r YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 3 9002 05350 0808 DISCOURSE OCCASIONED BY TIIE DEATH EON. D AIIEL ¥EBSTEE PREACUED October 31, and repeated November 14, 1853. E. L. CLEAVELAND, Pastor of the Third Congregational Church, New Haven. SECOND EDITION. NEW HAVEN: PniNTEU BY B. I.. IIAMLEN, Printer to Viilc College, 1852. A Cbi:;-3D5 DISCOURSE OCCASIONED BY THE DEATH Hon. D AIIEL ¥EBSTEE PREACHED October 31, and repeated November 14, 1853. E. L. CLEAVELAND, Pastor of the Third Congregational Church, New Haven. SECOND EDITION. ?^^-^ NEW HAVEN: PRINTED BY B. I,. IIAMLEN, Printer to Yale College. 1852. New Haven, Nov. 19, 1852. Rev. E. L. Cleaveland, Dear Sir — We heard with great pleasure your Discourse on the death of Daniel Webster ; and believing the principles and sentiments therein advanced are of vital importance to the welfare of our beloved Union, we would respectfully request a copy for publication. Truly yours, L. Candee. James Donaghe. "W. Hooker. H. Trowbridge. E. H. Trowbridge, J. Nicholson. DISCOURSE. Jer. xlviii, 17, — "All ye that are about him bemoan him; and all TE THAT KNOW HIS NAME, SAY, HoW 18 THE STRONG STAFF BROKEN, AND THE BEAUTIFUL ROD !" The word and providence of God are but different chapters in the same great volume, mutually explaining and enforcing each other. Rightly to understand either, we must study them both. To be unmindful of the im portant events which are transpiring under the government of God, is to be unmindful of God himself. In his more remarkable providences you see his hand, you hear his voice. God himself appears as the preacher and super sedes all other agency by his own majestic utterance. When God thus speaks, how becoming is it in us to give ear ! Especially when he speaks in the ministration of death. Often as he passes before us in the exercise of this dread prerogative, he never does it without laying a new emphasis on his word, and enforcing the claims of his sovereignty. Death indeed, is a most familiar event, and seldom does it compel more than a passing regard. Yet is it always the same momentous change ; never is it less than the voice of God, uttered in tones of impressive so lemnity. Wherever, however, or on whomsoever it is ex ecuted, it speaks of judgment and eternity, and that, whether men will hear or forbear. But although death is the common lot of all, involving in every case, consequences of infinite moment, yet to the living it is more instructive in some instances than in others. It may be invested with circumstances which give it a peculiar significance and importance. All deaths do not affect us alike, nor was it designed they should ; the death of a stranger is not the same thing to us, as that of a dear friend. The community is more deeply afflicted by the decease of an enterprising' capitalist, whose large invest ments, generous spirit, and untiring energy furnished the means of support to scores of families and hundreds of in dividuals, than it would be, had he been a poor man. In gathering therefore, the lessons to be derived by the living from the demise of any person, besides those elements which are common to every instance of dissolution, we must consider the character, position and general relations which distinguish one man from another. The moral im port of one man's death as compared with that of another, will depend upon his antecedents. We look to his history, to the nature and extent of his influence in life, if we would estimate our loss. It may be that some can see nothing in such a course but a disposition to honor men according to their worldly greatness and not according to their intrinsic worth. But it has no necessary connexion with such a spirit. It is merely an attempt to form an estimate of the contents of the event by the facts as they are ; to ascertain what God means to teach us, by what he has done : if he has taken an infant child from the family, — to weigh its full, sad import ; if he has removed the head and only tempo ral support of the family, — to take the guage and dimen sions of that sore bereavement. But surely it is no dispar agement to the departed infant, and no flattery to the de ceased father, if the death which plunges the helpless widow and orphans into the miseries of a relentless pov erty, throws a darker shadow, and impresses more and weightier lessons, on their bereaved hearts, than the death of the little one. Apart then from any honors offered to the dead, and apart from any incense offered to the pride of the living, our own highest interests demand that every death should be estimated not only by that which is es- sential to its nature, but also by those circumstances which distinguish the departure of one man from that of another. Death is clothed with peculiar emphasis, and demands especial attention, when he strikes his dart at the high places of power. When a Prince or a President is laid low, a whole nation is summoned to mourning. Not to give reverent heed to such an event would be to traverse the very design of God, who takes this method to arrest the current of worldliness