POPULAR CHARACTERISTICS.
A FRUGAL PEOPLE--LAWS AND RELIGION--FATHER PIERCE--THOMAS W. COBB--
REQUISITES OF A POLITICAL CANDIDATE--A FARMER-LAWYER--SOUTHERN
HUMORISTS.
The plain republican habits which characterized the people of Upper
Georgia, in her early settlement and growth, together with the fact of
the very moderate means of her people, exercised a powerful influence
in the formation of the character of her people. She had no large
commercial city, and her commerce was confined to the simple disposal
of the surplus products of her soil and the supply of the few wants of
the people. It was a cardinal virtue to provide every thing possible
of the absolute necessaries of life at home. The provision crop was of
first necessity, and secured the first attention of the farmer; the
market crop was ever secondary, and was only looked to, to supply
those necessaries which could not be grown upon the plantation. These
were salt, iron, and steel, first; and then, if there remained
unexhausted some of the proceeds of the crop, a small (always a small)
supply of sugar and coffee; and for rare occasions, a little tea.
The population, with the exception of mechanics, and these were a very
small proportion, and the few professional men and country merchants,
was entirely agricultural. This rural pursuit confined at home and
closely to business every one; and popular meetings were confined to
religious gatherings on Sunday in each neighborhood, and the meeting
of a few who could spare the time at court, in the village
county-seat, twice a year. There were no places of public resort for
dissipation or amusement; a stern morality was demanded by public
opinion of the older members of society. Example and the switch
enforced it with the children. Perhaps in no country or community was
the maxim of good old Solomon more universally practised upon, "Spare
the rod and spoil the child," than in Middle Georgia, fifty years ago.
Filial obedience and deference to age was the first lesson. "Honor thy
father and mother, that thy days may be long in the land," was
familiar to the ears of every child before they could lisp their a, b,
c; and upon the first demonstration of a refractory disobedience, a
severe punishment taught them that the law was absolute and
inexorable. To lie, or touch what was not his own, was beyond the pale
of pardon, or mercy, and a solitary aberration was a stain for life.
The mothers, clad in homespun, were chaste in thought and action;
unlettered and ignorant, but pure as ether. Their literature confined
to the Bible, its maxims directed their conduct, and were the daily
lesson of their children. The hard-shell Baptist was the dominant
religion; with here and there a Presbyterian community, generally
characterized by superior education and intelligence, with a preacher
of so much learning as to be an oracle throughout the land.
The Methodists were just then beginning to grow into importance, and
their circuit-riders, now fashionably known as itinerants, were
passing and preaching, and establishing societies to mark their
success, through all the rude settlements of the State. These were the
pioneers of that truly democratic sect, as of the stern morality and
upright bearing which had so powerful an influence over the then
rising population.
It is more than sixty years since I first listened to a Methodist
sermon. It was preached by a young, spare man, with sallow complexion,
and black eyes and hair. I remember the gleam of his eye, and the
deep, startling tones of his voice--his earnest and fervent manner;
and only yesterday, in the Baronne Street (New Orleans) Methodist
Church, I listened to an old man, upward of eighty years of age,
preaching the ordination sermon of four new bishops of the Methodist
Church. It was he to whom I had first listened: the eye was still
brilliant, the face still sallow, but wrinkled now, and the voice and
manner still fervent and earnest; and the great mind, though not the
same, still powerful. It was that venerable, good man, Lovie Pierce,
the father of the great and eloquent bishop. What has he not seen?
what changes, what trials, what triumphs! Generations before his eyes
have passed into eternity; the little handful of Methodist communicants
grown into a mighty and intelligent body; thousands of ministers are
heralding her tenets all over the Protestant world--mighty in learning,
mighty in eloquence--yet none surpass the eloquence, the power, and the
purity of Lovie Pierce.
When I first heard him, Bishop Asbury, William Russell, and he were
nursing the seed sown by John Wesley and George Whitefield, a little
while before, upon the soil of Georgia. All but Pierce have long been
gathered to their fathers, and have rest from their labors. He still
remains, bearing his cross in triumph, and still preaching the
Redeemer to the grandchildren of those who first welcomed him and
united with him in the good work of his mission. How much his labors
have done to form and give tone to the character of the people of the
State of Georgia, none may say; but under his eye and aid has arisen a
system of female education, which has and is working wonders throughout
the State. He has seen the ignorant and untaught mothers rear up
virtuous, educated, and accomplished daughters; and, in turn, these
rearing daughters and sons, an ornament and an honor to parents and
country. Above all, he has seen and sees a standard of intelligence,
high-breeding, and piety pervading the entire State. The log-cabin
gives way to the comfortable mansion, the broad fields usurping the
forest's claim, and the beautiful church-building pointing its taper
spire up to heaven, where stood the rude log-house, and where first he
preached. He has lived on and watched this growing moral and physical
beauty, whose germs he planted, and whose fruits he is now enjoying in
the eighty-fourth year of his age, still zealous, still ardent and
eloquent, and a power in the land. Should these lines ever meet his
eye, he will know that the child whose head he stroked as he sat upon
his knee--the youth whom he warned and counselled, loves him yet, now
that he is wrinkled, old, and gray.
