HIS CHOICE OF STUDIES.

63

they were then read, together with pure mathematics, the third year was devoted to natural philosophy, to moral philosophy, and to rhetoric. Natural philosophy was then, what it is now, an application of the higher mathematics to natural science. In this department, while he was prepared to be delighted, and was delighted, with the views of nature thus presented to him, he failed to realize as much pleasure and profit from it, as he would have realized, had he not chosen not to be very deeply interested in mathematics. With this disadvantage, nevertheless, he was about equal to the best of his competitors, but was estimated lower than he should have been, because he permitted such a difference to exist between his marked ability and his recitations. A person acknowledged to be remarkable, must always be remarkable in every thing he does, or he fails to receive the credit positively belonging to his performances. Milo must always carry the ox, whether he wished to carry him or not, or the superficial were ready to believe, that he could not bear a heavier burden than common people.

In moral philosophy, and in rhetoric, however, no such considerations need be offered. In both these studies, Daniel Webster had no equal in the university among the students. It is doubtful whether he had his superior, in all respects, among the teachers. His style as a writer and speaker, it is true, was then far from being what it became afterwards; and it might have been decidedly inferior, in point of accuracy and finish, to that of the weakest professor. But, taking his mind, his thought, his logic, his energy and power into the account; taking into consideration the earnest spirit, the lofty tone, the depth and breadth, of his range and reach of thought; and it is nearly certain, if not quite certain, from what we now possess of the efforts of that day, that no man in college, student or professor was entirely his equal. His conceptions, it is confessed, were frequently too glaringly bold for good taste, but they were not bald. They were full of meaning, of sense, of powerful thought

His diction, too, was daring, bombastic, sometimes turgid to the last degree of fault; but it was the diction, as every one could see, and as every one could see with all needful apology, of a masterly mind, crowded with ideas too big for such utterance as he had then acquired.

On the 4th of July, 1800, when he was in his seventeenth year, and a junior in college, he delivered an oration to the citizens and students, at their joint request. It is still extant; and though, in comparison with the immortal efforts of mature life, it bears no great resemblance to them, an inquirer into his genius and character might rather lose almost any one of his master-pieces, than to fail of reading and studying this. The master-pieces are numerous; they show what a great man is; but the first performance can be only one; and that one exhibits clearly the starting-point, the origin, the germ, of all that was to come. In the later efforts, we see what the man is by simple induction, by arguments a posteriori, by a very common and hackneyed process. In the first attempt, where nature speaks, before art has taken the control of nature, when the inner soul utters it self unconsciously, we look forward to the future being, to his coming greatness, by the more beautiful method a priori, as a man traces a stream from its fountain-head till it reaches the great ocean, or as a seer, a prophet, looks down the track of time, and beholds the grandest developments from the most inconsiderable of causes.

No one, familiar with Daniel Webster's style, will fail to see, in every part of his virgin effort, much of the man in the style and manner of the boy. Let the reader, who has heard him speak for the last ten or fifteen years, call up to his imagination a picture of the mature orator, as he was whenever he saw and heard him, and with that in view draw another picture, as he peruses the exordium of that juvenile address:

66

Countrymen, brethren and fathers: We are now assem bled to celebrate an anniversary, ever to be held in dear remem

HIS FIRST ORATION.

65

brance by the sons of freedom. Nothing less than the birth of a nation, nothing less than the emancipation of three millions of people from the degrading chains of foreign dominion, is the

vent we commemorate.

66 'Twenty-four years have this day elapsed, since these United States first raised the standard of Liberty, and echoed the shouts of Independence.

"Those of you, who were then reaping the iron harvest of the martial field, whose bosoms then palpitated for the honor of America, will, at this time, experience a renewal of all that fervent patriotism, of all those indescribable emotions, which then agitated your breasts. As for us, who were either then unborn, or not far enough advanced beyond the threshold of existence, to engage in the grand conflict for Liberty, we now most cordially unite with you to greet the return of this joyous anniversary, to welcome the return of the day that gave us Freedom, and to hail the rising glories of our country!"