and draw the thoughts of man kind to himself. When Saul and Jonathan fell in the bat tle of Gilboa, David, regarding it as a signal occasion for serious reflection and religious commemoration, set up a perpetual memorial in that exquisite song, "The beauty of Israel is slain in thy high places : how are the mighty fal len!" And so at the destruction of Moab, personified in their king, the prophet in my text, calls to a general mourning over the mighty catastrophe: "All ye that are about him bemoan him ; and all ye that know his name, say, How is the strong staff broken, and the beautiful rod !" But there is an empire of mind, far more august, and far more influential than any empire of physical force. And that empire has its princes, its potentates, its high and mighty rulers, clothed vvith more than regal majesty, and invested vvith a more than imperial scepter. When a mind that has long reigned in the realm of intellect, that has long given character and direction to the current-thought of the age, whose great ideas have become interwoven with tlie mental and moral life of a nation, on whose sa gacity and power, depend, in no small measure, the pres ent and future interests of a mighty people; when such a mind passes away from these earthly scenes, an event transpires which may well arrest universal attention, and bring the whole civilized world to a solemn and mournful pause. Princes and Presidents can be, as they often have been, made out of very common materials, and when they are removed, it is not always a diflScult matter to fill their 6 places : but when a profound and original thinker, a wise and far-seeing statesman, an eloquent and commanding or ator, ceases from among men, the loss may be irreparable, there may be no survivor to supply his place. Such is the calamity that has now befallen the American people. A great and mighty mind has passed away from earth ; " the foremost man" of this nadon, if not of the world, is numbered with the dead. He whose wisdom has so long been felt in our public councils, whose elo quence has so often thrilled the hearts of his countrymen, and whose sublime genius has for so many years been the admiration of the world, has disappeared forever from that august theater, on which but yesterday he was a most conspicuous actor. The death of Mr. Webster is not an event to be passed over in silence ; it ought not to be, and cannot be. The nadon cannot lose its noblest son, with out knowing and lamenting the bereavement; the world cannot part with so great a light, without a mournful con sciousness of the loss. We must lay it to heart, we do ; not so much from a sense of duty, as from an impulse of necessity. This event has sent a mountain wave of sor row over the land, which is still rolling westward, to break ere long on the Pacific coast. And while our cities are clothed in sackcloth, and all men are touched with sadness as under a heavy national affliction, shall the pulpit alone- be silent and indifferent ? Has it no words of comfort, in struction or admonition to offer? Surely it belono-s to the ministers of religion to interpret the moral import of this event and gather up its more significant lessons for gene ral edification. It is not my purpose, as it is not my province, to sketch ' the life, or attempt a full estimate of the character of the late Secretary of State. This has been, and will be done in places more appropriate, and by persons more compe tent to the diflicult task. My duty is of another kind ; I am to contemplate the death of this great man, as a provi- dential event, fraught with weighty instruction to the living. I am to inquire what lessons of wisdom it teaches us — what benefits' we may derive from it as individuals and as a na tion. And what I have to say of him or of his history, will be subservient to this practical end. In pursuance of my object, it may be well to contem plate for a moment the nature and extent of this national bereavement. The occasion which calls us to mourning is a most extraordinary one ; it is such as can occur only at wide intervals of time. No death, since that of Wash ington, has produced a sensation so extensive and pro found ; and we may look far back into the ages, before we shall find another intellect in all respects the equal of his whose death we deplore ; and ages to come may elapse ere the world will see his like again. Few genera tions since the race began, have been called to resign a treasure so rare and rich, as that which this nation has just committed to the grave. We have lost great men before; men who were great in some one branch of attainment ; but when has there ever a man gone from us who had achieved greatness in so many and such diverse depart ments of power? We have had profound lawyers, able statesmen, eloquent orators, and accomplished scholars. And it is usually considered honor enough to win distinc tion in any one of these professions ; but Mr. Webster united all of them in himself; he was eminent in them all. He stood at the head of the American Bar; he was the first of American statesmen ; and he had no supe rior among American orators. Certainly there is no man left on either side of the Atlantic, in whom are mingled so many elements of power. Taken in parts, this or that attribute may be matched or even excelled ; but taken as a whole, where will you find his equal? The granite foundation of native common sense which supported the magnificent superstructure, and directed his powers to wise and practicable ends ; the massive and rugged strength of 8 his intellect; the transparent clearness of his reasoning; the heavy and resistless tread of his argument ; his relent less logic ; his inevitable conclusions ; his courteous and lofty bearing, his impressive dignity and force as he rose with his subject ; the vast sweep of his thoughts over the field of discussion ; the sustained and steady wing, and sublime momentum with which he bore himself gracefully but unerringly and fatally upon the object of his attack ; the classic elegance of his diction; his chaste but rich imagination ; and withal, the majesty of his person, fit temple for his imperial mind ; the flexible play and power of his deep, but finely toned voice ; the strange spell of an eye, formed " To threaten or command" — the solemn grandeur, in fine, of that more than regal front, " The great soul's apparent seat." '• A combination and a form indeed. Where every [power] did seem to set [its] seal. To give the world assurance of a man :" — — add to this, the sound and just principles, the generous and undying patriotism, to which all these exalted faculties were unalterably consecrated, and you have a union and concentration of great qualities such as God takes centu ries to produce. It has not fallen to the lot of every gen eration, nor of every age to possess such an intellectual colossus. In this respect we have enjoyed and lost, one of God's noblest and rarest gifts. Now we are to bear in mind that this gigantic inteflect, with all its growing resources and accumulating experi ence, had been employed for forty years on the jurispru dence, the legislation, and the diplomacy of the country. For thirty-three years, Mr. Webster had been almost constantly in public life, either as a member of Con^^ress or of the Cabinet. During that period he had impressed his genius upon the laws of the land and upon the laws of nations ; and more broadly and indelibly still, on the minds and hearts of his countrymen. Time alone can measure the service he has rendered, or decide how much longer the Union will stand, than it would have done, had it not been for his triumphant and far-famed defense of the Con stitution ; his influence on the legislative councils, and his skill and sagacity in setUing questions of international policy, which had long baffled negotiation, and were fast assuming a threatening aspect. He had come to be re garded as a mighty pillar of the State — central, massive, towering; gracefully bearing upon his Atlantean shoulders the glorious fabric of our beloved Union. And what American did not feel that the interests and the honor of the nadon were safe in his hands? What American did not feel a conscious security and an honest pride in having such a man at the helm of government? Even "Europe," it has been truly said, " had come to see in his life a guar anty for justice, for peace, for the best hopes of civiliza tion." And yet he owed this foreign confidence to no be trayal of his country's rights ; he was every inch an Ameri can. He loved his native land with true filial devotion ; he loved its soil, its scenery, its institutions and its people; its past glories and its coming grandeur; he loved it all; to him it was one country, one people. In his own expressive lan guage, he 'knew no North, no South, no East, no West.' He was eminently, I had almost said, preeminently national in his spirit and general policy. No public man of his time was more free from sectional jealousy, and party lit tleness. Nor will any one now rise up to quesUon the purity or generosity of his patriotism. Himself the most gigantic growth of his country's institutions, he joyfully consecrated to that country all that she had made him — giving to her the entire service of his life, and when life was ended, bequeathing to her the glory of his deathless name. From these imperfect hints — (I dare attempt no com prehensive description of the man) — we may gather some 10 idea of our loss, and judge whether we have not some thing to learn from an event which has made us a nation of mourners. What then, are the lessons which Divine Providence is teaching us by this solemn dispensation ? Without attempting to notice them all, I will select a few pf the more important. I. The death of Mr. Webster is an impressive rebuke to the violence of party spirit. There is something significant in the time of its occur rence. On the eve of a great national election, amid the heat and commotion of an excited political canvass, when the whole mind and heart of the country is gathering to a focus of intensest feeling as the day of decision draws near which is to raise one of these