entirely on the wealthy and luxurious few, while the substantial and labouring many, who live at home and upon home products, go entirely free. By the direct tax system, none can escape. However strictly the citizen may exclude from his premises all foreign luxuries, fine cloths, fine silks, rich wines, golden chains, and diamond rings, still, for the possession of his house, his barn, and his homespun he is to be perpetually haunted and harassed by the tax-gatherer. With these views, we leave it to be determined whether we or our opponents are more truly democratic on the subject.

"... We declare it to be our solemn conviction that the Whigs are always a majority of this nation; and that to make them always successful needs but to get them all to the polls and to vote unitedly. This is the great desideratum. Let us make every effort to attain it. At every election, let every Whig act as though he knew the result to depend upon his action. In the great contest of 1840, some more than twentyone hundred thousand votes were cast, and so surely as there shall be that many, with the ordinary increase added, cast in 1844, that surely will a Whig be elected President of the United States."

FROM HIS SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES.1

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July 27, 1848.

I have said General Taylor's position is as well defined as is that of General Cass. In saying this, I admit I do not certainly know what he would do on the Wilmot proviso. I am a Northern man, or rather a Western free-state man, with a constituency I believe to be, and with personal feelings I know to be, against the extension of slavery. As such, and with what information I have, I hope and believe General Taylor, if elected, would not veto the proviso. But I do not know it. Yet if I knew he would, I still

1 No apology is deemed necessary for these selections from Mr. Lincoln's last important speech in Congress. It may be conceded that they are undignified; and yet they indicate that the seed sown in his early life had not fallen upon barren ground. It germinates slightly in his eulogy upon Henry Clay, in 1852; it grows strong in the speech at Peoria, in 1854; is still more vigorous in the criticism of the Dred Scott decision, in 1857; and its ripened fruit appears in the "Divided House" speech of June, 1858. The speech of July 27, 1848, marks the end of a stage in the intellectual growth of its author, - the change of the politician into the statesman. It was the time when he laid aside satire and ridicule, and thenceforward only made use of argument and historical or philosophic demonstration.

would vote for him. I should do so, because, in my judgment, his election alone can defeat General Cass; and because, should slavery thereby go to the territory we now have, just so much will certainly happen by the election of Cass, and, in addition, a course of policy leading to new wars, new acquisitions of territory, and still further extensions of slavery. One of the two is to be President; which is preferable?

". . . The other day, one of the gentlemen from Georgia [Mr. Iverson], an eloquent man, and a man of learning, so far as I can judge, not being learned myself, came down upon us astonishingly. He spoke in what the Baltimore 'American' calls the scathing and withering style.' At the end of his second severe flash I was struck blind, and found myself feeling with my fingers for an assurance of my continued physical existence. A little of the bone was left, and I gradually revived. He eulogised Mr. Clay in high and beautiful terms, and then declared that we had deserted all our principles, and had turned Henry Clay out, like an old horse, to root. This is terribly severe. It cannot be answered by argument; at least, I cannot so answer it. I merely wish to ask the gentleman if the Whigs are the only party he can think of who sometimes turn old

horses out to root. Is not a certain Martin Van Buren an old horse which your own party have turned out to root? And is he not rooting to your discomfort about now?

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"... But the gentleman from Georgia further says we have deserted all our principles and taken shelter under General Taylor's military coat-tail, and he seems to think this is exceeding degrading. Well, as his faith is, so be it unto him. But can he remember no other military coat-tail under which a certain other party have been sheltering for near a quarter of a century? Has he no acquaintance with the ample military coat-tail of General Jackson? Does he not know that his own party have run the last five presidential races under that coat-tail, and that they are now running the sixth under that same cover? Yes, sir. That coat-tail was used not only for General Jackson himself, but has been clung to with the grip of death by every Democratic candidate since.

"... By the way, Mr. Speaker, did you know I am a military hero? Yes, sir, in the days of the Black Hawk War, I fought, bled, and came away. Speaking of General Cass's career, reminds me of my own. I was not at Stillman's defeat, but I was about as near it as Cass was to

Hull's surrender; and, like him, I saw the place very soon afterward. It is quite certain I did not break my sword, for I had none to break; but I bent a musket pretty badly on one occasion. If Cass broke his sword, the idea is he broke it in desperation; I bent the musket by accident. If General Cass went in advance of me in picking huckleberries, I guess I surpassed him in charges upon the wild onions. If he saw any live fighting Indians, it was more than I did; but I had a good many bloody struggles with the mosquitoes, and although I never fainted from loss of blood, I can truly say I was often very hungry. . .

THE EULOGY UPON HENRY CLAY.

July 16, 1852.

NOTE. The fact is mentioned by all the biographers of Mr. Lincoln, except Nicolay and Hay, that on the 16th of July, 1852, at the request of his fellow-citizens, he delivered, at the State House in Springfield, an eulogy upon Henry Clay. In the most comprehensive of these biographies, no mention appears to be made of this eulogy, and of at least one other address made by Mr. Lincoln. No selections are made from this eulogy for obvious reasons.