their ultimate issues in this country; and repeatedly have the discussions and the experience, with all their lessons, been forgotten by the people. Take, for example, the subject of irredeemable paper money, and you will not find a better statement of the evils of that currency than was given by the Rev. Dr. Nathaniel Appleton, pastor of the First Church in Cambridge, in his second sermon preached on a special Fast Day in January, 1747, from the text, “And he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.” The reverend preacher spoke from his own observation, and the bitter experience of his contemporaries. The fact is that paper money, clipped coin, prohibitory tariffs, sumptuary laws, usurpations, repudiation, and corruption are not new sins or follies, but very old ones. The statesman must be constantly giving the most elementary lessons in public policy and public righteousness; but to give those lessons well—with lucidity, ample illustration, and logical acumen—is a worthy task for the keenest and best trained intellect. I need not say that this power of luminous exposition is a gift of exceeding rarity, which always commands our admiration; but when the gift is exercised and exhibited in a language not the mother tongue, it may well excite our admiration to the highest degree.
There is another great power which the statesman must constantly exercise, not only in legislative assemblies, but in committees, administration coun-
