to his character which he had heard that Hamilton had used. Compliance with this demand Hamilton and all his friends deemed inadmissible, and Burr sent him a challenge. Though opposed on principle to duelling, he felt that his position as a public man, and his high rank in the army of the United States, demanded its acceptance. His words, as found in a paper written the day before he went to the fatal field, are:-"The ability to be in future useful, whether in resisting mischief or effecting good in those crises in our public affairs which seem likely to happen, would probably be inseparable from a conformity with public prejudice in this particular." On the 11th of July, the parties met at Hoboken, and Hamilton fell, mortally wounded. He was taken home, and died the next day; living long enough, however, to disavow all intention of taking the life of Burr, and to declare his abhorrence of the whole transaction. Almost his last words were, "I have a tender reliance on the mercy of the Almighty through the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ."

Next to Washington, no man in this country was ever so universally mourned. The pulpit, the bar, and the press teemed with discourses commemorative of his exalted talents and services and virtues, and every one felt that America had lost her greatest man. Said the great and pious Fisher Ames, "My soul stiffens with despair when I think what Hamilton would have been !"2

THE NECESSITY OF A NATIONAL BANK.3

i am aware of all the objections that have been made to public banks, and that they are not without enlightened and respectable opponents. But all that has been said against them only tends to prove that, like all other good things, they are subject to abuse,

1 In a letter to a friend, soon after Hamilton's death, the Rev. Dr. Mason thus wrote:-"The greatest statesman in the Western World-perhaps the greatest man of the age-has been cut off in the forty-eighth year of his life by the murderous arm of Vice-President Burr. The death of Hamilton has created a waste in the sphere of intellect and probity which a century will hardly fill up. He has left none like him,-no second, no third,-nobody to put us in mind of him. You can have no conception of such a man unless you knew him. One burst of grief and indignation assails the murderer from every corner of the continent. Political enemies vie with friends in heaping honors upon his memory."

2 Read Life and Works by his son, J. C. Hamilton, 7 vols.; Eulogy by Rev. John M. Mason, D.D.; Sketch of, by Fisher Ames; "North American Review," liii. 70; "American Quarterly," xv. 311. William Coleman, the editor of the "New York Evening Post," published a memorial of the occasion in "A Collection of Facts and Documents relative to the Death of General Alexander Hamilton, with Orations, Sermons, and Eulogies." A work of great interest and value has recently been published, entitled "History of the Republic of the United States of America, as traced in the Writings of Alexander Hamilton and his Contemporaries, by John C. Hamilton."

3 From a letter to Robert Morris, dated April 30, 1781, when the financial state of our country was in a most depressed condition. The letter is long, and one of consummate ability; going into details how the bank should be managed, and what checks and safeguards should be adopted to place it on an enduring foundation. This "splendid plan," as it has been called, shows Hamilton's vast reach of mind united to great skill in practical details, as much, perhaps, as any single paper that ever came from his pen.

and when abused become pernicious. The precious metals, by similar arguments, may be proved to be injurious. It is certain that the moneys of South America have had great influence in banishing industry from Spain, and sinking it in real wealth and importance. Great power, commerce, and riches-or, in other words, great national prosperity-may, in like manner, be denominated evils; for they lead to insolence, an inordinate ambition, a vicious luxury, licentiousness of morals, and all those vices which corrupt a government, enslave the state, and precipitate the ruin of a nation. But no wise statesman will reject the good from an apprehension of the ill. The truth is, in human affairs there is no good pure and unmixed. Every advantage has two sides; and wisdom consists in availing ourselves of the good, and guarding as much as possible against the bad.

The tendency of a national bank is to increase public and private credit. The former gives power to the state for the protection of its rights and interests, and the latter facilitates and extends the operations of commerce among individuals. Industry is increased, commodities are multiplied, agriculture and manufactures flourish; and herein consists the true wealth and prosperity of a state. Most commercial nations have found it necessary to institute banks; and they have proved to be the happiest engines that ever were invented for advancing trade. Venice, Genoa, Hamburg, Holland, and England, are examples of their utility. They owe their riches, commerce, and the figure they have made at different periods, in a great degree to this source. Great Britain is indebted for the immense efforts she has been able to make in so many illustrious and successful wars, essentially to that vast fabric of credit raised on this foundation.

THE EXCELLENCY OF OUR CONSTITUTION.'

After all our doubts, our suspicions and speculations, Mr. Chairman, on the subject of government, we must return at last to this important truth, that when we have formed a constitution upon free principles, when we have given a proper balance to the different branches of administration, and fixed representation upon pure and equal principles, we may with safety furnish it with all the powers necessary to answer, in the most ample manner, the purposes of government. The great objects to be desired are a free representation and mutual checks. When these are obtained, all our apprehensions of the extent of powers are unjust and imaginary. What, then, is the structure of this constitution? One

1 From a speech delivered in the New York Convention, 1788.

branch of the legislature is to be elected by the people, by the same people who choose your State representatives. Its members are to hold their office two years, and then return to their constituents. Here, sir, the people govern; here they act by their immediate representatives. You have also a senate, constituted by your State legislatures, by men in whom you place the highest confidence, and forming another representative branch. Then, again, you have an executive magistrate, the president, created by a form of election which merits universal admiration. In the form of this government, and in the mode of legislation, you find all the checks which the greatest politicians and the best writers have ever conceived. What more can reasonable men desire? Is there any one branch in which the whole legislative and executive powers are lodged? No. The legislative authority is lodged in three distinct branches, properly balanced; the executive authority is divided between two branches; and the judicial is still reserved for an independent body, who hold their offices during good behavior. This organization is so complex, so skilfully contrived, that it is next to impossible that an impolitic or wicked measure should pass the great scrutiny with success. Now, what do gentlemen mean by coming forward and declaiming against this government? Why do they say we ought to limit its powers, to disable it, and to destroy its capacity of blessing the people? Has philosophy suggested, has experience taught, that such a government ought not to be trusted with every thing necessary for the good of society? Sir, when you have divided and nicely balanced the departments of government; when you have strongly connected the virtue of your rulers with their interest; when, in short, you have rendered your system as perfect as human forms can be,-YOU MUST PLACE CONFIDENCE, YOU MUST

GIVE POWER.

