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of his wife's annual visit to the camp during the revolutionary war, with his passing allusion to the "self denial" which the exigencies of his country had cost him, furnishes a charming illustration of his habitual exactness. The fact that every barrel of flour which bore the brand of "George Washington, Mount Vernon," was exempted from the customary inspection in the West India ports-that name being regarded as an ample guaranty of the quality and quantity of any article to which it was affixed-supplies a not less striking proof that his exactness was everywhere understood.

Everybody saw that Washington sought nothing for himself. Everybody knew that he sacrificed nothing to personal or to party ends. Hence, the mighty influence, the matchless sway, which he exercised over all around him. "He was the only man in the United States who possessed the confidence of all, (said Thomas Jefferson ;) there was no other one who was considered as anything more than a party leader."

Who ever thinks of Washington as a mere politician? Who ever associates him with the petty arts and pitiful intrigues of partisan office-seekers or partisan officeholders? Who ever pictures him canvassing for votes, dealing out proscription, or doling out patronage?

"No part of my duty," wrote Washington to Governor Bowdoin, in a letter, the still unpublished original of which is a precious inheritance of my own: "No part of my duty will be more delicate, and in many instances more unpleasant, than that of nominating and appointing persons to office. It will undoubtedly happen that there

will be several candidates for the same office, whose pretensions, abilities, and integrity may be nearly equal, and who will come forward so equally supported in every respect as almost to require the aid of supernatural intuition to fix upon the right. I shall, however, in all events, have the satisfaction to reflect that I entered upon my administration unconfined by a single engagement, uninfluenced by any ties of blood or friendship, and with the best intention and fullest determination to nominate to office those persons only who, upon every consideration, were the most deserving, and who would probably execute their several functions to the interest and credit of the American Union; if such characters could be found by my exploring every avenue of information respecting their merits and pretensions that it was in my power to obtain."

And there was as little of the vulgar hero about him, as there was of the mere politician. At the head of a victorious army, of which he was the idol-an army too often provoked to the very verge of mutiny by the neglect of an inefficient Government-we find him the constant counselor of subordination and submission to the civil authority. With the sword of a conqueror at his side, we find him the unceasing advocate of peace. Repeatedly invested with more than the power of a Roman Dictator, we see him receiving that power with reluctance, employing it with the utmost moderation, and eagerly embracing the earliest opportunity to resign it. The offer of a Crown could not, did not, tempt him for an in

stant from his allegiance to liberty. He rejected it with indignation and abhorrence, and proceeded to devote all his energies and all his influence, all his popularity and all his ability, to the establishment of that Republican System, of which he was from first to last the uncompromising advocate, and with the ultimate success of which he believed the best interests of America and of the world were inseparably connected.

It is thus that, in contemplating the character of Washington, the offices which he held, the acts which he performed, his successes as a statesman, his triumphs as a soldier, almost fade from our sight. It is not the Washington of the Delaware, or the Brandywine, of Germantown, or of Monmouth; it is not Washington, the President of the Convention, or the President of the Republic, which we admire. We cast our eyes over his life, not to be dazzled by the meteoric lustre of particular passages, but to behold its whole pathway radiant, radiant everywhere, with the true glory of a just, conscientious, consummate man! Of him we feel it to be no exagge

ration to say that

"All the ends he aimed at

Were his Country's, his God's, and Truth's."

Of him we feel it to be no exaggeration to say, that he stands upon the page of history the great modern illustration and example of that exquisite and Divine precept, which fell from the lips of the dying monarch of Israel— "He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God;"

* Sparks' Life of Washington, pp. 354–5.

"And he shall be as the light of the morning when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds!"

And now, fellow-citizens, it is this incomparable and transcendent character, which America, on this occasion, holds up afresh to the admiration of mankind. Believing it to be the only character which could have carried us safely through our own revolutionary struggles, we present it, especially, this day, to the wistful gaze of convulsed and distracted Europe. May we not hope that there may be kindred spirits over the sea, upon whom the example may impress itself, till they shall be inflamed with a noble rage to follow it? Shall we not call upon them to turn from a vain reliance upon their old idols, and to behold here, in the mingled moderation and courage, in the combined piety and patriotism, in the blended virtue, principle, wisdom, valor, self-denial, and self-devotion of our Washington, the express image of the man, the only man, for their occasion?

Daphni, quid antiquos signorum suspicis ortus,
Ecce Dionæi processit Cæsaris astrum!

Let us rejoice that our call is anticipated. Washington is no new name to Europe. His star has been seen in every sky, and wise men everywhere have done it homage. To what other merely human being, indeed, has such homage ever before or since been rendered?

"I have a large acquaintance among the most valuable and exalted classes of men," wrote Erskine to Washington himself, "but you are the only being for whom I ever felt an awful reverence."

Illustrious man!" said Fox of him, in the Britisn House of Commons in 1794, "deriving honor less from the splendor of his situation than from the dignity of his mind; before whom all borrowed greatness sinks into insignificance, and all the potentates of Europe* become little and contemptible."

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Washington is dead!" proclaimed Napoleon, on hearing of the event. "This great man fought against tyranny; he established the liberty of his country. His memory will be always dear to the French people, as it will be to all free men of the two worlds."

"It will be the duty of the historian and the sage in all ages," says Lord Brougham, "to let no occasion pass of commemorating this illustrious man; and, until time shall be no more, will a test of the progress which our race has made in wisdom and virtue be derived from the veneration paid to the immortal name of Washington."

"One thing is certain," says Guizot-"one thing is certain; that which Washington did the founding of a free government by order and peace, at the close of the revolution-no other policy than his could have accomplished."

And later, better still: "Efface henceforth the name of Machiavel," said Lamartine, within a few weeks past, in his reply to the Italian association-" efface henceforth the name of Machiavel from your titles of glory, and substitute for it the name of Washington; that is the one

* It was not thought necessary to disfigure the text, by inserting the loyal parenthesis, "(excepting the members of our own royal family)."

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