gentleman from North Carolina exclaimed the other day, in a strain of patriotic ardor, "What! Shall not our laws be executed? Shall their authority be defied? I am for enforcing them, at every hazard." I honor that gentleman's zeal; and I mean no deviation from that true respect I entertain for him, when I tell him that, in this instance, his zeal is not according to know

ledge."

66

I ask this House, is there no control to its authority? is there no limit to the power of this national legislature? I hope I shall offend no man when I intimate that two limits exist,-nature and the constitution. Should this House undertake to declare that this atmosphere should no longer surround us, that water should cease to flow, that gravity should not hereafter operate, that the needle should not vibrate to the pole,-sir, I hope I shall not offend, I think I may venture to affirm that, such a law to the contrary notwithstanding, the air would continue to circulate, the Mississippi, the Hudson, and the Potomac would roll their floods to the ocean, heavy bodies continue to descend, and the mysterious magnet hold on its course to its celestial cynosure.

Just as utterly absurd and contrary to nature is it to attempt to prohibit the people of New England, for any considerable length of time, from the ocean. Commerce is not only associated with all the feelings, the habits, the interests, and relations of that people, but the nature of our soil and of our coasts, the state of our population and its mode of distribution over our territory, render it indispensable. We have five hundred miles of sea-coast, all furnished with harbors, bays, creeks, rivers, inlets, basins, with every variety of invitation to the sea, with every species of facility to violate such laws as these. Our people are not scattered over an immense surface, at a solemn distance from each other, in lordly retirement, in the midst of extended plantations and intervening wastes: they are collected on the margin of the by the sides of rivers, at the heads of bays, looking into the water, or on the surface of it, for the incitement and the reward of their industry. Among a people thus situated, thus educated, thus numerous, laws, prohibiting them from the exercise of their natural rights, will have a binding effect not one moment longer than the public sentiment supports them. Gentlemen talk of twelve revenue cutters additional, to enforce the embargo laws. Multiply the number by twelve, multiply it by an hundred, join all your ships of war, all your gun-boats, and all your militia, in despite of them all, such laws as these are of no avail when they become odious to public sentiment.

ocean,

AN EMBARGO LIBERTY.

An embargo Liberty was never cradled in Massachusetts. Our Liberty was not so much a mountain as a sea nymph. She was free as air. She could swim or she could run. The ocean was her cradle. Our fathers met her as she came, like the goddess of beauty from the waves. They caught her as she was sporting on the beach. They courted her whilst she was spreading her nets upon the rocks. But an embargo Liberty; a handcuffed Liberty; a Liberty in fetters; a Liberty traversing between the four sides of a prison, and beating her head against the walls, is none of our offspring. We abjure the monster. Its parentage is all inland.

NEW ENGLAND.1

What lessons has New England, in every period of her history, given to the world! What lessons do her condition and example still give! How unprecedented; yet how practical! how simple; yet how powerful! She has proved that all the variety of Christian sects may live together in harmony, under a government which allows equal privileges to all,-exclusive pre-eminence to none. She has proved that ignorance among the multitude is not necessary to order, but that the surest basis of perfect order is the information of the people. She has proved the old maxim, that "no government, except a despotism with a standing army, can subsist where the people have arms," is false.

Such are the true glories of the institutions of our fathers! Such the natural fruits of that patience in toil, that frugality of disposition, that temperance of habit, that general diffusion of knowledge, and that sense of religious responsibility, inculcated by the precepts, and exhibited in the example, of every generation of our ancestors! * * *

What, then, are the elements of the liberty, prosperity, and safety which the inhabitants of New England at this day enjoy? In what language, and concerning what comprehensive truths, does the wisdom of former times address the inexperience of the future?

Those elements are simple, obvious, and familiar.

Every civil and religious blessing of New England, all that here gives happiness to human life, or security to human virtue, is alone to be perpetuated in the forms and under the auspices of a free commonwealth.

1 From the "Centennial Address," delivered in Boston, September 17, 1830, at the close of the second century from the first settlement of the city.

The commonwealth itself has no other strength or hope than the intelligence and virtue of the individuals that compose it.

For the intelligence and virtue of individuals, there is no other human assurance than laws, providing for the education of the whole people.

These laws themselves have no strength, or efficient sanction, except in the moral and accountable nature of man, disclosed in the records of the Christian's faith; the right to read, to construe, and to judge concerning which, belongs to no class or caste of men, but exclusively to the individual, who must stand or fall by his own acts and his own faith, and not by those of another.

The great comprehensive truths, written in letters of living light on every page of our history, the language addressed by every past age of New England to all future ages is this: Human happiness has no perfect security but freedom;-freedom none but virtue;-virtue none but knowledge; and neither freedom, nor virtue, nor knowledge has any vigor, or immortal hope, except in the principles of the Christian faith, and in the sanctions of the Christian religion.

Men of Massachusetts! citizens of Boston! descendants of the early emigrants! consider your blessings; consider your duties. You have an inheritance acquired by the labors and sufferings of six successive generations of ancestors. They founded the fabric of your prosperity, in a severe and masculine morality; having intelligence for its cement, and religion for its ground-work. Continue to build on the same foundation, and by the same principles; let the extending temple of your country's freedom rise, in the spirit of ancient times, in proportions of intellectual and moral architecture, just, simple, and sublime. As from the first to this day, let New England continue to be an example to the world, of the blessings of a free government, and of the means and capacity of man to maintain it! And, in all times to come, as in all times past, may Boston be among the foremost and the boldest to exemplify and uphold whatever constitutes the prosperity, the happiness, and the glory of New England!

