My
friend at the end of the table on my left has spoken pleasantly to us
to-night of the reputed miracles of tutelar saints. In a sober sense, in
a sense of deep conviction, I say that the emergence of this country
from British domination, and its union under its present form of
government beneath the general Constitution of the country, if not a
miracle, is, I do not say the most, but one of the most fortunate, the
most admirable, the most auspicious occurrences, which have ever fallen
to the lot of man. Circumstances have wrought out for us a state of
things which, in other times and other regions, philosophy has dreamed
of, and theory has proposed, and speculation has suggested, but which
man has never been able to accomplish. I mean the government of a great
nation over a vastly extended portion of the surface of the earth, _by
means of local institutions for local purposes, and general institutions
for general purposes_. I know of nothing in the history of the world,
notwithstanding the great league of Grecian states, notwithstanding the
success of the Roman system, (and certainly there is no exception to the
remark in modern history,)--I know of nothing so suitable on the whole
for the great interests of a great people spread over a large portion of
the globe, as the provision of local legislation for local and municipal
purposes, with, not a confederacy, nor a loose binding together of
separate parts, but a limited, positive general government for positive
general purposes, over the whole.
Pages:
1329
1330
1331
1332
1333
1334
1335
1336
1337
1338
1339
1340
1341
1342
1343
1344
1345
1346
1347
1348
1349
1350
1351
1352
1353