Ladies and gentlemen, friends and countrymen:  To the many acts of kindness received from the people of Maine, I have to add the welcome reception this evening.  The invitation of the Agricultural Society, with the attendant circumstances, serve further to impress me with the hospitality of ray fellow citizens of this State.  Coming here, an invalid, seeking the benefits which your clime would afford, and preceded by a reputation which was expected to prejudice you unfavorably towards me, I have everywhere met courtesy and considerate attention, from the hour I landed on your coast to the present time.  It was natural to ask, whence come these manifestations?  Is it because the opinion which had been formed has been found to be unjust, and the reaction has been in proportion to the previous impulse?  Or is it the exhibition of your regard for loyalty to one’s friends, and devotion by a citizen to the community to which he belongs?  Either the one or the other is honorable to you; but there is a broader and more beneficent motive—­the prompting of that sentiment which would cause you to recognize in every American citizen a brother.  That feeling which Daniel Webster indicated when he met me in company with your distinguished townsman, ex-Senator Bradbury, and taking us with the right hand and with the left, said in the peculiarly impressive manner which belonged to him, “My brethren of the North and of the South, how are ye?”

It is usual to offer to an Agricultural Society nothing less than a prepared address, and had I come with an intention to speak to you, I should not have failed to make that preparation which is evidence of due regard for the audience.  The invitation under which I now speak, having been given and accepted this evening, I have no power to do more than to offer you desultory remarks on such subjects as my visit to the Fair have suggested, and which may occur to me as I progress.

With great pleasure I have witnessed evidences of much attention and deep interest in agriculture.  It is the basis of all wealth.  It is the producer—­brings all new contributions to the general store.  The mechanic arts are essential to its success, and they serve by changing the form, to multiply the value of agricultural products.  And commerce too, by exchanging the products of individuals and of countries, enhances the value of labor, and increases the comfort of man.  They are all essential to each other.  I have no disposition to magnify or depreciate either, but my proposition is, that the soil is the source from which human wealth springs.  In addition to these pursuits, society requires what are termed liberal professions.  They are not producers, though they may contribute, by diffusing knowledge, to increase production.  They may be necessary to give security to property and to take care of some physical wants.  For instance you have lawyers and doctors; and the less need you have of them the better; for though necessary, like government, it is evil which makes them so.  As to another class—­those who have the cure of souls—­their mission is so sacred, their function so high as to place them beyond comment; and of them I have nothing to say, except that I propose to say nothing.