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS.

The life of a statesman second to none in diligent and effective preparation for public service, and faithful and fearless fulfilment of public duty, has now been sketched, chiefly from materials taken from his published works. The light of his own mind has been thrown on his labors, motives, principles, and spirit. In times better adapted to appreciate his worth, his merits and virtues will receive a more enduring memorial. The present is not a moment propitious to weigh them in a true balance. He knew

how little a majority of the men of his own time were disposed or qualified to estimate his character with justice. To a future age he was accustomed to look with confidence. "Altero sæculo" was the appeal made by him through his whole life, and is now engraven on his monument. The basis of his moral character was the religious principle. His spirit of liberty was fostered and inspired by the writings of Milton, Sydney, and Locke, of which the American Declaration of Independence was an emanation, and the Constitution of the United States-with the exception of the clauses conceded to slavery-an embodiment. He was the associate of statesmen and diplomatists at a crisis when war and desolation swept over Europe, when monarchs were perplexed with fear of change, and the welfare of the United States was involved in the common danger.

After leading the councils which restored peace to conflicting nations, he returned to support the administration of a veteran statesman, and then wielded the chief powers of the republic with unsurpassed purity and steadiness of purpose, energy, and wisdom. Removed by faction from the helm of state, he re-entered the national councils, and, in his old age, stood panoplied in the principles of Washington and his associates, the ablest and most dreaded champion of freedom, until, from the station assigned him by his country, he departed, happy in a life devoted to duty, in a death crowned with every honor his country could bestow, and blessed with the hope which inspires those who defend the rights, and uphold, when menaced, momentous interests of mankind. Close of the Memoir of J. Q. Adams.

ARCHIBALD ALEXANDER, 1772-1851.

THE ancestors of Archibald Alexander were from the north of Ireland, and emigrated to Virginia in 1737. He was the son of William Alexander, and was born near Lexington, Rockbridge County, Virginia, April 17, 1772. In 1789, he became the subject of "revival of religion" at his native place; and, in 1791, was licensed to preach the gospel by the Lexington Presbytery. In 1796, he accepted the Presidency of Hampden Sidney College, at that time in rather a languishing condition, and soon, by his wisdom and energy, imparted to it a more healthful and vigorous tone. He was often sent as a delegate to the General Assembly, which usually met in Philadelphia; and in 1806 he accepted a call from the Pine Street Church of that city, of which he continued pastor for six years. In 1810, the degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred upon him by the College of New Jersey; and, two years after, the General Assembly having established at Princeton a Theological Seminary, Dr. Alexander was chosen Professor of Didactic and Polemic Theology. Here he continued in the laborious discharge

187

of the duties of his professorship, with great ability and success, until within a short period of his death, which occurred on the 22d of October, 1851.'

That there have been some in the clerical profession of more learning, genius, and pulpit-eloquence than Dr. Alexander, none will deny; but no one has possessed in a higher degree that rare combination of every great and good quality, of wisdom and piety, which makes, on the whole, the deepest impression and exerts the widest influence. Men of all classes felt his power alike. Beyond any minister of his day, his preaching was equally acceptable to the learned and the illiterate, the old and the young, the untutored and the refined; and the works he has left, replete with wisdom, and instruction, and pious counsel, will remain an ever-enduring monument to his exalted worth.

THE RIGHT USE OF REASON IN RELIGION.

That it is the right and the duty of all men to exercise their reason in inquiries concerning religion, is a truth so manifest that may be presumed there are none who will be disposed to call it in question.

it

Without reason there can be no religion; for in every step which we take in examining the evidences of revelation, in interpreting its meaning, or in assenting to its doctrines, the exercise of this faculty is indispensable.

When the evidences of Christianity are exhibited, an appeal is made to the reason of men for its truth; but all evidence and all argument would be perfectly futile if reason were not permitted to judge of their force. This noble faculty was certainly given to man to be a guide in religion as well as in other things. He possesses no other means by which he can form a judgment on any subject or assent to any truth; and it would be no more absurd to talk of seeing without eyes than of knowing any thing without reason.

It is therefore a great mistake to suppose that religion forbids So far from this, she or discourages the right use of reason. enjoins it as a duty of high moral obligation, and reproves those who neglect to judge for themselves what is right.

But it has frequently been said by the friends of revelation, that although reason is legitimately exercised in examining the evidences of revelation and in determining the sense of the words by which it is conveyed, yet it is not within her province to sit

1 At the end of the life of this good man, by his son, James W. Alexander, D.D., may be found a list of his various publications. They are fifty-two in number, including sermons and pamphlets. The following are the principal ones:-Evidences of the Christian Religion, 12mo, 1825; The Canon of the Old Testament Ascertained, 12mo; Biographical Sketches of the Founder and Principal Alumni of the Log College, 12mo; A History of the Colonization of the Western Coast of Africa, Svo; A History of the Israelitish Nation, 8vo; Outlines of Moral Science, 12mo; Letters to the Aged, 18mo; Counsels of the Aged to the Young, 18mo; Thoughts on Religious Experience, 12mo; The Way of Salvation Familiarly Explained, in a Conversation between a Father and his Children, 18mo.