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 Second Address 
 
 PEOPLE OF MARYLAND. 
 
 WILLIAM H. COLLINS, 
 
 OF BALTIMORE, 
 
 THIRD EDITION. 
 
 BALTIMORE: 
 PRINTED BY JAMES YOUNG 
 
 114 WEST BAiriMORE STREET. 
 
 1861. 
 
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Second Address 
 
 TO THE 
 
 PEOPLE OF MARYLAND. 
 
 W 
 
 I LLI AM H. COLLINS, 
 
 OF BALTIMORE. 
 
 rHIKD EDITION. 
 
 BALTIMORE: 
 rniNTKD BY JAMES YOUNG 
 
 1U WKriT BALTIMORE STREF.T. 
 
 1861. 
 

 I 
 
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 Will you listen if I speak to you of Loyalty, of Love of 
 Country? Terrible times have fallen to your lot. Wliat- 
 ever of manhood, of i^rudence, of courage, of patriotism be- 
 longs to you, now is the time to show it. The Union is in 
 danger; your Country is near the throes of death — that 
 Union and that Country which have been to you, for sev- 
 enty years, one continued shower of blessings ; to which 
 you have been accustomed to look from your childhood as 
 the palladium of your safety, as the object of your dearest 
 affections. State after State has seceded from the Govern- 
 ment, refusing obedience to its laws, and attempting to form 
 another Government independent of that of our Union. 
 
 Under these painful circumstances it becomes you. People 
 of Maryland, to trace out for yourselves the patli to which 
 duty, honor, loyalty and patriotism may point the way. 
 
 In Maryland, as in much the larger part of our Country, 
 it has ever been held that, to the extent of the powers given 
 to the General Government by the People of the States at 
 the adoption of our Constitution, that Government became 
 a unit, and rightfully claims from us a direct allegiance ; 
 that, to the extent of the powers so given, the People of the 
 States, in whatever form they may choose to act, have parted 
 forever with all the great powers given to the General Gov- 
 ernment by the Constitution ; that the People of any one of 
 the States, or the State itself whether acting by its Legisla- 
 ture or Convention, have no more power over questions of 
 war or peace, of ambassadors or treaties, of coining money 
 
or establishing post-offices, of union or disunion, tlian lias the 
 General Government within a State over the distribution 
 of the estates of intestates, or the forms of wills, or the de- 
 scent of real estate ; that in each case the powers of the 
 General Government and of the State Government are re- 
 spectively supreme. 
 
 People of Maryland, do you wish to break up your Gen- 
 eral Government? Have you become weary of beholding 
 the stars and the stripes, the emblems of your Nation's glory? 
 Will you desert your Country because others have proved 
 false to their allegiance? Is your patriotism so versatile 
 that the long-cherished j)assion of your souls has suddenly 
 perished ? Are you ready to draw the sword against your 
 Country which, heretofore, you have drawn only in her de- 
 fence ? 
 
 What is patriotism ? From the beginning of nations, in 
 all ages and countries, the patriot has ever been held in the 
 highest veneration. The impulse under which he acts has 
 ever been lauded by ])ainters, sculptors, poets, historians, as 
 the noblest that belongs to our nature — save and except only 
 the sacred homage that binds us to our Father in heaven, 
 and the mystic tie that connects us with humanity itself. 
 Next to these, love of country is the highest and noblest 
 feeling of which the human heart is susceptible. Higher 
 and more sacred than the ties which bind the husband to his 
 wife or the parent to his child, it stands forth, has stood 
 forth, and will stand forth forever as the generous and noble 
 passion of our souls. The more his Country is in danger, 
 the dearer she becomes to the patriot. Are her ranks thin- 
 ning? The quicker is his step to take the place of the de- 
 serter or the fallen. Is she poor? He lays of his Avealth at 
 her feet. Is his life demanded? He lays it down, has ever 
 laid it down, and ever will lay it down freely at his country's 
 bidding, whether the altar for the sacrifice be at Thermo- 
 pylae, or Bunker Hill, or Princeton, or Trenton, or Cowpens, 
 or Yorktown. 
 
