Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 26.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

‘ [356] most deliberate reflections and mature conviction relative to the nature and obligation of the great leading principles which should regulate your conduct and form your characters.’

These lectures were published in that year as a ‘Token of Regard, presented to the pupils of the Elmwood School by their friend, James M. Garnett.’ The copyright of all of his lectures to both schools was given by Mr. Garnett to the publisher, Thomas W. White, then publisher and proprietor of the Southern Literary Messenger, the only condition being that the publisher supply a certain number of copies for gratuitous distribution to the pupils and other persons. The lectures, especially those addressed to young ladies, had a wide circulation and were highly valued.

Just before the meeting of the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1829, Mr. Garnett compiled and issued a volume of Constitutional Charts, or comparative views of the legislative, executive and judiciary departments, in the Constitutions of all the States in the Union, including that of the United States, with a dedication to the people of Virginia, and intended as a guide for the use of members of the Convention.

It would be out of place on this occasion to give any detailed account of Mr. Garnett's various addresses and of his contributions to newspapers and periodicals. These last were very numerous and over various signatures, were begun early in life and continued for forty years or more, and many of them had decided influence at the time. Perhaps the last of his public addresses was one on ‘Popular Education,’ delivered to an educational convention which assembled in Richmond on December 9, 1841, and published by request of the Convention in the Southern Literary Messenger for February, 1842. In this address Mr. Garnett discussed the importance of popular education, its neglect in Virginia, the effects of education upon crime with statistics, and especially the importance of religious instruction in the school-room. Although the Messenger had adopted for some years a rule discontinuing the publication of lectures and addresses, it was relaxed in this case, as the editor says, owing to ‘the importance of the subject and the ability with which the sound views and just opinions of the orator were illustrated and enforced.’

Mr. Garnett died at his residence on April 23, 1843, having attained the age of nearly seventy-three years, and he is buried in the family cemetery at Elmwood. A brief notice of his death in the American Almanac for 1844, after stating the public positions held by him, continues: ‘But Mr. Garnett's greenest laurels were won in ’