In this manner the controversy dragged on through the years 1768-69, but in the summer of the former year an event occurred which roused the people to a high pitch of excitement. Some of the custom-house officers seized a vessel belonging to John Hancock. For this they were assailed by a mob which burned the boat of the collector of customs. The officers fled to the castle. It was for this business that a body of British soldiers was first sent to Boston.

On the 12th of September, 1768, a great meeting was held in Faneuil Hall, but the crowd was such as to make necessary and adjournment to Sewall's Meeting-house. James Otis was moderator of the meeting. The presence of British soldiers, evidently sent to Boston to enforce the decrees of an arbitrary government, was sufficient to bring into play all the elements of patriotism.

The British soldier's coat in the old town was of the same color as the scarf which the picador shakes in the face of the enraged animal! The effect in either case was the same.

At the meeting just mentioned, Mr. Otis presided and spoke. A report of what occurred was written (presumptively by some enemy of the patriots), and was sent as a report to the British ministry. In this Otis was charged with saying, "In case Great Britain is not disposed to redress our grievances after proper application, the people have nothing more to do, but to gird the sword on the thigh and shoulder the musket." Doubtless this report was a perversion of the truth.

Other meetings were held, and resolutions were the order of the day. On the 22nd of June, Faneuil Hall was again crowded. James Otis, Thomas Cushing, Samuel Adams, and John Hancock were selected as representatives to meet Committees of other towns in a convention. At this meeting it was voted that the people should arm themselves. The convention met with delegates present from nearly ninety towns. The movement against the ministerial scheme had already become revolutionary.

Meanwhile in 1768, the general assembly was unceremoniously prorogued by Governor Bernard, but in May of the following year, the body was re-convened. On the meeting day the building was surrounded with British troops.

Otis made an address, declaring that free legislation would be impossible in the presence of an armed soldiery. He moved the appointment of a committee to remonstrate with the Governor, and to request the withdrawal of the soldiers. To this the Governor replied evasively that he had not the authority to order the withdrawal of the military. Otis in answer reported that the Governor's reply was according to English law, more impossible than the thing which the Assembly had petitioned for.

The matter resulted in the adjournment of the body to meet at Cambridge, in the chapel of Harvard College. Assembled at that place the legislature was addressed by Otis with impassioned eloquence. The people as well as the legislators were gathered.

"The times are dark and trying," said the speaker. "We may soon be called on in turn to act or to suffer." "You," he continued, "should study and emulate the models of ancient patriotism. To you your country may one day look for support, and you should recollect that the noblest of all duties is to serve that country, and if necessary to devote your lives in her cause."

The House soon prepared a paper to be sent to the British Ministry denouncing the administration of Governor Bernard and protesting against the further presence of a British Soldiery in Boston. On the 27th of June, 1769, the representatives went further and prepared a petition, praying for the removal of Bernard from the government. This they might well do for the king had already recalled him!

The Governor went away in such odor as the breezes of the Old Bay have hardly yet dissipated. He went away, but in the fall added his compliments to the Americans by the publication of sundry letters in which they were traduced and vilified. To this James Otis and Samuel Adams, were appointed a committee to reply. They did so in a pamphlet entitled "An Appeal to the World, or a Vindication of the Town of Boston," etc.

It was in these tumultuous and honorable labors and excitements extending over a period of fully ten years that the intellect of James Otis became overstrained and, at length, warped from its purpose.

We may regard his rational career as ending with the year 1769. In September of this year it was noticed that he had become excitable, and that his natural eccentricity was accented at times to the extent of rendering his conduct irrational.

It was at this time that he published in the Boston "Gazette" what he called an advertisement, in which he placarded the four commissioners of customs, on the ground that they had assailed his character, declaring that they had formed a confederacy of villainy, and warning the officers of the crown to pay no attention to them.

On the evening of the following day, Mr. Otis went into a coffee-house where John Robinson, one of the commissioners whom he had lampooned, was sitting. On entering the room, Mr. Otis was attacked by Robinson who struck him with his cane. Otis struck back. There was a battle. Those who were present were Robinson's friends. The fight became a melee.

A young man named Gridley undertook to assist Otis, but was himself overpowered and pitched out of the house. Mr. Otis was seriously wounded in the head, and was taken to his house, bleeding and exhausted. The principle wound appeared to be inflicted with a sword; it was in the nature of a cut, and an empty scabbard was found on the floor of the room in which the altercation occurred.

On the morrow, Boston was aflame with excitement. Otis was seriously injured; in fact he never recovered from the effects of the assault. He brought suit against Robinson, and a jury gave a judgment of two thousand pounds damages against the defendant. The latter arose in court with a writing of open confession and apology, and hereupon the spirited and generous Otis refused to avail himself of the verdict.

Could he have thrown off the effects of the injury in like manner, his last years might have been a happier sequel to a useful and patriotic life.

During the sessions of the Assembly, in the years 1770 and 1771, James Otis retained his membership, but the mental disease which afflicted him began to grow worse, and he participated only at intervals (and eccentrically) in the business of legislation.

In May of 1770, a town meeting was held in Boston, and a resolution of thanks was passed to the distinguished representative for his services in the General Assembly. This was on the occasion of his retirement into the country, in the hope of regaining his health. At the close, the resolution declared:

"The town cannot but express their ardent wishes for the recovery of his (Mr. Otis's) health, and the continuance of those public services, that must long be remembered with gratitude, and distinguish his name among the Patriots of America."

From this time forth the usefulness of James Otis was virtually at an end. In the immortal drama on which the curtain was rising —the drama of Liberty and Independence—he was destined to take no part. The pre-revolutionist in eclipse must give place to the Revolutionist who was rising. John Adams came after, not wholly by his own ambition, but at the call of inexorable History, to take the part and place of the great Forerunner.

What must have been the thoughts and emotions of that Forerunner when the minute men of Massachusetts came firing and charging after the British soldiers in full retreat from Concord Bridge and Lexington? With what convulsion must his mind, in semi-darkness and ruin, have received the news of the still greater deed at Bunker Hill? History is silent as to what the broken Titan thought and said in those heroic days.

The patriot in dim eclipse became at times wholly rational, but with the least excitement his malady would return. In conversation something of his old brilliancy would return in flashes. For the rest, the chimes in that high soul no longer played the music of reason, but gave out only the discords of insanity. He was never reduced to serious delirium or to violent frenzy, but he was an insane man; and under this shadow he walked for the greater part of ten years, during which Independence was declared and the Revolution fought out to a victorious end.

It was in this period of decline and obscuration that James Otis witnessed through the gathering shadows the rise to distinction and fame of many of the patriots whom he had led in the first campaigns for liberty. John Adams and Hancock were now at the fore battling for independence. Among those who rose to eminence in the immortal eighth decade was Samuel Alleyne Otis, who in 1776 was elected a representative in the great Congress of the Revolution. James did not live to see his brother become speaker of the House, but he witnessed in 1780 his service as a member of the Constitutional Convention of Massachusetts. Afterward, in 1787, he was a commissioner to negotiate a settlement with the participants in Shay's Rebellion. With the organization of the new national government he became Secretary of the Senate of the United States, and served in that capacity until his death, April 22, 1814.

In 1781, Mr. Otis was taken by his friend, Colonel Samuel Osgood, to the home of the latter in Andover. There the enfeebled patriot passed the remainder of his life. He became very obese, and his nervous excitability to an extent subsided.

He was amiable and interesting to his friends. His health was in some measure restored, but his intellectual strength did not return. He thought of going back to Boston, and in one instance he accepted and conducted a case in the court of Common Pleas; but his manner was that of a paretic giant.

The favorable turn in Mr. Otis's condition was at length arrested by an attempt on his part to dine with Governor Hancock. At the dinner he was observed to become first sad and then to waver into mental occultation. He was taken by his brother, Hon. Samuel Alleyne Otis, to Andover. The event convinced the sufferer that the end of his life was not distant.

Strange, strange are the foregleams of the things to come! On one occasion he said to his sister, Mrs. Warren, "I hope when God Almighty in his Providence shall take me out of time into eternity, it will be by a flash of lightning!" The tradition goes that he frequently gave expression to this wish. Did the soul foresee the manner of its exit?

A marvelous and tragic end was indeed at hand. On the 23d of May, 1783, only a few months before the Briton left our shores never to return but by the courtesy of the Republic, a thundercloud, such as the season brings in New England, passed over Andover.

James Otis stood against the lintel of the door watching the commotion of the elements. There was a crash of thunder. The lightning, serpent-like, darted from heaven to earth and passed through the body of the patriot! Instantly he was dead.

There was no mark upon him; no contortion left its snarling twist on the placid features of him who had contributed so much of genius and patriotic fire to the freedom and future greatness of his country—so much to the happiness of his countrymen.