From parents such as I have described, and under the teaching of such
men, grew up the remarkable men who have shed such lustre upon the
State of Georgia.
The great distinguishing feature of these men was that of the masses
of her people--stern honesty. Many families have been and continue to
be remarkable for their superior talents and high character;
preserving in a high degree the prestige of names made famous by
illustrious ancestry. The Crawfords, the Cobbs, and the Lamars are
perhaps the most remarkable.
Thomas W. Cobb, so long distinguished in the councils of the nation,
and as an able and honest jurist in Georgia, was the son of John Cobb,
and grandson of Thomas Cobb, of the County of Columbia, in the State
of Georgia. His grandfather emigrated from Virginia at an early day,
when Georgia was comparatively a wilderness, and selecting this point,
located with a large family, which through his remarkable energy he
reared and respectably educated. This was an achievement, as the
facilities for education were so few and difficult as to make it next
to impossible to educate even tolerably the youth of that day. This
remarkable man lived to see his grandson, Thomas W. Cobb, among the
most distinguished men of the State. He died at the great age of one
hundred and fifteen years, at the home of his selection, in Columbia
County, the patriarch pioneer of the country, surrounded by every
comfort, and a family honoring his name and perpetuating his virtues;
and after he had seen the rude forest give way to the cultivated
field, and the almost as rude population to the cultivated and
intellectual people distinguishing that county.
Thomas W. Cobb, in his education, suffered the penalties imposed in
this particular by a new country; his opportunities, however, were
improved to their greatest possible extent, and he continued to
improve in learning to the day of his death. In boyhood he ploughed by
day, and studied his spelling-book and arithmetic by night--lighting
his vision to the pursuit of knowledge by a pine-knot fire. This
ambition of learning, with close application, soon distinguished him
above the youth of the neighborhood, and lifted his aspirations to an
equal distinction among the first men of the land. He made known his
wishes to his father, and was laughed at; but he was his grandfather's
namesake and pet, and he encouraged his ambition. The consequence was
that young Cobb was sent to the office of William H. Crawford at
Lexington, to read law. He applied himself diligently, and won the
respect and confidence of Mr. Crawford, which he retained to the
day of his death. When admitted to the bar, he located with his
fellow-student in Lexington; thus taking the place of Mr. Crawford,
who was now in political life. He rose rapidly in his profession, and
while yet a young man was sent to Congress as one of the
representatives of the State.
At this time the representation in Congress was chosen by general
ticket. The consequence was the selection of men of superior talent
and character: none could aspire to the high position whose names had
not become familiar for services to the State, or for the display of
talent and character at the bar, or other conspicuous positions, their
virtues and attainments distinguishing them above their fellow-men of
the country. Throughout the State, to such men there was great
deference, and the instances were rare where it was not deserved. The
discipline and trickery of party was unknown, nor was it possible that
these could exist among a people who, universally, honestly desired
and labored to be represented by their best men. To attain to the high
position of senator or representative in Congress was so distinguishing
a mark of merit, that it operated powerfully upon the ambitious young
men of the State, all of whom struggled to attain it by laboring to
deserve it.
The standard of talent established by Crawford, Jackson, and Baldwin
was so high, that to have public opinion institute a comparison
between these and an aspirant was a sure passport to public favor; and
this comparison was in no instance so likely to be made as between him
and the pupils of his teaching. This fact in relation to Jackson and
Crawford is remembered well by the writer.
In the low country of Georgia, the fiat of James Jackson fixed the
political fate of every young aspirant. In the up-country, Crawford
was as potent. In Crawford's office the student was required to apply
himself diligently, and give promise of abilities, or he could not
remain. The writer remembers to have heard the question asked of Mr.
