GENTLEMEN:--Our distinguished President paid the very highest compliment to the Press to-night; for, while he has given at least a fortnight's notice to every other gentleman, he only told me to-night that I had to respond to the toast of "The Press." But as I have attended a good many dinners of the New England Society, and never knew "The Press" to be called upon before midnight, I felt entirely safe. [Laughter.] Now, sir, I have spent an evening--some six hours--here, enjoying all the festivities and hospitalities of this occasion to the utmost, and at last I am called upon, at an hour when we are all full of jollity and mirth, to respond to a toast that in reality calls upon me for my most serious effort. [Applause.] I assure you that, had I known that I was to speak upon this subject to-night, I would, contrary to my usual custom, have been deliberately prepared [laughter]; for I, in reality, have a great deal to say upon that matter; and permit me to add that I have a somewhat peculiar qualification, for I have been a man within the press, "a chiel amang ye takin' notes, an' prentin' them;" and I have been again a man altogether outside of the press, not writing for months to his own people, and subject to receive all the gibes and criticisms and attacks of the press. [Applause.] "I know how it is myself." [Laughter.] "The Press of the Republic" is a text worthy of the noblest oration. It has a great, a high, and a holy duty. It is at once the leader and educator, and, on the other hand, the representative of the people. I can only touch on some points that I have in my mind, upon this occasion. It seems to me that we are passing through a period of peculiar importance regarding the value and influence of the press of the American Republic. There are times when I join with them in the most indignant denunciation, in the warmest appeal. There are times when I feel the cutting, cruel, stinging injustice of the American press. [Applause.] It is the duty of an editor, sitting, as he does, as a judge--and I mean all that the word implies--upon all that goes on about him in public life--it is his duty to hear both sides, and all sides, as deliberately and calmly as he may, and to pronounce a judgment that, so far as he knows, may be the judgment of posterity. [Applause.] It is true that he has two duties. We know that it is his duty to condemn the bad. When it is made perfectly clear that the bad man is really a bad man, a corrupter of youth, make him drink the hemlock, expel him, punish him, crush him. [Applause.]