As a leader in a deliberative body, Mr. Clay had no equal in America. In him, intellect, person, eloquence, and courage, united to form a character fit to command. He fired with his own enthusiasm, and controlled by his amazing will, individuals and masses. No reverse could crush his spirit, nor defeat reduce him to despair. Equally erect and dauntless in prosperity and adversity, when successful, he moved to the accomplishment of his purposes with severe resolution; when defeated, he rallied his broken bands around him, and from his eagle eye shot along their ranks the contagion of his own courage. Destined for a leader, he every where asserted his destiny. In his long and eventful life he came in contact with men of all ranks and professions, but he never felt that he was in the presence of a man superior to himself. In the assemblies of the people, at the bar, in the senate――every where within the circle of his personal presence, he assumed and maintained a position of preeminence.
But the supremacy of Mr. Clay, as a party leader, was not his only, nor his highest title to renown. That title is to be found in the purely patriotic spirit which, on great occasions, always signalized his conduct. We have had no statesman, who, in periods of real and imminent public peril, has exhibited a more genuine and enlarged patriotism than Henry Clay. Whenever a question presented itself actually threatening the existence of the union, Mr. Clay, rising above the passions of the hour, always exerted his powers to solve it peacefully and honorably. Although more liable than most men, from his impetuous and ardent nature, to feel strongly the passions common to us all, it was his rare faculty to be able to subdue them in a great crisis, and to hold toward all sections of the confederacy the language of concord and brotherhood.
Sir, it will be a proud pleasure to every true American heart to remember the great occasions when Mr. Clay has displayed a sublime patriotism――when the ill-temper engendered by the times, and the miserable jealousies of the day, seemed to have been driven from his bosom by the expulsive power of nobler feelings――when every throb of his heart was given to his country, every effort of his intellect dedicated to her service. Who does not remember the three periods when the American system of government was exposed to its severest trials; and who does not know that when history shall relate the struggle which preceded, and the dangers which were averted by the Missouri compromise, the tariff compromise of 1832, and the adjustment of 1850, the same pages will record the genius, the eloquence, and the patriotism of Henry Clay?