And now, Sir, in the name of that Public Faith which is the very ligament of civil society, and which the great Roman orator tells us it is detestable to break even with an enemy, I arraign this scheme, and hold it up to the judgment of the country. There is an early Italian story of an experienced citizen, who, when told by his nephew, at the University of Bologna, that he had been studying the science of _Right_, said in reply, "You have spent your time to little purpose. It would have been better, had you learned the science of _Might_, for that is worth two of the other"; and the bystanders of that day all agreed that the veteran spoke the truth. I begin, Sir, by assuming that honorable Senators will not act in this spirit,--that they will not wantonly and flagitiously discard any obligation, pledge, or covenant, because they chance to possess the power,--that they will not substitute _might_ for _right_. Sir, the proposition before you involves not merely the repeal of existing law, but the infraction of solemn obligations, originally proposed and assumed by the South, after protracted and embittered contest, as a covenant of peace, with regard to certain specified territory therein described, namely, "All that territory ceded by France to the United States, under the name of Louisiana,"--according to which, in consideration of the admission into the Union of Missouri as a Slave State, Slavery was forever prohibited in all the remaining part of this territory which lies north of 36° 30´. This arrangement between different sections of the Union, the Slave States of the first part and the Free States of the second part, though usually known as the Missouri Compromise, was at the time styled a COMPACT. In its stipulations for Slavery, it was justly repugnant to the conscience of the North, and ought never to have been made; but on that side it has been performed. And now the unperformed outstanding obligations to Freedom, originally proposed and assumed by the South, are resisted. Years have passed since these obligations were embodied in the legislation of Congress, and accepted by the country. Meanwhile the statesmen by whom they were framed and vindicated have, one by one, dropped from this earthly sphere. Their living voices cannot now be heard, for the conservation of that Public Faith to which they were pledged. But this extraordinary lapse of time, with the complete fruition by one party of all the benefits belonging to it under the compact, gives to the transaction an added and most sacred strength. Prescription steps in and with new bonds confirms the original work, to the end, that, while men are mortal, controversies shall not be immortal. Death, with inexorable scythe, has mowed down the authors of this compact; but, with conservative hour-glass, the dread destroyer has counted out a succession of years, which now defile before us, like so many sentinels, to guard the sacred landmark of Freedom.