682 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 



arts, and inventions. A Chinese map of the world consists 

 of China; other countries, if indicated at all, occup^-ing no 

 larger space than that usually allotted to tlie smaller class 

 of islands. The wild Indians and the roving Tartars con- 

 sider the customs of their respective tribes or clans the per- 

 fection of human life, and regard with savage suspicion all 

 who do not judge of perfection by their standard; and, in 

 fact, every savage, and most all half-civilized people, think 

 that within the boundaries of their own country are to be 

 found all virtue, intelligence, heroism, and happiness. They 

 are ever jealous of strangers, [foreigners,) deny them all po- 

 litical rights, and sometimes persecute them to the death. 



Sir, I have some place read an account of a visit paid by 

 the officers of a French vessel to an African chief in the 

 wilds of his native country. Ills sable majesty, plentifully 

 besmeared with grease, seated on a log for a throne, and 

 wonderfully impressed with the vast superiority of every- 

 thing and everybody within his own dominions, eagerly in- 

 quired of the officers whether he loas much talked about in France. 

 I have met some men in this country — even the sons of 

 foreigners — equally puffed up in sell-importance with the 

 idea that America is the world, and they the chief instru- 

 ments in "governing America." Xo man can have a more 

 exalted opinion of this R,epul)lic than I, for it is my native 

 land, but I shall not, therefore, be blinded to the merit oT 

 those whose destiny it happened to be to come into the world 

 elsewhere, and especially those who, from choice, have se- 

 lected this as their permanent home; neither shall I forget 

 how much our own career of greatness and glorj' has been 

 facilitated by emigration. Most sincerely do I trust tJiat 

 narrow bigotr}-, sectional prejudice, and barbarian cxclusive- 

 ness will never control the destinies of the United States! 



Mr. Chairman, James Smithson was elevated far above 

 all selfish, narrow-contracted, sectional views. He is be- 

 lieved never to have set his foot on our soil, and yet he 

 passes the splendid monarchies of the Old World, and in- 

 trusts, with confidence unqualified, to the honor of repub- 

 lican America, the dispensation of his bequest for the good 

 of all men. Of noble descent himself, and of ample fortune, 

 his sympathies were not alone with those of his own class, 

 or his own country, but with " men," without limit or restric- 

 tion. He declares in exalted language, which deserves to 

 be written in letters of gold, that "the man of science is of 

 no country ; the world is his country, and all men liis country- 

 men." Though he could boast that the best blood of England 

 flowed in his veins, yet he said that availed him not, for hi& 