On the 24th of the month the body of Mr. Otis was taken to Boston and was placed in modest state in his former home. The funeral on the 25th was conducted by the Brotherhood of Free and Accepted Masons to which Mr. Otis belonged. The sepulture was made, as narrated in the first pages of this monograph, in the Cunningham tomb in the Old Granary Burying Ground. In that tomb, also was laid six years afterwards, the body of Ruth Cunningham Otis, his wife. Out of this brief narrative of a great life, let each reader for himself deduce as he may, the inspiration and purpose, without which American citizenship is no better that some other.

Since the first pages of this monograph were written (in March 1898,) the Sons of the American Revolution have marked the grave of James Otis with a bronze reproduction of their armorial badge, and a small tablet, as seen in the Illustration on this page.

[1] John Adams attempts to classify the pre-revolutionary orators of New England according to their ardor and influence. "The characters," says he, "the most conspicuous, the most ardent and influential, from 1760 to 1766, were first and foremost, above all and over all, James Otis; next to him was Oxenbridge Thatcher, next to him Samuel Adams; next to him, John Hancock, then Doctor Mayhew."—Works of John Adams, Vol. X, p. 284.

If we should insert in this list the name of John Adams himself his place would be between his cousin and Hancock.

[2] In a further discussion of the prerogatives of the crown Mr. Otis said: "When the Parliament shall think fit to allow the colonists a representation in the House of Commons, the equity of their taxing the colonists will be as clear as their power is, at present, of doing it if they please."

THE CHARACTER OF JAMES OTIS BY CHARLES K. EDMUNDS, PH. D.

In viewing Washington as the "Father" of our country, as he certainly was in a sense which we of to-day are coming more and more to appreciate, in classing Hamilton and Jefferson as brothers of Washington in his great work, and in ascribing to Franklin even a greater share in establishing "The United States of America" than to any of these three, we are apt to forget those patriots who did so much to keep alive the spirit of liberty and justice in our land during the troublesome times preceding the actual rupture between England and her American Colonies. While we ascribe great and merited praise to those who not only helped to lay the foundation but also actually began to build the superstructure of our nationhood, let us not forget those who by reason of the slightly earlier day in which they strove needed even a clearer vision to follow the same plans. They labored before the day had dawned, and yet they held ever before them the same high-minded general principles of liberty and justice which actuated the lives of those who took up their work after them, when the light of Independence was fast breaking on our shores. Among these pre-revolutionists there is none more worthy of remembrance and admiration than James Otis, the foremost advocate of his time in the Colonies. Very vigorously he toiled in sowing seed the fruits of which he himself was not to see, but which under the nurture of other able hands and in the providence of the God of Nations budded at last into "The Great Republic." Thus it becomes the purpose of this article to recall briefly the most striking characteristics of him whose name must always be intimately associated with the ardent debates and the troublesome events which foreshadowed the great struggle between the greatest of colonizing nations and her greatest Colonies.

The exigency of these times was great; and men of courage and capacity, wise in council and prompt in action rose to meet it. They were not men ennobled merely by their appearance on the stage at the time when great scenes were passing. They took a part in those scenes with a degree of aptness and energy proportional to the magnitude of the occasion and throughout displayed high qualities of character.

Otis's part was played not so much in the revolution itself, as in the agitations and controversies by which it was heralded and its way prepared. "Admirably fitted by his popular talents, legal acquirements, and ardent temperament, to take an active share in the discussion respecting the comparative rights of the Colonies and the British Parliament, and in preparing the minds of his countrymen for the great step of a final separation from England, and having exhausted, as it were, his mental powers in this preparatory effort, his mind was darkened when the contest really came, and he remained an impotent spectator of the struggle, by which the liberties of his native land were at last permanently established."

The Life of James Otis as narrated by William Tudor is one of the most pleasant and instructive in the whole range of American biographies, and leaves few particulars in the personal life of Otis to be gathered by the subsequent investigator. The sketch by Francis Bowen in Jared Sparks' Library of American Biography furnishes additional and valuable illustrations of the character and services of Otis, which were secured from the third volume of Thomas Hutchinson's History of Massachusetts, (first published after Tudor's Life of Otis appeared), from the copies of papers in the office of the English Board of Trade relating to the colonial history of Massachusetts, and from the private correspondence of Governors Bernard and Hutchinson with the English Ministry, during the time of Otis's public career. These sources throw much light on the conduct of Otis as the chief political opponent of the these two colonial executives.

It is the purpose of the present article merely to emphasize the three striking traits of his character,—his impetuosity and earnestness, his high integrity and devotion to truth and justice, and his marked ability as an advocate before the bar.

In reading the memoirs of James Otis one is struck from first to last with the impetuosity, the earnestness, the ardent temper of his nature. This was at once the secret of a great measure of his power and also the partial source of his mental undoing. As a student at Harvard, the last two years of his college life were marked with great assiduity in study, and while at home during the vacations in this period, he devoted himself so closely to his books, that he was seldom seen by his friends, and often it was not known that he had returned, till he had been in his father's house for some days. Such severe application doubtless served to sow the first seeds of mental derangement, which falling on the fertile soil of his feverish disposition and nutured by the constant and intense argumentative strife of his later political career, finally found their fruition in the mental collapse which so distressingly darkened his latter days. When participating in the common amusements of youth he exhibited all the vivacity of an excitable temperament.

The earnestness of his nature led him to resign a lucrative office, renounce the favor of government, abandon the fairest prospects of professional emolument and distinction, and to devote himself to the service of his country with unflinching courage, quenchless zeal, and untiring energy.

As an orator the impetuosity of his speech and the earnestness of his voice and manner were so impressive, that they forced conviction upon his hearers even when his arguments did not reach their judgment. Such was the fluency and animation of his language, whether written or spoken, that though it was sometimes coarse and defective in taste, it was always, as will be seen from the examples quoted in this paper, extremely effective.

In political controversy the impetuosity of his nature led him to be irascible and harsh towards his opponents and sometimes hasty in judgment. But towards those whom he liked he was equally effusive in expressions of regard, and was generous, high-spirited and placable.

The fiery and impetuous temper of Otis is well illustrated by the following anecdote given by Tudor, who, however, does not vouch for its authenticity. Upon first taking his seat in the house, a friend sitting near, said: "Mr. Otis, you have great abilities, but are too warm, too impetuous; your opponents, though they cannot meet you in argument, will get the advantage by interrupting you, and putting you in a passion." "Well," said Otis, "if you see me growing warm, give me a hint, and I'll command myself." Later on when a question of some importance arose, Otis and this friend were on the Boston seat together. Otis said he was going to speak, and his companion again warned him against being irritated by interruptions from the opposition.

He soon rose, and was speaking with great fluency and powerful logic, when Timothy Ruggles interrupted him; he grew warm in reply, and his friend pulled his coat slightly. Otis scowled as he turned round, but taking the hint moderated his tone. Soon afterwards, Mr. Choate, of Ipswich, broke in on him again. This aroused his temper, and his coat was pulled a second time; turning round quickly he said in an undertone to his monitor, "Let me alone; do you take me for a schoolboy?" and continuing his address with great impetuosity he overwhelmed his opponent with sarcasm and invective.

Without doubt James Otis was a strong man,—a man of strong and positive character, whose friends and enemies were equally strong in their feelings of like and dislike. The men who were ranged as his enemies have for the most part been relegated to a second place on the page of history (this does not apply to Thomas Hutchinson, who in his official capacity was Otis's chief political opponent, but who did not exhibit the personal enemity of Bernard and others); while those who were his friends stand out boldly among the notable characters of the past. As Otis himself remarked concerning Charles Lee, we are not at a loss to know which is the highest evidence of his virtues—the greatness and number of his friends, or the malice and envy of his foes. But friends and foes alike agree in ascribing to him a very ardent temperament, though with the latter it is unjustly regarded as violent. There is a great contrast between the estimate of Otis given by Hutchinson (quoted below) and that exhibited in the following extract from a long letter written by Governor Bernard to Lord Shelburne, near the end of the year 1766, which is entirely filled with a review of Otis's career and character, and is a curious specimen of studied calumniation. The introductory remarks show sufficiently well the spirit of the whole. "I would avoid personalities, but in the present case it is impossible. The troubles in this country take their rise from, and owe their continuance to, one man, so much, that this history alone would contain a full account of them. This man, James Otis, Esq., was a lawyer at Boston when I first came to the government. He is by nature a passionate, violent, and desperate man, which qualities sometimes work him up to an absolute frenzy.—I say nothing of him, which is not known to be his certain character, confirmed by frequent experience."