Crawford, in his later days, why a family in his own county,
distinguished for wealth, had uniformly opposed him politically. In
the frankness of his nature he said: "Aleck came, when a young man, to
read law in my office, and though he was diligent enough, he was
without the brain necessary to acquire a proper knowledge of the law.
I liked his father, and in reply to an inquiry of his relative, as to
Aleck's capacity, I told him 'his son would doubtless succeed as a
farmer, for he was industrious; but he had not sense enough to make a
lawyer.' He thanked me; and Aleck left the office, and, profiting by
my advice, went to the plough, and has made a fortune, and a very
respectable position for himself; but from that day forward, not a
member of the family has ever been my friend. I think I did my duty,
and have got along without their friendship."
Jackson had his _protégés_, and they were always marked for talent. In
early life he discerned the germ of great abilities in two youths of
Savannah--George M. Troup and Thomas U.D. Charlton. Through his
influence, these young men, almost as soon as eligible, were sent to
the Legislature of the State, and both immediately took high
positions. Talent was not the only requisite to win and retain the
favor of Jackson: the man must be honest, and that honesty of such a
character as placed him above suspicion.
Under the operation of the Confiscation Act, many who had favored the
mother country in the Revolutionary struggle had fled with their
property to Florida. Conspicuous among these was one Campbell Wiley, a
man of fortune. This man applied to the Legislature to be specially
exempted from the penalties of this act, and to be permitted to return
to the State. A heated debate ensued, when the bill was being
considered, in which Charlton was silent, and in which Troup made a
violent speech in opposition to its passage, ending with the sentence,
"If ever I find it in my heart to forgive an old Tory his sins, I
trust my God will never forgive me mine." This speech gave him an
immediate popularity over the entire State. Charlton in secret favored
the bill; but knowing its unpopularity with his constituents, he
contrived to be called to the chair, and was forced to vote on a
material motion which was favorable to the bill. The wealth of Wiley,
and Charlton's equivocation, attached suspicion to his motives, and
brought down upon him the wrath of Jackson, blighting all his future
aspirations. As a member of the bar he attained eminence, and all his
future life was such as to leave no doubt of his purity, and the cruel
wrong those suspicions, sustained by the frown of Jackson, had done
him.
Thomas W. Cobb was eminently social in his nature, and frank to a
fault; his opinions were never concealed of men or measures; and these
were, though apparently hasty, the honest convictions of his judgment,
notwithstanding their apparent impulsive and hasty character. Like his
tutor, Mr. Crawford, he cared little for ceremony or show; and in
every thing he was the kernel without the shell: his character was
marked before his company in five minutes' conversation, whether he
had ever met or heard of them before; and in all things else he was
equally without deceit. This openness to some seemed rude; and his
enemies were of this class. He expressed as freely his opinion to the
person as to the public; but this was always accompanied with a manner
which disrobed it of offence. But human nature will not in every
individual excuse the words because of the manner; and sometimes this
peculiarity made him sharp enemies. It will be supposed such traits
would have rendered him unpopular. At this day, when social
intercourse is less familiar, they certainly would have done so; but
they seemed a means of great popularity to Cobb, especially with those
who were most intimate with him, as all who met him were, after an
hour's acquaintance. His public life was as his private, open and
sincere; he never had a sinister motive, and this relieved him from
duplicity of conduct. His talents were of a high order: in debate, he
was argumentative and explicit; never pretending to any of the arts of
the orator; but logically pursued his subject to a conclusion; never
verbose, but always perspicuous. As a lawyer, he was well read; and
the analytical character of his mind appeared to have been formed upon
the model of Judge Blackstone. Before the juries of the country he was
all-powerful. These, in the main, were composed of men of very limited
information--and especially of legal lore. But they were generally men
of strong practical sense, with an honest purpose of doing justice
between man and man. Cobb with these was always sincere; never
attempting a deception, never seeking to sway their judgments and
secure a verdict by appealing to their passions or their prejudices,
or by deceiving them as to what the law was. Toward a witness or a
party of whose honesty he entertained doubts, he was sarcastically
severe; nor was he choice in the use of terms. As a statesman, he was
wise and able--and in politics, as in everything else, honest and
patriotic. In early life he was sent to the House of Representatives,
in the Congress of the United States, and soon distinguished himself
as a devoted Republican in politics, and a warm supporter of the
Administration of Mr. Monroe. Here he was reunited socially with Mr.
Crawford and family, and so close was this intimacy that he was on all
political measures supposed to speak the sentiments of Mr. Crawford.
