quite as effectually as a century of degradation, and nations have to purgate themselves for generations to be rid of their example and influence. History is too full of this baneful example to be questioned. It is seen in France, in England, in Rome, and it exists here amid the vice and corruption of low and hireling politics.

Thus, as we have said on a former occasion, it is well for a people to recall the inspiring names and the noble virtues of their great men, that their influence may diminish among men. How delightful it is that we can call up these names among all nations and in every country! Still, the inspiring names are not many, not because men have not virtues, but for the reason that these virtues must be set off by transcendent genius or great events in order to centre upon them the gaze of the nations. We have Brutus and Cicero, we have Demosthenes and Phocien, we have Chatham and Burke, we have Mirabeau and Vergniaud, and we have our own Clay and Webster to add to these great and beneficent geniuses of the past; and what would these nations. be except for such great men to instruct and adorn? How poor, indeed, would old Rome be without Cicero, and how could England exist shorn of the mighty genius of Chatham, Pitt, Fox, and Burke. And what would America be without a half dozen of her great men! Indeed, we can safely say that Henry Clay in all the elements of greatness, as a patriot, statesman, and orator, can take just rank with the first of any age. Henry Clay is the American Chatham, and had his speeches perished we should call him our greatest natural orator. At times he became grand, and often produced as astonishing an effect as Chatham, and yet we do not know of any passages of his eloquence that could be safely cited alongside of some of Chatham's. Still his presence and his delivery were so transcendent in the times of his transports of eloquence, that grave and dignified senators have, as it were, unconsciously risen to their feet, so completely were they carried away by

this inspiring and impetuous orator. They did not longer reason, they lost their senses, and in their amazement they gazed upon Henry Clay. In these sudden bursts he was indeed like Chatham, but in his usual delivery he was as statesmanlike and composed as the younger Pitt.

With this great power of eloquence Mr. Clay united all the moral qualities that gave ascendancy to Chatham-courage, genius, intrepidity, patriotism, and disinterestedness. Clay had all the fire of his English prototype, except his blazing eye, that sometimes awed and intimidated his great rivals; but he had all his splendid action and a fine form and voice to set off his genius. The silver-tongued Clay is indeed no more, and his genius as an orator does not survive him in his speeches, but only lives in his fame. His style is quite full and ample in character, but he seemed to rush along without much regarding his form of speech, being carried away with the subject and the occasion upon which he spoke. He surpassed in his action and manner of delivery every orator of his age, and had he possessed equal genius and elevation he could be ranked as our greatest orator. But Clay was as inferior to Webster in matter and strength of argument as he was superior to him in delivery. This is seen by comparing their speeches, in which Webster is elevated and rich beside Clay. Indeed, great as Webster is, we are told that Clay carried with him. the senate and the people, because he believed in the inspiration of Henry Clay. Mr. Clay had great common sense, tact, and the genius of a leader, and he led American statesmanship for thirty years more than any of his great rivals. It was character-it was courage-it was genius-it was intrepidity -it was judgment that gave him this decided leadership in public life.

Besides this, Mr. Clay was the greatest if not the wisest legislator of the age upon the great questions that came before the American congress; for it must be considered that there are few legislative bodies in the world where a statesman is called upon to consider almost entirely political ques

tions. The general government has power over foreign affairs, the revenue, and may regulate commerce between the states, and it has a limited power over certain internal affairs. Hence the legislation of congress is restricted to general questions which are mainly political in character. Thus American statesmen have not as wide a range of subjects as those of other countries. In England, Mackintosh, Romilly, and Brougham made great reputations in reforms of the laws. These subjects are with us nearly all left to the states, and over them congress has no control whatever. So the lawyer that enters congress finds the study of his profession only a partial aid in public life. The states pass upon questions of property and private rights. There is no common law jurisdiction in the United States; it is merely statutory, and relates to subjects coming under the delegated powers alone. So in speaking of the legislation of congress we must consider Mr. Clay in connection with political subjects alone. Had congress power over the laws that regulate property and individual rights, we then should have to see how far Mr. Clay would have led in the reforms of the law. And here it may be said that the exclusion of the general government from these subjects is fast becoming a serious question, in view of the chaos that exists in consequence of thirty-seven state legislatures, and the corruption that now controls a majority of them on every subject of a public nature. Surely out of this confusion and corruption we may be forced to enlarge federal powers so that one national body shall be vested with the powers of general internal legislation relating to public questions, if not to general questions of person and property. By this means we unify the laws. So in considering Mr. Clay as a legislator, we find his name connected with public questions alone; and it is connected since 1810 with all the important questions up to his decease in 1852, commencing with the war of 1812, and ending with the great compromise of 1850. But we shall not present the many questions that he was called upon to consider, for that would be the history of over forty years, and must be found and studied in his life and works.