Tell me not of serving our Country, or of standing by our 
 Country as long as it is our interest to do so. The doc- 
 trine is a libel on humanity. Unselfish love for our Country, 
 not for the blessings she has bestowed or will bestow, but 
 because she is our Country, because we delight to serve her, 
 because like your children she is twined around your hearts, 
 and it is happiness to labor for her welfare ; this, this is the- 
 love which has made, and I trust will make again and again, 
 those grand and heroic men to whom history gives immor- 
 tality. 
 
 Notwithstanding I am fully aware and justly proud of the 
 well-known fealty and loyalty of the People of Maryland to 
 their State and National Governments, it seems to me that 
 it may be profitable, in these days of rebellion and disunion, 
 to recall to your view some general outline of the powers 
 vested in those Governments respectively under which we 
 have so long lived in prosperity and honor. 
 
 The General Government as well as the Governments of 
 the States, in their respective spheres, were intended by the 
 Constitution to be immortal. The State of Maryland has no 
 more right — either by her State-Convention or otherwise — 
 to release you from your allegiance to the General Govern- 
 ment, than has the General Government to release you from 
 the duties you owe to the State of Maryland. Each has its 
 separate orbit, and the one has no right to interfere with 
 the other. If the State of Maryland should pass an ordi- 
 nance of secession by a Convention called by her Legislature, 
 or in any other way, and should attempt by such ordinance 
 to interfere with, or supersede the allegiance you owe to the 
 General Government, I say to you. People of Maryland, 
 under all the responsibilities which may attend the declara- 
 tion, that such an ordinance would be null and void. I re- 
 peat, such an ordinance would be null and void, because it 
 would be beyond the powers reserved to the States by the 
 Constitution of the Union, and would be a direct interference 
 with the powers granted by that Constitution to the General 
 Government. A Convention of the People of a State is 
 
6 
 
 limited, as to its powers, to the parceling out and providing 
 for the exercise of the powers and rights reserved to the 
 States. Over the j)owers granted to the General Govern- 
 ment hy the Constitution, a State-Convention has no power 
 whatever. Tlie Constitution of the United States is para- 
 mount to the State-Convention. The State-Convention is 
 subject to the Constitution of the United States. The State 
 Legislature is subject, first, to the Constitution of the United 
 States, and secondl)^, to the Constitution of tlie State. 
 
 I desire to he understood. The Constitution of the United 
 States vests in the Geneial Government, in perjDctuitj, all 
 the high powers, rights, and functions granted to it, and 
 specially enumerated in that sacred instrument. There can 
 be no change in that Constitution, except by one of the ways 
 pointed out in the fifth article thereof. By that article it is 
 in substance provided, that two-thirds of both Houses of 
 Congress can propose amendments to the Constitution ; or, 
 at tlie application of two-thirds of the Legislatures of the 
 States, it shall be the duty of Congress to call a Convention 
 for the purpose of proposing amendments to the Constitu- 
 tion ; which amendments, in either case, sliall be valid, as 
 parts of the Constitution to all intents and purposes^ when 
 ratified by the Legislatures of three-fourths of the States, 
 or by Conventions in three-fourths thereof, as the one or the 
 other mode of ratification may be proposed by Congress. 
 
 The powers of the General Government are such as the 
 Constitution now gives, or may hereafter give to it, by either 
 of the modes of amendment prescribed by the Constitution 
 itself. These powers are sacred to the General Government. 
 The States liave parted with them forever. A State-Govern- 
 ment, or a State-Convention has no more right to interfere 
 with any of these powers so vested in the General Govern- 
 ment, than it has to interfere with the powers of the 
 British Parliament, or of the absolute sovereign of Russia. 
 The Constitution of the United States is paramount to the 
 General Government, as well as to the Governments and 
 Conventions of the States respectively. All Acts of Con- 
 
gress passed in pursuance of its constitutional powers are 
 declared, by the Constitution itself, to be "the supreme law 
 of the land ; and the Judges in every State shall be bound 
 thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State 
 to the contrary notwithstanding." 
 
