THE POLYANTHOS, FOR JULY, 1812. BIOGRAPHICAL ACCOUNT OF THE LATE "THERE is a loveliness in personal worth and goodness, which every rational man will perceive and admire. They have an attractive and captivating influence, which always renders their possessor estimable. And it is the immediate dictate of our nature to approve and respect those who are known to possess integrity of principle, and to pursue a steady course of virtuous conduct. Whatsoever things are true, honest, just, and pure, are always lovely, honourable, and of good report. Such as have these moral qualities, acquire a respectable distinction while they live, and leave behind them a fair claim to grateful and pleasing remembrance. For, the memorial of virtue is immortal. It is known on earth, and approved in heaven. When present, men take example from it; and when it is gone, they desire it.' finding the whole province of Massachusetts, Boston excepted, under the control of the American Congress. In 1780, Mr. Bowdoin married Sarah, the only daughter, indeed the only child, of his uncle, William Bowdoin, Esq. The estate of both brothers thus centered in one family. Mr. Bowdoin was successively called to fill several honourable offices in the government of the commonwealth. He was in the senate and in the council, and one of the seven fellows or corporation of the University at Cambridge. The last publick employment in which he was engaged was a mission to the court of Spain, to effect, if possible, a settlement of the eastern and western boundaries of Louisiana, or, if necessa ry, to negotiate the purchase of the Floridas, and at the same time to obtain compensation for spoliations on American commerce. The ill success of negociation is well known; but those who are best acquainted with its history know also, that its failure is in no degree to be ascribed to any want of exertion on the part of Mr. Bowdoin. Though the immediate reason of his return was the ill state of his health, it is believed he came back with the deliberate persuasion of the impossibility of effecting any one of the objects of his mission at that time; a persuasion which subsequent events have entirely confirmed. In the hands of Mr. Bowdoin, however, the honour of his country could never have suffered. He took the most enlarged views of its interests and pursued them with a disinterestedness and a sense of duty, which were never sacrificed to any personal or private considerations; so that a great part of the time which he spent in this foreign service was passed in more laborious exertions and personal sacrifices, than the result of the mission might at first lead us to suppose. After his return to America he appeared to relinquish all inclination for publick employment, and to resign himself more and more to those occupations in which he could do most service to the community, with the least interruption from those passions and prejudices with which men in publick life have so often to contend. The repose which he sought was disturbed only by the infirmities of his health. He retired, not to indolence, but to a sphere of usefulness and activity within the reach of a private man. The improvements, which were making under his immediate direction on his estate at Naushaun, were of consequence not so much to himself as to the agricultural and economical interests of his country; and it is greatly to be regretted that he was not permitted longer to pur sue and direct them. |