He who could have charmed and entertained and inspired you is still detained by sickness, and it has fallen to my lot to fill unworthily the place of the chief lawgiver of this commonwealth. But I submit these facts to you with the confidence that you are men of courage and truth. I have no other suggestion to make to you than that you shall deal with them with that courage that befits sons of Massachusetts. I do not put it on so low a ground as to ask you to avenge these horrid deaths. O, no, I do not put it even on the ground of asking you to do credit to the good old commonwealth of Massachusetts. I lift you higher than that, gentlemen. I advance you to the altitude of the conscience that must be the final master of us all. You are merciful men. The wells of mercy, I hope, are not dried up in any of us. But this is not the time nor the place for the exercise of it. That mighty prerogative of mercy is not absent from the jurisprudence of this glorious old commonwealth. It is vested in magistrates, one of the most conspicuous of whom was the honored gentleman who has addressed you before me, and to whom no appeal for mercy ever fell upon harsh or unwilling ears. Let mercy be taken care of by those to whom you have intrusted the quality of mercy. It is not strained in the commonwealth of Massachusetts. It is not for us to discuss that. It is for us to answer questions, the responsibility of which is not with you nor with me. We neither made these laws, nor do we execute them. We are responsible only for the justice, the courage, the ability with which we meet to find an answer to the truth. Rise, gentlemen, rise to the altitude of your duty. Act as as you would act when you stand before the great white throne at the last day. What shall be your reward? The ineffable consciousness of duty done. There is no strait so hard, there is no affliction so bitter, that it is not made light and easy by the consciousness that in times of trial you have done your duty and your whole duty. There is no applause of the world, there is no station of hight, there is no seduction of fame that can compensate for the gnawings of an outraged conscience. Only he who hears the voice of his inner consciousness, it is the voice of God himself saying to him “Well done, good and faithful servant,” can enter into the reward and lay hold of eternal life.