Alas! how deeply is it to be lamented that this great statesman, as able as an impracticable man can be, when he knew that he was about to attempt a ladder upon the first round of which his boldest friend dared not even to place his foot, had not rather followed, in some respects at least, the example of his coadjutor and friend, James Madison. The coincidences in the occurrence of opportunities to make themselves useful to their country, and the contrasts in the ways in which these were improved and the consequences that followed, to be found in the public lives of these illustrious men, are both striking and instructive. In regard to one subject a partial reference to them has already been made. They were co-workers in a series of efforts to obtain from the Congress of the Confederation authority for the Federal head to levy and collect impost duties to enable it to perform the offices devolved upon the General Government by the Articles of Confederation, instead of trusting to the unsafe and unstable requisitions upon the States. No sooner had the first Congress of the new Government, established for that and other purposes, formed a quorum, than Mr. Madison, as we have already seen, before the executive branch had been organized, or even the President elect been informed of his election, introduced bills for the imposition and collection of duties on imported goods, which he pushed forward _de die in diem_ until they became laws, and the duties were in the process of being collected, and the public coffers in the way of being replenished. This good work he followed up in due time by the introduction into Congress of resolutions (and the most able support of them on its floor) in favor of a commercial policy recommended by the Secretary of State, Mr. Jefferson, to improve our trade and thus increase our revenue. These were the contributions of Mr. Madison, simple, practical, and direct like their author, for promoting the financial branch of the public service under the new Government, which was committed by President Washington to the special superintendence of Alexander Hamilton as Secretary of the Treasury. The Secretary's contributions to the same objects consisted of two very elaborate and very able reports, the first upon public credit, recommending the establishment of a funding system, and the second in favor of a national bank, embracing plans for each and, in the former, a scheme to raise funds for the payment of the interest of a debt to be funded. The _éclat_ which he acquired by these imposing state papers was so great, and many minds are still so much dazzled by the traditional splendor of their effects upon the credit and resources of the country as to render it not a little embarrassing to discuss, in a plain, matter-of-fact way, the questions of their real influence or non-influence upon our finances.