His essays, orations, and addresses were surprisingly numerous, and upon a great variety of subjects.

It cannot be said, however, that he contributed any thing to the permanent literature of the country.

Nor, in a true estimate of his extraordinary career in Congress, can it be asserted that he attained the first rank as a parliamentary debater.

It must be borne in mind that much of his fame in the House of Representatives was derived from the nature of the one question with which he became so conspicuously identified.

It was in large degree the moral courage of his position which first fixed the attention of the country and then attracted its admiration.