prostrate another. I will detain the for us to do our duty and the beneft commitee with but one other reason for will be so apparent that others will fol wishing to see the present amendment low the example. When that takes carried, and that is, the benefit in a na- place we shall hear no more of fluctua. tional point of view to have the country tions, and panics, and pressures. Engfull of the precious metals. What, let me land is frequently convulsed by these reask, would be the consequence if a war vulsions in commerce, owing to her pashould occur with a powerful nation of per system; while we hear but little of Europe and we had but $20,000,000, as them in France which is, and always was the case a few years since. But if has been, a hard money nation. by prohibiting small bills, $200,000,000 I have, sir, detained the Committee should be in circulation, we could sus- longer than I oxpected when I rose to tain a war for several years, and in a address you. While I hope that some pecuniary view scarcely perceive the of the Antimasons may rise superior to effects. One case may be compared to party and vote for this amendment, I a man who is compelled to go to mar- must say I do not believe they will: ket to obtain provision for the day; the such is the difference between faith and other to a farmer with well filled barns hope. The evidences that I have seen and granaries, sufficient to sustain him- of their attachment to the banks, comself and neighbors throughout the year. pel me to fear that they will vote against Let it not be objected that Pennsylvania all restrictions. cannot accomplish this. It is sufficient FELLOW-CITIZENS, EDWIN FORREST, On July 4th, in New York. WE are met this day to celebrate the most au- dom. The lapse of time, while it dims the light gust event which ever constituted an epoch in the of false systems, has continually augmented the political annals of mankind. The ordinary occa- brightness of that which shines with the inherent sions of public festivals and rejoicings lie at an in- and eternal lustre of reason and justice. New finite depth below that which convenes us here. stars, from year to year, emerging with perfect We meet, not in honor of a victory achieved on radiance in the western horizon, have increased the crimson field of war; not to triumph in the the benignant splendor of that constellation acquisitions of rapine; nor to commemorate the which now shines the political guiding light of accomplishment of a vain revolution, which but the world. substituted one dynasty of tyrants for another, No glittering display of military pomp and pridet no empty pageant of regal grandeur, allures us hither. We come, not to daze our eyes with the lustre of a diadem, placed, with all its attributes of tremendous power; on the head of a being as weak, as blind, as mortal as ourselves. We come, not to celebrate the birthday of a despot, but the birthday of a nation: not to bow down in senseless homage before a throne founded on the prostrate rights of man; but to stand up erect, in the conscious dignity of equal freedom, and join our voices in the loud acclaim, now swelling from the grateful hearts of fifteen millions of fellow men, in deep acknowledgement for the glorious charter of liberty our fathers this day proclaimed to the world. How simple, how sublime, is the occasion of our meeting! This vast assemblage is drawn together to solemnize the anniversary of an event which appeals, not to their senses nor to their passions, but to their reason; to triumph at a victory, not of might, but of right; to rejoice in the establishment, not of physical dominion, but of an abstract proposition. We are met to celebrate the declaration of the great principle of human freedom-that inestimable principle which asserts the political equality of mankind. We are met in honor of the promulgation of that charter, by which we are recognized as joint sovereigns of an empire of freemen; holding our sovereignty by a right indeed divine-by the immutable, eternal, irresistible right of self-evident truth. We are met, fellow-citizens, to commemorate the laying of the corner stone of democratic liberty. Threescore years and two have now elapsed since our fathers ventured on the grand experiment of freedom. The nations of the earth heard with wonder the startling novelty of the principle they asserted, and watched the progress of their enterprise with doubt and apprehension. The heart of the political philanthropist throbbed with anxiety for the result: the down-trodden victims of oppression scarce dared to lift their eyes in hope of a successful termination, while they knew that failure would more strongly rivet their chains and the despots of the old world, from their 'bad eminences,' gloomily looked on, aghast with rage and terror, and felt that a blow had been struck which loosened the foundation of their thrones. The event illustrates what ample