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with sensibility this proud and beautiful emblem of the "land of flowers,”- -an emblem, to which the events you have noticed so impressively give at once the value of historic truth and the interest of romance. Florida, though containing the oldest town in the Union, is one of the youngest of the States. Scarcely three years have passed since she became a member of our great national confederacy; but within that brief period she has redeemed the pledge given by her territorial history, that her accession to the Union would add new elements to its strength-fresh lustre to its fame. Her action through you, Gentlemen, as her representatives, in the celebra. tion on Tuesday, and in the proceeding of this morning, declares that for the charge of ingratitude, so often brought against Republics, the State of Florida is not, will not bė, justly responsible.

Monuments to public benefactors are consecrated by the best feelings of the hu. man heart, and by the conforming custom of the wisest nations. So long as patriotism was the ruling passion of the Roman citizen, the Republic delighted to commemorate the achievements of her great men by monuments, statues, paintings, medals, inscriptions and other sensible forms of national approval. With the origin of this practice adulation had no concern. In their golden era, so degrading a sentiment was a stranger to the masters of the world. But that sagacious people saw that enduring memorials of public gratitude for public services, quickened the spirit of patriotism from which those services had sprung, and inspired the whole community with a generous rivalry of the individual actors. ROME continued free while she cherished the examples of her benefactors; her freedom soon perished, when she had become careless of their deeds, and cold to their glory.

The decree of history has long since gone forth, sinking the loftiest name to which even ROME ever reared a monument, to an immeasurable distance below the name of WASHINGTON. Since his death, nearly three generations have lived and died. The warrior, whose sword struck down the mightiest of nations in the height of her pride; and who, even amid the clangor of arms, was the master statesman:— the founder of an empire already the marvel of the world:-the patriot, who ac cepted power only at the call of duty, who wielded it only for his country's good, and to whom no moment of its possession was so pleasing as its end:-the man, whose name is the watchword of the friends of liberty in every land, and whose character, the consenting voice of mankind proclaims to be the only consummate model of human excellence which the Almighty has ever vouchsafed to his creatures: —This man, the man of men, GEORGE WASHINGTON, died nearly half a century ago. And yet it was only on the day before yesterday-the 4th of July,—a day the brightest in the political calendar, and which but for him, might never have been seen there, that the first stone was laid of a monument to his memory! Whence, asks the wondering foreigner, whence this delay? Is there any good reason for it? And he is sometimes told that the aid of marble is not needed to eternize the fame of WASHINGTON; that WASHINGTON lived to "read his history in a nation's eyes," that his monument has already been built by his own matchless deeds, in war and in peace, and by the influence, always and everywhere at work, of his great example. This, and much more in the same strain, is all true—undoubtedly true. gentlemen of Florida, you feel that it is all no answer to the question. Your understandings and your hearts alike repel the logic that extorts from the very magnitude of the services to which America owes her freedom and her greatness, an argument

And yet,

against acknowledging the debt: you think,-you have said,—and the world thinks and says with you, that the only suitable acknowledgment is that prescribed by universal custom, founded on universal feeling.

It may not, must not, be supposed that at any moment the American people have been insensible to the sacred duty of erecting at some time a monument to the memory of WASHINGTON. But, they have felt that such a memorial, to be appropriate, must transcend all former standards. Associating with it ideas of grandeur at once peculiar and indefinite, when opportunities of acting them out were suggested, they have shrunk from their own conception, in despair or distrust of the possibility of its being realized. This, and concurring occasional causes, have produced apparent apathy on a subject intrinsically so animating. All believed that this apathy was one day to terminate; and each seemed expecting his neighbor to rouse the public mind. This office was at length assumed by an eminent citizen of this place. He has since devoted to it years of toil and energy, and under his auspices the present organization was effected. The Managers have adopted for the proposed monument a plan, which, with such modifications as further reflection may commend, will, it is hoped, be satisfactory to the country. They have, you are aware, the prominent co-operation of a gentleman distinguished in the public councils, and whose connection with the enterprise guaranties efficiency in its conduct. An important advance in it has just been made. The rate of its future progress must, of course, be regulated by the contributions which may be made to it. Let but the spirit of the young State of Florida pervade the Union, and within a few years the long standing national reproach which every day's delay makes darker, will be removed. The people of the United States will then have raised in honor of Wash ington, at the city selected by himself to be the capital of the Republic, and bearing his name, a monument, fit for such a people to erect to the memory of such a man— a monument standing among marble memorials as he stood among men, as he stands in history, unequalled, unapproached!

Permit me now, Gentlemen, to offer you for the State of Florida, a piece, prepared for her acceptance, of the corner-stone of the monument, and to wish you a safe and happy return from your patriotic mission to your homes.

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