 What, then, are the powers of a State-Convention, duly 
 convened? Such a Convention has absolute control over all 
 the rights and jDowers reserved to the States ; that is to say, 
 not granted by the Constitution to the General Government. 
 Such a State-Convention can shape the State-Government in 
 any form it jileases — provided it be republican — as to the 
 apportionment and exercise of the powers so reserved to the 
 States. This has usually been done by forming a State-Con- 
 stitution. Such a State-Constitution usually provides that 
 certain of the reserved powers shall not be interfered with 
 by the State Legislature ; and vests the other reserved powers 
 in siich State-Legislative, Judicial and Executive Depart- 
 ments as the State-Constitution provides. These State-Con- 
 ventions and Constitutions have no more control over the 
 powers and rights of the General GovernJiient, than over 
 the powers and rights of Foreign Nations. 
 
 Such, People of Maryland, I believe to be the true and 
 plain statement of the powers and relations of the compli- 
 cated machinery which constitutes our General and State 
 Governments. 
 
 First in order, and over and above all, is the Constitution 
 of "The United States of America," as it now exists, or as 
 it may hereafter be amended in pursuance of provisions con- 
 tained within itself. 
 
 Second in order^ is the Government of "The L^nited States 
 of America," which, to the full extent of the powers con- 
 ferred upon it by the Constitution, is over and above all 
 State-Legislatures, or State-Conventions, or State Constitu- 
 tions ; and is subject only, to the full extent of those powers 
 and all laws passed in pursuance thereof, to the Constitution 
 itself as it now is^ or as it may hereafter be amended in 
 pursuance of its own provisions. 
 
8 
 
 Third in order are the State-Conventions when lawfully 
 assembled. These State-Conventions have supreme power 
 only over the rights reserved to the States ; that is to say, 
 not granted by*the Constitution to the General Government. 
 These State-Conventions are clearly subject to the Constitu- 
 tion of the United States, and to all acts of Congress passed 
 pursuant thereto. 
 
 Fourth in order are the State-Governments, consisting of 
 their legislative, judicial, and executive departments ; all 
 of which are clearly subject, firsts to the Constitution of the 
 United States ; secondly to the General Government to the 
 full extent of its powers as vested in it by the Constitution ; 
 and thirdly, to the Constitutions of the respective States. 
 
 If these things be so, should there be a question with any 
 faithful and loyal citizen of the United States, whether he 
 will obey a Convention of his own State acting beyond its 
 ])Owers, or the General Government in the exercise of its 
 constitutional functions ? Is not the very statement of the 
 question its argument? 
 
 To go a step further. A State cannot leave the Union, 
 even by the consent of the General Government. Congress, 
 or the President and Senate have no power to give such 
 consent. The relations of the General Government to the 
 several States, and of the several States to the General Gov- 
 ernment are prescribed and fixed by the Constitution, No 
 ao-reement or consent between a State and the General Gov- 
 ernment can change these relations. Any such agreement 
 would be in direct violation of the Constitution, That Con- 
 stitution is paramount to the General Government, as well 
 as to the State-Governments, The separation of a State 
 from the General Government can only be legalized by an 
 amendment to the Constitution, according to one of the ways 
 pointed out in that instrument. 
 
 Nor can the separation of a State from the General Gov- 
 ernment be authorised by a treaty between them. No treaty 
 can be made between the General Government and a State 
 Government. Ambassadors, by force of the term, are high 
 
9 
 
 agents, appointed by one sovereign power to separate and 
 distinct nationalities. Their agreements are called treaties. 
 Such treaties, by the grants of the Constitution, the United 
 States has power to make with another Government. But 
 that Constitution expressly declares, that "no State shall 
 enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation." The 
 powers of the General Government of the United States, as 
 also of the Governments of the States, are fixed by the Con- 
 stitution. The General Government has all the powers 
 granted by that instrument. All powers not thereby granted 
 to the General Government, nor prohibited to the States, are 
 reserved to the States respectively. The General Govern- 
 ment and the State-Governments each, within its sphere, is 
 supreme. Out of its sphere each is powerless, and its acts 
 7iull and void. 
 