While sympathy for Otis made the public commonly ascribe the alienation of his reason chiefly to the injuries received during his encounter with Robinson in the British Coffee House, it is fairly certain that the commencement of the disease dates further back, and that the blows on the head hastened and aggravated an already incipient malady superinduced by very different causes.

In the ardor and assiduity of his devotion to the colonial cause Otis had overtaxed his mental powers. His fine faculties that had been exerted so strenuously, and with such striking effect, in the service of his country, were sinking under the excitement and the effort which had sustained them in the heat of action. For ten years he had abandoned the ordinary practice of his profession and renouncing all recreation had given his entire time and thought, himself, verily, to the "great argument" which involved the welfare of the Colonies, and as we now see it, of the world. To allow one idea exclusive occupancy of the mind and constantly to ponder a single topic, is a very frequent and almost sure cause of mental distress. It was his highest merit and at the same time his greatest misfortune, that Otis permitted this political controversy to have such an absorbing and despotic command of his attention that melancholy consequences gradually appeared and left little hope of his final restoration. His excitable and passionate temperament allowed the fire to be soon kindled, and nourished the flame in which his intellect, strong as it had been, was ultimately destroyed.

Otis's mental malady first appeared in a form which was mistaken for mere eccentricity of humor, and some time elapsed before his oddities of fancy and conduct deepened into acknowledged insanity. An incident which might have aroused the suspicions of his friends occurred during the legislative session of 1769, when at the close of a powerful and ingenious speech by Brigadier Ruggles in which he had made a deep impression, Otis at once arose and in an impassioned tone and manner which struck awe upon all those present, exclaimed, "Mr. Speaker, the liberty of this country is gone forever, and I'll go after it;" and turning round immediately left the House. Some members stared, some laughed, but none seemed to suspect the true cause of this odd behavior.

How, after the encounter with Robinson, this mental disease made inroads on his fine powers, we best know from John Adams, who on September 3, 1769, wrote: "Otis talks all; he grows the most talkative man alive; no other gentleman in company can find space to put in a word. He grows narrative like an old man." On September 5th occurred the encounter with Robinson, one of the Commissioners of Customs, at the British Coffee House, which greatly aggravated his mental disorder. From this time on he was a subject of some perplexity to the Whig leaders, though the spell with which he influenced the people was long in breaking. On January 16, Adams again wrote: "Otis is in confusion yet; he loses himself; he rambles and wanders like a ship without a helm; attempted to tell a story which took up almost all the evening. * * * In one word, Otis will spoil the club. He talks so much, and takes up so much of our time, and fills it with trash, obsceneness, profaneness, nonsense, and distraction, that we have none left for rational amusements or inquiries. * * * I fear, I tremble, I mourn, for the man and for his country; many others mourn over him with tears in their eyes."

In connection with Otis's charge against Hutchinson as to rapacious office-seeking the following extract from John Adams's diary is of curious interest. After detailing certain detractions of which he had been the victim, the diarist breaks out testily: "This is the rant of Mr. Otis concerning me. * * * But be it known to Mr. Otis I have been in the public cause as long as he, though I was never in the General Court but one year.

I have sacrificed as much to it as he. I have never got my father chosen Speaker and Counselor by it; my brother-in-law chosen into the House and chosen Speaker by it; nor a brother-in-law's brother-in-law into the House and Council by it; nor did I ever turn about in the House, and rant it on the side of the prerogative for a whole year, to get a father into a Probate office first Justice of a Court of Common Pleas, and a brother into a clerk's office. There is a complication of malice, envy, and jealousy in this man, in the present disordered state of his mind, which is quite shocking." (Oct. 27, 1772.)

In this incapacity of Otis, who at last had to seek confinement, Samuel Adams came to the front of the opposition to Hutchinson as representing the government policy, and in nothing did he show more adroitness than in the manner in which he humored and exploited the colleague, whom, though sick, the people would not suffer to be withdrawn, as is shown by the following resolution:

RESOLUTION ADOPTED AT A TOWN MEETING IN BOSTON, MAY 8, 1770.

"The Honorable James Otis having, by advice of his physician, retired into the country for the recovery of his health; Voted, That thanks of the town be given to the Honorable James Otis for the great and important services, which, as a representative in the General Assembly through a course of years, he has rendered to this town and province, particularly for his undaunted exertions in the common cause of the Colonies, from the beginning of the present glorious struggle for the rights of the British consituation. At the same time, the town cannot but express their ardent wishes for the recovery of his health, and the continuance of those public services, that must long be remembered with gratitude, and distinguish his name among the patriots of America."

During short periods of sanity, or of only partial aberration, Otis's wit and humor, rendered more quaint and striking by the peculiarities of his mental condition, made him the delight of a small circle of friends. The following anecdote, admirably told by President Adams, presents in a very graphic manner the peculiarities of his character:

"Otis belonged to a club, who met on evenings; of which club William Molineux was a member. Molineux had a petition before the legislature, which did not succeed to his wishes, and he became for several evenings sour, and wearied the company with his complaints of services, losses, sacrifices, etc., and said, 'That a man who has behaved as I have, should be treated as I am, is intolerable,' etc. Otis had said nothing; but the company were disgusted and out of patience, when Otis rose from his seat, and said, 'Come, come, Will, quit this subject, and let us enjoy ourselves; I also have a list of grievances; will you hear it?' The club expected some fun, and all cried out, 'Ay! ay! let us hear your list.'

"'Well, then, Will; in the first place, I resigned the office of the Advocate-General, which I held from the crown, that produced me—how much do you think?' 'A great deal, no doubt,' said Molineux. 'Shall we say two hundred sterling a year?' 'Ay, more I believe,' said Molineux. 'Well, let it be two hundred; that for ten years, is two thousand. In the next place, I have been obliged to relinquish the greatest part of my business at the bar. Will you set that at two hundred more?' 'O, I believe it much more than that.' 'Well, let it be two hundred; this, for ten years, is two thousand. You allow, then, I have lost four thousand pounds sterling?' 'Ay, and much more, too,' said Molineux.

"'In the next place, I have lost a hundred friends; among whom were the men of the first rank, fortune, and power, in the province. At what price will you estimate them?' 'D—n them,' said Molineux; 'at nothing: you are better without them than with them.' A loud laugh. 'Be it so,' said Otis.

"'In the next place, I have made a thousand enemies; among whom are the government of the province and the nation. What do you think of this item?' 'That is as it may happen,' said Molineux.

"'In the next place, you know, I love pleasure; but I have renounced all amusement for ten years. What is that worth to a man of pleasure?' 'No great matter,' said Molineux; 'you have made politics your amusement.' A hearty laugh.

"'In the next place, I have ruined as fine health, and as good a constitution of body, as nature ever gave to man.' 'This is melancholy indeed,' said Molineux; 'there is nothing to be said on that point.'

"'Once more,' said Otis, holding his head down before Molineux; 'look upon this head!' (Where was a scar in which a man might bury his finger.) 'What do you think of this? And, what is worse, my friends think I have a monstrous crack in my skull.'

"This made all the company very grave, and look very solemn. But Otis, setting up a laugh, and with a gay countenance, said to Molineux, 'Now, Willy, my advice to you is, to say no more about your grievances; for you and I had better put up our accounts of profit and loss in our pockets, and say no more about them, lest the world should laugh at us.'"

This whimsical dialogue put all the company, including Molineux, in a good humor, and they passed the rest of the evening very pleasantly.

One of the few fragments in Otis' handwriting now extant, is a memorandum made during the two years of transient sanity just preceding his tragic death. Returning one Sunday from public worship, he wrote: "I have this day attended divine service, and heard a sensible discourse; and thanks be to God, I now enjoy the greatest of all blessings, mens sana in copore sano" (a sound mind in a sound body). But this gleam of reason was as transient as others that had preceded, and with Bowen we willingly draw a veil over the sad record of this most terrible misfortune of our hero. "To be among men, and yet not of them; to preserve the outward form and lineaments of a human being, while the spirit within is wanting, or is transformed into a wreck of what it has been; is surely one of the most impressive and affecting instances of the ills to which mortality is exposed. It enforces with melancholy earnestness the moral lesson, that the only objects of the affections are the character and the intellect; and when these are destroyed, we look upon the external shape and features only as on the tomb in which the mortal remains of a friend repose. We even long for the closing of the scene, and think it would be far better if the now tenantless and ruined house were levelled with the ground."

A nice sense of honor was perhaps the second most striking point in Otis's energetic and strongly-marked character. Called by reason of his fame as an advocate to the management of suits even at a distance from home, and receiving the largest fees ever given to an advocate in the province, he yet disdained to suffer the success of any of his cases to rest on any petty arts or undue evasions. Conscious of possessing eminent abilities and sufficient learning he undertook to advocate no cause that he did not truly and fully believe in. His ardent pleading and the fairness of his dealing before the courts was the result of his firm belief in the justice of his cause. Nothing but truth could give him this firmness; but plain truth and clear evidence can be beat down by no ability in handling the quirks and substitutes of the law.