competitors to the highest official station in the world ; at this critical moment the foremost man of this republic, is smitten down ! What a comment on the uncertainty and vanity of all mere tem poral interests ! He who had so long been associated in the public mind with questions and scenes like these ; whose powerful voice has so often been heard on such occasions, whose elevation to the presidency has so long been the fond desire of multitudes, not a few of whom adhered to him even to the last ; he who was in fact a candidate for that high honor, at the present canvass, now lies a tenant of the silent tomb ! And does not the death of such a man, occurring at such a moment, administer a solemn admonition to the intolerance of party spirit, to the fierceness of political strife? Does it not say to the ragin^- elements, "Peace, be still?" Upon all the pursuits of earthly ambition, upon all the trappings of temporal power and glory, does it not pronounce with signal emphasis, "Vanity of vanities?" And will m.en still rush on as blindly, as madly, after a prize that is so liable at all times to be snatched from their grasp ? Will they learn from this calamity to put no restraint upon their passions, no regulating hand upon their measures ? Will they not tern- 11 per the present conflict with a spirit of moderation and forbearance, which, while it leaves every man to act ac cording to his convictions of duty, softens the a.sperities of political warfare, and which, repressing on the one hand, the insolence of victory, assuages on the other, the mortifi cation of defeat? It did seem a few days ago, as if no event could arrest the public attention, or turn aside the powerful current of feeling then rushing on to the point of confluence. But God has found means to do this very thing ; a voice has spoken which is heard above the roar of popular clamor and commotion. A new thing has come to pass ; a whole people, on the eve of an all-engrossing, all-exciting election, is suddenly diverted from the great question of the hour, and thrown into mourning by the death of a single man — and he, not a president; not a prominent candidate for president; not standing in the way of either of the great parties ; yet was he the only man whose death could have produced such an effect — " Between the pass and fell-incensed points Of [these] mighty opposites," a power was interposed before which both parties fell back in awe, and forgetting their strife, gave way to grief over the fallen object of their common veneration. Then was it that other thoughts than those of political life, were sug gested to the mind ; other interests than those of earth were pressed upon the attention ; other scenes than those of time rose on the view; other objects than those of selfish ambition, were presented to the eye. For a mo ment, there was a sense of this worid's emptiness, and a glance at the vastness and inconceivable superiority of the woHd to come ; visions of the soul in its future state, vis ions of God, of judgment and eternity, were flitting before men's minds, and a shade passed over the, glories of earth. O could those influences but remain and humble the pride, and subdue the selfishness, and purify the motives, and 12 elevate the aims of these living, beating hearts, so capa cious of sin or holiness, of misery or happiness, what a blessed transformation would be witnessed on the face of society, and on the affairs of government ! 2. The providential dispensation which loe noio deplore, is fitted to aioaken solicitude in respect to the national loclfare. It is not the least among the qvils of party politics that they often blind us to the real value of our great states; men. We associate the.se men with the heats, animosities, and ambitious schemes of partisan warfare, and we forget that over and above what is done for their respective par ties as such, they do render a vast amount of important service to the country. True, they are not perfect, they are not free from selfish and ambitious aims, but this is only saying that they are men; and after all, the service they perform may be just as valuable to the country as if they had no private ends whatever. They are the ministers of God for good, independently of their motives. What they think in their heart, what their ulterior aims may be, is a matter between them and their Maker; but what ac tual service they render belongs to us and our children. And owing to the cause just mentioned, we are greatly liable to underrate that service. By their great wisdom and power they have saved the nation from threatening dan gers, not once nor twice — by their learning and sagacity they have built up the goodly fabric of jurisprudence and consdtutional government, under which twenty-five mil lions of people repose in peaceful prosperity. By their judicious counsels and wise administrations, they have held in check many rash and pernicious movements, many subtle, but fatal elements which endangered the stability of our institutions, and generally they have tasked their exalted faculties to give a healthful development to the un- calculated energies of this mighty nation. 