Calhoun as a Lawyer and Statesman. Ex-President Davis describes Mr. Calhoun socially as follows: " In 1845, as a member of the House of Representatives, I frequently visited Mr. Calhoun, who was then a senator, at his residence. His conversation was al ways instructive and peculiarly attractive. The great question of the day was on giving notice to Great Britain of a termination of the joint occupation of Oregon. He and his colleague, the brilliant orator McDuffie, did not fully concur, as I had occasion to learn, being one of several in a private conversa tion. There was great excitement in the country, and there was believed to be immi nent danger of a war with Britain." The Presbyterian reader will be pleased to learn that Mr. Calhoun greatly admired Dr. James H. Thornwell, who, as a pulpit-orator, erudite scholar, and profound theologian, was the peer of any on the American conti nent. Indeed, Dr. J. Marion Sims, in his de lightful autobiography, tells us that Mr. Cal houn regarded Thornwell as the coming man of the South, and had picked him out as his own successor. It is gratifying to know that Dr. Thornwell reciprocated this appreciation in full measure, having himself for Calhoun the greatest esteem and admiration. Mr. Calhoun was brought up under Presby terian influences and, though in later life he, with his family usually attended the Episco pal church at Pendleton, still it is thought that he retained throughout his life the Pres byterian ideas, which he had imbibed in his youth. When he attended church, he seems to have given close attention to the words of the preacher. Dr. Pinckney, in last year's July number of " Lippincott's Magazine," gives an interesting incident illustrating this fact. As I remember it, it came under his own obser vation. It seems that on a partictdar Sab bath, the Episcopal clergyman at Pendleton had preached on the importance of attend ance upon divine worship. The doctor, then a boy, had noticed that Mr. Calhoun sat with his eyes closed, apparently taking a nap dur
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ing most of the sermon. On their way home from church, he and his father overtook Mr. Calhoun. His father remarked to the former that their preacher had given them a fine ser mon that day. Now, thought young Pinck ney, Mr. Calhoun has been caught napping again. Very much to his surprise, however, after assenting to his father's comment, Mr. Calhoun rehearsed the four points in favor of attendance upon public worship which the preacher had made, and then went on to say that he might have added a fifth, namely, the social benefit. He amplified this point by saying that, if two persons were estranged, they could hardly sit in their pews, Sabbath after Sabbath, hearing the same sermons, singing the same songs, and listening to the same prayers, without their hearts becoming softened and their feeling a disposition to be come reconciled. Dr. Pinckney easily solved the matter afterwards, when he learned that Mr. Calhoun, while presiding over the Sen ate, often closed his eyes and yet paid the strictest attention to what was going on. Mr. Calhoun believed in an overruling Providence, who controls all things and governs all creatures and all their actions. He was a firm believer in the great cardinal doctrines of the Christian religion. I have already quoted what he said to a friend in his last days : " I have an unshaken reliance up on the providence of God." Indeed the great truths of religion became part and parcel of his mental and moral make-up, were im bedded in his life, and permeated his speeches and writings. That Mr. Lamar was so im pressed I infer from what he says of him in his Charleston oration. Mr. Lamar says: "Nothing in the works of theological writers can be found stronger than his repeated assertion of the superinten dence of Divine Providence over the govern ment of man. He also firmly believed that the voice of a great people uttered for the benefit of the whole community through or gans so constituted as to suppress the voice of selfish factions and interests, and to ex
