happiness may be secured, our future made brilliant, and the glorious
destiny of our country established forever. I bid you a kind farewell.
ADDRESS AT UTICA, NEW YORK,
FEBRUARY 18, 1860
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN:--I have no speech to make to you; and no time to
speak in. I appear before you that I may see you, and that you may see me;
and I am willing to admit that so far as the ladies are concerned I have
the best of the bargain, though I wish it to be understood that I do not
make the same acknowledgment concerning the men.
REPLY TO THE MAYOR OF ALBANY, NEW YORK
FEBRUARY 18, 1861.
MR. MAYOR:--I can hardly appropriate to myself the flattering terms in
which you communicate the tender of this reception, as personal to myself.
I most gratefully accept the hospitalities tendered to me, and will not
detain you or the audience with any extended remarks at this time. I
presume that in the two or three courses through which I shall have to go,
I shall have to repeat somewhat, and I will therefore only express to you
my thanks for this kind reception.
REPLY TO GOVERNOR MORGAN OF NEW YORK, AT ALBANY,
FEBRUARY 18, 1861.
GOVERNOR MORGAN:--I was pleased to receive an invitation to visit the
capital of the great Empire State of this nation while on my way to the
Federal capital. I now thank you, Mr. Governor, and you, the people of
the capital of the State of New York, for this most hearty and magnificent
welcome. If I am not at fault, the great Empire State at this time
contains a larger population than did the whole of the United States of
America at the time they achieved their national independence, and I was
proud--to be invited to visit its capital, to meet its citizens, as I now
have the honor to do. I am notified by your governor that this reception
is tendered by citizens without distinction of party. Because of this
I accept it the more gladly. In this country, and in any country where
freedom of thought is tolerated, citizens attach themselves to political
parties. It is but an ordinary degree of charity to attribute this act to
the supposition that, in thus attaching themselves to the various parties,
each man in his own judgment supposes he thereby best advances the
interests of the whole country. And when an election is past it is
altogether befitting a free people, as I suppose, that, until the next
election, they should be one people. The reception you have extended me
to-day is not
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