Mr. Palfrey is a political Abolitionist, of the Free-soil party, and is a decided advocate of the cause. While some were of opinion that his vote against Winthrop as the Speaker of the House in Congress was an ineffaceable stain on the honor of Middlesex, others proclaimed that it was probably one of the most useful acts of his life; and John Quincy Adams is said to have exclaimed, after the delivery of his celebrated abolition speech in Congress, "Thank God! the seal is broken!" Was it consistent in Mr. Palfrey, who acted in Congress unpledged, to endeavor to secure pledges from Mr. Winthrop in regard to the constitution of those committees which have especial surveillance of subjects connected with war and slavery? Some say his former conservative spirit gave him a more elevated influence than his radicalism will ever effect.

Mr. Palfrey is a member of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and pronounced a valuable semi-centennial discourse before the institution, Oct 31, 1844. While Mr. Palfrey applauds the society for an undeviating devotion to its interests, his opponents remark that it would be a happy circumstance if the quotation he so pertinently applied to them could be adapted to himself, as regards his political career. He remarks to the society, it should be ours to justify it in saying,

"While I remain above the ground, you shall
Hear from me still, and never of me aught
But what is like me formerly ; — that's
Worthily as any ear can hear."

Mr. Palfrey is a man of varied learning. Though his style is, at times, rather involved with qualifying clauses, we often find great beauty of diction. He published two discourses on the History of the Brattle-street Church. He wrote the Life of William Palfrey, Paymaster-general in the Army of the Revolution; Practical Discourses on Domestic Duties; Lectures on the Jewish Scriptures and Antiquities, 2 vols. 8vo.; Lowell Lectures on the Evidences of Christianity, 2 vols. 8vo.; and many other productions. There can be no question of the patriotic motives of Mr. Palfrey in political matters, any more than of his devotion to the interests of general literature and humanity.

WILLIAM FOSTER OTIS.

JULY 4, 1831. FOR THE YOUNG MEN OF BOSTON.

WAS born in Boston, Dec. 1, 1801, and the son of Harrison Gray Otis, and Sally Foster, his wife. He entered the Latin School in 1813; graduated at Harvard College in 1821, where he took part in a conference on the state of physical science, oratory, fine writing, and metaphysics, in England, during the reign of Queen Anne; read law with Harrison Gray Otis, Jr., and Augustus Peabody; became a counsellor-at-law, and married Emily, a daughter of Josiah Marshall, Esq., a selectman of Boston, May 18, 1831, who died Aug. 17, 1836, aged 29.

Mr. Otis was a member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company, in 1828; a major in the Boston regiment, a judge-advocate, a representative to the State Legislature, and president of the Young Men's Temperance Society.

At the public festival in Faneuil Hall, after the delivery of the oration for the young men of this city, the following sentiment was given to the orator of the day: "Rich in the hereditary possession of the virtues and talents of his ancestors,-far richer in possessing the hearts of the present generation."

We will quote the peroration of this performance: "Do we suppose that we can shed our liberty upon other countries without exertion, and let it fall upon them like the dew which stirs not the leaf? No; liberty must be long held suspended over them in the atmosphere, by our unseen and unwearied power. The more intense the heat which oppresses them, the more must it saturate and surcharge the air, till, at last, when the ground is parched dry, when vegetation is crisped up, and the gasping people are ready to plunge into destruction for relief, then will it call forth its hosts from every quarter of the horizon; then will the sky be overcast, the landscape darkened, and Liberty, at one peal, with one flash, will pour down her million streams; then will she lift up the voice, which echoed, in days of yore, from the peaks of Otter to the Grand Monadnock; then will

'Jura answer through her misty cloud,

Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud.'

"We are asked upon what is our reliance in times of excitement; what checks have we upon popular violence; what compensation for

human infirmities; what substitutes for bayonets, dragoons, and an aristocracy? I answer, the religion and morality of the people. Not the religion of the State; not the morality of the fashionable. Thank

Heaven, our house is of no Philistine architecture! Our trust our only trust is where it ought to be,- the religion and morality of the whole people. Upon that depends, and ought to depend, all that we enjoy or hope. Our strength is in length, in breadth, and in depth. It is in us, and must be felt and exercised by each one and all of us, or our downfall is doomed. For we are the people; we are our governors; we are the Lord's anointed; we are the powers that be, and we bear not the sword in vain. And upon us is the responsibility; humble and obscure, domestic and retiring, secluded and solitary, we may be, but ours is still the great national trust, go where we will; and to God are we, one and all, accountable. Our responsibility is with it weighs upon us; it overhangs us, like the dome of this house; its universal pressure is the great principle of our protection. If the just rules of religion and morality pervade through all its parts, the prodigious weight is gracefully sustained; but if vice and corruption creep in its divided circles, the enfeebled fabric will yawn in dread chasms, and, crumbling, will overwhelm us with unutterable ruin!"

us;

TIMOTHY FULLER.

