GLORY OF ARMS. 105 LXXV.-GLORY OF ARMS. CHARLES SUMNER. It WHATEVER may be the judgment of poets, of moralists, ). satirists, or even of soldiers, it is certain that the glory o arms still exercises no mean influence over the minds of men. The art of war, which has been happily termed by a French divine, the baleful art by which men learn to exterminate one another, is yet held, even among Christians, to be an honorable pursuit; and the animal courage, which it stimu lates and develops, is prized as a transcendent virtue. will be for another age, and a higher civilization, to appreciate the more exalted character of the art of benevolencethe art of extending happiness and all good influences, by word or deed, to the largest number of mankind,—which, in blessed contrast with the misery, the degradation, the wickedness of war, shall shine resplendent the true grandeur of peace. All then will be willing to join with the early poet in saying at least :- "Though louder fame attend the martial rage, Then shall the soul thrill with a nobler heroism than that of battle. Peaceful industry, with untold multitudes of cheerful and beneficent laborers, shall be its gladsome token. Literature, full of sympathy and comfort for the heart of man, shall appear in garments of purer glory than she has yet assumed. Science shall extend the bounds of knowledge and power, adding unimaginable strength to the hands of men, opening innumerable resources in the earth, and revealing new secrets and harmonies in the skies. Art, elevated and refined, shall lavish fresh streams of beauty and grace. Charity, in streams of milk and honey, shall diffuse itself among all the habitations of the world. Does any one ask for the signs of this approaching era? The increasing beneficence and intelligence of our own. day, the broad-spread sympathy with human suffering, the widening thoughts of men, the lougings of the heart for a higher condition on earth, the unfulfilled promises of Christian Progress, are the auspicious auguries of this Happy Future. As early voyagers over untried realms of waste, we have already observed the signs of land. The green twig and fresh red berry have floated by our bark; the odors of the shore fan our faces; nay, we may seem to descry the distant gleam of light, and hear from the more earnest observers, as Columbus heard, after midnight, from the masthead of the Pinta, the joyful cry of Land! Land! and lo! a new world broke upon his early morning gaze. LXXVI. ON THE REMOVAL OF WASHINGTON'S REMAINS. A. S. CLAYTON. PHYSICAL monuments perish, but it is the grand moral association that perpetuates events to the latest age, and occasions them to endure, with increasing effect, through all future time. Among these great moral recollections associated with the character of Washington, is the place of his birth and the home of his childhood. What country so fitted for his sepulchre as Virginia, the State that gave him being ?that State, so distinguished for every noble daring, and where Washington commenced and ended his military career—a career so signally famed for its masterly valor at the very outset, and the crowning victory of York at its close. But, sir, when you add to this, the recollection of that spot, in his native State-the one above all others, which he selected for his home-where he spent a long life-to which every day in that long life was devoted in works of taste, and around which he had thrown his great mind in the most imperishable evidences of genius and industry-that had attracted the visits of thousands from every part of the world, and those, too, of the most distinguished foreigners, at the head of whom stands the immortal La Fayette-which, in life, was open to every stranger, the curious as well as the grateful, and since his death has become the shrine of the patriot's pilgrimage-what site on earth so suited for a monument as that, thus consecrated by such undying recollections? This, then, should be the grave of Washington. But, sir, there is another strong consideration why these remains should not be disturbed. It was the last request recorded in his will, that there he should rest, and that no pomp or show attend his funeral, nor splendid monument mark his grave. This was truly in character with his republican simplicity. ON THE REVOLUTIONARY PENSION BILL. 107 And when it is remembered that his unrivalled fame is far above the reach of artificial glories to adorn, and beyond all the efforts of marble structures and towering edifices to perpetuate, it is better secured, and more illustriously commemorated in the unostentatious manner in which, at Mount Vernon, his remains are entombed, than it would be, if they were deposited under the gaudy dome of the capitol, where, torn from the shade of his consort, they would become a mere spectacle for the " gaze of the idler,' and where, I would add, all reverence for them would be lost in the same reckless levity that is witnessed every day at the pictures in the rotunda. The immeasurable distance between the great. ness of his life and the simplicity of his death, and burial, forms of itself a monument of moral grandeur, that utterly contemns all the splendors of art. LXXVII-ON THE REVOLUTIONARY PENSION BILL. W. R. DAVIS. SIR, the passage of this bill will be a signal, the sounding of a reveille, that will wake up from