cause; and, above all, did I not permit myself humbly to
hope for the sustaining support of an ever-watchful and beneficent
Providence.

To the confidence and consolation derived from these sources it would be
ungrateful not to add those which spring from our present fortunate
condition. Though not altogether exempt from embarrassments that disturb
our tranquillity at home and threaten it abroad, yet in all the
attributes of a great, happy, and flourishing people we stand without a
parallel in the world. Abroad we enjoy the respect and, with scarcely an
exception, the friendship of every nation; at home, while our Government
quietly but efficiently performs the sole legitimate end of political
institutions--in doing the greatest good to the greatest number--we
present an aggregate of human prosperity surely not elsewhere to be
found.

How imperious, then, is the obligation imposed upon every citizen, in
his own sphere of action, whether limited or extended, to exert himself
in perpetuating a condition of things so singularly happy! All the
lessons of history and experience must be lost upon us if we are content
to trust alone to the peculiar advantages we happen to possess. Position
and climate and the bounteous resources that nature has scattered with
so liberal a hand--even the diffused intelligence and elevated character
of our people--will avail us nothing if we fail sacredly to uphold those
political institutions that were wisely and deliberately formed with
reference to every circumstance that could preserve or might endanger
the blessings we enjoy. The thoughtful framers of our Constitution
legislated for our country as they found it. Looking upon it with the
eyes of statesmen and patriots, they saw all the sources of rapid and
wonderful prosperity; but they saw also that various habits, opinions
and institutions peculiar to the various portions of so vast a region
were deeply fixed. Distinct sovereignties were in actual existence,
whose cordial union was essential to the welfare and happiness of all.
Between many of them there was, at least to some extent, a real
diversity of interests, liable to be exaggerated through sinister
designs; they differed in size, in population, in wealth, and in actual
and prospective resources and power; they varied in the character of
their industry and staple productions, and [in some] existed domestic
institutions which, unwisely disturbed, might endanger the harmony of
the w