JULY 11, 1831. FOR THE ANTI-MASONIC SOCIETY.

WAS son of Rev. Timothy Fuller, of Princeton, Mass., and was born at Chilmark, July 11, 1788. He graduated at Harvard College in 1801, on which occasion he took part in the discussion, whether occupancy creates a right of property. He was two years a teacher in Leicester Academy, and read law with the father of Gov. Levi Lincoln, of whom he acquired his Democratic views. He studied law, and practised in Boston, having his residence at Cambridge. His remarkable logical acuteness, unwavering integrity, and habitual philanthropy, aided by unwearied application, won for him rapid distinction. As a speaker, he was remarkable for ready address and forcible language, producing popular effect. He was an active and spirited leader in the Antimasonic movement of 1831, and was president of the Anti-masonic

convention of Massachusetts. He espoused the cause of Democracy, and his political opinions are made very obvious in an oration he delivered at Watertown, July 4, 1809. Mr. Fuller was a senator of his native State from 1813 to '16; was a representative from Middlesex for Congress during the period from 1817 to '25. He was speaker of the house, in the State Legislature, in 1825, and one of the governor's Council in 1828.

Mr. Fuller was an earnest advocate for the election of John Quincy Adams to the presidency; and that distinguished patriot owed his most elevated station, in no small degree, to his untiring efforts. He had put forth his energies to elevate Mr. Adams to the chair of his native State, but without success.

Mr. Fuller made several noted speeches in Congress, among which was his caustic philippic on the Seminole War, that attracted marked attention. He was chairman of the naval committee, and his labors in that department are held in grateful remembrance. In the last years of his life, he withdrew from business, and retired to Groton. A favorite project with him was to write a history of the United States, and that object he hoped to accomplish in his retirement, from the ample materials he had gathered during his public career; but his decease, on the 1st day of October, 1833, removed him before his plan had ripened for completion. Mr. Fuller married Margaret Crane, of Canton, and had seven children, one of whom was Margaret, who married the Marquis Ossoli, of Italy,—a lady highly estimated in the literary world, who perished in the wreck of the ship Elizabeth, on Fire Island, near New York, July 19, 1850. Though Mr. Fuller was involved in the outlay of time and money incident to a political life, he left a handsome fortune accumulated in his profession.

JOSIAH QUINCY, JR.

JULY 4, 1832. FOR THE CITY AUTHORITIES.

"CITIZENS of Boston," says our orator, in the peroration of this performance, "you are now assembled where, more than half a century ago, your fathers stood, and where, half a century hence, your children will probably stand, to celebrate the glories of the American Rev

olution. May the orator of that day speak of a confederated republic, stretching from ocean to ocean, filled with arts, and civilization, and freedom! May he speak of the fathers of the Revolution as the instruments of establishing and extending the blessings of liberty over this land, and over the world! May he appeal to the then living constitution of our country, as an abiding witness of the wisdom and foresight of men who framed an instrument which a century could scarce improve! May he kindle the patriotism of his hearers by pointing to the monument that rises over the spot where Warren fell, and to the fields throughout our land that were wet with the blood of the victims in the cause of independence! But, in the height of his enthusiasm, may he pause and testify of the men of this generation. May he say, and say truly, that they gained a victory more glorious than was ever won on a tented field; that the men of the east and of the west, the manufacturer of the north, the planter of the south, overcame selfishness, and immolated local interest on the altar of peace and union; that, drawing wisdom from the experience of the past, and weighing the consequences of their actions on the future, they calmly and deliberately sacrificed temporary and transient views to the permanency of ancient friendship; that they transmitted unimpaired the constitution of the United States, the palladium of their own and their country's liberty, to their descendants, and deserved the name of the preservers and perpetuators of the peace, liberty and happiness, of these States, then and forever one united indivisible ! "

Josiah, son of Josiah Quincy, was born at Boston, Jan. 17, 1802, in Pearl-street, nearly opposite the old Boston Athenæum. He was prepared for college at Phillips' Academy, Andover, and graduated at Harvard College in 1821, on which occasion he engaged in a discussion with Warren Burton, on the elegant literature of England and France. He read law with William Sullivan, became a counsellor-at-law, and married Mary Jane, daughter of Samuel R. Miller. He was lieutenant of the Boston Light Infantry, an aid-de-camp to Gov. Lincoln, and commander of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company. He was a member of the city Council in 1833, and its president in 1834 to '37. He was a member and president of the Senate in 1842. He was elected mayor of Boston from 1845 to '49. Owing to his financial skill in the direction of the Western Railroad enterprise, during twelve years of the most perilous period of its course, it had become one of the safest investments in the stock market; was treasurer, also,