A Funeral Dration ON GEORGE WASHINGTON. Pronounced at OXFORD, Massachusetts, at the Request of the Field Officers of the Brigade, ftationed at that Place, on the 15th Jan. 1800. BY JOŠIAH DUNHAM, A. M. Capt. 16th U. S. Regiment. AMERICANS! THE Sun of our glory has fet forever; -WASHINGTON IS NO MORE!!. -The pride of Columbia has fallen! He that was mighty among the valiant has failed! The glory has departed from Israel; and the tents of Cufhan are in affliction! Afflicting and painful indeed must be that event, which has clad five millions of people in mourning, and filled a nation with tears: an event, which has, at once, bid the pipe and the tabor to cease in our land; which has turned our joys into forrow, and our mirth into heavinefs: an event, which robbed America of her boast, Humanity of her pride, and has electrified the World with aftonishment and grief. And, is it not fingular, nay, is it not beyond all parallel, that this interesting, this extraordinary event is no more than the death of ONE MAN? "O, what a fall was there my countrymen ! When I contemplate the folemnity of the occafion which has brought us together, ftruck with a pious awe and veneration for the illuftrious Character, whofe manes we are about to entomb, I fhrink from the holy theme, and would fain evade the task this day affigned me. Emboldened, however, by a fenfe of duty, I will humbly pursue, with others, the delightful, yet beaten track, where, though novelty will not furprise, yet neither praise can furfeit, nor eulogy be exhaufted. Par LI don me, venerable fhade! if, with unequal step, and unhallowed feet, I tread the facred ground. To attempt a complete portrait of this great man, would be in vain. It is a task reserved for the genius of future ages: a task, which will engrofs the talents of the poet, the painter, the biographer, and hiftorian, when the names of George, of Lewis, of Frederick, and of Paul, would have been long fince forgotten, had they not have vegetated on a throne, in the fame era in which WASHINGTON lived. To enumerate all those exploits, which have stamped his character and immortalized his memory, would be to narrate every incident of his life, from the cradle to the tomb-to fwell volume upon volume, till "the world itself could not contain the books which fhould be written." They exhibit one uniform fcene of goodnefs, greatness, and fublimity-one bright galaxy of glory, which, in a comparative view, darkens and eclipfes the brightest perfections of all who have gone before him. It was WASHINGTON, who reared our infant country from a state of childhood and weakness, to that of manhood and strength; from a ftate of bondage and oppreffion, to that of freedom and independence; from a state of anarchy, war, and mifery, to that of order, peace and happiness. It was WASHINGTON, who confirmed to us the poffeffion of this American Canaan; who, through a wilderness of dangers, and a Red Sea of blood, ftood, under GOD, OUR SHELTERING cloud BY DAY, AND OUR PILLAR OF FIRE BY NIGHT. He it was, who feated us beneath the fhadow of the peaceful olive; who converted our "fwords into ploughfhares, and our fpears into pruning-hooks ;" who gave us to eat of the trees of light and liberty, in this our. political paradife. Like yon bright orb of day, when not a cloud obfcures the vaft horizon around, he has rifen and fhone with genial fplendour and unborrowed majefty; while kings, potentates, and princes, have fhrunk abafhed from his prefence, and, like the twinkling ftars of night, hid their diminished heads. At the commencement of our revolution, when the dark storm was gathering and burfting upon us; when the iron tempeft of war was already howling in our ears; when the galling chains of flavery were riveting on our heels; when not a gleam of light nor a ray of hope could be difcerned through the impenetrable gloom that enveloped our country; when despair was our fecret companion, and the fons of little men were afraid; then it was, that the fame ftar which once ftood over Bethlehem, and guided the wife men of the East to the place of our SAVIOUR's birth, now ftood over Mount Vernon, and conducted the wife men of the West to the abode of our political faviour. Compare WASHINGTON (if their characters will admit of comparison) with the heroes, the patriots, the fages, the legiflators of antiquity. View him in all his important relations to himself, to his country, and to his GOD. Do we not find him as much their fuperior, as the golden fun is fuperior to the fwift meteor of night, or to the dim luftre of the rayless mock-fun in the cir cumambient cloud? As a hero, compare him with Cromwell, with Cefar, with Alexander. Alas! where is their greatness? what were their virtues ?