It was from this source as from no other that Otis drew his power as a pleader. He was as John Adams records concerning his speech on the "Writs of Assistance," "a flame of fire," but he was a flame of fire set burning to consume the dross of injustice and to purify and rescue the gold of liberty and fair-dealing. Thomas Hutchinson, before whom Otis often pleaded and whose testimony is of the greatest weight when we remember that Otis was his political opponent, has said that he never knew fairer or more noble conduct in a pleader than in Otis; that he always disdained to take advantage of any clerical error or similar inadvertence, but passed over minor points, and defended his causes solely on their broad and substantial foundations. In this regard Otis seems to satisfy Emerson's definition of a great man, when in his essay on the "Uses of Great Men" the latter declares: "I count him a great man who inhabits a higher sphere of thought, into which other men rise with labor and difficulty; he has but to open his eyes to see things in a true light, and in large relations; whilst they must make painful corrections, and keep a vigilant eye on many sources of error."

Indeed, it can be said of Otis as Coleridge said of O'Connell, "See how triumphant in debate and action he is. And why? Because he asserts a broad principle, acts up to it, rests his body upon it, and has faith in it." The world is upheld, as Emerson says, by the veracity of good men; and so the great power of Otis as an advocate before the civil bar in the minor cases of his career, and as an advocate of the people in the larger court in the great case of his life, for the liberty of opposing arbitrary power by speaking and writing the truth, arose almost entirely from his absolute integrity and fairmindedness. Clarendon's portrait of Falkland applies equally as well to Otis, —"He was so severe an adorer of the truth that he could as easily have given himself leave to steal as to dissemble." In short, Otis acted aright, and feared not the consequences, and thus became a power in the community because of his personal character.

The great popularity that he immediately acquired he used for no sinister or selfish ends. He stooped to none of the arts of the demagogue; he was never carried away by a blind spirit of faction. He opposed the arbitrary design of the English ministry with great spirit and firmness, though with some indiscretion; but he was no advocate of turbulent dissensions or causeless revolt. He allowed himself to be ruled by the greater moderation and prudence of his associates, while he inspired them with his own resistless energy and determination.

No imputation can justly be thrown on the sincerity of his patriotism, although the attempt was made by some of his contemporaries.

When in 1764, Otis, as chairman of a committee of the Assembly appointed to consider the status of the Sugar Act, favored the commission of Hutchinson as a special agent of the Colony to go to England and present the claims of the colonists, he was accused of inconsistency in opinion and action, and of dereliction of duty as the acknowledged leader of the patriotic party. Combined with the extraordinary appointment of Hutchinson, which however never took effect owing to the opposition of Governor Bernard, Otis was also charged with a too absolute recognition of the supremacy of Parliament in his pamphlet on the Rights of the Colonies. As his father had recently received a judicial appointment, of no great importance, however, some persons went so far as to suspect Otis's fidelity to the cause, among whom was John Adams, as we see from his diary quoted elsewhere in this paper. People talked of a compromise in which he was supposed to be engaged for gradually withdrawing all resistance to the proceedings of the ministry.

Such charges, however, were but the indications of the unsteadiness and injustice of fickle popular favor. The sacrifices which Otis made for the cause, as told of by himself in the narrative given in this paper, were far too heavy for his patriotism to be doubted for an instant, and any remaining doubt must certainly be removed by a glance at the official correspondence of Governor Bernard in which he is from first to last regarded as the chief opponent of the prerogative and is subjected to much calumny on that account.

The selection of Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson as the special agent of the Colony, though appearing at first sight somewhat strange, is easily explained and appears as the best possible choice. He was a native of the province, and as such thoroughly acquainted with its interests and desirous of promoting them. A few years before he had given sound advice to both Houses in relation to the very matter of the Sugar Act, counselling them not to apply for a reduction of the duty, lest they should appear as indirectly consenting to pay it under any circumstances; advice which had prevailed against the preconceived opinion of a majority of both branches of the legislature. Moreover, Hutchinson's attachment to the interests of the crown, and his intimate relations with the ministry, would enable him to prosecute the suit of the province to great advantage, whereas a known leader of the popular party in Massachusetts would not be received with much favor at the Board of Trade, whatever his errand.

As to Otis's rather unstinted recognition of the prerogatives of the crown and the right of Parliament to tax the Colonies, we remark that he had undoubtedly the same ends in view as the other popular leaders, but he differed from them in the choice of the means, the selection of arguments, and the proper mode of conducting the controversy. All certainly desired to be exempt from taxation and to secure freedom of trade; the question was how best attain these ends and reconcile their pretensions with the acknowledged principles of English law? Otis opposed both the Sugar Act and the Stamp Act on the same broad principle on which Hampden in England resisted the payment of ship-money, namely, that neither measure was sanctioned by the representatives of the people on whom these contributions for the support of the government were to be levied. He was too good a lawyer to question openly the abstract supremacy of Parliament, or to deny the technical "right" of this body to tax America, or to do anything else. But he affirmed that he could not justifiably exercise this right unless representatives elected by America were admitted to sit in the House of Commons. "When Parliament," said he, "shall think fit to allow the colonists a representation in the House of Commons, the equity of their taxing the colonists will be as clear as their power is at present of doing it, if they please." These opinions did not coincide with the sentiments of the greater part of the people at this period, and they were displeased with the explicit and comprehensive terms in which Otis acknowledged the authority of Parliament; they did not care to be reminded of their subjection in such positive language. Otis's incautious use of words may have led him to exaggerate the sovereignty of England over her Colonies, but the course which he pursued was undoubtedly the most judicious one for the interests of America.

That this criticism and disaffection concerning Otis was of short duration, and justly so, is shown by the fact that at the end of the legislative session he was appointed chairman of the committee charged with securing the co-operation of the other Colonies in a united effort of opposition to the scheme for taxing America. That he was sufficiently alive to the true interests of the Colonies and watchful of any imposition upon their rights as subjects under the English Constitution, we may cite one or two brief extracts from the letter of instructions to the provincial agent in England, written by him and adopted by the representatives. "The silence of the province," he says in regard to the Sugar Act, "should have been imputed to any cause, even to despair, rather than be construed into tacit cession of their rights, or an acknowledgment of a right in the Parliament of Great Britain to impose duties and taxes upon a people, who are not represented in the House of Commons." "Ireland is a conquered country, which is not the case with the northern Colonies, except Canada; yet no duties have been levied by the British Parliament on Ireland. No internal or external taxes have been assessed on them, but by their own Parliament."

"Granting that the time may come, which we hope is far off, when the British Parliament shall think fit to oblige the North Americans, not only to maintain civil government among themselves, for this they have already done, but to support an army to protect them, can it be possible that the duties to be imposed and the taxes to be levied shall be assessed without the voice or consent of one American in Parliament? If we are not represented, we are slaves."

The charge that Otis turned from his support of the government policy because his father failed to receive the desired appointment as Chief Justice is as unfounded as it is improbable.

The office of Chief Justice was worth not over a hundred and twenty pounds sterling a year, and as Colonel Otis's practice at the bar was worth much more than this, and his seat in the legislature gave him all the power and reputation he needed, the loss of the Chief Justiceship could not have been a very great concern to him. On the other hand one of the first measures of Otis in coming into public life was to resign his office as Advocate-General which was worth twice as much as the seat on the bench. Of course a person of his fiery disposition felt keenly the insult involved in the rejection of his father, and doubtless the event imbittered his language towards Hutchinson; but it would hardly be likely to shape his whole political career when public questions of such great moment were at stake.

There was no trace of meanness or selfishness in his disposition.

To be sure, Otis's admitted superiority over his legal associates and the natural impetuosity of his nature sometimes made him excessively dogmatic, and his manner though courteous even to a fineness towards those whom he liked was imperious and even unguarded toward his political enemies. At one time, having cited Dormat (the noted French jurist, 1625-1696, author of "The Civil Laws in their Natural Order," 1689) in the course of an argument, Governor Bernard inquired "who Dormat was." Otis answered that "he was a very distinguished civilian, and not the less an authority for being unknown to your excellency." Yet notice the high-minded courtesy exhibited in the following incident: When Charles Lee was in command of the left wing of the army with his headquarters at Winter Hill, in what is now Somerville, he refused to have an interview and conference with his old friend Burgoyne, then lately arrived in Boston, looking toward the restoration of an amicable understanding between the colonies and the mother country. Four months later, a letter came from the Old World containing a warning that Lee was not a man of trustworthy character. Otis was at that time the executive head of the provisional government which had been formed in Massachusetts, during one of the last of his lucid intervals. On behalf of the government he sent a letter to Lee, quite touching for its fairminded simplicity. The council had come into possesssion of a letter from Ireland making very unfavorable mention of Lee. It produced no impression upon the council. "On the contrary," says Otis, "we are at a loss to know which is the highest evidence of your virtues—the greatness and number of your friends, or the malice and envy of your foes." This was a most delicate and effective way of offering good advice.

