The tyrants of Europe had no vacant lands, or Texas stocks, wherewith to put down humanity, and so they used gunpowder and bayonets.

Hence a fitting occasion presents itself for the statement of a few principles, by whose unerring guidance the exulting Hopes of Youth may always be transformed into the happy Memories of Age.

They promised themselves that they could draw over leading northern men to their support, by offering them the Tantalus cup of presidential honors; and then, by the force of party cohesion and discipline, insure the support of the vast…

No northern Democrat, opposed to slavery extension, could expect the support of the southern democracy.

Hence, General Cass stepped promptly forward, and declared, in his Nicholson letter, that Congress had no power to exclude slavery from the territories.

The course of the pro-slavery leaders, on that occasion, resembled that of a madman who should seize a torch and stand over the magazine of a ship, and proclaim that he would send men and vessel to destruction, unless they would steer for…

The desire of some form of happiness being secured, as a motive power, it seems to have been left very much to the option of each individual to select his own objects of enjoyment, whether noble or ignoble, and to devise his own means for…

The emulous and aspiring youth of a Free People will always find much of their private, and most of their public welfare, indissolubly connected with the institutions and laws of their country.

In these, therefore, their interest is both public and personal;--it pertains to the citizen as well as to the man.

All great moral questions, though touching them but lightly at first, will come closer and closer home, as long as they live;--growing into greater importance for their posthumous memory than for their living fame, and affecting the…

Though all Young Men are substantially alike in their desire of well being, yet, in regard to the guiding principles by which the objects of hope are pursued, in order to obtain happiness, three marked distinctions, or classes, exist among…

There are those who adopt with implicit and unquestioning faith the views of their parents, or of the circle, or caste, into which they were thrown by the accident of birth.

They never venture to explore or wander outside of the ideas and opinions among which they were born and bred.

Even if practically right, therefore, they are never rationally right, for they have never discerned between good and ill; and all their convictions, whether true or untrue, rest upon the foundation of bigotry alone.

The second class look eagerly beyond family or caste.

Finding where the preponderance of forces lies, they attach themselves to the stronger.

No matter whether the tide ebbs or flows, they drift with the current.

If popular views change, they change, “like a wave driven with the wind and tossed;” like a chameleon, changing its color with every contact.

But there is a third class of Young Men who are true to the sacred instincts of virtue, and devoutly reverent of duty.

They seek, not for the time-hallowed, but for the truth-hallowed.

They have learnt that, in the divine classification, there are but two great objects in the universe,--God and Mankind.

Hence the two resulting and all-comprehending duties,--love to God and love to Man.

Hence all other entities and possibilities,--opulence, power, fame, genius, things present, or things to come,--are, and forever must be, secondary and subordinate to these primary and everlasting laws.

No names so lofty, no multitude so large, that they can abolish these truths, or abstract one jot or tittle from their binding force, in this life, or in any life.

So far from facilitating the increase of individual or national wealth, slavery retards both.