forty
years of service in trusts of the highest dignity and splendor that a
confiding country could bestow, succeeded by twenty years of retirement
and private life, not inferior, in the estimation of the virtuous and the
wise, to the honors of the highest station that ambition can ever attain.

"Of the public life of James Madison what could I say that is not deeply
impressed upon the memory and upon the heart of every one within the sound
of my voice? Of his private life, what but must meet an echoing shout of
applause from every voice within this hall? Is it not in a pre-eminent
degree by emanation from his mind, that we are assembled here as the
representatives of the people and the States of this Union? Is it not
transcendently by his exertions that we all address each other here by the
endearing appellation of countrymen and fellow-citizens? Of that band of
benefactors of the human race, the founders of the Constitution of the
United States, James Madison is the last who has gone to his reward. Their
glorious work has survived them all. They have transmitted the precious
bond of union to us, now entirely a succeeding generation to them. May it
never cease to be a voice of admonition to us, of our duty to transmit the
inheritance unimpaired to our children of the rising age.

"Of the personal relations of this great man, which gave rise to the long
career of public service in which twenty years of my own life has been
engaged, it becomes me not to speak. The fulness of the heart must be
silent, even to the suppression of the overflowings of gratitude and
affection." To the year 1835, the career of Mr. Adams in Congress had been
marked by no signal display of characteristics peculiar to himself, other
than such as the world had long been familiar with in his previous
history. He had succeeded in maintaining his reputation for patriotism,
devotion to principle, political sagacity and wisdom, and his fame as a
public debater and eloquent speaker. But no new development of qualities
unrecognized before had been made. From that year forward, however, he
placed himself in a new attitude before the country, and entered upon a
career which eclipsed all his former services, and added a lustre to his
fame which will glow in unrivalled splendor as long as human freedom is
prized on earth. It can hardly be necessary to state that allusion is here
made to his advocacy of the Right of Petition, and his determined
hostility to sl