Various

“ But suppose that the dislike had been much more deliberate, and much more general than I am persuaded it was.—When we know that the opinions of even the greatest multitudes are the standard of rectitude, I shall think myself obliged to make those opinions the masters of my conscience. But if it may be doubted whether Omnipotence itself is competent to alter the essential constitution of right and wrong, sure I am that such things as they and I, are possessed of no such power. No man carries farther than I do the policy of making government pleasing to the people. ”

“ The diamond may be known, by the tests of experiment, from the gems which mimic its lustre; but there is no moral chemistry which can separate truth from error, and resolve each into its proper elements. In fact, it seems to be one of the fallacies which have obtained currency among mankind, that truth and error are natural antagonists. So far from it, they are scarcely ever to be found in a state of disunion or repulsion. Error winds itself around the stately column of truth, as the creeper folds in its poisonous embrace the sturdy oak of the forest. ”

“ The covering and drapery of the throne, the hangings of the walls, the carpet, the screens, the benches, cushions and backs, every thing is red in this hall. Red is the aristocratic color. When the Peers, on the occasion of a visit from the King, are seated in state, with their red mantles, the whole appearance of the chamber is more dazzling than imposing. The appearance of the Commons at the bar, in their simple every day dress, presents a striking contrast. One smiles in spite of himself on reflecting that those are not the masters, who are thus sumptuously dressed in garments of purple. ”

“ It is in the power of such as yourselves to invigorate with unspeakable pleasure the feebleness of old age—to raise their sinking hearts with the most animating anticipations of your future prosperity, fame and happiness—to banish forever from their minds the utter misery of leaving you in the broad road to destruction—and even to surround the bed of a beloved and aged parent's death with joys and foretastes of future felicity to each, such as none but a mother's or father's imagination can possibly conceive. ”

“ The whole thing is redolent with poetry of the very loftiest order. It is positively crowded with nature and with pathos. Every line is an idea—conveying either the beauty and playfulness of the fawn, or the artlessness of the maiden, or the love of the maiden, or her admiration, or her grief, or the fragrance and sweet warmth, and perfect appropriateness of the little nestlike bed of lilies and roses, which the fawn devoured as it lay upon them, and could scarcely be distinguished from them by the once happy little damsel who went to seek her pet with an arch and rosy smile upon her face. ”

“ There is no such thing as dividing or modifying this State claim to instruct the Senators of the United States. It is a full, perfect, and universal right, or it is no right. It binds every limb and muscle of the Senator, or none of them. If he may move a finger in opposition to it, his whole body is free. It is an absolute, despotic power in all cases, or it must be reduced to that voluntary respect and serious consideration which a wise representative will always give to the opinions and wishes of those from whom he derives his office. There will always be subserviency enough ”

“ Alas! have we not studied human nature enough to know, that all men are not honest and patriotic, and that some are sufficiently selfish, cunning, cruel and ambitious to work out their own designs, and accomplish their own evil desires, although calamity should overspread society, and millions go supperless to bed? Are there not hundreds of demagogues who are willing to flatter and wheedle and delude the people into final enslavement, if in the whirlwinds of their own creation they can ride into power and office? ”

“ Is he to shut his eyes and his understanding to such a state of things, and surrender his duty, his honor, and his conscience, to the dictation of ignorance, passion and prejudice, and turn a deaf ear to the voice of knowledge, virtue, and patriotism? Is he to decide a vital constitutional question by the will of such masters, who would not hold themselves bound by their vote? ”

“ Is it honorable in the United States to use, forever, the knowledge furnished by others, to teach us how to shun a rock, escape a shoal, or find a harbor; and add nothing to the great mass of information that previous ages and other nations have brought to our hands.
* * * * *
The exports, and, more emphatically, the imports of the United States, her receipts and expenditures, are written on every pillar erected by commerce on every sea and in every clime; but the amount of her subscription stock to erect those pillars and for the advancement of knowledge is no where to be found. ”

“ Many children are whipped into Latin, and made to spend many of their precious hours uneasily on it, who, after they are once gone from school, are never to have more to do with it as long as they live. Can there be any thing more ridiculous, than that a father should waste his own money, and his son's time, in setting him to learn the Roman language, when at the same time he designs him for a trade, wherein he, having no use of Latin, fails not to forget that little which he brought from school, and which it is ten to one he abhors, from the ill usage it procured him? ”

“ Our national honor and glory which, be it remembered, are to be “transmitted as well as enjoyed,” are involved. In building up the fabric of our commercial prosperity, let us not filch the corner stone. Let it not be said of us, in future ages, that we ingloriously availed ourselves of a stock of scientific knowledge, to which we had not contributed our quota—that we shunned as a people to put our shoulder to the wheel—that we reaped where we had never sown. ”

“ There, to direct the lonely mariner on the dangerous coast by night, burns the guiding light, and reminds him of a great deed; and when he passes in the day, the white pile, reared out of the tossing waves, he reads that name, which he, to whom it once belonged has added—a noble bequest—to the rich inheritance which his brave people—foremost in liberty, foremost in enterprize, foremost in readiness to die for religion—possess in the many pages of their proud annals. ”

“ What torrents of blood have been shed under the crimson banner of orthodoxy, and how many meek and conscientious heretics have fled from the tender embraces of that holy and infallible mother, who has assumed the supreme government of the soul in this world, as well as the direction of its immortal destiny hereafter. ”

