place and bid adieu to these halls, to act your parts upon the
great theatre of active life. Your friends and your country have
much to hope, much to expect from you. Devote yourselves with
diligence to your studies. When you shall have finished your course
here, remember that your education is just commencing; I mean that
education which is to fit you for acting a distinguished part
upon the theatre of your country. The pursuits and the honors of
literature lie in the same road with those of ambition; and he
who aspires to fame or distinction must rest his hopes upon the
improvement of his intellect. Julius Caesar was one of the most
accomplished scholars of Rome, and Napoleon Bonaparte of France.
In our own country we lately have seen one of our most eminent
scholars raised to the chief magistracy of the nation, and the
greatest orator of the age made his prime minister. I speak not here
of politics: literature has no factions; good taste no parties.
Remember, my young friends, that most of the men who thus far have
shed a lustre upon our country had not one-half the opportunities
of education which you have enjoyed. They had to rely upon their
genius and industry. Genius delights to toil with difficulties:
they discipline its powers and animate its courage; it contemns
the honors which can be obtained without labor, and prizes only
those which are purchased by noble exertion. Wish not, therefore,
for a life of ease; but go forth with stout hearts and determined
resolution. As yet you little know what labor and perseverance can
effect, nor the exalted pleasures which honorable exertion gives to
an ingenious mind. May God take charge of you; lead you in the ways
of uprightness and honor; make you all useful men, and ornaments to
your country!
LETTER FROM CHIEF JUSTICE MARSHALL TO MURPHY.
RICHMOND, October 6, 1827.
DEAR SIR:--Your oration, delivered in Person Hall, Chapel Hill,
reached this place during a visit I had made to our mountain
country. It was taken out of the post-office and placed on a
general table, among a number of papers and pamphlets received
during my absence, and was not perceived till to-day. I mention
this circumstance as an apology for having permitted so much time
to elapse without making any acknowledgments for the gratification
derived from its perusal.
I take a great deal of interest in your portraits of the eminent
men of North Carolina, who have now passed away from the theatre
of action. It was my happiness to be acquainted with those of whom
you speak as being known to yourself, and I feel the justness of
the eulogies you have bestowed upon them. I never heard Mr. Davie
nor Mr. Moore at the bar, but the impressions they both made upon
me in private circles were extremely favorable, and I think you
have given to the character of each its true coloring. Neither have
I ever heard Mr. Stanly, but I have known him also in private,
and it was not possible to be in his company without noticing and
being struck with his general talent, and most especially his
vivacity, his wit, and his promptness. He appeared to be eminently
endowed with a ready elocution, and almost intuitive perception
of the subjects of discussion. With Mr. Haywood and Mr. Henderson
I was well acquainted, and have heard them often at the bar. They
were unquestionably among the ablest lawyers of their day. I saw
not much of Mr. Duffy as a professional man, but thought him a
pleasing, agreeable gentleman. You omitted one name which ranks, I
think, among the considerable men of your State. It is that of the
late Judge Iredell. I was well acquainted with him too, and always
thought him a man of real talent.
In the rapid sketch you have taken of the colonial government,
some circumstances excite a good deal of surprise. The persecuting
spirit of the High-church party was still more vindictive than I
had supposed, and the principle of limiting your laws to two years
was, I believe, peculiar to Carolina. The scarcity of books, too,
which seems to have prevailed ever since the Revolution, is a
very remarkable fact. Although I concur perfectly in the opinion
you express that much more advantage is to be derived from the
frequent and attentive perusal of a few valuable books, than from
indiscriminate and multifarious reading--that cramming injures
digestion--yet, some books are necessary, not only for ornament, but
for use.
Allow me to thank you for the pleasure I have received from the
perusal of your oration, for I must suppose that I am indebted
to yourself for this mark of polite attention, and to express my
particular acknowledgments for the flattering notice you have taken
of the _Life of George Washington_. That work was hurried into the
world with too much precipitation, but I have lately given it a
careful examination and correction. Should another edition appear it
will be less fatiguing and more worthy of the character which the
biographer of Washington ought to sustain.
With very great respect and esteem, I am, sir,
Your obedient servant,
J. MARSHALL.
The Hon. ARCHIBALD D. MURPHY,
Haw River, North Carolina.
[Illustration: WILLIAM GASTON.]
WILLIAM GASTON.
BY WM. H. BATTLE.