 As correctives of any abuse of these respective powers we 
 have the ballot-box, both State and National, the equality 
 of all the States both great and small in the Senate, popu- 
 lar representation in the House of Representatives and in 
 the Executive, and a life-tenure on the part of the Judiciary, 
 which has full power, in any case brought before it within 
 the range of its jurisdiction, to redress any wrong committed 
 against the humblest citizen. 
 
 The General Government has no power to make war on a 
 State. Why is this? It is because by the very nature of 
 icar the conqueror becomes absolute master of the conquered. 
 He can give the conquered country such laws and govern- 
 ment, and dictate to it such terms as he pleases. But the 
 General Government, by the Constitution, is prohibited from 
 interfering with the powers reserved to the States. The 
 General Government can neither take from, nor add to 
 the powers of the States. JSTor can she, as against or in 
 ftivor of a State, take from or add to her own powers. There- 
 fore it is that the General Government cannot make loar on 
 a State ; because, if successful, she would annihilate State- 
 power through the high powers conferred by the laws of war 
 
10 
 
 (3n the conqueror ; and tliat would be inconsistent witli, and 
 in violation of the Constitution. 
 
 Nor can tlie General Government make "war on the people 
 of a State ; because by the laws of war, resistance made by 
 the people of a Country, in defence of its nationality, has ever 
 been held as noble and praiseworthy by generous conquer- 
 ors ; w^hereas the levying of war against the United States, 
 by the citizens of a State, is treason by the clear provisions 
 of the Constitution. The converse of these propositions is 
 equally true. A State, or the people thereof, cannot make 
 war on the General Government. The riglits, the relations, 
 and the obligations of the States to the General Govern- 
 ment, and of the General Government to the States, are 
 fixed and settled by the Constitution. They can neither be 
 increased, nor changed, nor varied by war, nor by treaty, 
 nor otherwise, excei^t by an amendment of the Constitution 
 in one of the ways pointed out by it. This Constitution is 
 the true higher laio. It binds alike the General Govern- 
 ment, the several States, and the People thereof; and cannot 
 be cbanged, or altered by nullification, secession, or rebellion 
 on the part of a State ; nor by war or treaty between a State 
 and the Government of the Union. 
 
 But, People of Maryland, you have never denied, nor your 
 Fathers before you, that the General Government possesses 
 ample powers to enforce obedience to her laws. The very 
 term Government implies these powers. They are innate, 
 inherent, from the nature of things. They have been recog- 
 nised and practiced from the beginning in the better and 
 purer days of the Republic. The General Government has 
 also, of necessity, the right and the power to defend her 
 Forts, her Arsenals, her Custom-Houses, and to collect her 
 revenues. These powers are also inherent. They too are in 
 the nature of things. The Convention which framed the 
 Constitution, and the Peo])le of the States wlio adopted it, 
 no doubt intended to create, and did create thereby, a Gov- 
 ernment able to sustain itself. 
 
11 
 
 I do not deem it advisable, however, in the present con- 
 dition of our Country, to discuss, in detail, the ways and 
 means by which the General Government might, in case of 
 dire extremity, uphold and maintain her authority. I trust 
 that dire extremity will never come. The largest statesman- 
 ship, the truest love for our whole Country, with a, full share 
 thereof for the disaffected part ; the deei)est horror and 
 dread of fratricidal contests, patience, forbearance, concilia- 
 tion, a willingness to listen to complaints, and a desire and 
 resolution to redress them to the extreme verge of justice and 
 equity ; a firm resolve to maintain the Union and the Con- 
 stitution ; with a full knowledge that these will find their 
 surest foundations when, without a strain, like a ship on the 
 water, they rest on the affections of the People ; these are 
 some of the qualities of that high and eminent statesman- 
 ship which would be necessary for a wise and proper decision 
 of these great questions of power, and prudence, and patriot- 
 ism, in the event of the failure of all other means to sustain 
 the Government, Long, long may it be before the American 
 Statesman is called upon to decide these high and mighty 
 questions. Should it be otherwise I humbly pray that he 
 may bring to that decision a courage, a wisdom, a discretion, 
 a patience and a patriotism equal to those of Washington 
 himself. I have the greatest confidence that, with a tithe of 
 these high qualities of statesmanship, the present difficulties 
 of our Country can be settled, and our Union saved in all its 
 brotherhood and glory and power. 
 