CHARACTER OF MAJOR ANDRE.

There was something singularly interesting in the character and fortunes of Andre. To an excellent understanding, well improved by education and travel, he united a peculiar elegance of mind and manners, and the advantage of a pleasing person. 'Tis said he possessed a pretty taste for the fine arts, and had himself attained some proficiency in poetry, music, and painting. His knowledge appeared without ostentation, and embellished by a diffidence that rarely accompanies so many talents and accomplishments, which left you to suppose more than appeared. His sentiments were elevated, and inspired esteem; they had a softness that conciliated affection. His elocution was handsome; his address easy, polite, and insinuating. By his merit, he had

acquired the unlimited confidence of his general, ani was making a rapid progress in military rank and reputation. But in the height of his career, flushed with new hopes from the execution of a project the most beneficial to his party that could be devised, he was at once precipitated from the summit of prosperity, and saw all the expectations of his ambition blasted, and himself ruined.

The character I have given of him is drawn partly from what I saw of him myself, and partly from information. I am aware that a man of real merit is never seen in so favorable a light as through the medium of adversity; the clouds that surround him are shades that set off his good qualities. Misfortune cuts down the little vanities that, in prosperous times, serve as so many spots in his virtues, and gives a tone of humility that makes his worth more amiable. His spectators, who enjoy a happier lot, are less prone to detract from it through envy, and are more disposed, by compassion, to give him the credit he deserves, and perhaps even to magnify it.

I speak not of Andre's conduct in this affair as a philosopher, but as a man of the world. The authorized maxims and practices of war are the satires of human nature. They countenance almost every species of seduction as well as violence; and the general who can make most traitors in the army of his adversary is frequently most applauded. On this scale we acquit Andre, while we could not but condemn him if we were to examine his conduct by the sober rules of philosophy and moral rectitude. It is, however, a blemish on his fame that he once intended to prostitute a flag; about this, a man of nice honor ought to have had a scruple; but the temptation was great; let his misfortunes cast a veil over his error.

CHARACTER OF GENERAL GREENE.1

As a man, the virtues of Nathaniel Greene are admitted; as a patriot, he holds a place in the foremost rank; as a statesman, he is praised; as a soldier, he is admired. But in the two last characters, especially in the last but one, his reputation falls far below his desert. It required a longer life, and still greater opportunities, to have enabled him to exhibit, in full day, the vast-I had almost said the enormous-powers of his mind.

1 Nathaniel Greene, a major-general in the Revolutionary army, was born in Warwick, R. I., in 1742, and died in 1785. In the tenth volume of the second series of "Sparks's American Biography" will be found a well-written life, by his grandson, George Washington Greene, who is engaged in preparing a much fuller biography, to be completed in six volumes..

The termination of the American war-not too soon for his wishes, nor for the welfare of his country, but too soon for his glory-put an end to his military career. The sudden termination of his life cut him off from those scenes which the progress of a new, immense, and unsettled empire could not fail to open to the complete exertion of that universal and pervading genius which qualified him not less for the senate than for the field. * * General Greene, descended from reputable parents, but not placed by birth in that elevated rank which, under a monarchy, is the only sure road to those employments that give activity and scope to abilities, must, in all probability, have contented himself with the humble lot of a private citizen, or, at most, with the contracted sphere of an elective office in a colonial and dependent government, scarcely conscious of the resources of his own mind, had not the violated rights of his country called him to act a part on a more splendid and more ample theatre.

Happily for America, he hesitated not to obey the call. The vigor of his genius, corresponding with the importance of the prize to be contended for, overcame the natural moderation of his temper; and though not hurried on by enthusiasm, but animated by an enlightened sense of the value of free government, he cheerfully resolved to stake his fortune, his hopes, his life, and his honor, upon an enterprise of the danger of which he knew the whole magnitude,—in a cause which was worthy of the toils and of the blood of heroes.

The sword having been appealed to at Lexington as the arbiter of the controversy between Great Britain and America, Greene shortly after marched, at the head of a regiment, to join the American forces at Cambridge, determined to abide the awful decision.

He was not long there before the discerning eye of the American Fabius marked him out as the object of his confidence.

His abilities entitled him to a pre-eminent share in the councils of his Chief. He gained it, and he preserved it, amidst all the chequered varieties of military vicissitude, and in defiance of all the intrigues of jealous and aspiring rivals.

As long as the measures which conducted us safely through the first most critical stages of the war shall be remembered with approbation; as long as the enterprises of Trenton and Princeton shall be regarded as the dawnings of that bright day which afterwards broke forth with such resplendent lustre; as long as the almost magic operations of the remainder of that memorable winter, distinguished not more by these events than by the extraordinary spectacle of a powerful army straitened within narrow limits by the phantom of a military force, and never permitted to transgress those limits with impunity, in which skill supplied the