luence of the professors
at the College.

I resigned the office of Secretary, January 1, 1861, with the purpose
of resuming the practice of law. During my term of office, I prepared
five annual reports, the last of which, the twenty-fourth in the
Series, was devoted to an analysis of the school laws with a history of
the educational and reformatory institutions of the State. I also
published a volume of educational papers, which had a considerable
sale, especially in the State of Ohio, where a copy was ordered for
each school library.

XXIII
PHI BETA KAPPA ADDRESS AT CAMBRIDGE

About ten days before the 18th of June, 1861, Judge Hoar called at my
office and invited me to deliver the Phi Beta Kappa oration at
Cambridge on the 18th of the month. Although I had but little time for
preparation, I accepted the invitation upon the understanding, or
rather upon his request, that I was to deal with the questions then
agitating the country. Among my hearers was the venerable Josiah
Quincy, formerly President of the College. My address was so radical
that the timid condemned it, and even Republican papers deprecated the
violence of my language--they then living in the delusion that
concessions, mild words and attitudes of humility could save the Union.
Mr. Quincy was not of those. He gave to my address unqualified
support, and I had no doubt that the majority of my audience
sympathized with my views. There were, however, copperheads, and
peace-men at any price, and gradually there appeared a more troublesome
class of men who professed to be for the prosecution of the war, but
criticized and condemned all the means employed. They were the
hypocrites in politics--a class of men who affect virtue, and who
tolerate and protect vice in government.

My address was called "The Conspiracy--Its Purpose and Power," and as
far as I know, it was the first time that emancipation was demanded
publicly, as a means of ending the war and saving the nation. The
demand was made in a qualified form, but I renewed it in the December
following in an address that I delivered before the Emancipation
League. This address gave rise to similar or even to severer
criticisms from the same classes. They were never a majority in
Massachusetts, but they had sufficient power to impair the strength of
the state, and in 1862 under the style of the People's Party, they
endangered the election of Governor Andrew.

These criticisms made no impres