 After our troubles are over^ should another Anacharsis 
 visit our Country — as did the first of that name, some twen- 
 ty-four centuries ago, the States of Greece — for tlie purpose 
 of carrying back to his native Scythia a knowledge of our 
 institutions, our civilization, our manners, our customs, our 
 commerce, our science, our agriculture and our military 
 power, he should, first of all, study the frame-work of our 
 National and State Governments, and take a clear view of 
 the wondrous w^orking of the Constitution as it holds the 
 great Central Government firm in its place, whilst the State- 
 
12 
 
 Grovernments revolve around it in their respective orbits 
 without a jostle, controlled by the same mighty power. 
 
 He might then be told that, less than four centuries ago, 
 the existence of the American Continent was unknown to the 
 civilizations of Europe and of Asia ; that the race which now 
 owns and controls the vast area of the United States is an 
 offslioot from Europe ; and under colonial forms of Govern- 
 ment, in about a century and a half it reached a population 
 of three millions ; that it separated from the parent stem 
 less tlmn a century since, and, under the workings of our 
 General Government, the Nation thus formed has trebled its 
 area, and increased by more than tenfold its population, 
 power, commerce, productions and wealth ; that soon a 
 hundred millions of free and brave sons will repose in plenty 
 and safety under the wings of this Great Central Govern- 
 ment. 
 
 When this great creation of our Fathers shall have been 
 clearly comprehended, well might the noble Scythian ex- 
 claim : I will visit your Niagara ; I will float on your great 
 Inlaud Seas in the wooden palaces I have heard of, and which 
 more than rival the wonders of Eastern story ; I will climb 
 your Mountains, as they divide the water-sheds of your land, 
 stretching from Ocean to Ocean ; I will trace your Rivers as 
 they drain and fertilize your valleys, and afford path-ways 
 for your commerce for thousands and tens of thousands of 
 miles ; I will see with my own eyes your fields white with 
 the bloom of the cotton, or yellow with their golden har- 
 vests ; I will travel on your Rail-Roads and Canals ; I will 
 visit your Cities and behold your monuments and your (/api- 
 tol ; but I shall see nothing, I can see nothing equaling in 
 colossal grandeur the great intellectual creation which gave 
 your General Government the powers of an Empire ; whilst 
 your State-Governments^ existing in smaller fragments, bring 
 justice, and law, and government almost to the door of the 
 citizen, and give him at the ballot-box control over their ad- 
 ministration. These, People of America, are your true glory. 
 As a friend of humanity, I pray you sustain your Govern- 
 
13 
 
 ment; uphold your Constitution; maintain your allegiance; 
 let Stars be added to your National Flag ; let one be struck 
 from it, Never ! Never ! 
 
 People of Maryland, I have tried to present to you a brief, 
 but I trust a clear and accurate outline of the powers and 
 relations of the National and State-Governments, under 
 which we have lived in prosperity, honor, and freedom for 
 more than seventy years. Of all the States of the Union, 
 Maryland, from her location, has drunk freest and deepest 
 from the great fountains of our National prosperity. The 
 General Government has been to you as a shower of manna 
 for seventy years. You have grown with its growth. Your 
 wives, your children, your liberties and your institutions, 
 have ever found a safe shelter under the wings of its eagle. 
 Truly, "as a hen gathereth lier chickens under her wings," 
 so has the National Government sheltered you. The Sons 
 of Maryland have found service and gained honor and glory 
 in the military, as well as in the civil departments of the 
 Government. Your mechanics and artisans have found 
 honest and well-rewarded employment in her noble and 
 costly public works. Your commerce has been protected on 
 every sea. For seventy years you have been cherished by 
 her love, her care, her power as if she were, as in truth she 
 is, your mother. Through her you are owners of a broad 
 domain, stretching from Ocean to Ocean, and from Mexico 
 to the frozen regions of Canada, All this is now your 
 Country, and within its more than imperial limits you and 
 your children and your children's children, may find free 
 and ample homes for ages and ages to come. 
 