13 Such was Mr. Webster : so long had he given the strength of his transcendant intellect to the public affairs of the country — so identified was he with the national councils — so commanding was his influence, whether in the majority or not — to such an extraordinary degree did he impress his own ideas on the legislation of the country, that the history of the man must be the history of the government during the period in question. As a Secretary of State the connexion was still more intimate and vital. What he accomplished during his two short: terms of service in that department, has saved us from war with Great Britain, has established most important principles of international law, and opened a new era in diplomacy. Now is it possible that an influence so long continued, so wise and safe and powerful, should suddenly be removed from us, no more to guide, defend and control, without exciting in our minds a sense of danger? When we acknowledge that the greatest man and one of the purest patriots of the age has been taken away, and that his place is not likely to be made good for years, if for generations to come, must we not confess to a secret mis giving as to the eflTect of such a loss? Can we afford to spare so much wisdom and power from our national coun cils ? When darkness and perplexity troubled the minds of men, how instinctively our eyes turned to Webster for light. And when an attempt was made to foment sec tional jealousies, by a concerted attack upon New England, the heaviest fire of which was discharged upon the person of her disdnguished representative, well do we remember with what impatience, yet assured confidence, we waited for the vindication of our dishonored name at th^ hands of one whose competence to the task was better known to us than to his assailants. And never will the nation, never will the worid forget how that task was performed — how, with eye unabashed, and heart undismayed, he re ceived the combined assault — with what impressive dig- 14 nity he advanced to the defense— with what Titanic strength he overthrew the positions of its opponents, shat tering and scattering their forces as if a hail-storm had swept the field. And how, vvith noble magnanimity, in stead of pursuing his advantage by changing the seat of the war^ he raised on the ruins of this demolished arma ment, a plea for the Union, which stands to this day the proudest monument of his own fame and the strongest pil lar of the national edifice — and which, should that edifice ever crumble to ruins, will still remain, towering aloft in solitary grandeur and beauty, to mark the spot where the temple of American liberty once stood. But he is gone. And whatever perils may come here after, there is no one man to whom the whole nation would instincdvely turn for the defense of its rights. Who then will say, that in the death of Mr. Webster, we have lost no strength and incurred no danger? It is worthy of remark too, that the standing and moral power of a nation among other nations, is due very much to the reputation of her great men. The glory of Greece and Rome, consisted in the worid-wide renown of their philosophers and statesmen, their poets and military he roes. And when a nation begins to decline in illustrious men, she loses an element of power, which nothing else can supply. It is an impressive fact that within three years we have lost three of our most eminent statesmen. Cal houn, Clay, and Webster. History scarcely furnishes a parallel of three men endowed with such extraordinary yet diverse powers of mind — commencing public life so near together — moving so constantly on the same august theater — often opponents, and achieving their highest hon ors in conflict with each other, as if unable to find else where antagonists who could draw out their whole force; continuing their public labors to the end of life, and falling at last on the high places of the field, with all their armor on. Long before their number was broken, they were the 15 pride and boast of the whole nation ; they were known as the "Three Mighties" of our American chieftains. And a sad day it was, when the first of their number was borne away from the scene of his senatorial renown. Still, we comforted ourselves that Clay and Webster remained. And when at length the great orator of the West had been carried in funereal pomp through the land, all eyes, all hearts turned fondly, and with augmented reverence to the last and mightiest of the Three. We took consolation from the thought, that Webster still lived; and ardent was the desire, and fervent the prayer that he might continue to live for many a year to come, the defense and the pride of his native land. Already he had become an historical character, and his fame, a national posession. Too great to be the exclusive property of any one party, he was proudly claimed by every American, abroad, if not at home, as his country's most illustrious son. And as the frosts of time and the rich lights of a long and eventful experience were gathering