-Curfe on fuch virtues-they have. undone their country! Cromwell, with facrilegious zeal, destroyed a throne to enthrone himself. Cefar, with electric rapidity, fubdued nations; but "Cefar was ambitious"-he enflaved an empire! Alexander, meanly brave, and wretchedly victorious, wantonly overran the world, laid waste the fairest portion of humanity, and, with undiscriminating madness and fury, cried, "Havoc! and let flip the dogs of war" among the nobleft works of God! WASHINGTON fought not to conquer, but to defend; not to ruin the foe, but to protect his people; not to enslave a country, but to free, to blefs, and to buiid up a nation-to establish it on the broad basis of equal rights, under the enjoyment of liberty, and un der the protection of law. At the birth of our independence, in the days which tried men's fouls, when every hand was weak, and every heart faint, who, like WASHINGTON, could have united all hearts, and strengthened all hands? Who, like him, could have rifen fuperior to all the trials, perplexities, and dangers, which, like a dark cloud, hovered over us, and threatened our political exiftence? Who elfe could have combined the varying interests, reconciled diverfe opinions, and foothed the difcordant paffions, with which our infant country was torn, paralyfed, and convulfed? Who, but WASHINGTON, could have stept forward, with prudence, fortitude and zeal, to command, as well the affections as the confidence of trembling millions? Who, like him, without the weaknesses, which depreciate, or the vices, which difgrace human nature, could have displayed all the virtues, and all the talents, which ennoble man, or adorn the hero? Who, but WASHINGTON, amidft the contending elements of our revolution, with modeft dignity, and unbaffled fkill, could have "rode upon the whirlwind and directed the ftorm?" Always calm and ferene, always firm and inflexible, always prompt and decided-in fhort, always himself, he has been found prepared for every event, and adequate to every trust. It was his perfevering prudence, his cautious circumfpection, his unparalleled moderation, which, in our revolutionary war, out-generaled British skill, and eventually turned the fcale, which long had poised dubious. Gradually weakening and wearing out the enemy, while his own army was difciplining, and his own refources increafing, at length, "He gain'd, like FABIUS, by delay.” Though intrepid as Hannibal, and fortunate as Cefar, yet mildness and humanity were prominent traits in his character. He never pierced a fallen foe! After eight years' faithful and gratuitous fervice, at the head of our victorious armies, he cheerfully facrificed, upon the altar of his grateful country, the mighty harveft of laurels he had won, and great, like Cincin natus, returned to the plough--to the exercise of his domestic virtues, and, the ever favourite object of his heart, the cultivation of the foft arts of peace. Won derful man!-Here was a fight the gods beheld with pleasure! Like the hero of Offian, he was terrible in the battles of his fteel. His fword was like lightning in the field; his voice like thunder on the diftant hills. Many fell by his arm; they were confumed in the flames of his wrath! But when he returned from the war, how peaceful was his brow! His face was like the fun after rain; like the moon in the filence of the night; calm as the breast of the lake, when the loud wind is laid! Once more called from his philofophic retreat, in the fhades of Mount Vernon, by the unanimous voice of his country, to the administration of a government, in the formation of whose Constitution he was himself an important agent, who will pretend to fay, that his virtues or his talents fhone lefs confpicuously in the cabinet, than in the field? Unverfed in the policy and intrigues of courts, untaught in the theoretical fpeculations of fire-fide philofophers, and unacquainted with the metaphyfical jargon of fchool-bred politicians, he poffeffed a thorough, and an intuitive knowledge of the human heart. Superior to Solon or Lycurgus, he was that felf-taught fage, that heaven-infpired patriot and legiflator, who clearly comprehended all the fprings and all the motives of human nature and human actions. He understood, not only those principles, which conftitute the interefts, the relations, and the dependencies, mutually fubfifting between man and man; but his ideas were as extended as the vaft empire of Reason; fo that a knowledge of the relative interefts of his country, with regard to foreign nations, and of the meafures, which would moft effectually promote and fecure them, were perfectly familiar to his capacious mind. Suffice it to fay, that from these interests, during an eight years' prefidency, in a period as eventful and dangerous as war itfelf, he was never once known |