affection of his country, and confidence of the govern ment; mature in years, maturer in glory, all-wife but to us mysterious Heaven (perhaps to fhow that our dependence is not to be placed in man; to recal our reverence from the inftrument to the author of our happinefs) fummoned him to itfelf. His mortal part is now at reft in the fepulchre of his fathers; his fublime spirit has afcended to its GOD, in whofe prefence thofe tranfcendent virtues, which the honours of this world were infufficient to reward, will find moft ample retribution. A Funeral Oration ON GENERAL WASHINGTON. Delivered February 22, 1800, by Appointment of a number of the Clergy of NEW-YORK. BY JOHN M. MASON, A. M. Quæ te tam læta tulerunt In freta dum fluvii current, dum montibus umbræ VIRG. FELLOW-CITIZENS, THE offices of this day belong lefs to eloquence than to grief. We celebrate one of those great events which, by uniting public calamity with private affliction, create in every bolom a refponse to the throes of an empire. God, who doeth wonders; whose ways must be adored, but not queftioned, in fevering from the embraces of America her firft-beloved patriot, has impofed on her the duty of blending im paflioned feeling with profound and unmurmuring fubmiffion. An affembled nation, lamenting a father in their departed chief; abforbing every inferior confideration in the fentiment of their common lofs; mingling their recollections and their anticipations; their wishes, their regrets, their fympathies, and their tears, is a fpectacle not more tender than awful, and excites emotions too mighty for utterance. I should have no right to complain, Americans, if, inftead of indulging me with your attention, you should command me to retire, and leave you to weep in the filence of wo. I fhould deferve the reprimand, were I to appear before you with the pretenfions of eulogy. No! Eulogy has miftaken her province and her powers, when she affumes for her theme the glory of WASHINGTON. His deeds and his virtues are his high eulogium. His deeds moft familiar to your memories, his virtues most dear to your affections. To me, therefore, nothing is permitted but to borrow from yourselves. And though a pencil more daring than mine would languifh in attempting to retrace the living lines which the finger of Truth has drawn upon your hearts, you will bear with me, while, on a fubject which dignifies every thing related to it, I tell you that which you yourselves do know.' The name of WASHINGTON, Connected with all that is most brilliant in the hiftory of our country, and in human character, awakens fenfations which agitate the fervours of youth, and warm the chill bofom of age. Transported to the times when America rose to repel her wrongs, and to claim her deftinies, a fcene of boundless grandeur bursts upon our view, Long had her filial duty expoftulated with parental injuftice. Long did the deprecate the rupture of thofe ties which fhe had been proud of preferving and difplaying. But her humble entreaty fpurned; aggreffion followed by the rod, and the rod by fcorpions, having changed remonftrance into murmur, and murmur into refiftance, fhe transfers her grievances from the throne of earth to the throne of heaven; and precedes by an appeal to the God of judgment, her appeal to the fword of war. At iffue now with the miftrefs of the feas; unfurnished with equal means of defence; the convulfive fhock approaching; and every evil omen paffing before her, one step of rafhnefs or of folly may feal her doom. In this accumulation of trouble, who fhall command her confidence, and face her dangers, and conduct her caufe? God, whofe kingdom ruleth over all, prepares from afar the inftruments beft adapted to his purpose. By an influence which it would be as irrational to dispute as it is vain to fcrutinize, he ftirs up the spirit of the statesman and the foldier. Minds on which he has bestowed the elements of greatnefs, are brought, by his providence, into contact with exigencies which rouse them into action. It is in the feafon of effort and of peril that impotence disappears, and energy arifes. The whirlwind which fweeps away the glow-worm, uncovers the fire of genius, and kindles it into a blaze, that irradiates at once both the zenith and the poles. But among the heroes who fprung from obfcurity, when the college, the counting-house, and the plough teemed with thunderbolts of war," none could, in all refpects, meet the wants and the wishes of America. She required, in her leader, a man reared under her own eye; who combined with distinguished talent, a character above suspicion; who had added to his phyfical and moral qualities the experience of difficult fervice; a man, who fhould concentrate in himself the public affections and confidences; who fhould know how to multiply the energies of every other man under his direction, and to make difafter itself the means of fuccefs-his arm a fortrefs and his name a host. Such a man it were almost presumption to expect; but fuch a man all-ruling Heaven had provided, and that man was WASHINGTON. Pre-eminent already in worth, he is fummoned to the pre-eminence of toil and of danger. Unallured by the charms of opulence: unappalled by the hazard of a dubious warfare: unmoved by the profpect of being, in the event of failure, the first and most confpicuous victim, he obeys the fummons, because he loves his duty. The refolve is firm, for the probation is terrible. His theatre is a world; his charge, a family of nations; the intereft ftaked in his hands, the profperity of millions unborn in ages to come. His means, under aid from on high, the refources of his own breaft, with the raw recruits and irregular fupplies of distracted Colonies. O crifis worthy of fuch a hero! Followed by her little bands, her prayers and her tears, WASHINGTON efpouses the quarrel of his country. As he moves on to the conflict, every heart palpitates, and 66 every knee trembles. The foe, alike valiant and veteran, prefents no eafy conqueft, nor aught inviting but to those who had confecrated their blood to the public weal. The Omnipotent, who allots great enjoyment as the meed of great exertion, had ordained that America fhould be free; but that the fhould learn to value the bleffing by the price of its acquifition. She fhall go to a wealthy place," but her way is "through fire and through water.". Many a generous chief muft bleed, and many a gallant youth fink, at his fide, into the furprifed grave; the field must be heaped with flain; the purple torrent must roll, ere the angel of peace defcend with his olive. It is here, amid devaftation, and horror, and death, that WASHINGTON must reap his laurels, and engrave his trophies on the fhields of immortality. Shall Delaware and Princeton? Shall Monmouth and York?-But I may not particularize; far lefs repeat the tale which babes recite, which poets fing, and fame has published to the liftening world. Every fcene of his action was a scene of his triumph. Now, he faved the republic by more than Fabian caution; now, he avenged her by more than Carthaginian fierceness. While, at every ftroke, her forefts and her hills re-echoed to her fhout, "The fword of the LORD and of WASHINGTON !" Nor was this the vain applaufe of partiality and enthusiasm. The blafted fchemes of Britain; her broken and her captive hofts, proclaimed the terror of his arms. Skilled were her chiefs, and brave her legions; but bravery and skill rendered them a conqueft more worthy of WASHINGTON. True, he suffered, in his turn, repulfe and even defeat. It was both natural and needful. Unchequered with reverse, his story would have resembled rather the fictions of romance, than the truth of narrative: and had he been neither defeated nor repulfed, we had never feen all the grandeur of his foul. He arrayed himself in fresh honours by that which ruins even the great-viciffitude. He could not only fubdue an enemy, but, what is infinitely more, he could fubdue misfor |