter. Of what he has 
 done for the American Antiquarian Society, to whose interests he 
 lias evinced an active devotion from its first organization, I hardly 
 need remind its members, as they recall the many claims upon 
 their respect which the contemplation of his life cannot fail to 
 awaken. The only fitting way in which they can signify their 
 sense of the loss which their association has sustained in his 
 death, is by turning aside, for a little while, from the busy walks 
 of active duty, and joining with those who will gather around 
 his open grave to-day, to pay their last tribute of respect to his 
 memory. Many can join with me in adding the personal offer- 
 ing of grateful emotions, when recalling the unselfish considera- 
 tion with which he attached himself to his friends. There was a 
 sincerity in his friendship which was above the influence of sun- 
 shine or success, and was not measured in its warmth or expression 
 by how it was to tell upon his own personal advancement. And 
 there will be a wide circle outside of that more central point of 
 his household and his home, who will mourn him as a loved and 
 cherished friend. Nor can I add anything more on this occasion 
 than to remind you that the eloquent advocate, the excellent citi- 
 zen, the wise counsellor, the consummate magistrate, the high- 
 toned gentleman, and the genial and faithful companion and friend 
 has passed away, in the ripe vigor of his manhood, in the full 
 possession of his powers, and the undimmed lustre of his fame. 
 Nothing remains for us but to draw lessons for ourselves and 
 others from the example he has left us, and to express by our 
 presence at the obsequies paid to the honored dead, the love and 
 veneration we bore for him while living. 
 
 Hon. Benjamin F. Thomas spoke substantially as follows : 
 
 Mr. President : 
 
 I had expected that a professional engagement would have 
 prevented my being with you to-day, — otherwise I would not 
 
88 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 have come without some preparation. As it is I must trust to the 
 suggestion and word of the moment. 
 
 As I came home this morning, for this is the spot of earth 
 that wears to me the neai’est aspect of home, something seemed to 
 be wanting. The place was here in the freshness and beauty and 
 glory of the spring-time, — these rounded hills crowned with the 
 homes of taste and culture, this valley teeming with life, 'which 
 nature and art have united to make so beautiful, — but something 
 was wanting. Without the spiritual, the material is ever wanting. 
 Men make the city, as they “ make the state.” I felt that the 
 erect and manly form with which time had dealt so gently, soften- 
 ing as with the hues of twilight, those winning and courtly man- 
 ners, that venerable and kindly presence, that stately, graceful, 
 and eloquent speech, which have lent such charm and dignity to 
 the proceedings of our Society, we should see and hear no more. 
 The link which bound this generation to the last, the thronged and 
 busy city to the quiet rural village, was to be laid in his grave. 
 
 Gov. Lincoln came from a vigorous stock. Among my 
 earliest recollections of Worcester is the seeing (in 1820, I think,) 
 the funeral procession of Governor Lincoln’s father winding its 
 way from Lincoln Street to the then new burying ground. That 
 was an event in our village history, for he was the most eminent 
 of her citizens, the intimate friend of Jefferson and Madison, 
 Lieutenant-Governor and acting Governor of the State, Attorney- 
 General of the United States, and by appointment Judge of the 
 Supreme Court of the United States. From that day to this, the 
 history of his eldest son has been part, and a most honorable part 
 of the history of Massachusetts. By the time he reached mature 
 manhood he had been a Representative of the town, Senator of the 
 County, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Lieutenant 
 Governor, Judge of the Supreme Court, and Governor of the 
 Commonwealth. The duties of each and every place he had dis- 
 charged with signal ability and fidelity. He had large instinctive 
 
MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 89 
 
 capacity for the public service. It belonged to the family. Some 
 of us may recollect seeing standing by the mother’s grave, Levi, 
 Governor of Massachusetts ; Enoch, the accomplished Governor 
 of Maine; John, then Senator of the State, and in clear, vigorous 
 understanding, firmness of purpose and executive force, perhaps 
 primus inter pares; and William, the accomplished scholar and 
 antiquarian, historian of Worcester, then representing the town 
 with distinction in the General Court. 
 
 I cannot enter with any detail upon the public life and 
 services of Gov. Lincoln. Their history will doubtless be written 
 by competent hands. I can but glance at one or two points. As 
 Governor he did great service to the Commonwealth by the 
 sagacity and foresight with which he devoted himself to her means 
 of internal communication. Our admirable system of railroads 
 owes much to his unremitting zeal and energy, when men, who 
 thought themselves wise and prudent, held back or sneered. 
 
 If any one act of his public life were to be selected as deserv- 
 ing especial notice and gratitude, it would be that in which, at the 
 sacrifice of personal friendship and attachment, he gave to the 
 Commonwealth, the most eminent and useful of her judicial magis- 
 trates, in the appointment of Lemuel Shaw as Chief Justice. 
 
 The quality which distinguished his administration of public 
 office, was the thoroughness and fidelity with which he discharged 
 every duty, great or small. He magnified his office. He jealously 
 upheld its dignity and consideration, and none of its duties were 
 looked at as small. It was enough for him that there was work to 
 be done, and if to be done, it must be well and faithfully done. 
 
 Gov. Lincoln was a man of firmness and courage. He loved 
 and desired to win and retain popular favor. But, he loved it 
 wisely and not too well. lie did not believe in this new gospel, 
 which substitutes popular opinion for the divine will, or the mature 
 convictions of one’s own judgment, — a doctrine which so shrivels 
 and dwarfs the culture, the understanding, the faith, and the man- 
 12 
 
90 
 
 MEMORIAL OF LEVI LINCOLN. 
 
 hood of so many of the public men of to-day. He would do his 
 duty though it cost him the averted looks of friends, or stirred 
 popular wrath and indignation. He knew “the wind bloweth 
 where it listeth.” 
 
 I ought perhaps to stop here. The judgment says, yes, but 
 the heart says, no. I must draw a little nearer. 
 
 Some forty-two years ago, I went with Gov. Lincoln and his 
 military family through the country to Taunton to attend a 
 review. I was greatly delighted by the dignity and courtesy of 
 his manners, and by his kindness and attention to myself, a boy 
 of thirteen. From that time to this, I have received from him 
 nothing but kindness and consideration ; and there have been times 
 when, in my humble sphere, I seemed to be treading the wine- 
 press alone, when the assurance of his approbation, confidence, and 
 sympathy, has been to me a benediction. Standing by his open 
 grave, I could not, Mr. President, omit this expression of love 
 and gratitude. 
 
 These occasions, Mr. President, belong rather to the living 
 than to the dead. He may not hear these voices of eulogy and of 
 grateful remembrance. If, looking upon a long life so well spent, 
 vai’ied service so well done, varied honors so worthily won and 
 worn, we catch no inspiration from his example, no invigoration in 
 the way of duty, it were better that our lips were silent as his own, 
 and that the dead should be left to bury their dead. 
 

 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 I