a ripe and mellow radiance upon that ma jestic head, while the shadows of an approaching eternity were setthng in deeper lines on that solemn countenance, we watched the change with reverential awe, and clung to him the more fondly, as we saw how soon we must behold his face no more. And now he too has followed his great compatriots. We have been compelled at last to resign him to the claims of death. And as the eye travels slowly up to that intellectual eminence where he reigned so long and so gloriously, it discovers but a vacant throne, which no man on earth can fill, and which is likely to remain, a monument to the greatness of the departed, and to the inferiority of the survivors. Never was there a more impressive illustration of the effect of death in suddenly revealing the real value of a great man. Highly as Mr. Webster was appreciated, it took us by surprise to find on his decease how much we had yet to learn of his actual greatness. We knew not 16 how wide a space he filled in the public eye, until we saw the void occasioned by his removal. It could not but be so. It is scarcely possible to form an adequate estimate of such a man when living. To say nothing of party ani mosity which blinds so many to the excellences of an oppo nent, and which generates so many foul slanders to defraud him of his good name ; leaving this out of view, there is a difficulty in taking the real altitude of a great man while he is yet with us. We are too familiar with his presence ; his influence, though powerful and manifold, falls upon us so constantly and so insensibly, that we fail to observe it. It is not when walking in the light of the sun that we get the most vivid conception of our dependence on his beams, but when some eclipse or mysterious day of darkness hides him from our View. Long had we been accustomed to lift our eyes to this majestic column standing in our na- donal temple, but we knew not its girth, its height, the space it occupied, or the weight it supported, until it fell ; and the thundering shock, and the mighty void, and the bending roof, revealed as in an instant the irreparable loss. We know that governments precede a declaration of war, by the re-call of ambassadors. Is it because God is about to change his face towards us, that he has taken away our three greatest men ? If a day of trouble is coming, then why is it that before the battle begins, we have lost our ablest champions? If you point to our national greatness and prosperity, as enough to silence these fears, I reply that the Israelite of Solomon's time might have drawn the same inference from the unexampled stability and glory of the kingdom at that period — yet the reign of Solomon proved to be the grand climacteric of the Israelii ish nation. From that culminating point of their power, they fell into insignificant and belligerent fragments, which gradually declined until they became extinct. The nation never saw another Solomon. He was the last and highest result of the civihzation of his age. In the tropics there is a tree 17 which yields nothing but a tuft of leaves at its top, until fifty years of age, when it gives birth to one gigantic, glorious flower, and then dies. It maij he that this illus trious triad of statesmen who have now gone to their graves, constitute that gigantic growth which our country has been struggling for a century to produce : and that having achieved the wonder, she wiU repeat it no more, but give place to an age of decline, both of- men and deeds. Our physical resources may be undiminished — we may be great in numbers and wealth, but deficient in great and illustrious rulers and citizens. God may be preparing to punish us as'he threatened to punish the Jews. "Behold the Lord doth take away from Jerusalem and Judah, the stay and the staff, the whole stay of bread, and the whole staff' of water, the mighty man, and the man of war, the judge and the prophet, and the prudent and the ancient, the honor able man and the counsellor, and the eloquent orator ; and I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them, and the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbor: the child shall behave proudly against the ancient, and the base against the honorable." Should God ever leave this nation to sqch a fate — should a time ever come when the land, sterile of great souls, should be given up to men of moderate minds, of little reason, but of great passions — when a head less, heartless multitude, left to the dark promptings of their baser nature, and no longer able to discern the path of wisdom, of right and of safety, shall make to themselves rulers who will unscrupulously gratify their evil desires and obey their imperious will — when servility of spirit shall be regarded as a better qualification for office than intellectual strength, profound sagacity, sound principles and large ex perience — then, in the misrule and oppression, the con fusion and anarchy of that dismal period, will it be seen what a precious boon God confers upon a nation when he gives them a leader of consummate ability for