growing as long as this realm lasts. Within that time, one of the
strangest phenomena which I think I may say any nation has ever
manifested arose to its height and fell--I mean that strange and
altogether marvellous phenomenon, English Puritanism. Within that
time, England had to show statesmen like Burleigh, Strafford, and
Cromwell--I mean men who were real statesmen, and not intriguers,
seeking to make a reputation at the expense of the nation. In the
course of that time, the nation had begun to throw off those swarms of
hardy colonists which, to the benefit of the world--and as I fancy, in
the long run, to the benefit of England herself--have now become the
United States of America; and, during the same epoch, the first
foundations were laid of that Indian Empire which, it may be, future
generations will not look upon as so happy a product of English
enterprise and ingenuity. In that time we had poets such as Spenser,
Shakespere, and Milton; we had a great philosopher, in Hobbes; and we
had a clever talker about philosophy, in Bacon. In the beginning of
the period, Harvey revolutionized the biological sciences, and at the
end of it, Newton was preparing the revolution of the physical sciences.
I know not any period of our history--I doubt if there be any period of
the history of any nation--which has precisely such a record as this to
show for a hundred years. But I do not recall these facts to your
recollection for a mere vainglorious purpose. I myself am of opinion
that the memory of the great men of a nation is one of its most precious
possessions--not because we have any right to plume ourselves upon
their having existed as a matter of national vanity, but because we
have a just and rational ground of expectation that the race which has
brought forth such products as these may, in good time and under
fortunate circumstances, produce the like again. I am one of those
people who do not believe in the natural decay of nations. I believe,
to speak frankly, though perhaps not quite so politely as I could