cause there was for the prophetic tremors which thrilled to the soul of arbitrary power. Time has stamped the attestation of its signet on the success of the experiment, and the fabric then erected now stands on the strong basis of established truth,the mark aud model of the world. The vicissitudes of threescore years, while they have shaken to the centre the artificial foundations of other governments, have but demonstrated the solidity of the simple and natural structure of democratic free How grand in their simplicity are the elementary propositions on which our edifice of freedom is erected! A few brief, self-evident axioms, furnish the enduring basis of political institutions which harmoniously accomplish all the legitimate purposes of government to fifteen millions of people. The natural equality of man; the right of a majority to govern; their duty so to govern as to preserve inviolate the sacred obligations of equal justice, with no end in view but the protection of life, property, and social order, leaving opinion free as the wind which bloweth where it listeth: these are the plain, eternal principles on which our fathers reared that temple of true liberty, beneath whose dome their children congregate this day, to pour out their hearts in gratitude for the precious legacy. Yes! on the everlasting rock of truth the shrine is founded where we worship freedom; and "When the sweeping storm of time that shrine shall stand, unshaken by the beating The very simplicity of those maxims on which is reared the proud arch of our confederated democracies, embracing a hemisphere in its span, gives signal assurance of that inherent durability, which can withstand unhurt the stormy conflicts of opinion, and the tempest breath of time. Simplicity is the invariable characteristic of truth. Error loves to hide her deformity in cumbrous shapes and complicated envelopments, to bury her sophistries in mazy labyrinths of subtlety,and disguise her purposes in oracular ambiguities. But truth is open as the day; her aspect is radíant with candor; her language direct and plain; her precepts admirable in beauty, irresistible in force. The grand elementary principles of whatever is most valuable to man are distinguished by simplicity. If we follow nature to her hiding places, and wring from her the secret by which she conducts her stupendous operations, we shall find that a few simple truths constitute the foundation of all her vast designs. If we roam abroad into the fields of science, the same discovery will reward our investigations. Behold, for example, on what a few self-evident axioms is reared that sublime and irrefragable system of mathematical reasoning, by means of which man proportions the grandest forms of art, directs his course through the pathless wastes of ocean, or, ascending into the boundless fields of space, tracks the comet in its fiery path, and "unwinds the eternal dances of the sky. We are apt,in political applications, to confound simplicity with barbarisin; but there is the simplicity of intelligence and refinement, as well as the simplicity of ignorance and brutality. Simplicity is the end, as it is the origin, of social ef fort: it is the goal, as well as the starting poston the course of nations. Who that reads the lessons of history, or surveys the actual condition of mankind, with thoughtful eyes. does not perceive that, in religion and morals, in science and art, in taste, fashion, manners, every thing, simplicity and true refinement go forward hand in hand. As civilization advances, the gorgeous rites of an idolatrous faith, performed with pompous ceremonial before altars smoking with hecatombs of human victims, are succeeded by the simple and refined worship of a sublimer creed. The dogmas of an arrogant philosophy, full of crude and contradictory assumptions, are followed by the harmonious discoveries of inductive reason. The grotesque and cumbrous forms of architecture, glittering with barbaric pomp and gold, give place to the structures of a simpler and severer taste. Literature strips off her tawdry trappings of superfluous ornament, and rejecting the quaint conceits of cloistered rhetoricians, and their elaborate contortions of phrase, speaks to the heart in words that breathe the sweet simplicity of nature. Simplicity is indeed the last achieve ment in the power of man. It is the ultimate lesson to be acquired before he can reach that state of millennial equality and brotherhood, which the inspiring precepts of democratic philosophy, not less than the sublime ethics of the Christian faith, teach us to hope may yet conclude, with an unsullied page, the crime stained annals of our race. benedictions of this and all succeeding times are due for reducing the theory of freedom to its simplest elements,and in a few lucid and unanswerable propositions, establishing a groundwork on which men may securely raise a lasting superstructure of