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Excerpt from Lives and Portraits of the Presidents of the United States, From Washington to Grant The narratives of the Lives of the Presidents of the United States will ever afford an interesting and profitable subject of study; and this not merely from their elevated position ranking them as rulers with contemporary kings, emperors, and others in chief authority; but, as representatives of a distinct and peculiar social and political organization. The hereditary sovereigns of Europe, succeeding one another by a fixed and absolute decree; educated for their position and following, for the most part, through life a uniform routine of etiquette and State policy, are spoken of in relation to families and dynasties; nor do they always represent the nationality of the countries over which they rule. They may be, as in the case of the Hanover line in England, taken from a foreign country, or as in Greece of the present day, chosen from other countries in obedience to a real or supposed political necessity of European State craft. They may be weak or able, virtuous or vicious, according to their capacity or individual tendencies, without the nation over which they rule being particularly honored in the one case or held responsible in the other. Not so in the United States. Here the Chief Magistrate, as it is our glory to call the presiding officer at the head of our system of government, being chosen by the people at short intervals, the nation becomes directly responsible for his intelligence and virtue. The prejudices of party, the accidents of political intrigue, occasional deference to what is termed expediency, may, indeed, direct the election so that the successful candidate may fall short, as a representative man, of the character of the people in its highest and best development. It is by no means to be expected that the best adapted or qualified man will be chosen every four years to the Presidency. In all human affairs it frequently happens that the right