234
MR. WEBSTER'S SPEECH.
that Olympian head would bow so low, so deeply kiss the ground? Try it morally, try it intellectually, try it by the statesman's test, world-wide justice; nay, try it by the politician's basest test, the personal expediency of to-day—it is a speech "not fit to be made," and when made, not fit to be confirmed.
"We see dimly in the distance what is small and what is great,
Slow of faith how weak an arm may turn the iron helm of fate;
But the soul is still oracular; amid the market's din,
List the ominous stern whisper from the Delphic cave within—
'They enslave their children's children, who make compromise with sin.'"