When he had suffered so cruelly at the hands of Commissioner Robinson and his companions at the British Coffee House, and had been awarded damages by the court, Otis's high spirit revolted at the idea of receiving pecuniary compensation for a personal insult; and Robinson's release drawn up by Otis himself is to be found in the files of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, along with Robinson's written acknowledgment and apology.

Next to his impetuous devotion to the true relations of things, the source of Otis's power lay in his adequate preparation for the life of an advocate. Bred to the law at a time long before the pathway had been smoothed by the multiplication of elementary works and other modern improvements, he yet fully mastered that abstruse science, which perhaps does more to quicken and invigorate the understanding than many of the other kinds of learning put together. As a sufficient foundation for his later legal studies he had pursued at Harvard, the foremost college in the colonies, not only the regular undergraduate classical course, but also the three years of work required for the Master's degree. Moreover, in conformity with his views on the necessity of a generous and comprehensive culture of the mind as a means of success at the bar, or in any professional career, Otis did not plunge at once from his collegiate courses into the routine of the legal office; but allowed himself two years of self-directed general study with a view toward further disciplining his mind and widening his information. The subjects thus pursued and the general culture which he acquired served to open and to liberalize his mind in nearly the same proportion as the assiduous study of the law was next to invigorate and quicken it. In conversation with his brother he remarked, "that Blackstone's Commentaries would have saved him seven years' labor pouring over and delving in black letter." He appears to have formed a very correct judgment respecting the nature of professional education and the best means of mastering its abstruse details. He constantly inculcated upon the young men who came to study in his office the maxim, "that a lawyer ought never to be without a volume of natural or public law, or moral philosophy, on his table or in his pocket."

After two years of practice in Plymouth, he removed to Boston (1750), where he found the larger field which was demanded by his superior training and abilities; and he very soon rose to the front rank of his profession.

The regard which he entertained for his master in the law is well shown by his conduct as the opposing advocate during the hearing on the Writs of Assistance, when Otis having resigned his post of Advocate-General of the Province in order to champion the people's cause, the vacancy was filled by the appointment of Gridley. Otis held the character and abilities of his former teacher in very high respect, and allowed this differential feeling to appear throughout the trial. "It was," says John Adams, who was present on this occasion, and from whom nearly all the details of the course of this affair are derived, "it was a moral spectacle more affecting to me than any I have ever seen upon the stage, to observe a pupil treating his master with all the deference, respect, esteem, and affection of a son to a father, and that without the least affectation; while he baffled and confounded all his authorities, confuted all his arguments, and reduced him to silence." Nor was a suitable return wanting on the part of Mr. Gridley, who "seemed to me to exult inwardly at the glory and triumph of his pupil."

Though he made no pretensions to scholarship, some of his writings showed a cultivated taste and a love of literary pursuits, which were gratified so far as his numerous engagements in public service would permit. With a literary taste formed and matured by the study of Latin and Greek prosidy as constituted in the best models of antiquity, it is not surprising that his opinions on matters of criticism and scholarship were those of the Odd school, and that he decried all the forms of innovation in letters which had begun to show themselves in his day, and which he regarded as affectations. His constant advice to young people was if you want to read poetry, read Shakespeare, Milton, Dryden, and Pope; throw all the rest in the fire. And with the addition of but one or two names which have appeared since his time, such counsel is judicious advice even to-day.

His abilities were, perhaps, somewhat overrated in the admiring judgment of his contemporaries. His style as a writer was copious and energetic; but it was sometimes careless, coarse and even incorrect. His eloquence was better adapted to popular assemblies than to the graver occasions of legislative debate; in the halls of justice, it produced a greater effect on the jury than on the judge. "The few fragments of his speeches that were reported and are now extant give no idea of the enthusiasm that was created by their delivery. The elevation of his mind, and the known integrity of his purposes, enabled him to speak with decision and dignity, and commanded the respect as well as the admiration of his audience." While his arguments were sometimes comprehensive and varied, they generally related only to a few points which they placed in a very clear and convincing light. His object was immediate effect. He had studied the art of clear expression and forcible argument in order to act with facility and force upon the minds of others to such an extent as to convince them, and then to convert their conviction into action. He employed the facility and the power thus gained not for any personal agrandizement, but to advocate political reform for the good of the whole people.

In the latter part of his speech on the Writs of Assistance, he discussed the incompatibility of the acts of trade as lately adopted by the English Ministry with the charter of the colony. In so doing "he reproached the nation, Parliament, and King," says John Adams, "with injustice, illiberality, ingratitude, and oppression, in their conduct towards the people of this country, in a style of oratory that I never heard equalled in this or any other country." As to the effect of this oration in increasing the courage of the colonists, inciting them to scrutinize more closely and resist more strenuously, the claims of the British Ministry and Parliament, we have Adams's significant statement,— "I do say in the most solemn manner that Mr. Otis's oration against Writs of Assistance breathed into this nation the breath of life."

The longest and most elaborate production from his pen is the pamphlet on the "Rights of the Colonies." It affords a fair specimen of his impetuous and inaccurate rhetoric, his rapid and eager manner of accumulating facts, arguments, and daring assertions, and the "glowing earnestness and depth of patriotic feeling with which all his compositions are animated." It is not surprising that a book written in this style caused the author to be suspected of wildness and even of madness. But there was, as Bowen remarks, a method and a good deal of logical power in his madness.

The pamphlet was reprinted, circulated, and read in Great Britain and even attracted the attention of the House of Lords. In February, 1766, during a debate in that body on the disturbances in America, Lord Littleton made some allusion to the peculiar opinions of Mr. Otis, and spoke slightingly of his book. Lord Mansfield replied, "With respect to what has been said, or written, upon this subject, I differ from the noble Lord, who spoke of Mr. Otis and his book with contempt, though he maintained the same doctrine in some points, although, in others, he carried it further than Otis himself, who allows everywhere the supremacy of the crown over the colonies. No man on such a subject is contemptible. Otis is a man of consequence among the people there. They have chosen him for one of their deputies at the Congress, and general meeting from the respective governments. It was said the man is mad. What then? One madman often makes many. Massaniello was mad, no body doubts; yet for all that, he overturned the government of Naples. Madness is catching in all popular assemblies, and upon all popular matters.

The book is full of wildness. I never read it till a few days ago, for I seldom look into such things."

In some of his arguments he lays down general principles with a quaint extravagance which marks the peculiar humor of the man. "No government has the right to make hobby-horses, asses, and slaves of the subject; nature having made sufficient of the two former, for all the lawful purposes of man, from the harmless peasant in the field to the most refined politician in the cabinet; but none of the last, which infallibly proves that they are unnecessary." "The British constitution of government as now established in his Majesty's person and family, is the wisest and best in the world. The King of Great Britain is the best as well as the most glorious monarch upon the globe, and his subjects the happiest in the universe. The French King is a despotic, arbitrary prince, and, consequently, his subjects are very miserable." The last specimen which we shall quote comes from his defence of the objectionable passage in the remonstrance drawn up by Otis on behalf of the Assembly of 1762 against Governor Bernard's conduct in increasing the expenses of the colony without previously obtaining the consent of the Legislature. This passage was as follows: "No necessity can be sufficient to justify a House of Representatives in giving up such a privilege; for it would be of little consequence to the people, whether they were subject to George or Louis, the King of Great Britain or the French King, if both were arbitrary, as both would be, if both could levy taxes without Parliament." Afterwards in commenting on this passage he made the following defense of its apparent unpatriotic sentiment. "It may be objected, that there are some differences between arbitrary princes, in this respect, at least, that some are more rigorous than others. It is granted; but, then, let it be remembered, that the life of man is a vapor that soon vanisheth away, and we know not who may come after him, a wise man or a fool; though the chances, before and since Solomon, have ever been in favor of the latter."—"That I should die very soon after my head should be struck off, whether by a sabre or a broadsword, whether chopped off to gratify a tyrant by the Christian name of Tom, Dick, or Harry, is evident. That the name of the tyrant would be of no more avail to save my life, than the name of the executioner, needs no proof. It is, therefore, manifestly of no importance what a prince's Christian name is, if he be arbitrary, any more, indeed, than if he were not arbitrary. So the whole amount of this dangerous proposition may, at least in one view, be reduced to this, viz.: It is of little importance what a king's Christian name is. It is, indeed, of importance, that a king, a governor, and all good Christians, should have a Christian name; but whether Edward, Francis, or William, is of none, that I can discern."