national greatness and prosperity. But our fathers, in the august assemblage of "76, were prompt to acknowledge and adopt the solemn and momentous principles he asserted. With scarce an alteration-with none that affected the spirit and character of the instrument, and with but few that changed in the slightest degree its verbal construction-they published that exposition of human rights to the world, as their Declaration of American Independence; pledging to each other their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor. in support of the tenets it proclaimed. This was the grandest, the most important experiment, ever undertaken in the history of man. But they that entered upon it were not afraid of new experiments, if founded on the immutable principles of rights, and approved by the sober convictions of reason. There were not wanting then, indeed, as there are not wanting now, pale counsellors to fear, who would have withheld them from the course they were pursuing, because it tended in a direction hitherto untrod. But they were not to be deterred by the shadowy doubts and timid suggestions of craven spirits, content to be lashed forever round the same circle of miserable expedients, perpetually trying anew the exploded shifts which had always proved lamentably inadequate before. To such men, the very name of experiment is a sound of horror. It is a spell which conjures up gorgons, hydras, and chimeras dire. They seem not to know that all that is valuable in life-that the acquisitions of learning, the discoveries of science and the refinements of art-are the result of experiment. It was experiment that bestowed on CADMUS those keys of knowledge with which we unlock the treasure-houses of immortal mind. It was experiment that taught BACON the futility of the Grecian philosophy, and led him to that hea-en-scaling method of investigation and analysis, on which science has safely climbed to the proud eminence where now she sits, dispensing her blessings on mankind. It was experiment that lifted NEWTON above the clouds and darkness of this visible diurnal sphere, enabling him to explore the sublime mechanism of the stars, and weigh the planets in their eternal rounds. It was experiment that nerved the hand of FRANKLIN to snatch the thunder from the armory of heaven. It was experiment that gave this hemisphere to the world. It was EXPERIMENT that gave this continent FREEDOM. To the genius of BACON the world is indebted for emancipating philosophy from the subtleties of the schoolmen, and placing her securely on the firm basis of ascertained elementary truth, thence to soar the loftiest flights on the unfailing pinions of induction and analogy. To the genius of JEFFERSON-to the comprehensive reach and fervid patriotism of his mind-we owe a more momentous obligation. What BACON did for natural science, JEFFERSON did for political morals, that important branch of ethics which directly affects the happiness of all mankind. He snatched the art of government from the hands that had enveloped it in sophisms and mysteries, that it might be made an instrument to oppress the many for the advantage of the few. He stripped it of the jargon by which the human mind had been deluded into blind veneration for kings as the immediate vicegerents of God on earth; and proclaimed in words of eloquent truth, which thrill ed conviction to every heart, those eternal selfevident first principles of justice and reason, on Let us not be afraid, then, to try experiments, which alone the fabric of government should be merely because they are new, nor lavish upon reared. He taught those 'truths of power in words aged error the veneration due only to truth. Let immortal' you have this day heard; words which us not be afraid to follow reason, however bear the spirit of great deeds; words which have ion. All the inventions which embellish life, all far she may diverge from the beaten path of opinsounded the death-dirge of tyranny to the remote the discoveries which enlarge the field of human est corners of the earth; which have roused a sense of right, a hatred of oppression, an intense happiness, are but various results of the bold exyearning for democratic liberty, in a myriad of perimental exercise of that distinguished attrihuman hearts; and which, reverberating through taught our sires those simple elements of freedom time like thunder through the sky, will, on which they founded their stupendous structure of empire. The result is now before mankind, not in the embryo form of doubtful experiment; not as the mere theory of visionary statesmen, or the mad project of hot brained rebels: it is before them in the beautiful maturity of estab in the distant far away, Waken the slumbering ages. TO JEFFERSON belongs, exclusively and forever the high renown of having framed the glorious charter of American liberty. To his memory the bute of man. It was the exercise of reason that |