276 [ASSKMBEY 



A superb common sense, is the property of nine out of ten of 

 the men and women of our country. No matter what the ques- 

 tion may be, or however fiercely debate may rage, the judgment 

 of this great nation has never once failed in the end as to its true 

 course and duty to the world and to itself. Hence the almost 

 incredible march of it, almost as astonishing to ourselves, as it is 

 to the old world. 



In spite of all history, we have up to this hour, made but one 

 uninterrupted march from the beginning. No civil war, no in- 

 cnrable wounds have been among us. Those causes of dissen- 

 tion which have in all former ages been productive of war and 

 Ct)nsequent desolation — a periodical return of war — so that the 

 old nations stood still for ages, as to population, have not yet 

 Operated dangerously among us. 



Here in a couple of centuries, from a small boat-full of men, 

 see more than twenty millions of them. See from the thirteen 

 colonies, in my time, an empire four thousand miles by two 

 thousand, or upwards of five thousand millions of acres. Sup- 

 pose that the population of the whole earth is one thousand mil- 

 lions, then our republic can give to the whole human race, five 

 acres each, large and small, so that an ordinary family of father, 

 mother and four children can have thirty acres for its own use. 



All over our great domain we hear the ceaseless hum of human 

 and machine labor. The latter has become in our time the ob- 

 ject of wonder. We are almost as much astonished at modern 

 inventions, as our Indians were at the ships and the artillery of 

 Columbxis. By the constant habit of observation, and with en- 

 tire self-reliance, and with liberty which has no other bounda- 

 ries than those which morality and religion impose, the freemen 

 of our country will carry to the uttermost perfection all the 

 arts that can be useful or agreeable to man. To this grand spec- 

 tacle of American work of only a single year, we most hearti- 

 ly bid you all a welcome, hoping and believing that many will 

 profit by the great means afforded to the public for selection of 

 valuable works lor improvement, and all of us by a view of the 

 whole. 