 If you are asked to abandon tliis imperial domain and 
 withdraw your allegiance from the General Government, 
 will you do it ? Have you any complaints to make of the 
 General Government ? Its course has ever been parental. 
 You complain of your Sister States ! And will you abandon 
 your allegiance to the General Government, because some of 
 your Northern Sisters have passed laws unfrienclly to your 
 Institutions in violation of their constitutional duties, and 
 
14 
 
 wlncli laws are therefore void ; or because some of your 
 Southern Sisters have passed ordinances of secession, in vio- 
 lation of the same sacred instrument, and therefore equally 
 void? I trust not ; I pray not. Rely upon it the heart of 
 the People of this gi'eat Country heats in tune to the 
 music of the Union. If the Congress which is about to 
 close its career shall fail, by a constitutional majority, to 
 propose satisfactory amendments to the Constitution, do not 
 be disheartened. That Congress— and it is with a blush for 
 my Country tliat I say it — numbers nvciuy politicians, and but 
 few statesmen. 
 
 There is another mode of amending the Constitution. Let 
 the Legislatures of the several States call on Congress to 
 summon a Convention. Two-thirds of the State-Legisla- 
 tures agreeing, Congress is bound to call it. A Convention 
 fresh from the People would agree on amendments satisfac- 
 tory to the Country. The People of the United States would 
 look to this. They do not mean that this our Government 
 is to be broken up ; and will therefore take care that fair 
 concessions are offered by the one side, and accepted by the 
 other. These amendments should be submitted to State- 
 Conventions, and not to the State-Legislatures. The People 
 will see to it that they are accepted by the constitutional 
 majority of the States. Even the seceding Slates, tired as 
 they will be of their unnatural position, will cast their votes 
 for the amendments when they are assured that these votes 
 will ensure their final adopytion. What we need now is 
 patience, forbearance, love of Country. Do not despair of 
 the Republic. Stand firmly by your flag, your Government, 
 your Country in this their hour of danger. If evil betide 
 you, it will come whilst you are in the path of honor and 
 duty. Abandon these, and you will at best become a de- 
 fenceless member of a dwarfed Confederacy, full of nullifica- 
 tion and secession — for of these it will have been born, and 
 it will naturally partake of the qualities of its jmrents. 
 
 For myself, I did not know how much I loved my Coun- 
 try till I saw her in these her greatest perils. She has the 
 
15 
 
 best, the truest, the inosth;)yal affections of my soul. I love 
 her the more for her misfortunes and dangers. I love her 
 better than in 7iiy yontli. In youth we love so many things 
 as to prevent concentration of the affections. But, as we 
 advance in life, our own future home, where we humbly hope 
 to meet the loved-ones who have gone before us ; and the 
 home here, to whose shelter we must commit the loved-ones 
 we leave behind us and the race with Avhich we are con- 
 nected by the mysterious ties of nature, stand forth in bold 
 relief, and challenge our highest and holiest thoughts. Lilce 
 the Sibylline books these remaining objects of our love are 
 the more dearly treasured for their diminished number. I 
 am too old to change my allegiance. I could not have done 
 so in the more impulsive days of my youth. Be that as it 
 may, I have loved my country too long, too well, ever to 
 renounce her. Were she to treat me unjustly, yea, even 
 cruelly, I would sooner perish than do aught against her 
 honor, her glory or her power. She would be my Country 
 still. I would trust to her justice. If that justice failed to 
 reach me whilst I live, I would still serve her to the utmost 
 of my power, and trust that it would at last reach my hum- 
 ble name, even in the grave. Come what may in the widest 
 range of human events, I trust my arm, if ever raised against 
 my Country, may fliU shattered by my side, and that my 
 tongue may be palsied if it ever attempt to give utterance 
 to a thought, or a wish disloyal to her safety and honor. 
 