We shall rather gather up the outline of his great performances, and present it in a manner that it may be seen at one view with his real character as a statesman, and his position as an orator in the public affairs of America.

Mr. Clay certainly held the foremost position in American affairs in the war of 1812, upon the Missouri question in 1820, upon the compromise of the tariff in 1833, and upon all the succeeding questions until he retired from the senate in 1842. And then he was the nominee of the whigs in 1844 for the presidency, and again came back to public life and the senate in 1849, that he might again compose and conciliate the country in the great compromise of 1850, and then die as did John Quincy Adams and Calhoun,-in the service of his country. Running over this period of great events, Mr. Clay's last great compromise must be pronounced his crowning work, and it was performed in the senate after he had reached his seventy-third year, where sectionalism was then mustering its forces under the lead of Seward and Jefferson Davis. Mr. Clay, in his retiracy at Ashland, had heard these mutterings of the approaching storm long before it swept over the nation in wild fury, and like a true and great captain he rushed back to the helm that he might once more steady its bearings, and with other great men of the nation steady the old ark until it should pass by. Congress assembles, and weeks and months are passed in vain struggles to organize and proceed to business. So intense was the excitement that days were spent upon the election of a mere door-keeper. Finally, Mr. Clay, on the fifteenth of February, after two weeks' struggle, brought forward his plan of settlement, and asked to have it referred to a committee of thirteen. Early in July, President Taylor suddenly died, and amid intense excitement Mr. Fillmore was inaugurated to the presidency, and was in full sympathy with the policy that sought to conciliate the sections under the great lead of Mr. Clay.

Up to this time Mr. Webster gave this plan of adjustment the weight of his great influence in the senate, and had in one

speech set the North in a great commotion upon these questions of compromise. Having been selected and nominated by the president for the first place in the cabinet, he took his leave of the senate three months after the death of his great rival, Calhoun: but up to his own death he continued his herculean labors to give effect to the great compromises which were passed, after a nine months' constant struggle, before the usual, practical business of the session was attended to. After this retirement of Mr. Webster, Mr. Clay and Cass were still strengthened by the strong blows of Douglass, who could alone successfully encounter in debate any of these great sectional leaders that had already seduced Mr. Burton into their ranks, and clasped hands to defeat all compromise and settlement of the slave issues, by the conjoint and indivisible strength of slavery and freedom. Right here Mr. Clay stretched forth his hand, and with the strength of Webster they broke down the walls of brass, and sectionalism was finally overthrown, and peace and settlement were once more proclaimed throughout the land, amid the bonfires and rejoicings of the American people. But these great labors of Clay and Webster, rendered so constantly for so long a period, impaired their frames, and each was borne to his final restingplace at Lexington and Marshfield, in the year 1852. Such a triumph and such a death in the cause of a nation are followed by the benedictions of the good in all ages and in every land; and in this manner Clay and Webster were consigned to their mother earth.

Here we may pause, and conjure up the spirit of departed peace, and over the green graves of half a million fallen heroes contemplate their beneficent policy of adjustment, when compared with that which compelled America to draw the sword and quite perish amid the jar of warring states. It cannot be said of them they knew their duty and did it not: for when they fully awoke to their country's danger they laid aside all their former dreams of rivalry and ambition, and conjointly moved on together to bring before the country the