A passage ascribed to Otis during a session of the legislature at Cambridge gives some idea of the character of his invective. It had been said in defence of some measure that it had been taken by the advice of Council, when Otis exclaimed, "Ay, by the advice of Council, forsooth! And so it goes, and so we are to be ruined! The Council are governed by his Excellency, his Excellency by Lord Hillsborough, Lord Hillsborough by his Majesty, his Majesty by Lord Bute, and Lord Bute by the Lord knows who. This recalls to mind what used to be said when I was a student in this place. It was observed at that time, that the President directed the scholars how they should act, madame directed the President, Titus, their black servant, governed madame, and the devil prompted Titus."

The most comprehensive and just appreciation of the character and work of Otis is given us by Francis Bowen in Jared Spark's Library of American Biography. In part he says: "The services which Mr. Otis rendered to this country were so conspicuous and important, that it is difficult to form an estimate of his character with the impartiality that history requires. Gratitude might justly efface the memory of his faults from the minds of those who have profited so largely by his patriotism and his virtues. But it is not necessary thus to seek excuses for his failings, or reasons for covering up the errors that he committed. The defects of his temperament and conduct may be freely mentioned, for they are not such as materially lessen our respect for him as a man. * * * * * * * * * * * "As the vindicator of American rights, during the period of colonial subordination, as the acknowledged leader, in Massachusetts, of the constitutional opposition to ministerial influence and parliamentary usurpation, the services of Mr. Otis cannot be too highly appreciated. * * * * * * * * * * * "He was not permitted to witness the grand result of his labors. He did not live to enjoy the final triumph; he can hardly be said to have survived till the opening of the struggle. But the historian who searches into the causes of this great event, and seeks to determine the comparative merits of the men who achieved it, will dwell long upon the services, and pay a just tribute of admiration and respect to the memory of James Otis."

THE USE AND ABUSE OF ARBITRARY POWER, Including Tracts from Burke, 0tis and Wilkes. By Charles K. Edmunds, Ph.D.

It is the honor of England that she had deposited in the virgin soil of her colonies the germ of freedom. Nearly all at their foundation, or shortly after, received charters which conferred the franchises of the mother country on the colonists. These charters were neither a vain show nor a dead letter, but really did establish and allow powerful institutions which impelled the colonists to defend their liberty, and to control the power by participating in it as constituted in the grant of supplies, the election of public councils, trial by jury, and the right of assembling to discuss the general affairs. To us of to-day these appear as common-sense or logically necessary rights; but we must remember that in those early days of colonization they were distinct privileges accorded in power to the colonists. And it is in these very privileges that we behold the germinating principle which was ultimately to bring to life the new republic then as yet unborn. For as Thomas Jefferson afterward wrote, "where every man is a sharer in the direction of his town-republic, and feels that he is a participator in the government of affairs, not merely at an election one day in the year, but every day; when there shall not be a man in the State who will not be a member of some one of its councils, great or small, he will let the heart be torn out of his body sooner than allow his power to be wrested from him by a Caesar or a Bonaparte. How powerfully did we feel the energy of this organization in the case of the embargo!"

Notwithstanding the widely different origin of the various colonists, the circumstances in which they were placed were so similar, that the same general form of personal character must inevitably have developed itself, and produced a growing consciousness of power and impatience of foreign imposition. The proximate independence of America need not have been a certainty, however, had the eyes of English statesmen not been blinded to the truth of the principles urged by such men as Otis in America and Burke in England. The causes which were to produce a final rupture were, to be sure, already at work (their full operation being delayed by the lack of union among the different provinces), but there was at the same time a warm hereditary attachment to the parent country, under whose wings the provinces had grown up, by whose arms they had been shielded, and by whose commerce, in spite of jealous restrictions, they had been enriched.

Indeed life in the Colonies was so closely related to that in the mother country that in a very marked degree, the history of the Colonies is only the more practical and laborious development of the spirit of liberty flourishing amid the conditions of life in the new country under the standard of the laws and traditions of the old country. As the eminent philosophical historian, M. Guizat, has said, "It might be considered the history of England herself." The resemblance is the more striking when we remember that the majority of the American Colonies and the more important of them were founded or increased the most rapidly at the very epoch when England was preparing to sustain, and in part already sustaining, those fierce conflicts against the pretensions of absolute power which were to obtain for her the honor of giving to the world the first example of a great nation free and well governed.

How similarly the state of affairs appeared, in the eyes of those who were not blinded by self-interest, on both sides of the Atlantic, is shown by the following extracts from Burke and Otis.

In 1770 Burke thus described the social and political conditions both at home and in the Colonies: "That the government is at once dreaded and contemned; that the laws are despoiled of all their respected and salutary terrors; that their inaction is a subject of ridicule and their enforcement of abhorrence; that rank, and office, and title, and all the solemn plausibilities of the world, have lost their reverence and effect; that our foreign politics are as much deranged as our domestic economy; that our dependencies are slackened in their affection and loosened from their obedience; that we know neither how to yield nor how to enforce; that hardly anything above or below, abroad or at home, is sound and entire; but that disconnection and confusion, in office, in parties, in families, in parliament, in the nation, prevail beyond the disorders of any former time, these are facts universally admitted and lamented."

When in 1768 troops were sent to Boston to prevent a repetition of the disturbances which had resulted from the arbitrary and insulting manner in which the commissioners of customs exercised their office, Otis was chosen moderator of the town meeting held in protest, and is reported to have declared "That in case Great Britain was not disposed to redress their grievances after proper applications, the inhabitants had nothing more to do, but to gird the sword to the thigh, and shoulder the musket." Another account presents a somewhat more temperate tone, representing Otis as "strongly recommending peace and good order, and the grievances the people labored under might in time be removed; if not, and we were called on to defend our liberties and privileges, he hoped and believed we should, one and all, resist even unto blood; but at the same time, he prayed Almighty God it might never so happen."

The change from favorable conditions both in England and in the Colonies to the state of unrest depicted by these passages from Burke and Otis, had been brought about by the attempt to use strong measures, enforced with no just regard for the welfare of the whole people. The English Ministry failed to realize that it is of the utmost importance not to make mistakes in the use of strong measures; that firmness is a virtue only when it accompanies the most perfect wisdom. Their course of political conduct, combined with the establishment of a system of favoritism both at home and abroad like that adopted by Henry the Third of France, produced results of the same kind as the latter.

Members of parliament for the most part were practically convinced that they did not depend on the affection or opinion of the people for their political being, and gave themselves over, with scarcely the appearance of reserve, to the influence of the court. There was thus developed both a ministry and parliament unconnected with the people, and we have the deplorable picture of the executive and legislative parts of a government attempting to exist apart from their true foundation—the opinion of the people. How signally such attempts have always failed is a matter of historical record. And the steadfast belief that they always will so fail constitutes the great force of public opinion to-day.

Had the English Ministry and the Colonial Governors, in particular Governor Bernard of Massachusetts, recognized certain cardinal principles of individual and national liberty, which were so strongly advocated by Burke and Otis, the course of events in their dealing with the colonists would in all probability have been greatly different from that actually developed. Burke declared that as long as reputation, the most precious possession of every individual, and as long as opinion, the great support of the state, depend entirely upon the voice of the people, the latter can never be considered as a thing of little consequence either to individuals or to governments. He pointed out that nations are governed by the same methods, and on the same principles, by which an individual without authority is often able to govern those who are his equals or even his superiors, namely, by a knowledge of their temper, and by a judicious management of it; that is, when public affairs are steadily and quietly conducted, not when government descends to a continued scuffle between the magistrate and the multitude, in which sometimes the one and sometimes the other is uppermost; each alternately yielding and prevailing in a series of contemptible victories and scandalous submissions. "The temper of the people amongst whom he presides ought, therefore, to be the first study of a statesman. And the knowledge of this temper it is by no means impossible for him to attain, if he has not an interest in being ignorant of what it is his duty to learn."

Of course it will not do to think that the people are never in the wrong. They have frequently been so, both in other countries and in England; but in all disputes between them and their rulers, the presumption is at least upon a par in favor of the people. History justifies us in going even further, for when popular discontents have been very prevalent something has generally been found amiss in the constitution, or in the conduct of the government. As Burke declares, "the people have no interest in disorder. When they do wrong, it is their error, and not their crime. But with the governing part of the state it is far otherwise. They certainly may act ill by design, as well as by mistake. * * * If this presumption in favor of the subjects against the trustees of power be not the more probable, I am sure it is the more comfortable speculation; because it is more easy to change an administration than to reform a people."

