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BUNKER HILL MONUMENT BEGUN. ITS PURPOSE. (From Address delivered June 17, 1825.)

We know, indeed, that the record of illustrious actions is most safely deposited in the universal remembrance of mankind. We know that if we could cause this structure to ascend, not only till it reached the skies, but till it pierced them, its broad surfaces could still contain but part of that which, in an age of knowledge, hath already been spread over the earth, and which history charges itself with making known to all future times. We know that no inscription on entablatures less broad than the earth itself can carry information of the events we commemorate where it has not already gone; and that no structure, which shall not outlive the duration of letters and knowledge among men, can prolong the memorial.

But our object is, by the edifice, to show our deep sense of the value and importance of the achievements of our ancestors; and, by presenting this work of gratitude to the eye, to keep alive similar sentiments, and to foster a constant regard for the principles of the Revolution. Human beings are composed not of reason only, but of imagination also, and sentiment; and that is neither wasted nor misapplied which is appropriated to the purpose of giving right direction to sentiments and opening proper springs of feeling in the heart.

Let it not be supposed that our object is to perpetuate national hostility, or even to cherish a mere military spirit. It is higher, purer, nobler. We consecrate our work to the spirit of national independence, and we wish that the light of peace may rest upon it forever. We rear a memorial of our conviction of that unmeasured benefit which has been conferred on our own land, and of the happy influences which have been produced by the same events on the general interests of mankind.

We come, as Americans, to mark a spot which must forever be dear to us and our posterity. We wish that whosoever, in all coming time, shall turn his eye hither, may behold that the place is not undistinguished where the first great battle of the Revolution was fought. We wish that this structure may proclaim the magnitude and importance of that event to every class

and every age. We wish that infancy may learn the purpose of its erection from maternal lips, and that wearied and withered age may behold it, and be solaced by the recollections which it suggests. We wish that labor may look up here and be proud in the midst of its toil. We wish that in those days of disaster, which, as they come on all nations, must be expected to come on us also, desponding patriotism may turn its eyes hitherward, and be assured that the foundations of our national power still stand strong.

We wish that this column, rising towards heaven among the pointed spires of so many temples dedicated to God, may contribute also to produce, in all minds, a pious feeling of dependence and gratitude. We wish, finally, that the last object on the sight of him who leaves his native shore, and the first to gladden his return to it, may be something which shall remind him of the liberty and glory of his country. Let it rise till it meet the sun in his coming; let the earliest light of the morning gild it, and parting day linger and play on its summit.

DANIEL WEBSTER.

THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT COMPLETED.

(From Address delivered June 17, 1843.)

THE Bunker Hill Monument is finished. Here it stands. Fortunate in the natural eminence on which it is placed, higher, infinitely higher, in its objects and purpose, it rises over the land and over the sea; and visible, at their homes, to three hundred thousand citizens of Massachusetts, it stands a memorial of the last, and a monitor to the present and all succeeding generations.

I have spoken of the loftiness of its purpose. If it had been without any other design than the creation of a work of art, the granite of which it is composed would have slept in its native bed. It has a purpose; and that purpose gives it character. That purpose enrobes it with dignity and moral grandeur. That well-known purpose it is which causes us to look up to it

with a feeling of awe. It is itself the orator of this occasion. It is not from my lips, it is not from any human lips, that that strain of eloquence is this day to flow most competent to move and excite the vast multitudes around. The potent speaker stands motionless before them. It is a plain shaft. It bears no inscriptions, fronting to the rising sun, from which the future antiquarian shall wipe the dust. Nor does the rising sun cause summit. But at the rising of

tones of music to issue from its the sun, and at the setting of the sun, in the blaze of noonday, and beneath the milder effulgence of lunar light, it looks, it speaks, it acts, to the full comprehension of every American mind, and the awakening of glowing enthusiasm in every American heart. Its silent but awful utterance; its deep pathos, as it brings to our contemplation the 17th of June, 1775, and the consequences which have resulted to us, to our country, and to the world, from the events of that day, and which we know must continue to rain influence on the destinies of mankind to the end of time; the elevation with which it raises us high above the ordinary, feelings of life, surpass all that the study of the closet, or even the inspiration of genius, can produce. To-day it speaks to us. Its future auditories will be through successive generations of men, as they rise up before it and gather round it. Its speech will be of patriotism and courage; of civil and religious liberty; of free government; of the moral improve ment and elevation of mankind; and of the immortal memory of those who, with heroic devotion, have sacrificed their lives for their country.