government, whom 18 they are willing and proud to follow. And it will also be seen what a calamity is the removal of such a man. But this very thing God has begun to do. He has taken away "the mighty man," "the prudent and the ancient," "the honorable man, and the counsellor, and the eloquent orator" — and if he does not go on to give us " children for our princes, and babes to rule over us," it must be because his people, alarmed by these judgments, are enabled to prevail with him by prayer to lighten his hand. Here is our only hope — God may yet be entreated for our country. Let Christian patriots intercede with him not to forsake us utterly, nor cause his faithfulness wholly to fail. Let U3 in voke upon our land a rain of righteousness, that heavenly gift which more than any other, supplies every loss, and without which nothing, not even great men, can save us. 3. The event of ivhich we speak, is one of interest to the cause of Christianity. It is the shameless boast of infidels that none but weak and inferior minds can be satisfied with the argument for Christianity. And many are the dupes of this arrogant falsehood. In refutation of this miserable charge, we are happy to give the great name of Daniel Webster — a name which the bitterest enemies of Christianity must re spect. Had he been an infidel, how would the fact have been emblazoned to the injury of the Gospel ! And how baleful would have been his influence on muUitudes of men ! But God was pleased to spare us such a calamity ; and we are permitted to know that his powerful mind never was ensnared by the sophistries of infidelity. His child hood was nurtured under the influence of Chri.sdanity — the Assembly's Catechism formed a leading element of his edu cation. And he never was known, I beheve, to deny the great doctrines of the Gospel. The instructions of the nursery were deliberately endorsed by the mature judg ment of the jurist and the statesman. So far was he from being a skeptic, that he was not even a speculator on re- 19 ligious subjects — his convictions were too strong and fixed to admit of speculation — divine truths seemed to rise up before him like the great mountains, resting immoveably on everiasting foundations, and throwing their vast forms in clear, bold, rigid outline against the sky — and whenever he spoke of them, it was as if he felt their awful shadows. Never shall I forget the impressive solemnity of counte nance and voice with which he uttered the peroration of his celebrated argument at the trial of the Knapps for the murder of Mr. White. "A sense of duty," said Mr. Webster on that occasion, " pursues us ever. It is omni present like the Deity. If we take to ourselves the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the seas, duty performed, or duty violated, is still with us, for our happiness, or our misery. If we say the darkness shall cover us, in the darkness as in the light, our obligations are yet with us. We cannot escape their power, nor fly from their presence. They are with us in this life, will be vvith us at its close ; and in that scene of inconceivable solemnity, which lies yet farther onward, we shall still find ourselves surrounded by the consciousness of duty, to pain us wher ever it has been violated, and to console us so far as God may have given us grace to perform it." This serious cast of thought was aprominent characteristic of Mr. Webster's mind. It continually manifests itself in his speeches and writings — he seemed to be in habitual contact \yith religious truth, and hence his allusions to it were easy and natural. To say the very least, the Christian system had become necessary to meet the demands of his intellect, and to main tain the equipoise of all his faculties. Such a mind as hi.s, could not rest in the low and narrow conclusions of infi- (jelity — it must needs overlap the boundaries of time and stretch on towards the infinite— it must needs go out of itself and out of this visible scene to find the complement of its being, and an appropriate theater for its agency. His superior mental stature, while it enlarged his horizon, 20 showed him how mean a thing is man when separated from his Maker. " Religion," said Mr. Webster, standing on that intellectual summit, and looking down the vista of eternity, " religion is a necessary and indispensable element in any great human character. There is no living without it. Religion is the tie that connects man with his Creator, and holds him to his throne. If that tie be sundered or broken, he floats away a worthless atom in the universe, its proper attraction all gone, its destinies and its whole future, nothing but darkness, desolation and despair. A man with no sense of religious duty, is he whom the scriptures de scribe in such terse and terrific language, as ' living with out God and without hope in the world.' Such a man is out of his proper being, out of the circle of all his duties, out of the circle of all his happiness ; away, far, far away from the purposes of his creation. A man, a true man, with all his proper sendments and sensibilities alive