This administration, Sir, is represented as succeeding to the last, by an inheritance of principle.  It professes to tread in the footsteps of its illustrious predecessor.  It adopts, generally, the sentiments, principles, and opinions of General Jackson, proclamation and all; and yet, though he be the very prince of nullifiers, and but lately regarded as the chiefest of sinners, it receives the honorable gentleman with the utmost complacency.  To all appearance, the delight is mutual; they find him an able leader, he finds them complying followers.  But, Sir, in all this movement he understands himself.  He means to go ahead, and to take them along.  He is in the engine-car; he controls the locomotive.  His hand regulates the steam, to increase or retard the speed at his discretion.  And as to the occupants of the passenger-cars, Sir, they are as happy a set of gentlemen as one might desire to see of a summer’s day.  They feel that they are in progress; they hope they shall not be run off the track; and when they reach the end of their journey, they desire to be thankful!

The arduous struggle is now all over.  Its richest fruits are all reaped; nullification embraces the sub-treasuries, and oppression and usurpation will be heard of no more.

On the broad surface of the country, Sir, there is a spot called “the Hermitage.”  In that residence is an occupant very well known, and not a little remarkable both in person and character.  Suppose, Sir, the occupant of the Hermitage were now to open that door, enter the Senate, walk forward, and look over the chamber to the seats on the other side.  Be not frightened, gentlemen; it is but fancy’s sketch.  Suppose he should thus come in among us, Sir, and see into whose hands has fallen the chief support of that administration, which was, in so great a degree, appointed by himself, and which he fondly relied on to maintain the principles of his own.  If gentlemen were now to see his steady military step, his erect posture, his compressed lips, his firmly-knitted brow, and his eye full of fire, I cannot help thinking, Sir, they would all feel somewhat queer.  There would be, I imagine, not a little awkward moving and shifting in their seats.  They would expect soon to hear the roar of the lion, even if they did not feel his paw.

Sir, the spirit of union is particularly liable to temptation and seduction in moments of peace and prosperity.  In war, this spirit is strengthened by a sense of common danger, and by a thousand recollections of ancient efforts and ancient glory in a common cause.  But in the calms of a long peace, and in the absence of all apparent causes of alarm, things near gain an ascendency over things remote.  Local interests and feelings overshadow national sentiments.  Our attention, our regard, and our attachment are every moment solicited to what touches us closest, and we feel less and less the attraction of a distant orb.  Such tendencies we are bound by true patriotism and