William Gaston, late one of the Judges of the Supreme Court of
North Carolina, was born in the town of New Bern on the 19th day of
September, A. D. 1778. His paternal ancestors were distinguished
French Huguenots, who were driven from their country by the
revocation of the famous edict of Nantes, and retired to Ballymore,
in Ireland, where they settled, and where Alexander Gaston, the
father of the Judge, was born. Alexander, having chosen the
profession of medicine and obtained his diploma at the medical
college of Edinburgh, entered the British navy as a surgeon. After
remaining a few years in this service, he resigned his commission
and came to New Bern in this State, where he settled and commenced
the regular practice of his profession. In the year 1775 he married
Margaret Sharpe, an English lady of the Roman Catholic faith, by
whom he had two sons and a daughter, of whom the Judge was the
second son. The elder brother died young; and before the subject of
this sketch was three years of age he lost his father in a manner
deeply tragical. He was shot by a band of Tories, who, in the year
1781, surprised the town of New Bern, and singled out the doctor,
who was an ardent and active Whig, as an especial object of their
vengeance. It is said that the fatal instrument of death was fired
over the head of the agonized wife, while she was imploring, as only
a woman can implore, the life of her husband. The Judge was then
doubtless too young to appreciate all the horrors of the scene,
but that it made a deep impression upon him in subsequent life we
are well assured. Many years afterwards, while he was a member of
Congress, upon being charged, in an exciting party debate, with
a want of proper American feeling, he indignantly repelled the
imputation by the eloquent exclamation, "I was baptized an American
in the blood of a murdered father."That same incident was alluded
to with thrilling effect in the convention called to amend the
Constitution in 1835 by the distinguished and venerable president
of that body. The death of his father threw upon his mother the
entire care and responsibility of rearing and educating her infant
children. Her situation was peculiarly beset with difficulties.
The death of two brothers, with whom she had come to this country,
followed by the loss of her husband, left her without any other
relatives in America than her two children. But happily for them,
she was a woman of great energy of character, of singular prudence,
and of devoted piety. It immediately became a leading object of
her life to train up her son to usefulness and honor. We may be
well assured from its results, that her course of discipline was
eminently judicious. Indeed, the Judge has been heard to declare
that whatever success and distinction he had attained in life he
owed to her counsels and her admirable management, and that but
for her he might have been a vagabond. He was first sent to school
in his native town, and while there he was represented as having
been "very quick, and apt to learn; of an affectionate temper,
and yet volatile and irritable. His mother used every means to
correct his infirmities of disposition, and to give an aim to
his pursuits--sometimes employing kindness, or mild but solemn
admonition, and occasionally still stricter discipline." She kept
him under her own immediate supervision and control until the fall
of the year 1791, when she sent him to the Roman Catholic college
at Georgetown. After remaining at this institution about eighteen
months, his failing health compelled him to return home. Soon
afterwards his health was reestablished, and he resumed his studies
under the tuition of the Rev. Thomas P. Irving, who then had charge
of the academy at New Bern. Here he was prepared for admission into
the junior class of Princeton College, which he entered in the fall
of 1794; and in 1796 was graduated, at the early age of eighteen,
with the first honors of the institution.
After completing his collegiate course he selected the law as his
profession, and immediately commenced his studies in the office of
François Xavier Martin, then a practicing lawyer in this State,
but now a Judge of the Supreme Court of the State of Louisiana.
The same diligent attention to the studies of his profession,
which had distinguished his career in college, enabled him to
obtain admittance to the bar in the year 1798. In that same year
the late Chief Justice Taylor, who had married his sister, was
elevated to the bench and gave all his business to his young friend
and relative, which put him at once into full practice. This
sudden accumulation of business, which would have operated to the
disadvantage of a mind less active and cultivated, served only to
call forth all his energies, by the necessity it occasioned of a
thorough preparation to meet the great responsibility thrown upon
him. He very soon acquired distinction in his profession, which
steadily increased until he attained, by universal acknowledgment,
the proud eminence of being at the head of the bar of this State--a
pre-eminence which he never lost until he was raised by his admiring
countrymen to a still more exalted station. But while he was
thus pursuing, with rare success, the profits and honors of his
profession, he never for a moment lost sight of the interests of his
country. The very next year after he reached the age of manhood he
was elected a member of the State Senate from his native county of
Craven; and in 1808 he was elected a member of the House of Commons,
and was chosen to preside over its deliberations. The same year
he was nominated by the Federal party, to which he was attached,
as Presidential Elector for the district in which he resided. The
reputation which he had acquired at the bar and in the legislative
halls of the State for integrity, patriotism and distinguished
ability procured his election in 1813, and again in 1815, to the
House of Representatives in the Congress of the United States. Of
the elevated stand which he took in that body it is needless for
me here to speak. It is a part of the history of the country, that
amidst the brilliant constellation of statesmen then seen in the
councils of the American nation--a constellation illustrated by
the genius and eloquence of a Lowndes, a Randolph, a Calhoun, a
Webster, and a Clay, the star of Gaston was far from being the least
brilliant. The admirer of parliamentary oratory will find in his
speeches upon the Loan Bill and the previous question some of the
finest displays of reasoning and eloquence which our country has
produced.