That, every reader will say, in spite of its grandiloquence, in spite of one or two inaccuracies in the use of language, such as the man was never guilty of, is a splendid exordium for a boy of sixteen years.

The statement of the subject, as in all his future speeches, is brief, clear and simple: "On occasions like this, you have hitherto been addressed, from the stage "-he means the platform-" on the nature, the origin, the expediency of civil government." He must have been a close observer to have arrived, at so early an age, at an induction so general and truthful. "The field of political speculation has here been explored by persons possessing talents to which the speaker of the day can have no pretensions. Declining therefore, a dissertation on the principles of civil polity”—which he pretty clearly understood, but which he was too diffident to offer as the topic of a dis course "you will indulge me in slightly sketching those events,

-

which have originated, nurtured and raised to its present grand eur this new empire."

The orator now proceeds directly to his argument, in which he gives a succinct history of the country, from its settlement to the close of the revolutionary war. The diction, in this part of the performance, by no means equals that of the exordium: "As no nation on the globe can rival us in the rapidity of our growth, since the conclusion of the revolutionary war, so none, perhaps, ever endured greater hardships and distresses, than the people of this country previous to that period.

"We behold a feeble band of colonists engaged in the arduous undertaking of a new settlement in the wilds of North America. Their civil liberty being mutilated, and the enjoyment of their religious sentiments denied them, in the land that gave them birth, they fled their country, they braved the dangers of the then almost unnavigated ocean, and sought on the other side of the globe, an asylum from the iron grasp of tyranny and the more intolerable scourge of ecclesiastical persecution.

"But gloomy, indeed, was the prospect when arrived on this side of the Atlantic.

"Scattered in detachments along a coast immensely extensive, at a distance of more than three thousand miles from their friends on the eastern continent, they were exposed to all those evils, and encountered or experienced all those difficulties, to which human nature seemed liable. Destitute of convenient habitations, the inclemencies of the seasons harrassed them, the midnight beasts of prey prowled terribly around them, and the more portentous yell of savage fury incessantly assailed them. But the same undiminished confidence in Almighty God, which prompted the first settlers of this country to forsake the unfriendly climes of Europe, still supported them under all their calamities, and inspired them with fortitude almost divine. Having a glorious issue to their labors now in prospect, they

FIRST ORATION CONTINUED.

67

cheerfully endured the rigors of the climate, pursued the sav age beast to his remotest haunt, and stood, undismayed, in the dismal hour of Indian battle.

แ "Scarcely were the infant settlements freed from those dangers, which at first environed them, ere the clashing interests of France and Britain involved them anew in war. The colonists were now destined to combat with well appointed, well disciplined troops from Europe; and the horrors of the tomahawk and the scalping knife were again renewed. But these frowns of fortune, distressing as they were, had been met without a sigh, and endured without a groan, had not Great Britain presumptuously arrogated to herself the glory of victories achieved by American militia. Louisburg must be taken, Canada attacked, and a frontier of more than one thousand miles defended by untutored yeomanry, while the honor of every conquest must be ascribed to an English army.

"But while Great Britain was thus tyranically stripping her colonies of their well-earned laurels, and triumphantly weaving them into the stupendous wreath of her own martial glories, she was unwittingly teaching them to value themselves, and effectually to resist, on a future day, her unjust encroachments.

"The pitiful tale of taxation now commenced-the unhappy quarrel, which resulted in the dismemberment of the British Empire, has here its origin.

England, now triumphant over the united powers of France and Spain, is determined to reduce to the condition of slaves her American subjects.

"We might now display the legislatures of the several States, together with the general congress, petitioning, praying, remonstrating; and, like dutiful subjects, humbly laying their griev ances before the throne. On the other hand, we could exhibit a British parliament, assiduously devising means to subjugate America, disdaining our petitions, trampling on our rights, and menacingly telling us, in language not to be misunderstood,

VOL. I.

5