"I sincerely state that I never regarded as important the salary of the office, but I entered public office with a sincere desire to advance the best interest of the country, which was my main reward. If a person would subdue his ambition for office and remain a private citizen, he would be a more happy man."
That he must have been the most miserable of men, during the greater part of his long life, clearly appears from the following: "There is no person happy who is in public office, or a candidate for office."
A more extensive field of usefulness now opened up to the Old Ranger as he took his seat in Congress. He had many projects in mind for the benefit of the people—one, the reduction of the price of the public lands to actual settlers; another, the improvement of our Western rivers. But like many other members both before and since his day, he found that "these things were easier to talk about on the stump than to do." He candidly admits: "This body was much greater than I had supposed, and I could effect much less than I had contemplated."
He informs us that he felt like a country boy just from home the first time, as he entered the hall of the law-makers of the great Republic. The city of Washington, grand and imposing, impressed him deeply, but was as the dust in the balance to "the assemblage of great men at the seat of Government of the United States, and at the opening of Congress, when a grand and really imposing spectacle was presented."
His profound admiration for some of his associates upon the broader theatre of the public service found vent in the following eloquent words:
"When the Roman Empire reached the highest pinnacle of literary fame and political power in the reign of Augustus Caesar, the period was called the Augustan age. There was a period that existed eminently in the Jackson administration and a few years after that might be called the Augustan age of Congress. So extraordinary a constellation of great and distinguished individuals may never again appear in office at the seat of government."
If apology were needed for the new members' exalted opinion of his associates, it can readily be found in the fact that among them in the House were John Quincy Adams, John Bell, Thomas F. Marshall, Ben Hardin, James K. Polk, Millard Fillmore, and Franklin Pierce. The first named had been President of the United States, and the last three were yet to hold that great office. At the same time "the constellation of great stars" that almost appalled the Illinois member upon his introduction included, in the Senate, Crittenden, Wright, Cass, Woodbury, Preston, Buchanan, Grundy, Benton, Clay, Calhoun, and Webster.
On finally taking leave of Congress, our member congratulates himself that during seven years of service he was absent from his seat but a single day. That all his humble endeavors were in the interest of the people, of course, goes without saying. He deprecates in strong terms the extravagance of some members of Congress in allowing their expenses to exceed their salaries, and then leaving the capital in debt. That he did nothing of the kind, but practised economy in all his expenses, it is hardly necessary to state. He is not, however, entitled to a patent for the discovery that "the expenses for living at the seat of Government of the United States are heavy."
Being a widower, conditions were now favorable for a little romance to be mingled with the dull cares of state. Near the close of his last term, he says: "I became acquainted with a lady in the District of Columbia, and we, in consideration of mutual love and affection, married. The same tie binds us in matrimonial happiness to the present time." He here admits a fact that might at this later day subject him to Executive displeasure: "Posterity will have an unsettled account against us for having added nothing to the great reservoir of the human family."
It may be of interest to know that while in Congress our member humbly accepted the appointment tendered him by Governor Carlin as Commissioner to negotiate the Illinois and Michigan Canal bonds. His earnest desire to have some one else appointed availed nothing, and in the interest of the great enterprise, upon the success of which the future of the State seemed to hang, he spent the summer of 1839 in Europe. While his mission abroad was fruitless as to its immediate object, it is gratifying to know that our commissioner returned duly impressed with "the immense superiority in every possible manner of our own country, and all its glorious institutions, over those of the monarchies of the old world."