In 1817, Judge Gaston voluntarily retired from Congress, and never
returned to the national councils. The residue of his days he
devoted to the duties of domestic and professional life, and to the
service of his native State. He was frequently chosen, sometimes by
the freemen of the county of Craven, and sometimes by those of the
town of New Bern, to represent them in the General Assembly. Of the
value of his services in this more limited, but still very important
sphere of usefulness, it is difficult to speak in adequate terms
without the appearance of exaggeration. I have not the materials,
if I had the time and opportunity, for stating in detail all the
measures which he accomplished, or assisted in accomplishing, for
the good of the State. I can point only to a few monuments in the
course of our legislative history, to show that the hand of a
master-workman has been there. In the year 1808 he drew up the "Act
regulating the descent of inheritances," which, with scarcely any
alteration or addition, remains the law on that subject to this
day. In 1818 he was mainly instrumental in the establishment of our
present Supreme Court system; and in 1828 all his varied powers of
eloquence and argumentation were exerted to their utmost to prevent
the success of a measure in relation to the banks, which would have
spread ruin and dismay throughout the length and breadth of our
State. His last appearance in the Legislature was as a member of the
House of Commons in 1831 when he made a splendid effort, but all in
vain, in favor of rebuilding the capitol, which had been destroyed
by fire the preceding summer.
In the summer of 1833 a vacancy upon the bench of the Supreme Court
occurred by the death of Chief Justice Henderson. From various
causes, of which I know too little to attempt an explanation, the
Supreme Court had at that time by no means so strong a hold upon
the confidence of the people as it has since obtained. It was very
desirable, therefore, on the part of the friends of the system to
fill the vacancy by a man of commanding talents and great influence,
in order to give it strength. All eyes were at once turned towards
Judge Gaston. But there were supposed to be two very serious
obstacles to his acceptance of the office. It was known that his
practice at the bar was extensive and very lucrative, and it was
also known that a prudent regard to his private affairs would
dictate that his professional income should not be exchanged for a
judge's salary. It was also believed by many that the thirty-second
article of our State Constitution forbade his accepting the office,
in that clause which declared that "no person who shall deny the
truth of the Protestant religion shall be capable of holding any
office or place of trust or profit, in the civil department, within
this State." The friends of the Judge nevertheless urged him to
become a candidate for the office. After a full and fair explanation
of the latter and most important objection, he became satisfied
that it was not tenable; and as to the former, that his duty to his
country required him to make the sacrifice. His name was accordingly
brought before the Legislature in the winter of 1833, and he was
elected by a large majority on the first ballot. At the ensuing term
of the Court he took his seat upon the bench, and from that time
until the very day of his death he continued to discharge the duties
of his office with an ability and devotion seldom equaled and never
surpassed. When a Convention of the people of the State was called
in 1835, to amend the Constitution, he took a seat in it as one of
the members from the county of Craven. Of the manner in which he
performed the peculiarly delicate and important duties of assisting
to revise and amend our fundamental law, I know it is needless for
me to speak in this presence. The distinguished President of this
Institution, who was then Governor of the State and a member of the
Convention, can tell the extent of his labors and the value of his
services in that body. Suffice it for me to say that he was placed
on almost every important committee; that he took a leading part
in every important debate; that he, in a great measure, guided and
directed the whole business of the Convention. And when its labors
were at last brought to a successful conclusion, it was from his
hand that the amendments to the Constitution received the form and
dress in which they now appear. Excepting his judicial duties,
this was the last public service in which he was engaged. It is
true that when our Senators in Congress resigned in 1840, the Whig
party, which had then the ascendency in the Legislature, tendered
him the nomination for one of the vacancies; but he declined it,
preferring to remain on the bench, where he thought he could do the
State better service. Nor need we regret his determination; for
though none could have represented the State in the Senate with more
dignity, fidelity, and ability, yet his profound legal attainments,
his extensive and varied information, his severe and patient habits
of thought, and a style of composition at once dignified and
elegant, so admirably fitted him for the high tribunal on which he
was placed that we could not have wished to see him transferred to
any other station, however exalted. But it is needless for me to
enlarge upon his judicial fitness and ability. The Chief Justice
of the Court, the associate of his labors and his duties, himself
one of the ablest judges and most profound lawyers of his day,
has emphatically pronounced from the judgment-seat that he was
a "great judge." In confirmation of this sentence, if it needed
confirmation, I would refer to all his reported judicial opinions;
and particularly to the opinion of the Court as delivered by him in
the case of the _State_ vs. _Will_, 1 Dev. and Bat. Rep., 121; and
his dissenting opinion in the _State_ vs. _Miller_, _ibid._, 500;
the latter of which has been pronounced by a very competent judge
one of the finest judicial arguments to be found in this country.
