Page:Visit of the Hon. Carl Schurz to Boston, March 1881.pdf/49

34 summons, Mr. Chairman, I will say a few words on that theme.

You will not imagine that I have any reference to that large class of public men who are described as office-brokers. That, gentlemen is certainly the meanest business now anywhere done. The very word is an insult to an honest and useful trade which, I see, is honorably represented at these tables.

The modern statesman needs, in the first place, the power of clear, forcible, and persuasive exposition. Especially is this the case in a republic where millions of voters have to be instructed in matters of public policy, and crass ignorance is often to be found even in intelligent representative bodies. The statesman seldom deals with new principles or ideas; his task is to show how to treat new cases by old rules; his business is wisely to apply well-established principles under more or less novel conditions. Look at the speeches made by our distinguished guest during the twenty years past, and you will find that they treat of well-worn themes,—such as slavery, executive usurpation of powers, discontented populations, international relations, public finance, currency, public works, and civil service. These subjects have all been treated with the utmost thoroughness, both theoretically and practically, in one nation or another, at one time or another, in the history of the modern world. Indeed, some of them have been repeatedly worked out to