Very much the same ideas are presented by Otis in his article on the "Rights of the Colonists," and the passage bearing on this present topic will be given for comparison with Burke's treatment. The pamphlet is divided into four parts, treating respectively of the origin of government, of colonies in general, of the natural rights of colonists, and of the political and civil rights of the British colonists. The writer maintains, that government is founded not as some had supposed on compact, but as Paley afterwards affirmed, on the will of God. By the divine will, the supreme power is placed "originally and ultimately in the people; and they never did, in fact, freely, nor can they rightfully, make an absolute, unlimited renunciation of this divine right. It is ever in the nature of a thing given in trust; and on a condition the performance of which no mortal can dispense with, namely, that the person or persons, on whom the sovereignty is conferred by the people, shall incessantly consult their good. Tyranny of all kinds is to be abhorred, whether it be in the hands of one, or of the few, or of the many.

The colonies were not at all unwilling to pay revenue to the home government, if the manner of payment was just and right. They were so far from refusing to grant money that the Assembly of Pennsylvania resolved to the following effect: "That they always had, so they always should think it their duty to grant aid to the crown, according to their abilities, whenever required of them in the usual constitutional manner." This resolution was presented by Franklin, who was a member of the Pennsylvania Assembly, to the Prime Minister of England, Mr. Grenville, before the latter introduced the Stamp Act into Parliament. Other colonies made similar resolutions, and had Grenville instead of the Stamp Act, applied to the King for proper requisitional letters to be circulated among the colonies by the Secretary of State, it is highly probable that he would have obtained more money from the colonies by their voluntary grants than he himself expected from the stamps. Such at any rate is the claim of Franklin, who was surely in a position to feel the pulse of the colonies better than any other one man. "But he (Grenville) chose compulsion rather than persuasion, and would not receive from their good-will what he thought he could obtain without it. Thus the golden bridge which the Americans were charged with unwisely and unbecomingly refusing to hold out to the minister and parliament, was actually held out to them, but they refused to walk over it."

The action of the English Ministry in the matter of the tea tax in particular, and of the whole question of American taxation in general, is thus spoken of by Burke in his famous address in the House of Commons:

"There is nothing simple, nothing manly, nothing ingenious, open, decisive, or steady, in the proceeding, with regard either to the continuance or the repeal of the taxes. The whole has an air of littleness and fraud. * * * There is no fair dealing in any part of the transaction." * * * * * * * * * * * "No man ever doubted that the commodity of tea could bear an imposition of three-pence. But no commodity will bear three-pence, or will bear a penny, when the general feelings of men are irritated, and two millions of people are resolved not to pay. The feelings of the colonists were formerly the feelings of Great Britain. Theirs were formerly the feelings of Mr. Hampden when called upon for the payment of twenty shillings. Would twenty shillings have ruined Mr. Hampden's fortune? No, but the payment of half twenty shillings, on the principle it was demanded, would have made him a slave. * * * It is then upon the principle of this measure, and nothing else, that we are at issue." * * * * * * * * * * * "I select the obnoxious colony of Massachusetts Bay, which at this time (but without hearing her) is so heavily a culprit before parliament—I will select their proceedings even under circumstances of no small irritation. For, a little imprudently, I must say, Governor Bernard mixed in the administration of the lenitive of the repeal no small acrimony arising from matters of a separate nature. Yet see, Sir, the effect of that lenitive, though mixed with these bitter ingredients; and how this rugged people can express themselves on a measure of concession.

"'If it is not in our power,' (say they in their address to Governor Bernard), "in so full a manner as will be expected, to show our respectful gratitude to the mother country, or to make a dutiful and affectionate return to the indulgence of the king and parliament, it shall be no fault of ours; for this we intend, and hope we shall be able fully to effect.'

"Would to God that this tender had been cultivated, managed, and set in action; other effects than those which we have since felt would have resulted from it. On the requisition for compensation to those who had suffered from the violence of the populace, in the same address they say, 'The recommendation enjoined by Mr. Secretary Conway's letter, and in consequence thereof made to us, we will embrace the first convenient opportunity to consider and act upon.' They did consider; they did act upon, it. They obeyed the requisition. I know the mode has been chicaned upon, but it was substantially obeyed, and much better obeyed than I fear the parliamentary requisition of this session will be, though enforced by all your rigour, and backed with all your power. In a word, the damages of popular fury were compensated by legislative gravity. Almost every other part of America in various ways demonstrated their gratitude. I am bold to say, that so sudden a calm recovered after so violent a storm is without parallel in history. To say that no other disturbance should happen from any other cause, is folly. But as far as appearances went, by the judicious sacrifice of one law, you procured an acquiescence in all that remained. After this experience, nobody shall persuade me, when a whole people are concerned, that acts of lenity are not means of conciliation."

"0PP0SITI0N T0 ARBITRARY POWER," By John Wilkes, 1763.

While Otis and other patriots were opposing the arbitrary measures of the English Ministry in their dealings with the Colonies, certain men in England were equally as ardent in their opposition to such a course whether pursued at home or abroad. Most prominent among these were Edmund Burke and John Wilkes, both members of Parliament. In this connection the following extracts frown Wilkes' article on "Opposition to Arbitrary Power" will be of interest. This article appeared in the famous No. 45 of "The North Briton," edited by Wilkes, who was very clever but somewhat profligate.

* * * "In vain will such a minister (referring to Lord Bute), or the foul dregs of his power, the tools of corruption and despotism, preach up in the speech that spirit of concord, and that obedience to the laws, which is essential to good order. They have sent the spirit of discord through the land, and I will prophesy, that it will never be extinguished, but by the extinction of their power. Is the spirit of concord to go hand in hand with the Peace and Excise, through this nation? Is it to be expected between an insolent Excisemen, and a peer, gentleman, freeholder, or farmer, whose private houses are now made liable to be entered and searched at pleasure? The spirit of concord hath not gone forth among men, but the spirit of liberty has, and a noble opposition has been given to the wicked instruments of oppression. A nation as sensible as the English, will see that a spirit of concord when they are oppressed, means a tame submission to injury, and that a spirit of liberty ought then to arise, and I am sure ever will, in proportion to the weight of the grievance they feel. Every legal attempt of a contrary tendency to the spirit of concord will be deemed a justifiable resistance, warranted by the spirit of the English constitution.

"A despotic minister will always endeavor to dazzle his prince with high-flown ideas of the prerogative and honor of the crown, which the minister will make a parade of firmly maintaining. I wish as much as any man in the kingdom to see the honor of the crown maintained in a manner truly becoming Royalty.

* * * * The prerogative of the crown is to exert the constitutional powers entrusted to it in a way not of blind favor and partiality, but of wisdom and judgment. This is the spirit of our constitution. The people too have their prerogative, and I hope the fine words of Dryden will be engraven on our hearts: 'Freedom is the English Subject's Prerogative.'"

JOSEPH WARREN'S OPINION OF GOVERNOR BERNARD, OTIS'S PRINCIPAL ENEMY.

Governor Bernard's bad temper and bad taste in dealing with the legislature may justly be ranked among the principal causes which gradually, but effectually, alienated the affections of the people of Massachusetts, first from the persons immediately charged with the government of the province, and finally, from the royal authority and whole English dominion. "With an arrogant and self-sufficient manner, constantly identifying himself with the authority of which he was merely the representative, and constantly indulging in irritating personal allusions, he entirely lost sight of the courtesy and respect due to a co-ordinate branch of the government, and made himself ridiculous, while he was ruining the interests of the sovereign whom he was most anxious to serve. Even Hutchinson, as we learn from the third volume of his History, though he was attached to the same policy, and favored the same measures, censures the tone of Bernard's messages as ungracious, impolitic, and offensive."

Popular animosity against Governor Bernard waxed exceedingly strong during the controversy concerning the circular letter sent by the Massachusetts Assembly to each House of Representatives in the thirteen Colonies, in which the Colonies were urged to concert a uniform plan for remonstrance against the government policy. Bernard sent advices to England declaring that stringent measures were imperative. Among those who were particularly vehement in their denunciation of Bernard's character and conduct was Joseph Warren, a young physician of twenty-seven years, Otis's brother-in-law, for some time a writer for the papers, who was even more drastic than Otis in his arraignment of Bernard's tactics as governor, and who caused somewhat of a sensation by publishing the following in the "Boston Gazette" of February 29, 1768. (Warren was killed while serving as a volunteer aide at the battle of Bunker Hill.)