in him, in this state of existence, must have something to beheve, and something to hope for, or else, as life is advancing to its close, all is heart-sinking and oppression." To those who aflfect to sneer at personal piety as the superstidon of weak and deluded minds, I commend this noble testimony. Whether its gifted author was himself an illustration of his own principles, is not now the question. Here is his dehberate judgment that religion, so far frDra being unworthy of our belief, is "an indispensable element to any great human character," — that without it man is mean,' miserable, lost — that it is not a thing beneath us, but soaring high above us — not a mere decency or decoration, to be accepted or rejected according to our taste, but an affair of such imperative necessity that " there is no living without it." Nor did he mean by religion, a cold, general izing philosophy, or a vague and vapid sendmentalism which reaches no man's conscience and benefits no man's heart. " If clergymen in our days," said he on a recent occasion, " would return to the simplicity of the Gospel, and preach 21 more to individuals, and less to the crowd, there would not be sq much complaint of the decline of true religion. Many of the ministers of the present day take their text from St. Paul and preach from the newspapers. When they do so, I prefer to enjoy my own thoughts rather than to Hsten. I want my pastor to come to me in the spirit of the Gospel, saying, 'you arfe mortal! your probation is brief — your work must be done speedily. You are immortal, too, you are hastening to the b-ar of God ; the Judge standeth before the door!' When I am thus admonished, I have no dis position to, muse or to sleep." On another occasion Mr. Webster said to his pastor at Marshfield, " when I attend upon the preaching of the Gospel, I wish to have it made a personal matter — a personal matter." Now when we see such a mind as Mr. Webster's yielding a full, unhesita- dng and steadfast assent to the great truths of Christianity — when we hear him insisting on practical piety as necessary to a high character, a happy fife, a peaceful death, and a glorious immortality, we feel that it is answer enough to the infidel's malignant sneer, that no great and philosophic mind can yield its convictions to the claims of Christianity. We offset his insuking imputation with this weighty ex ample. 4. The mournfxd event toe are considering teaches us the emptiness of all mere human glory. Few men ever had more of the admiration, the almost adoration, which is given to transcendant genius, than Mr. Webster. No physical power could build such a throne as that on which he reigned — no wealth could fashion such a crown as that which encircled his princely head — no po sition, no office on earth could have added anything to his greatness. He held a rank not dependent on the popular vote, and swayed a sceptre which no change of parties could wrench from his hand. His place was in the con stellation of " ever»during men." From the hour his sun rose, it attracted the gaze, first of his naUve State, then of 22 New England, then of the nation, and finally of the whole worid. And never for one moment was that gaze Jaken off — it followed his every movement, it watched his every act, it suffered nothing to escape unnoticed — it grew more absorbing, more intense, as he moved sublimely on in his orbit — " in wonder it began, in wonder it ended, and ad miration filled up the interspace." And when at last this resplendent luminary was seen touching the horizon, the whole nation, as if suddenly conscious that a great light was about to p-ass away, awaited in awful suspense as -it slowly but steadily sunk from the view of mortals. And still, all eyes are turned fondly and mournfully to the linger ing glory which marks the spot where his sun went down. If there were anything in the enthusiastic admiration of millions — in the eager crowds that every where followed him and hung upon his hps — in the applaus'e of enraptured senates, in the ovations of cities, in the homage of the civil ized world : if there were anything in the proudest triumphs of argument, oratory and statesmanship — any thing in the consciousness that in all future ages he would take rank with Burke and Chatham, and Cicero and Demosthenes — if in all this there were elements that could satisfy his great soul, then Webster must have been the happiest of mor tals. But while he was doubtless fully sensible of the value of a good and a great name, it does not appear that he looked chiefly to these honors for happiness. On the con trary, he remarked to a clergyman in Boston, soon after his recent nomination for the Presidency, that " he would most gladly resign all competition for office — all earthly honors, for an assurance that his salvaUon was secure." And in that last sublime scene, when the dying statesman had most need of whatever support he could find, we do not learn that he once turned for consolation to his public service, his distinguished reputation. Not a word is re ported from him indicating a self-righ