THE DEATH OF JOHN DAVIS.

REMARKS MADE AT THE SEMI-ANNUAL MEETING OF THE AMERICAN ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY, BOSTON, APRIL 26, 1854.

I PRAY leave, Mr. Vice-President, to present to the Society a resolution or two, for the purpose of placing formally upon the records of this meeting the views which have been already expressed on all sides of the hall. They relate, I need not say, to our lamented President, whose death has been so fitly and feelingly announced to us in the Report of the Council.

It has been my good fortune to know Governor Davis long and well. It is twenty years this very month, since I entered his military family (as it is sometimes called) as his senior aide-decamp, upon his first election to the office of Governor of Massachusetts. From that time to this, hardly a year has elapsed in which I have not been associated with him in some sphere or other of the public service. I have known him, for years together, in the intimacies of a congressional mess, where all that is peculiar in private character is sure to make itself known. And it has been my privilege, too, to serve at his side in the Senate Chamber of the United States, during a brief, but crowded and momentous, period in the history of our national legislation. I desire, under these circumstances, sir, to bear my humble testimony to the many excellent and noble qualities, both of head and of heart, which distinguished him everywhere alike. No better or worthier Senator, in my humble judgment, was ever sent to the Capitol from Massachusetts, or from any other State, than John Davis; none more intelligent, more industrious, more faithful, more useful, more pure, disinterested, and patriotic.

His physical health and vigor were, it is true, not always equal to the demands which were made upon him. He had, too, a

natural repugnance to every thing in the nature of ostentation or personal display. But he had a word ably and fitly and eloquently spoken for every occasion where it was called for; and he had, what is better than a whole volume of words, a quick eye, a listening ear, an attentive and thoroughly informed mind, and a punctual personal presence, for the daily and practical proceedings of Congress. No man took a more active interest, and no man exerted a more valuable influence, in regard to the real business of the country. Though born and bred in the interior of the State, and educated to the profession of the Bar, his mind seemed to have a natural facility for grappling with the difficult questions of trade and currency and tariffs, which belong more peculiarly to those who have their homes upon the seaboard, and who are personally engaged in commercial affairs. Upon questions of this sort, his opinion was often appealed to, almost as law. More than one occasion might be cited where that opinion was deferred to implicitly, as an all-sufficient authority to govern the action of the Senate, even by those least inclined and least accustomed to waive any views of their own. The labor of the country, and the commerce and navigation of the country, owe him a debt which could not easily have been paid, had he lived; and which now, alas! can only be the subject of empty and formal recognition.

Above all, sir, he was a just and virtuous man, whose daily life was without spot or blemish, and whose example may be commended, without qualification, to the imitation of both young and old. As such, his name belongs to the treasures of our State and nation, and his memory can never fail to be cherished by all who appreciate the value of virtuous and Christian statesmen.

I ought to apologize, Mr. Vice-President, for having added a syllable to the able and admirable tributes to which we have just listened, in the reports of my friend Judge Kinnicutt, and of our devoted Librarian; and I will only trespass further upon your time by submitting the following resolutions:

Resolved, That we have learned with unfeigned sensibility and sorrow the sudden death of our distinguished and excellent President, and that this Society will ever cherish his memory with the warmest regard and respect.

Resolved, That the President's chair, in the Society's hall at Worcester, be shrouded with black until the next annual meeting; and that the Council be requested to take measures for adding a portrait of Governor Davis to the Society's gallery.

Resolved, That the thanks of the Society be presented to the Council for the admirable memoir of our lamented President which they have presented in their Report, and that they be instructed to prepare it for the press in a form in which it may have general circulation.

Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be communicated to the widow and family of Governor Davis, with an assurance of the sincere sympathy of the Society in their afflicting bereavement.

AN INCREASED CIRCULATION OF

RELIGIOUS BOOKS.

A SPEECH MADE AT THE ANNIVERSARY MEETING OF THE AMERICAN TRACT SOCIETY, BOSTON, MAY 81, 1854.

I AM quite sensible, Mr. President, that there are many others before me and around me at this moment, far better entitled to be heard, and far better able to speak, than myself, upon such an anniversary as this, and upon such a subject as the Resolution which has just been placed in my hand. I am not here, however, as a volunteer, but only in deference to the repeated solicitations of your Committee of Arrangements, who have found some difficulty, as they have informed me, in finding a layman to take part in these proceedings. I claim the benefit of this consideration, sir, in the very few remarks which I shall venture to offer. I claim, as I shall need, a full measure of that indulgence, which is always accorded to one who has been pressed into the service, I will not say unwillingly, but certainly without any prompting of his own.

Let me not, however, be understood to imply, Mr. President, that any apology is needed for the appearance of a layman, or even for my own individual appearance, on this occasion. Heaven forbid that the day should ever come, when New-England laymen shall consider the moral and religious interests of their country as any thing alien to their own affairs, or any thing outside the appropriate sphere of their own duties. I have great confidence, sir, in the American clergy. A purer or an abler body of men does not exist in any profession or in any region the world over. Their voice should always be respectfully heard, and attentively listened to, upon every question on which it

may be uttered; and that man assumes a fearful responsibilty who sets himself at work to break down or impair their rightful influence over the public mind. They are the legitimate leaders, moreover, in such an institution as this, and I gladly range myself beneath their banner, and follow their lead, in the cause which we are assembled this evening to consider.

But I cannot admit that the clergy have any exclusive concern or any exclusive obligation in reference to this cause. I hold that every citizen of the Union has an interest in the enterprise in which this Society is engaged, and an interest which he ought to feel it a privilege and a pride to recognize and to assert.

Sir, I wish it were in my power, by any language within my command, to give adequate utterance to the impressions which I have conceived as to the importance of the precise operations of this institution to the prosperity and welfare of our country. I do not forget that religion is not primarily an affair of country or of masses. It is an individual matter, a personal matter, which must be brought home, sooner or later, to the individual heart, and mind, and conscience of each one of us. It is a matter primarily and principally pertaining to the salvation of souls in another world, and not to the advancement of material prosperity or political security in this world; and souls, I am aware, are not to be saved by any aggregate or by any average merits. But there is a secondary value to religious and moral culture, in its influence upon the welfare of society, and upon the stability of States, which ought not to be, and cannot be, overlooked by any reflecting patriot. And it is of this influence that laymen may not only be permitted to speak, but ought not to be pardoned for not speaking, plainly and earnestly.

We have indeed, sir, as the reverend gentleman who has preceded me has well said, a vast country, which is in process of being filled up and occupied by all sorts and conditions of men. Who that has ever looked at that monster map, which your worthy Secretary has exhibited on both sides the Atlantic, and which he has made the subject of so many instructive and admirable lectures, who that has ever followed him in tracing the outlines of our territorial possessions, can fail to have been impressed with the immense and almost immeasurable extent of