ia Palinurus in unda.

At that time I was connected with men of high place in the community.
They loved liberty as much as the Duke of Bedford can do; and they
understood it at least as well. Perhaps their politics, as usual, took a
tincture from their character, and they cultivated what they loved. The
liberty they pursued was a liberty inseparable from order, from virtue,
from morals, and from religion,--and was neither hypocritically nor
fanatically followed. They did not wish that liberty, in itself one of
the first of blessings, should in its perversion become the greatest
curse which could fall upon mankind. To preserve the Constitution
entire, and practically equal to all the great ends of its formation,
not in one single part, but in all its parts, was to them the first
object. Popularity and power they regarded alike. These were with them
only different means of obtaining that object, and had no preference
over each other in their minds, but as one or the other might afford a
surer or a less certain prospect of arriving at that end. It is some
consolation to me, in the cheerless gloom which darkens the evening of
my life, that with them I commenced my political career, and never for a
moment, in reality nor in appearance, for any length of time, was
separated from their good wishes and good opinion.

By what accident it matters not, nor upon what desert, but just then,
and in the midst of that hunt of obloquy which ever has pursued me with
a full cry through life, I had obtained a very considerable degree of
public confidence. I know well enough how equivocal a test this kind of
popular opinion forms of the merit that obtained it. I am no stranger to
the insecurity of its tenure. I do not boast of it. It is mentioned to
show, not how highly I prize the thing, but my right to value the use I
made of it. I endeavored to turn that short-lived advantage to myself
into a permanent benefit to my country. Far am I from detracting from
the merit of some gentlemen, out of office or in it, on that occasion.
No! It is not my way to refuse a full and heaped measure of justice to
the aids that I receive. I have through life been willing to give
everything to others,--and to reserve nothing for myself, but the inward
conscience that I had omitted no pains to discover, to animate, to
discipline, to direct the abilities of the country for its service, and
to place them in the best light to improve their age, or to adorn it.
T