“ Few are the enjoyments left, in a great majority of cases, to those who, like myself, are fast approaching the verge of their graves; but it is in the power of the young to multiply these enjoyments far beyond what they themselves are able to conceive. It is in the power of such as you, my youthful hearers, to furnish the generally gloomy and painful close of long protracted life with intellectual repasts infinitely more delightful than can possibly be afforded by the sensual gratifications of the most ardent of all the sinful passions of youth. ”

“ But above all, women should be at the head of establishments for the education of their own sex. If it be found necessary, let gentlemen be employed as teachers and lecturers occasionally,—but a lady should always preside as directress. This is invariably practised in every country, save America; and such a preposterous fashion, as that of committing the scientific education of young girls, mostly to men, cannot much longer continue here. Women will feel what is due to their own character and dignity, sufficiently to rouse themselves to the education, at least, of their own sex. ”

“ To postpone any useful act, any thing from which we ourselves, or others, may derive the least benefit, is bad enough; but to defer so essential a duty as constant attention to our scholastic studies, in the vain expectation that some future day will answer as well as the present, is like drawing a pecuniary order on an unknown person, without naming any time, and for money to which we have not even the shadow of right or title. ”

“ If the Allies adhere to their treaty of Chaumont, the peace of Europe will be preserved—but in France I think the seeds of disorder must abound. Instead of the triple aristocracy of the Noblesse, the Church and the Parliaments, I see nothing but janissaries and a divan of ruffians: Algiers on a great scale. Moral causes I see none—and I am well persuaded that these are not created in a day. Matters of inveterate opinion, when once rooted up, are dead never to revive: other opinions must succeed them. ”

“ Indeed, my friends, is it any thing short of actual madness, to delay for an instant so momentous a work, when we have every reason to believe that God has placed the remedy in our own hands, for a very great portion of the vice and consequent misery which we see in our country? The reform of which I speak, regards more the motives to study and mental culture, than the things generally taught. In these last, I am not disposed, were it in my power, to make much change: languages, the sciences and arts, with all kinds of accomplishments, are well taught in a large portion of our schools. ”

“ In a vigorous figurative expression—a quality seldom allowed him—he has indeed few equals. As this point is disputed, we will adduce from the volumes before us one or two instances, more to show what we mean by vigor of expression, than to prove our position by a number of quotations.
“You ask, in England, who has the privilege of this water?—or you say of an oak, that it stood in such a man's time; but with us water is an element unclaimed and unrented, and a tree dabbles in the clouds as they go over, and is like a great idiot, without soul or responsibility.” ”

“ A lame man feels poor—helpless, much more so than a man with an injured arm. How interesting does not a young officer look with his arm in a sling; but his comrade with a crutch attracts nothing but bare, sheer pity. Limping—the mere idea of limping, makes all the difference. Has not the Prussian government [p. 536] decided, after the wars against Napoleon, that the old law, which prohibits a cripple from officiating as priest or minister, is to be interpreted, that an individual who has lost a leg is a cripple, but if he has lost an arm only, he is not to be considered such. ”

“ To fulfil the purposes of ambition, the vilest appeals are made to the lowest and basest passions of the multitude. The pride of democracy is a never failing chord to be skilfully touched, when some wicked design or atrocious mischief is meditated. The popular good—the welfare of the dear people—is the favorite string played upon by worn out political hacks and corrupt aspirants to office. ”

“ It is in vain to turn our eyes to the bright region of science and the arts, displaying all their glories, and diffusing their innumerable blessings over the whole face of our happy country. None can rejoice in such a delightful prospect, nor give more heartfelt thanks to God for it, than I do. But alas! I cannot always avoid the sight of the dark, portentous, and terrific clouds of vice and crime which always obscure, in some direction or other, and often threaten to destroy this heavenly view. ”

“ If single specimens of architecture have the effect to improve, humanize, and elevate the ideas of a people; if they are a language, and answer a purpose kindred to that of literature, poetry and painting, why may not a whole city have this effect? To secure this result, there must, I am afraid, be a power like that of the autocrat of Russia, who, I am told, when a house is built in his royal city of St. Petersburg which does not conform to his general plan, sends word to the owner that he must remove that building and put up another of a certain description. ”

“ When we consider well the nature, tendency, and general prevalence of the faults which I have enumerated among all the parties concerned in the great business of education, together with the errors so commonly committed in regard to its chief ends and purposes, or rather in the choice of means for their attainment, and then endeavor to measure the destructive power of their combined influence, the contemplation is truly appalling. ”

“ How many are the triumphs which the world of science can boast of, even in our recollection! How much increased is the amount of all knowledge within the present century! We have a new chemistry, a new science of light, that has almost furnished us with one sense more than nature intended we should have. Astronomy has had its Laplace. Mechanics has produced its steam boats and rail roads. Many of the most interesting geographical problems have received their solution—the Niger has been navigated—and the British standard planted on the magnetic pole. ”

“ To make education universal, it must be afforded cheap. It is a false principle, which estimates the benefits of a privilege by the money it costs. If it were true, our Republican government would be a miserable one, in comparison with those of royal magnificence. It is, usually, the abuses of our privileges, which form the largest item in their expense. Our nation has need of all the talents of its citizens, exerted in the most beneficial manner, to keep pace with the spirit of the age. ”