hamlet of the republic-to the affliction of the people at their earthly separation from two of their best and well tried friends-to the profound respect of every philanthropist and lover of the rights of man.

There is one course indeed which may be pursued by the unpretending, and which I shall timorously adventure upon with a view to present a correct delineation and a true eulogy of their characters-I mean, by tracing by their unwearying footsteps through the principal incidents of their eventful lives. The prominent and elevated positions into which they were thrown by the wants and perils of their country, render those footsteps plainly marked and easy to be followed. I cannot speak for them, but their actions shall eloquently proclaim their merits.

Their deaths like their lives, were strangely assimilated, and well may they together share in equal portions the grief of a bereaved country. They died on the 4th of July, when the voice of exulting millions, ascending to Heaven, proclaimed the result of their labours in the prosperous enjoyment of liberty and peace; that the very hour of our national freedom might be the more sacred and revered.

In all the circumstances attending their dissolution, there is much to console us. Almighty God, who had so highly endowed them, and who had carried them through the multiplied perils of their wonderfully protracted lives, continuing his gracious protection until the last moment, allowed them to depart without a pang. Hope, celestial resignation, and prayers for their country, accompanied their tranquil passage to immortality. They were permitted to reach an age, with the full preservation of their eminent faculties, which but rarely falls to the lot of man. We delight in the fact, that they were graciously allowed, for so many years, to remain in the midst of their countrymen, witnessing the prac tical effects of that rational system of government which had been put into operation under such fearful and heavy respon. sibility. It would seem, as if Providence had kept them

among us for half a century as hostages for the truth and sincerity of their early doctrines and declarations!

But they are now gone. We are standing over their graves-graves of our political parents. We are approaching to take a last look of all that is earthly of them. Shall one unhallowed thought, then mingle with the solemn and affecting impulse of such a moment? Shall we be found occupied in coldly endeavoring to recall the little foibles of either? Shall memory be taxed to call up some supposed act of harshness or severity-some infirmity of temper—some instance of rigorous discipline in our early years? We cannot be so unnatural! Our swelling hearts have room for nothing but the remembrance of their numberless virtues-of the days and nights during which they anxiously watched over our infancy-of the perils and privations which they cheerfully and fearlessly encountered; and of the unrivalled prosperity for which we are now indebted to them.

If, in those differences of opinion which honestly arise in every country, and are incident to our nature, aught may have been done by either of these great men to offend, forget it.Imitate their own example. Recollect the perfect harmony which arose, and the delightful and affectionate recollections which they cherished in retirement on a calm and deliberate retrospect. They recurred to early days; the one acknowledging the transcendant talents and devotion to the common cause of the accomplished draftsman of the Declaration of Independence; and the other the intrepid actions and eloquence of its ablest advocate upon the floor of congress.The intimacy and affection of June and July '76, seemed to be revived, mellowed and enriched by the years that had passed! In 1826 they were as affectionately allied,, and as confidential in their intercourse, as they had been in the chamber of the sub-committee on the 11th of June, 1776.

It would be in the highest degree interesting, but, at this moment, impracticable, to examine the origin, and trace the progress of the American Colonies, through their subordinate

condition up to the time when they assumed their station amongst the nations of the earth. I must be content with referring to one or two leading incidents immediately preceding that continental congress which brought into such useful action and threw before the world, in such vivid colours, the great men of whom we speak.

Our ancestors were always distinguished for a bold spirit of thought and action, brought with them in their escape from religious intolerance and regal persecution. And this spirit, from an early period, was attended by the secret and anxious hope of future union and eventful freedom. Notwithstanding this spirit and this hope, they were uniformly and zeal. ously devoted to England in the wars in which she became involved.

The many and patriotic services of the colonies during the French war of 1755, failed to soften the tempers of those for whom they had fought, and produced no relaxation of the spirit of domination. Instead of being followed by a single liberal and magnanimous action, the Stamp Act was the boon they received; and this odious law, spreading universal ferment and alarm, produced the first temporary congress of colonial delegates, recommended in the first instance by Massachusetts, and which assembled at New-York on the first Tuesday of October, 1765. After adopting some dignified, but pacific measures, they dissolved, and a change in the British ministry of the following year, was succeeded by a repeal of the Stamp Act.-This display of "grace and condescension," as it was termed, although accompanied with the assertion of the power and right of Great Britain to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever, was received with much joy in a great portion of the country.

This pacifying repeal was followed by eight years of apparent repose, but really of feverish inquietude. At times indeed all bitterness seemed to be forgotten, but the wounds inflicted had been deep, and the notions of American rights strongly impressed. During this period too, the early patri

ots, such as Henry and Lee, Randolph, Samuel Adams, Otis and Jefferson and John Adams, lost no opportunity which presented of pointing to those wounds, and of asserting those rights boldly and distinctly.

The crisis rapidly approached-the Boston Port-bill and the bill for the special government of Massachusetts Bay effected a general coalition and simultaneous measures in many of the colonies tending to a general resistance. Early in the spring of '74, for the purpose of union in action and deliberation, an annual congress was recommended and acceded to by all the colonies, except Georgia, which did not join the general association until in the month of July of the following year.

On the 4th day of September, '74, the Delegates from eleven provinces (those of North Carolina not arriving until 10 days afterwards) appeared in the City of Philadelphia, the place selected by the committees of correspondence; and on the next day, assembled in Carpenter's Hall.

Under a short notice and with the materials within our reach, it is difficult to ascertain and to enumerate in detail all the various labors of these patriots during the tumultuous years which immediately preceded the meeting of the first congress. But it is well known that they were warmly and actively engaged in making preparation for a systematic and coalesced resistance.

These wise and penetrating men, with others dispersed over the colonies, foresaw that a great event was approaching, and that to meet it with effect and to insure a happy result, the primary object was to produce a change of feeling and of sentiment in the people-to dissolve their attachment to the old order of things-to rouse them to unanimity and perseverance in the plan which might be adopted-in short, to effect a moral revolution in the colonial community.

The task was a difficult and perilous one, every way wor thy of such men. They had to sever bonds of the strongest kind; they had to overcome the timidity of the weak, the

scruples of the cautious, and the settled prejudices and attachments of the people growing out of their education and long established habits. They had to break down the power of families holding influential offices scattered over the country. They had to combat the pride of ancestry and the impulses of blood and of affinity; and it was, at first regarded by many as an act of filial impiety to think of separating from what was affectionately called "the mother country.". Notwithstanding these difficulties the work is undertaken. The elder patriot labors in the north, the younger in the south-the change is produced and the vital determination made.

It is the august Congress of '74, and those annually succeeding it, which introduce, and hold up to us, the characters and services of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson upon a more enlarged canvass and in a light and colours more bold and interesting. But, before we speak of them in their associated career, let us go back and trace them individually to the period at which we have now arrived.

John Adams, descended from ancestors whose devotion to liberal priciples had thrown them among the first settlers of Massachusetts, was born in that state on the 19th of October 1735. He was an assiduous student of Cambridge college, at which he graduated in his 20th year. Learned and well instructed himself, like many distinguished American statesmen his early years were occupied in the instruction of others, and imparting to the youth of his neighborhood the knowledge which he had acquired. It is probable that whilst thus engaged, with that industry which always characterized him, he also devoted himself to the study of the Law, for he was admitted to the bar in 1759. He continued the honorable and successful practice of his profession, until his time and talents were given to the service of the oppressed colonies.

It is to be presumed, also, that no inconsiderable part of this period of his life was devoted to that enlarged and profound inquiry into the history and principles of government