“Such is the man for whom ruffians lay in wait, whom they assaulted, when unarmed and defenceless, in the Senate House.”
Richard H. Dana, Jr., Esq., made an elaborate speech, of which the following is only an extract.
“But I cannot, if I would, altogether withdraw my thoughts from this personal outrage upon Mr. Sumner. Charles Sumner!
‘He is my friend,—faithful and just to me.’
I cannot allow myself to call up that scene in the Senate House, lest I should feel more than I shall be able to express or be willing to betray. Boston, his native town, has spoken. Next to Boston, there is no place so dear to him as Cambridge. He is a true son of Harvard. The best years of his early life, from fifteen to twenty-three, he spent here: the four years of college,—a fifth year which he wisely, though unusually, added to his course, for the perfecting of his classical and general studies,—and the three years of his studies in the Law School. At the Law School his attainments were not only great, but wonderful; and for purity of character, kindness, and frankness, he was respected and beloved by all. He was the friend, young as he was, the beloved friend, the frequent and honored guest of Story, of Channing, and of Allston. He was the companion of your Longfellow and your Felton. No young man was more honored by Mr. Webster—in I had almost said his better days. He was the friend of every man and of every cause that deserved to have a friend. At the bar he distinguished himself, especially in juridical literature. He was the reporter of Judge Story’s decisions, and editor of the Jurist, where the young student will find the copious results of his enthusiastic labors in his then beloved profession. When he went abroad, he took nothing in his hand that his own merits had not given him. He had not one claim that did not rest on character, learning, and talents. Still under the age of thirty, he became in Europe the honored friend of men whose names have honored the world. Turning his back upon the attractions of dissipation and fashion, he devoted himself to the society of the learned, the wise, the philanthropic, and to all great and good objects. Thomas Carlyle, in a letter to America, says, “We have had popular Sumner here,”—so universally was he liked. In Paris, while the Northeastern Boundary question was agitating England and America, and attracting much of the attention of Europe, Sumner shut himself into the libraries and public archives, and produced a treatise upon the subject, thought then to be almost exhausted, which, published in the great journals of Europe, and brought before Parliaments and Councils, changed the aspect of the question in Europe, and redounded to his great honor at home.
“After his return, under the influence of Dr. Channing, and in sympathy with Dr. Howe and others, he devoted much of his time to the great philanthropic and social problems of the day,—Slavery, Pauperism, Crime, and Prison Discipline,—and gradually the overshadowing social, political, and national importance of the Slave question drew him first before the people and into public life. When his sentiments on the Slave question were to be sustained at the risk of his ease, his interests, his friendships, and his popularity, he put them all to the hazard. When proposed as candidate for the Senate, the highest office Massachusetts can give, while his election hung trembling in the balance week after week, when one or two votes would secure it, and this or that thing said or done it was thought would gain them, nothing would induce Charles Sumner to take one step from his regular course from his house to his office to speak to any man; he would not make one bow the more, nor put his hand to a line, however simple or unobjectionable, to secure the result. I know—I have right to say this—I know that in this course he resisted temptations and advice and persuasions which few men would not have yielded to. He was elected. It was a tribute to character and talent.
“When he went to Washington, to fight almost alone, with only two or three allies, discountenanced by colleagues and cried down by the great majority, to fight the fight for Freedom, he determined not to speak on the subject of Slavery until he had done all in his power to secure the confidence and good-will of his opponents. So far did he carry this, that his friends here feared that he was bending before the idol, as others had bent. He secured his footing as well as it could be secured. All but fanatics for Slavery admitted his claims to personal affection and public respect. On this basis he took his stand for Freedom. You have seen the result. Few men in America have ever had, perhaps no one man now has, so many readers as he. His opponents say that he burns the midnight lamp. He does. And
‘How far that little candle throws his beams!’
His opponents, too, burn the midnight lamp; but, as you remember, Sir, the great Athenian said, there is a difference between the objects on which their lamp throws its glare and his.”
Among the meetings, that of Concord deserves mention. The resolutions, introduced by Hon. E. Rockwood Hoar, were as follows.