I have said that Judge Gaston continued in the faithful discharge
of his official duties until the very day of his death. This is
literally true. On Tuesday, the 23d of January past, not quite a
fortnight ago, he took his seat in the Court as usual, though he had
felt for several days a sensation of chilliness and a difficulty
of breathing. He remained on the bench until about two o'clock
P. M., giving strict attention to a case then under discussion,
when he was attacked with faintness and other symptoms of violent
sickness. He was taken to his room and a physician called in, who
very soon relieved him. He revived, became cheerful and engaged in
an interesting conversation with some of his friends who had called
to see him. In the course of the evening he told several anecdotes,
at which they laughed heartily. "He then related" (says a published
account) "the particulars of a convivial party at Washington City,
many years ago, and spoke of one who, on that occasion, avowed
himself a freethinker in religion. 'From that day,' said Judge
Gaston, 'I always looked on that man with distrust. I do not say
that a freethinker may not be an honorable man; that he may not,
from high motives, scorn to do a mean act; but I dare not trust
him. A belief in an All-ruling Divinity, who shapes our ends, whose
eye is upon us, and who will reward us according to our deeds, is
necessary. We must believe and feel that there is a God--All wise
and Almighty." As he was pronouncing the last word, he rose to give
it greater emphasis. The moment after there was a sudden rush of
blood to the brain, when he immediately fell back and expired.
In reviewing the life of this eminent man, which has been thus
hastily and imperfectly sketched, we see that though left an orphan
in earliest infancy in a country where he had no kindred, save a
widowed mother and an infant sister, though professing a religious
faith almost proscribed, and attached to a political party always
in the minority, he yet rose to the highest summit of professional
distinction, acquired, during a brief career in the Legislature of
his State, a preponderating influence in its councils, was among
the foremost of the great in the national assembly, was selected
by almost general acclamation to preside in the highest judicial
tribunal known to our law, and, more than all, won and maintained
to the day of his death, the confidence, the admiration, and the
affection of his countrymen. It is interesting, and it must be
profitable to all, particularly to you, young gentlemen, who are
just entering upon the career of life, to inquire what were the
qualities and what the talents which enabled their possessor, under
such circumstances, to achieve such great results. In the very
outset of his life, we discover one trait to which much, if not all,
of his success was owing--his love and veneration for his mother.
An early attention to all his duties, and a desire to excel in
everything useful, was another distinctive trait in the character
of Judge Gaston. We discover this in the rapid progress made in
his studies and the distinction which he acquired at college. I
am aware that college honors are often decried, at least by those
who never obtained them, and that it has been frequently said
that they afford no presage of excellence in after-life. I beg
leave to dissent from that opinion. Judge Gaston himself thought
far otherwise. Long after he had left the walls of his _alma
mater_, when his mind was enlarged by observation and corrected by
experience, he expressed himself in an address to the young men
who then occupied the seats now filled by you in the following
glowing words: "True it is that it sometimes, though very rarely,
happens that those who have been idle during their academical course
have by extraordinary exertions retrieved their early neglect and
in the end outstripped others who started in the race far ahead.
These are exceptions--they furnish cause to humble arrogance, check
presumption, banish despair and encourage reformation. But as surely
as a virtuous life usually precedes a happy death so surely will it
be found that within the college precincts is laid the groundwork of
that pre-eminence afterwards acquired in the strife of men; and that
college distinctions are not only good testimony of the fidelity
with which college duties have been performed, but the best presages
and pledges of excellence on a more extended and elevated field of
action."
A faithful and fearless discharge of whatever he found to do in
the path of duty was another prominent trait in the character of
the Judge. He never asked what interest or policy might dictate,
but what truth and justice required; and the latter he resolutely
performed, "uncaring consequences." I might mention many instances
of his braving popular prejudices, and incurring for a time popular
odium, in doing what an enlightened conscience told him he ought to
do. A memorable instance is presented in his appearing as counsel
for Lord Granville in the famous suits which he instituted in this
State after the Revolutionary war. A course, which all would now
acknowledge to be right, then very sensibly affected his popularity
for many years. He was at that time a young man, and it required no
little of the force of conscious rectitude to enable him to stem the
torrent of prejudice which ran so strong against him.