 Taunt me not with being a submissionist. To lawful 
 authority the loftiest spirit submits most loyally. No man 
 was ever less noble for being submissive to tlic will and the 
 laws of our Great Father in heaven ; or for being obedient. 
 and faithful to the Constitution and laws of his Mother — 
 the Country of his birth and his love. These are high 
 duties, acknowledged alike by Jewish, Grecian, Roman, and 
 Christian patriotism. When Socrates, more than twenty 
 centuries ago, was condemned to death by an unjust and un- 
 grateful Country, his friends arranged for his escape. He 
 refused his proffered liberty and life ; and placed that refu- 
 
16 
 
 sal on an oLecIiencc to the laws of his country so high and 
 lofty as to challenge, in all ages and countries, the approval 
 of the humblest, as well as of the loftiest minds. "Are you 
 ignorant that your Country is more considerable, and more 
 worthy of respect and veneration before God and man, than 
 your lather, mother, and all your relations together? That 
 you ought to honor your Country, yield to it, and humor it, 
 more than an angry father? That you must either reclaim 
 it by your counsel, or obey its injunctions, and suflPer with- 
 out a murmur all that it imposes upon you? If it order 
 you to be" "laid in irons, if it sends you to the wars, there 
 to spend your blood, you ought to do it without demurring. 
 You must not shake off the yoke, or flinch, or quit your 
 post; but in the army, in prison, and everywhere else, ought 
 equally to obey the orders of your Country. For if offering 
 violence to a father or a mother is a piece of grand impiety, 
 to put a force upon one's Country is a much greater." Such 
 is the lesson of patriotism taught by the wisest and noblest 
 son of Greece. For more than twenty centuries it has re- 
 ceived the plaudits of the wise, the good, the true and the 
 brave ; and I must be ^^ardoned if I refuse to change it for 
 the teachings of the modern school of "nullification, seces- 
 sion, disunion and rebellion." 
 
 People of Maryland ! I asked you to listen if I spoke to 
 you of Loyalty, of Love of Country. I pray your forgive- 
 ness if my words have proved false to the impulses of my 
 heart, and have flowed in a strain unequal to the high 
 themes of which I have spoken. Would to God the power 
 were given me to discuss these higli questions witli an elo- 
 quence as lofty as themselves. They do not concern your 
 wealth, or your safety, or your industry ; though I believe 
 these interests lie in the same direction that your higher and 
 holier duties point out. But whether that be so or not my 
 purpose was to point you to the path of duty, of honor, of 
 loyalty, of love of Country, in the full belief that it will lead 
 you to glory and lienor which, to a People, are worth more 
 than all the untold treasures of the golden rocks of (Cali- 
 fornia. 
 
17 
 
 The true need of our Country is more of faithfvl sons. 
 People of Maryland, come to her rescue. Lay upon hei- 
 altars your "lives, your fortunes, your sacred honor."" I 
 trust it will not be long before the restored brotherhood and 
 revived patriotism of our people will bring back harmony to 
 our Federal and State-Governments ; when the American, 
 offering to his brother — no matter whence they come or 
 wliere they meet — the right-hand of fellowslii'i), of conces- 
 sion^ of kindness, and of peace, will reserve his sword and 
 his courage for the enemies of his Counti-y ; when we shall 
 once more, as a People, acknowledge the duties of loyalty, 
 of love of Country. This blessed time I think I see in the 
 distance. "The North will give up; the South will not 
 keep hack." Even South Carolina will return to her true 
 resting-place in the arms of the Union ; ready again to 
 answer, if need he, at tlie call of a Noithern commander, 
 and with a son as brave and true as he who fell on the jdains 
 of Mexico, "Lead on; South Carolina will follow you to the 
 death." 
 
 WJien this blessed day shall have arrived, as arrive it 
 surely will, thirty millions of People will shout with one 
 united voice : Thanks, thanks to the Great Father of us all, 
 our Brotherhood is restored, our Country is saved, oui- Peo- 
 ple united, our Constitution and Government maintained. 
 
 WILLIAM H. COLLINS. 
 
 Baltimore, Felntary 23, 1801. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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