DANIEL WEBSTER.

THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT BEGUN.

(From Oration at the laying of the corner-stone, July 4, 1848.) OTHER monuments to this illustrious person have long ago been erected. By not a few of the great States of our Union, by not a few of the great cities of our States, the chiselled statue or the lofty column has been set up in his honor. The highest art of the Old World-of France, of Italy, and of England-has

been put in requisition for the purpose. Houdon for Virginia, Canova for North Carolina, Sir Francis Chantrey for Massachusetts, have severally signalized their genius by portraying the form and features of the Father of his Country. The mas

sive and majestic figure which presides over the precincts of the Capitol, and which seems almost in the act of challenging a new vow of allegiance to the Constitution and the Union, is a visible testimony, and one not less grateful to an American eye as being the masterly production of a native artist, that the government of the country has not been unmindful of what it owes to Washington.

One tribute to his memory is left to be rendered. One monument remains to be reared. A monument which shall bespeak the gratitude, not of States, or of cities, or of governments; not of separate communities or of official bodies, but of the people, the whole people of the nation; a national monument, erected by the citizens of the United States of America. The people themselves are here, in masses such as never before were seen within the shadows of the Capitol,—a crowd of witnesses,—to bring their heart-felt testimony to the occasion. From all the States of the Union, from all political parties, from all professions and occupations, men of all sorts and conditions bow, as lending the chief ornament and grace to every scene of life.

The people have come up this day to the temple gates of a common and glorious republic to fraternize with each other in a fresh act of homage to the memory of the man who was, and is, and will forever be, "first in the hearts of his countrymen." Welcome, welcome, Americans all! The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity (I borrow the words of Washington himself), must always exalt the just pride of patriotism more than any appellation derived from local discriminations.

Yes, to-day, fellow-citizens, at the very moment when the extension of our boundaries and the multiplication of our territories are producing, directly and indirectly, among the different members of our political system so many marked and mourned centrifugal tendencies, let us seize this occasion to renew to each other our vows of allegiance and devotion to the American Union; and let us recognize, in our common title to the name

and the fame of Washington, and in our common veneration for his example and his advice, the all-sufficient centripetal power, which shall hold the thick-clustering stars of our confederacy in one glorious constellation forever! Let the column which we are about to construct be at once a pledge and an emblem of perpetual union! Let the foundations be laid, let the superstructure be built up and cemented, let each stone be raised and riveted, in a spirit of national brotherhood! And may the earliest ray of the rising sun-till that sun shall set to rise no more-draw forth from it daily, as from the fabled statue of antiquity, a strain of national harmony, which shall strike a responsive chord in every heart throughout the republic!

Proceed, then, fellow-citizens, with the work for which you have assembled! Lay the corner-stone of a monument which shall adequately bespeak the gratitude of the whole American people to the illustrious Father of his Country! Build it to the skies: you cannot outreach the loftiness of his principles ! Found it upon the massive and eternal rock: you cannot make it more enduring than his fame! Construct it of the peerless Parian marble: you cannot make it purer than his life! Exhaust upon it the rules and principles of ancient and of modern art: you cannot make it more proportionate than his character!

Nor does he need even this. The republic may perish; the wide arch of our ranged union may fall; star by star its glories may expire; stone after stone its columns and its capitol may moulder and crumble; all other names which adorn its annals may be forgotten; but as long as human hearts shall anywhere pant, or human tongues shall anywhere plead, for a sure, rational, constitutional liberty, those hearts shall enshrine the memory, and those tongues shall prolong the fame, of George Washington!

ROBERT C. WINTHROP.

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