tions constitute too faint a tie to be the foundation of religious institutions. They say nothing of futurity, and were there no belief in immortality, all religion would fall to the ground. It is only the feeling of responsibility created by man's moral nature, and the natural expectation of immortality, modified by the fear of punishment and the hope of reward, which keep alive religious investigation, sustain worship and public instruction, and thus give force and sanction to man's moral convictions.

Laws, public opinion, religion, these are the means of human progress, the ultimate hope of man. As these improve, man will advance to higher degrees of perfection and happiness. If they are stationary, so will be the condition of the species. If they deteriorate, the hope of humanity is just so far eclipsed. We shall speak of them in their order, laws, public opinion, and religion.

It will not be necessary, I hope, to prove to such an audience as this, the immense influence of government and legislation over the morality and prosperity of a people. It will only be necessary to illustrate it by

examples. The physical prosperity of a people depends upon industry, guided by intelligence, and secured by morality. Man will never act without a motive, and the most natural and powerful motive is the hope of enjoying the fruits of his labors. This certainty, or this hope is strong just in proportion to the goodness of the government under which we live. Under a good government enterprise is kept perpetually upon the stretch. Every hand capable of producing is kept constantly at work, every brain capable of contriving is kept continually employed to invent new methods by which the productiveness of the earth may be increased, and by which the same labor may create more material for the satisfaction of human wants. There have been probably more labor saving machines invented in this country since the declaration of independence, than there were in the whole world since the beginning of time. A bad government paralyzes all enterprise by extinguishing all hope. It puts an end to all invention by taking away all motive. It makes a people idle, vicious, discontented, miserable. Under a good government men work together with

are selected will have the requisite knowledge of the science of legislation? Let our own statute books bear witness. The best lawyer will tell you that such is the ignorance and want of system in our state legislatures that a few years fill the courts with utter confusion, and make civil duty, which ought to be the plainest of all subjects, the most perplexed. In a Republic, if the legislators be capable, is there any security that they will be honest? Certainly not, when the hall of legislation is changed into an arena of combat for the offices of the country, where session after session is consumed in plots and counterplots to retain power, or to oust the possessors. There you may see question after question decided by a strictly party vote, and of course law after law enacted with no reference to abstract right, or the good of the country, but solely to the upholding or putting down the party in power.

The very rotation in office, which is the boast of a Republic, though it may be the best on the whole, is decidedly a disadvantage to legislation. To be an accomplished legislator, requires the study of a life. It is certainly a more important office to make laws

than to expound them. adopt the principle of

Would it be safe to rotation in the office

of the judge, and as soon as one set has become qualified for the duties of their station, to dismiss them, and supply their places from the ranks of the people? Steadiness in legislation is quite as important as abstract right. A bad system steadily pursued is better than perpetual change.

But am I a monarchist because I thus speak? By no means. The subjection of the fortunes of millions of human beings to the caprice of one man, or to the chances of his character and disposition is a most appalling thought. It is a risk which no wise man would ever wish to run. That one man should have the power to prostrate the prosperity of a great nation, is a state of things which every philanthropist would choose to avoid. Legislation is safer in the hands of many than of one, and safest in the hands of those whom a community choose as their wisest and their best. All I mean to say is, that even then it is liable to mistake and abuse.

What is it but bad legislation that has brought on our country its present distress? The states have borrowed millions from abroad.

But this would be no evil if they had been properly expended. If they had been judiciously invested, and only so fast as they would become immediately productive, no evil would have come of it. They would have been a vast benefit to the country. As it is, the different legislatures have acted without sufficient scientific and statistical knowledge, without a knowledge either of the cost or the productiveness of public improvements; they have sunk millions on millions of capital, and involved the country in debts which the present generation will not see discharged. I may be asked, if I think that the office of legislator would be any better discharged if it were conferred for life, or made hereditary? I answer; Not at all. The experiment has been tried sufficiently often. Nay, it is tried every year in the British Parliament. Nature's nobles sit there year after year beside the aristocracy of human creation, and while the wisdom and eloquence of the House of Commons fill the world with its fame, it is but rarely that a voice of power issues from the House of Lords, and then it usually comes from those who have fought their way there from the ranks of the people..