"We have for a long time known your enmity to this Province. We have had full proof of your cruelty to a loyal people. No age has, perhaps, furnished a more glaring instance of obstinate perseverance in the path of malice. * * * Could you have reaped any advantage from injuring this people, there would have been some excuse for the manifold abuses with which you have loaded them. But when a diabolical thirst for mischief is the alone motive of your conduct, you must not wonder if you are treated with open dislike; for it is impossible, how much soever we endeavor it, to feel any esteem for a man like you. * * * Nothing has ever been more intolerable than your insolence upon a late occasion when you had, by your jesuitical insinuations, induced a worthy minister of state to form a most unfavorable opinion of the Province in general, and some of the most respectable inhabitants in particular. You had the effrontery to produce a letter from his Lordship as a proof of your success in calumniating us. * * * We never can treat good and patriotic rulers with too great reverence. But it is certain that men totally abandoned to wickedness can never merit our regard, be their stations ever so high.

'If such men are by God appointed, The Devil may be the Lord's anointed.' A TRUE PATRIOT.

Hutchinson tried to induce the grand jury to indict Warren for libel on account of this intemperate attack. The jury, however, returned "ignoramus," and the Governor had to bear the affront, which was but one of a series directed against him during his remaining days in America.

On the other hand, direct attacks were also made against Otis, and some were marked by scurrility and coarseness of language, which could not fail to arouse a man of his temper and fine sense of honor. How he did regard them appears from the following extract from a letter to his sister, Mrs. Warren:

"Tell my dear brother Warren to give himself no concern about the scurrilous piece in Tom Fleet's paper. It has served me as much as the song did last year. The tories are all ashamed of this, as they were of that; the author is not yet certainly known, though I think I am within a week of detecting him for certain. If I should, I shall try to cure him once for all, by stringing him up, not bodily, but in such a way as shall gibbet his memory in terrorem. It lies between Bernard, Waterhouse, and Jonathan Sewall. The first, they say, has not wit enough to write anything; the second swears off; and the third must plead guilty or not guilty as soon as I see him. Till matters are settled in England, I dare not leave this town, as men's minds are in such a situation, that every nerve is requisite to keep them from running to some irregularity and imprudence; and some are yet wishing for an opportunity to hurt the country."

OTIS'S AFFECTION FOR ENGLAND IN SPITE OF HIS OPPOSITION TO THE ARBITRARY MEASURES OF HER MINISTRY. By Charles K. Edmunds, Ph. D.

Otis defended the rights of his countrymen by vindicating their enjoyment of English liberty, not by asserting the demand for American independence. He, however, sowed the seed without knowing what kind of harvest it was to produce, for his writings and speeches did more than those of any other man toward preparing the minds of others for the final separation from England. That such was his purpose he steadfastly repudiated, and the following quotations from his pen exhibit full well his attachment to the mother country and to the principles of her constitution.

When in January, 1763, the joyful news was received at Boston that the preliminaries of peace between Great Britain and France had been signed, and that Canada was permanently annexed to the former country, the colonists justly rejoiced, and a town meeting was held of which Otis was chosen moderator. In the course of his speech, Otis declared in his usual earnest way that "the true interests of Great Britain and her plantations are mutual, and what God in his providence united, let no man dare attempt to pull asunder." Similar sentiments expressed by other leaders among the various Colonies might be quoted. We give one more from Otis's pamphlet on the "Rights of the Colonies," published in 1765. In speaking of the colonists, he says: "Their loyalty has been abundantly proved, especially in the late war. Their affection and reverence for their mother country are unquestionable. They yield the most cheerful and ready obedience to her laws, particularly to the power of that august body, the Parliament of Great Britain, the supreme legislative of the kingdom and its dominions. These, I declare, are my own sentiments of duty and loyalty." He angrily repels the charge that the Colonies were seeking for independence, insisting that the people had a "natural and almost mechanical affection for Great Britain which they conceive under no other sense, and call by no other name, than that of home. We all think ourselves happy under Great Britain. We love, esteem, and reverence our mother country, and adore our King. And could the choice of independency be offered the colonies or subjection to Great Britain on any terms above absolute slavery, I am convinced they would accept the latter."

In 1769 he wrote: "The cause of America is, in my humble opinion, the cause of the whole British empire; an empire which, from my youth, I have been taught to love and revere, as founded in the principles of natural reason and justice, and upon the whole, best calculated for general happiness of any yet risen in the world. In this view of the British empire, my Lord, I sincerely pray for its prosperity, and sincerely lament all adverse circumstances. Situated as we are, my Lord, in the wilderness of America, a thousand leagues distant from the fountains of honor and justice, in all our distresses, we pride ourselves in loyalty to the King, and affection to the mother country."

OTIS AS A PROPHET.

Otis was not much given to general speculations upon the future; but there is something very striking in the following language, taken from his pamphlet "The Rights of the Colonies," if we consider how soon after there occurred the two great crises in the world's affairs, the American and French revolutions. "I pretend neither to the spirit of prophecy, nor to any uncommon skill in predicting a crisis; much less to tell when it begins to be nascent, or is fairly midwived into the world. But I should say the world was at the eve of the highest scene of earthly power and grandeur, that has ever yet been displayed to the view of mankind. The cards are shuffling fast through all Europe. Who will win the prize is with God. This, however, I know, detur digniori. The next universal monarchy will be favorable to the human race; for it must be founded on the principles of equity, moderation, and justice."

JAMES OTIS. [1725 - 1783.] By G. Mercer Adam[3]

The character and life-work of few men belonging to the pre-Revolutionary era are better worth studying than are those of James Otis, the patriot-orator of Massachusetts, who took so prominent a part in opposing England's obnoxious Stamp Act and in arousing the American Colonies to a sense of the outrage done them by the issue of the arbitrary Writs of Assistance. Though the records of his personal life are somewhat meagre, sufficient is known of Otis's public career to interest students of his country's history and entitle him to the admiration of all, as one of the most earnest and eloquent advocates of Liberty in the Nation's youth-time, and a sturdy and noble defender of its cause at the critical era of England's injustice and oppression. No man of the period, it may be hazarded, did more yeoman service than Otis did in the cause of American Freedom, or was more sensible of the rights of the Colonists and of the injustice done them by the Motherland in her assaults on their civil and political status in the years preceding the Revolution. Not only was he one of the most fearless asserters of the great principles for which our forefathers fought and bled, but few men better than he saw more clearly the malign character of the arbitrary acts imposed upon the Colonies that brought about separation and laid the foundation of American independence. In resisting the enforcement of these Acts, Otis was actuated not only by disinterested and patriotic motives, but by a statesmanlike discernment of their unconstitutional character and the wrong they would inflict, in being inconsistent with the foundation charter of the Massachusetts Colony. Like many of the Revolutionary fathers, Otis was not at heart a rebel, or from the outset disloyal to the Crown in its administration of the affairs of the Colonies. His occupancy of the Crown post of Advocate-General and his own well-known integrity and conscientiousness forbid that idea, not to speak of his pride in the fact that his ancestors were English and for generations had held high judicial offices and militia appointments in the gift of the King and the ministry of the period. But though by tradition and training, at the outset of his career, a subject of monarchy and a true man in his official relations with England, Otis was at the same time ardent in his interests for the wellbeing of the Colonies and zealous for their rights and privileges. When these came into conflict, the stand he took was staunchly patriotic, even to the sacrifice of his office and its emoluments; while in espousing the popular cause against the King and the ministry he stood forth, as John Adams expressed it, as "a flame of fire," full of consuming zeal for his country and an ardent upholder of its rights and prerogatives. In assuming this attitude, that Otis's zeal and energy were at times unrestrained and his language occasionally unguarded and overvehement, is doubtless true; but this was certainly excusable in a man of his ardent temperament and strength of character; while the situation of affairs was such as to call not only for patriotic enthusiasm, but for righteous indignation and heated denunciation, in a cause that stirred to the depths the heart and brain of an impetuous and commanding orator. Nor do we well to forget what this consuming, patriotic passion and heated vindication of his country's rights cost Otis, in the responsibility he felt and the solicitation he manifested, especially in the middle and later stages of his strenuous career, for the cause he had so keenly at heart. Pathetic is the story of the ailment that clouded his closing years; and only exculpatory can be the judgment now passed upon the man and his work when we consider what the strain was that he had long and anxiously borne and that revealed its effects in periods of sad mental alienation and incipient madness. To speak and write strongly on taxation and its injustice, in the case of the Colonies, might well, however, disturb the mental equilibrium of even a strong man, and the more so when actively protesting, as Otis long continued to protest, against unlawful encroachments upon the liberties of the Colonies and the other arbitrary acts that then characterized the administration of the Crown. Whatever it cost Otis personally to engage in this defence, the result, as we all now know and admit, was only and wholly beneficent—in the defeat of an unrighteous autocracy, and the emancipation of a Continent from a fettering and baleful administration.