A Sermon Delivered before His Excellency Levi Lincoln, Governor, His Honor Thomas L. Winthrop, Lieutenant Governor

Such were not the men, who have raised this country to its present enviable place among the nations of the earth. There was not a wonderful genius among them all; but they were able men, and such as feared God, men of truth, hating covetousness. This point was secured in the first settlement of New England by the strict and puritanical principles, which our forefathers brought over with them from the parent country; and also by the idea they were continually holding up to one another of establishing here a Christian commonwealth. It is also true of the leaders of the Revolution, throughout the country, that they were remarkable alike for their public and private virtues, and owed their elevation, in most cases, to this circumstance, and I may add, their power and consequence afterwards. The war broke out, and a time of difficulty and sacrifice began; the pecuniary resources of the nation were drained to the last drop, continual levies of men to recruit the army operated all over the country with the effect of a military conscription, and meanwhile the enthusiasm which marked the opening scenes of the struggle, was rapidly subsiding. In this state of things, if there had been the slightest pretext for believing that the leading men were false to their pledges, had but the shadow of a suspicion passed across the singleness and purity of their intentions, the new and ill constituted government would not have lived for an hour. We often speak of the virtue and intelligence of the people, as the great security of our liberties; and in quiet times, and under a well established government, they are perhaps a great and sufficient security. But in the shock of a great political revolution the legal restraints and natural landmarks of authority are broken up; and the mind is pained at the bare contemplation of the possible consequences, if at this crisis in our country's destiny the supreme command had devolved on a Cromwell, instead of a Washington.

It is difficult to do justice to that assemblage of qualities in the character of this great man, which makes his name almost equally dear to the lovers of liberty in both hemispheres; and the reason is, that no one of these qualities is very striking, considered apart from the rest. His writings do not show him to have been a very original or profound thinker; military men do not speak of his campaigns as evincing the highest order of talents in this service; and he is understood as a statesman to have availed himself of the aid of the distinguished men he called about him. His fame does not rest on any one quality, but on a wonderful union and blending of qualities, in which there was none that detracted at all from the confidence and admiration the whole inspired. Those who think there can be no true greatness, where there is nothing dazzling, startling; those who are smitten with a foolish admiration of heroes, may pronounce his character tame and commonplace; but much of this appearance originates in what really constitutes the chief glory of his character; its exact proportions, its perfect harmony. Above all, there was his sacred regard to principle, and the solemn resolve with which he devoted himself to the service of his country, that gave a moral finish and sublimity to his character, and makes us speak of him, as we speak of religion. Yes, we can hardly stand in the presence of that noble form in the almost speaking marble, without something of the feeling with which the pagans were impressed, when they stood before the statues of their gods. You have done well to place it where it is; for there is something in that look, which a public man can hardly pass without being reminded of his obligation to go, and do likewise.