should not fail to excite a spirit of great vigilance and caution. In a single hour an important act may go through all the forms of legislation and become the law of the land, at the time believed to be harmless in its provisions, called for by the interests of the State, and tending in no respect to the injury of individuals. Yet, a short experience affords proof that this legislation was uncalled for, was unwise, and in its effects prejudicial to the interests of the State and disastrous to the rights of the citizen. It has occurred to me from the best reflections which I have been able to give to the subject, that no public act passed at one session of the Legislature should take effect until thirty days at least after the commencement of the next succeeding session, and that the same limitation should be imposed upon all private acts, which can by possibility either affect the interests of the State or of individuals. Such a provision would take away, in all probability, the practical evils ordinarily resulting from hasty legislation. It is an undeniable fact that the frequency of change in our public laws is an evil, and if such evils occur, they should be commented on plainly and decidedly. I speak decidedly, because I feel deeply the importance of the subject. I speak with a confidence that my remarks will be taken in the same spirit which actuates me in making them, and with an earnest hope that the representatives of so orderly, so industrious and so religious a people as the citizens of New Hampshire, will hereafter be ambitious not to increase the number of the laws, but with patience and forbearance to ascertain the positive defects in the existing legislation, and then to apply such correctives as the nature of the case may require. Having so recently given to the public our system of statute law, it is but the part of wisdom to suffer it to remain unchanged, until experience shall suggest defects which the condition of society, the wants of the people and a regard to their true interests require should be remedied.

Our primary schools richly deserve at all times the pat

ronage and encouragement of the legislature. Our government is based upon the virtue of the people

that virtue is best preserved as knowledge shall be most diffused. As the means of education, the nurseries of pure morals and the sources of undefiled religion, these primary institutions of our country have within the last twelve months excited much of the public attention. A new impulse has been given to the public mind, and a new spirit has been awakened to the importance of our common schools for the spread of morality and religion, for the diffusion of intelligence among the people and for the preservation of our republican institutions.

Those patriots who framed the constitution of our State, incorporated into that instrument a sentiment worthy of themselves, that knowledge and learning generally diffused through a community were essential to the preservation of a free government, and that it was the bounden duty of legislators and magistrates to cherish the interests of all seminaries and public schools. This injunction of our political fathers should never be forgotten or disregarded by the friends of popular liberty. In my first address to the legislature I alluded to the republican character of our free school system. I then remarked that in those institutions are imparted to the youth of our State that love of civil and religious liberty, that high devotion to the cause of human rights, which lead to the unfailing exertion of their energies and of their efforts for the security of individual and public freedom. The constitution of our primary schools points. them out as especially meriting public confidence and public support. The scholars in these seminaries must be on terms of strict equality, and mingle together exclusively for instruction. The children of the poor as well as of the rich-those emanating from the laboring classes, as well as those from the independent portions of our community-enjoy the same rights and the same privileges: they commence their course of study-enter upon the acquisition of

knowledge, under like influences and with like hopes. Our primary schools may well be denominated public institutions. They are sustained at the public charge, are dedicated to the use of all the youth of certain ages within the limits of our State, and a direct benefit is periodically realized by the education of the sons and daughters of our republic. Our free school system may be considered as the heart of the body politic, and the streams which are continually flowing from it, give health, vigor and strength to all the members of our community.

It has been matter of complaint that our common schools were not receiving that encouragement from the hands of the Legislature, which they ought to receive. Academies and high schools, it is said, have been multiplied in our land to the neglect of those primary institutions which should be our pride and boast, and which should receive, as they merit, our constant care and support. Far be it from me to say any thing which might tend to discourage that public and benevolent spirit, manifested in providing for the thorough education of any portion of our community. If the effect of multiplying other literary and scientific institutions be to break down our common schools, to change their character and impair their usefulness, the friends of a general diffusion of knowledge and learning would regret the tendency of any course to produce any such effect.— There is, however, within the power of the Legislature at all times a perfect remedy for any such evil. Elevate the character of our primary schools. Place within the reach of the most depressed son of poverty within our State, the means of obtaining a thorough English education, through the influence of these free seminaries of learning. Let there be such a division, (whenever practicable,) of the youth, that the younger scholars may constitute an exclusive class to receive such instruction as they would require and let the scholars more advanced in attainments, be placed under the exclusive guidance and instruction of those well qualified to teach the higher branches of an English education.

It is a reproach to our free school system that the higher branches of mathematics, philosophy and political economy can only be acquired at our academies and high schools. This should not so be. An invidious feeling is thereby engendered among the youth of our State, and one of the great objects of our free primary schools is defeated, and that is the opportunity of giving to the poorer classes of our community as thorough an English education, as can be attained elsewhere; and thus fitting them to perform the duties which may devolve upon them as citizens of this republic.

I do not design to recommend any alterations in our present militia system. It has received its present modification after having been carefully and recently revised by the immediate representatives of the people. I would therefore confidently trust that no amendments will be attempted in our militia laws, until experience shall suggest the necessity of further change. Far better is it to bear some practical inconveniences than to subject the system to frequent alterations. No man can entertain a more exalted opinion of the value of a well regulated militia for the preservation of our institutions and for the protection of the rights of the citizen, than myself. No man, looking to the honor of this free country, the continuance of this free government, the happiness of this free people, could more deeply lament than myself the existence at any time of a sentiment or feeling opposed to the respectability and usefulness of our militia.

In connexion with our primary schools, the institution of our militia alike deserves the protecting care of the State government. The minds of men may be enlightened; the value of political and social virtue may be realized; the genius of our liberal institutions may be well understood; and laws may be passed with all the sanctions which the wisdom of man can devise; yet all these would avail but little, without the influence of a citizen soldiery; without that moral force, that physical "corps de reserve,

designed for the ultimate security and defence of the just rights, the equal privileges, the constitutional liberty of the people. These opinions are given as the result of much reflection. They are presented to you as my sober convictions. And I cannot but hope that they will find a hearty and concurrent response from those to whom they are addressed, and that at no future period of our history will any representative body of the people be assembled without feeling the force of the sentiment, that for the due preservation of the liberties and the rights of the people, and for the security of our free government, it becomes their bounden duty to do all that can be done, to maintain the character and to promote the usefulness and efficiency of our free school and of our free militia systems.

From communications which have been made to me, I learn that the Asylum for the Insane has been in readiness for the reception of patients for the last seven months; that about seventy within that period have been received at the institution, twenty of whom have been returned to their friends, having been partially or perfectly restored to the exercise of their right reason; and that nearly fifty are, at this time, under the charge of the superintendent. It is worthy of remark that the Asylum for the Insane in its erection and in its subsequent management has been conducted with great judgment and economy, and although such institutions are inavoidably subject, at the commencement of their operations, to severer charges than are ordinarily incurred afterwards within the same period of time; yet it is believed that the means within the control of the Asylum will enable it to meet its ordinary expenditures for the coming year. The buildings and the grounds belonging to this institution, its location and superintendency, cannot fail to recommend it to the public as a most desirable retreat and residence for those unhappy fellow beings who, for a time, may have been deprived of that unerring light given us by