Memoirs of John Adams Dix; comp. by his son, Morgan Dix.

1828-1830.] POLITICS IN THEIR PRISTINE DAY.

93

as a soldier, he had, after fourteen years, resigned his commission and commenced the practice of the law. Scarcely four
years elapsed before he put off the robe of the jurist and entered on the higher duties of the politician and the statesman.
They stood high in those days; it may not be so now. Then
it was an advance to go from the Bar to public life; when
office sought men, not men the office; when to be a scholar
and a gentleman, to be conspicuous for good-breeding, literary
attainments, and high social position was neither a disadvantage nor likely to impair the prospect of success; ere yet the
pathway to distinction had become a gauntlet-race between
lines of vulgar and selfish inferiors, whom he must flatter and
propitiate who would secure their support.
And here, perhaps, as well as anywhere, I may add this-in
which they who knew him best will bear me out —that all his
life through he was what he was at the outset-the same honest, sterling character, ever true to his convictions, and consistent when tried by standards that do not change; and
especially that he was a man who detested the lower arts of
the politician. Using that word in the sense which it now
bears, it would be incorrect to speak of my father as a politician; he should rather be called a man of state. He was not
of those who manceuvre to gain a public position. One after
another offices came to him; not through his bidding for
them; often against his will; simply because men needed the
help which they knew him able to give. I wish to emphasize
the fact that in my father there was no resemblance to the
politician of our day; and the proof is, that he was never
popular in political rings, but rather detested by the men who
compose them. It is easy to account for a dislike which they
did not affect to conceal. They could not depend on him to
farther their selfish aims, nor count on him for personal
favors in return for partisan support; he was above their
plane, and they lost no opportunity to do him a mischief
when they could. It would not be true to say of him that
he disliked office, position, and power. A man naturally