Josiah Quincy: “There is a feeling, but too prevalent, which distinguishes between custom-house oaths and other oaths.”

May the Ruler of the universe preserve you from such degradation! 'Freedom!

He knew how little a majority of the men of his own time were disposed or qualified to estimate his character with justice.

They have transmitted that freedom to you; and upon you now devolves the duty of transmitting it unimpaired to your posterity.

Though conscious, being then in his seventy-eighth year, that he stood on the threshold of human life, he sought no relaxation from duty, no exemption from its performance.