and "define your position"; to live under a horrid necessity to be
pointedly civil to all the world; to find your most casual remarks and
most private conversations getting distorted in print,--this, and more
than this, it was to be a candidate for the Presidency. The most
wonderful thing that we have to say of Henry Clay is, that, such were
his native sincerity and healthfulness of mind, he came out of this
fiery trial still a patriot and a man of honor. We believe it was a
weakness in him, as it is in any man, to set his heart upon living
four years in the White House; but we can most confidently say, that,
having entered the game, he played it fairly, and bore his repeated
disappointments with genuine, high-bred composure. The closest
scrutiny into the life of this man still permits us to believe that,
when he said, "I would rather be right than be President," he spoke
the real sentiments of his heart; and that, when he said to one of his
political opponents, "Tell General Jackson that, if he will sign my
Land Bill, I will pledge myself to retire from public life and never
to re-enter it," he meant what he said, and would have stood to it. It
is our privilege to believe this of Henry Clay; nor do we think that
there was ever anything morbidly excessive in his desire for the
Presidency. He was the head and choice of a great political party; in
the principles of that party he fully believed; and we think he did
truly desire an election to the Presidency more from conviction than
ambition. This may not have been the case in 1824, but we believe it
was in 1832 and in 1844.

The history of Henry Clay's Presidential aspirations and defeats is
little more than the history of a personal feud. In the year 1819, it
was his fortune to incur the hatred of the best hater then
living,--Andrew Jackson. They met for the first time in November,
1815, when the hero of New Orleans came to Washington to consult with