the slumber of the grave all the dead militia of the land. Not harmless ghosts and spectres, but substantial pensioners, tax receivers, and consumers of the substance of the people. I believe, however, I might be induced to vote for this bill, if it would have power and virtue to resurrect the blessed patriots who have gone before us; if it would arouse from their slumbers the real and true men who repose on the sides of Breed's hill, on the plains of Trenton and Princeton, on the banks of the Brandywine; of those who sleep on the gory but hallowed spots that scar the bosoms of the Southern States; of those who rest beneath the green sod of Yorktown, Guilford, King's Mountain, Cowpens, Stono, and Eutaw; if it would bring to life and light "the buried warlike and the wise,' and give back to us, at this dread crisis, their counsels, advice, example, and countenance, to warm, animate, and cheer our country's wintry state! Yes, sir, I would give it my support, if it would cause the great Washington to burst the cerements which swathe him, and enable him to partici pate in the counsels of this day; if it would call to your aid the gallant Greene, the wise and patriotic Hancock, the Adamses, Shermans, Pinckneys, and all that host of worthies; if it would resuscitate that brotherly feeling which once connected and made invincible the old thirteen States; which blazed with radiance the path of honor and virtue they trod together, and gave to history one bright page of spotless devotion to human liberty. What would such patriots feel and say, at the present state of the country? Would not Washington again warn you against sectional legislation? And what might we not expect from the heroic Greene-from him, around the urning edges of whose shining buckler the whole chivalry of the South delighted to rally?" From one so loved aud cherished in life, so mourned in death by the whole South ?from one, who chose to live and die on fields dear to him, to his and American glory?-from one into whose lap she poured her rich treasures? He would tell you, for well he knew, that the Hugonots of Carolina, like the Pilgrims of Plymouth rock, were a liberty-loving, but not a factious or seditious people. What, too, would the old Maryland line say to the charge of disaffection and want of patriotism made against us by the selfish and interested? Would the How ards and Campbells of that day give the charge a moment's credence? Would they not remember when our banners floated, and our arms were stacked together on the bloody but victorious plains of Eutaw ? LXXVIII. THE MAYFLOWER. EDWARD EVERETT METHINKS, I see it now, that one solitary, adventurous vessel, the Mayflower of a forlorn hope, freighted with the prospects of a future state, and bound across the unknown gea. I behold it pursuing, with a thousand misgivings, the uncertain, the tedious voyage. Suns rise and set, and weeks and months pass, and winter surprises them on the deep, but brings them not the sight of the wished for shore. I see them now, scantily supplied with provisions, crowded almost to suffocation in their ill-stored prison, delayed by calms, pursung a circuitous route; and now, driven in fury before the The The raging tempest, in their scarcely sea-worthy vessel. awful voice of the storm howls through the rigging. laboring masts seem straining from their base; the dismal sound of the pumps is heard; the ship leaps, as it were, madly from billow to billow; the ocean breaks, and settles with ingulfing floods over the floating deck, and beats with deadening weight against the staggering vessel. I see them escaped from these perils, pursuing their all but desperate undertaking, and landed at last, after a five months' passage, on the ice-clad rocks of Plymouth, weak and exhausted from the voyage, poorly armed, scantily provisioned, depending on the charity of their ship-master for a draught of beer on board, drinking nothing but water on shore, without shelter, without means, surrounded by hostile tribes. Shut now the volume of history, and tell me, on any principle of human probability, what shall be the fate of this handful of adventurers? Tell me, man of military science, in how many months they were all swept off by the thirty savage tribes enumerated within the boundaries of New England? Tell me, politician, how long did this shadow of a colony, on which your conventions and treaties had not smiled, languish on the distant coast? Student of history, compare for me the baffled projects, the deserted settlements, the abandoned adventurers of other times, and find the parallel of this Was it the winter storm, beating upon the houseless heads of women and children? was it hard labor and spare meals? was it disease? was it the tomahawk? was it the deep malady of a blighted hope, a ruined enterprise, and a broken heart, aching in its last moments at the recollections of the loved and left, beyoud the sea? was it some or all of them united that hurried this forsaken company to their melancholy fate? And is it possible, that neithe: of these causes, that all combined, were able to blast this oud of hope! Is it possible, that from a beginning so feebie, o frail, so worthy, not so much of admiration as of pity, there has gone forth a progress so steady, a growth so wonderful. a reality so important, a promise yet to be fulfilled so glorious! |