Proviso, let the
consequences be what they may." Now, Gentlemen, I do not mean to say
that great consequences would have followed from such a course on my
part; but suppose I had taken such a course. How could I be blamed for
it? Was I not a Northern man? Did I not know Massachusetts feelings and
prejudices? But what of that? I am an American. I was made a whole man,
and I did not mean to make myself half a one. I felt that I had a duty
to perform to my country, to my own reputation; for I flattered myself
that a service of forty years had given me some character, on which I
had a right to repose for my justification in the performance of a duty
attended with some degree of local unpopularity. I thought it my duty to
pursue this course, and I did not care what was to be the consequence. I
felt it was my duty, in a very alarming crisis, to come out; to go for
my country, and my whole country; and to exert any power I had to keep
that country together. I cared for nothing, I was afraid of nothing, but
I meant to do my duty. Duty performed makes a man happy; duty neglected
makes a man unhappy. I therefore, in the face of all discouragements and
all dangers, was ready to go forth and do what I thought my country,
your country, demanded of me. And, Gentlemen, allow me to say here
to-day, that if the fate of John Rogers had stared me in the face, if I
had seen the stake, if I had heard the fagots already crackling, by the
blessing of Almighty God I would have gone on and discharged the duty
which I thought my country called upon me to perform. I would have
become a martyr to save that country.

And now, Gentlemen, farewell. Live and be happy. Live like patriots,
live like Americans. Live in the enjoyment of the inestimable blessings
which your fathers prepared for you; and if any thing that I may do
hereafter should be inconsistent, in the slightest degree, with the
opinions and principles which I have this day submitted to you, then
discard me for ever from your recollection.

THE ADDITION TO THE CAPITOL.

AN ADDRESS DELIVERED AT THE LAYING OF THE CORNER-STONE OF THE ADDITION
TO THE CAPITOL, ON THE 4th OF JULY, 1851.[1]

Fellow-Citizens,--I greet you well; I give you joy, on the return of
this anniversary; and I felicitate you, also, on the more particular
purpose of which this ever-memorable day has been chosen to witness the
fulfilment. Hail! all hail! I see before and around me a mass of faces,
glowing with c