The same peculiarity can be discerned in his letters. The fun and humor
which had hitherto run through his correspondence seems now to fade away as
if blighted. On September 10, 1850, he writes to Mr. Harvey that since
March 7 there has not been an hour in which he has not felt a "crushing
sense of anxiety and responsibility." He couples this with the declaration
that his own part is acted and he is satisfied; but if his anxiety was
solely of a public nature, why did it date from March 7, when, prior to
that time, there was much greater cause for alarm than afterwards. In
everything he said or wrote he continually recurs to the slavery question
and always in a defensive tone, usually with a sneer or a fling at the
abolitionists and anti-slavery party. The spirit of unrest had seized him.
He was disturbed and ill at ease. He never admitted it, even to himself,
but his mind was not at peace, and he could not conceal the fact. Posterity
can see the evidences of it plainly enough, and a man of his intellect and
fame knew that with posterity the final reckoning must be made.
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