Associated with Forsyth, Tatnal, Gilmer, and Cuthbert, all men of
superior abilities, all belonging to the same political party, and all
warm supporters, of Mr. Crawford, he led this galaxy of talent--a
constellation in the political firmament unsurpassed by the
representation of any other State. Nor must I forget, in this
connection, Joel Crawford and William Terrell, men of sterling worth
and a high order of talent. Mr. Cobb was a man of active business
habits, and was very independent in his circumstances: methodical and
correct, he never left for to-morrow the work of to-day.
He was transferred from the House to the Senate, and left it with a
reputation for integrity and talent--the one as brilliant as the other
unstained--which falls to the lot of few who are so long in public
life as he was. Unlike most politicians whose career has been through
exciting political struggles, the blight of slander was never breathed
upon his name, and it descended to his children, as he received it
from his ancestry, without spot or blemish.
Toward the close of his life, he was elected by the Legislature of the
State to the Bench of the Superior Court, then the highest judicial
tribunal of the State. This was the last public station he filled.
Here he sustained his high character as a lawyer and honest man;
carrying to the tomb the same characteristics of simplicity and
sincerity, of affability and social familiarity, which had ever
distinguished him in every position, public or private. He assumed
none of that mock dignity or ascetic reserve in his intercourse with
the Bar and the people, so characteristic of little minds in elevated
positions: conscious of rectitude in all things, he never feared this
familiarity would give cause for the charge of improper bias in his
decisions from the bench or his influence with the jury.
Mr. Cobb died at the age of fifty, in the prime of his manhood and
usefulness. In person, he was a model for a sculptor--six feet in
height, straight, and admirably proportioned. His head and face were
Grecian; his forehead ample; his nose beautifully chiselled; gray
eyes, with sparkling, playful expression, round, and very beautiful;
his head round, large, and admirably set on; the expression of his
features, variant as April weather, but always intellectual, they
invited approach, and the fascination of his conversation chained to
his presence all who approached him. In fine, he was a type in manner
and character of the people among whom he was born and reared; and I
scarcely know if this is the greater compliment to him or them.
With few exceptions, this peculiar population of Middle Georgia has
furnished all of her distinguished sons, and to the traits which make
them remarkable is she to-day mainly indebted for her exalted
prominence among her sister States of the South. The peculiar training
of her sons, the practical education and social equality which
pervades, and ever has, her society, acquaints every one with the
wants of every other; at the same time it affords the facility for
union in any public enterprise which promises the public good. All
alike are infused with the same State pride, and the equality of
fortunes prevents the obtrusion of arrogant wealth, demanding control,
from purely selfish motives, in any public measure.
This community of interests superinduces unity of feeling, and unity
of action; and the same homogeneous education secures a healthy public
opinion, which, at last, is the great controlling law of human action.
Thus the soil is one, the cultivation is one, the growth is one, and
the fruit is the same. Nowhere in the South have these been so
prominent as in Middle Georgia, and no other portion of the South is
so distinguished for progress, talent, and high moral cultivation.
There is, perhaps, wanting that polish of manners, that ease and grace
of movement, and that quiet delicacy of suppressed emotion, so
peculiar to her citizens of the seaboard, which the world calls
refinement; which seems taught to conceal the natural under the
artistic, and which so frequently refines away the nobler and more
generous emotions of the heart. I doubt, however, if the habit of open
and unrestrained expression of the feelings of our nature is not a
more enduring basis of strong character and vigorous thought and
action, than the cold polish of refined society. Whatever is most
natural is most enduring. The person unrestrained by dress grows into
noble and beautiful proportions; the muscles uncramped, develop not
only into beauty, but strength and healthfulness. So with the mind
untrammelled by forms and ceremonies; and so with the soul unfettered
by the superstition of vague and ridiculous dogmas. The freedom of
action and familiarity of language, where there are few social
restraints to prevent universal intercourse, familiarizes every class
of the community with the peculiarities of each, and forms an outlet
for the wit and humor of the whole. This was the stimulant to mirth
and hilarity, for which no people are so much distinguished as the
Georgians of the middle country. At the especial period of which I now
write, her humorists were innumerable. Dooly, Clayton, Prince,
Longstreet, Bacon (the Ned Brace of Longstreet's Georgia Scenes), and
many others of lesser note, will long be remembered in the traditions
of the people. These were all men of, eminence, and in their time
filled the first offices of the State. The quiet, quaint humor of
Prince is to be seen in his Militia Muster, in the Georgia Scenes; and
there too the inimitable burlesque of Bacon, in Ned Brace.