h my short sight, I can fathom the depth of the abyss below;
nor could I regard him as a safe counsellor in the affairs of this
government, whose thoughts should be mainly bent on considering, not
how the Union should be best preserved, but how tolerable might be the
condition of the people when it shall be broken up and destroyed. While
the Union lasts, we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread
out before us, for us and our children. Beyond that I do not seek to
penetrate the veil. God grant that, in my day at least, that curtain may
not rise. God grant that, on my vision never may be opened what lies
behind. When my eyes shall be turned to behold, for the last time, the
sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored
fragments of a once glorious Union; on states dissevered, discordant,
belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be,
in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather
behold the gorgeous ensign of the republic, now known and honored
throughout the earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies
streaming in their original lustre, not a stripe erased or polluted,
nor a single star obscured,--bearing for its motto no such miserable
interrogatory as, _What is all this worth?_ nor those other words
of delusion and folly, _Liberty first, and Union afterwards_; but
everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing on
all its ample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and
in every wind under the whole heavens, that other sentiment, dear to
every American heart--Liberty _and_ Union, now and forever, one and
inseparable!

* * * * *

From the "Speech at the Laying of the Corner Stone of the Bunker Hill
Monument."

=_86._= OBJECT OF THE MONUMENT.

Let it not be supposed that our object is to perpetuate national
hostility, or even to cherish a mere military spirit. It is higher,
purer, nobler. We consecrate our work to the spirit of national
independence, and we wish that the light of peace may rest upon it
forever. We rear a memorial of our conviction of that unmeasured benefit
which has been conferred on our own land, and of the happy influences
which have been produced, by the same events, on the general interests
of mankind. We come, as Americans, to mark a spot which must forever be
dear to us and our posterity. We wish that whoever, in all coming
time, shall turn