to principles whereby to govern their actions. Sooner or later, every man will ask himself the good old queftion, Cui bono? In the right of inferting a paltry piece of paper into the ballotboxes once or twice a year, which in nine caufes out of ten I find to be a mére nullity, I behold but a despicable substitute for that fecurity and repofe which I fhall in vain look for to the exercise of my right. Complete fecurity of perfon and property having been immoveably eftablished, as much proper liberty as can be ingrafted on the establish, ment may then be well enough.-But it must be an after business, Never did man, propofing to make a new enclosure for his animals, first proftrate the old one to the ground. Never will man be brought willingly from licence to reftraint. But this, with all other prin ciples that are not bad, are reverfed, and liberty, nominal liberty, a cloud, a vapour, a breath, a vifion, a phantom, a whim, exifts a magnificent nothing in the ftead of fecurity and peace: at this moment, indeed, it has given way to a more abfurd and unmeaning fubstitute, Republicanifm; but this is only afcending a half-note higher in the gamut of nonfenfe. A more important refult of this ftate of things may be viewed in the courts of juftice. There are, in the United States, judges enough (and judges too, with power over life and death,) to form a little army-there is a national court, a demi-national court, and that of the States, which again is branched out into innumerable subdivifions, and it has been no rare thing to fee them in a scramble for the victim. To the want of an efficient national court of justice it is to be attributed that the country is overrun with knots of petty tyrants "Who, dreft in a little brief authority, Play fuch fantastic tricks before high heaven With groupes of pick-pockets, bark-robbers, and hen-pecked dotards, who make a jeft of their holy functions, and with more than Gallic in. difference, fport with liberty, property, and life. Thus, where a man might efcape in the abftract, he is cut up in detail; and his thraldom under the ftate adminiftrations, continually at loggerheads with his nominal liberty under the federal government, places him in a fituation not to be endured. Could there, indeed, be united in the fame corporeal frame two oppofite and jarring natures; could a man's love of liberty, and his tolerance of tyranny, like Caftor and Pollux, live and die by turns, then, 'twere quite another cafe. But the age of miracles is gone; the powerful and pleafing fyftem of mythology has departed, and no fubftitute for either remains at a time when they are more needed than ever. To the want of fuch a court is it owing that party and politics have long watched at the veftibule, and, at length, entered the temple, of justice. Federal judges, Federal juries, a Democratic judge, Democratic juries, are common terms. Juftice, frightened at the unholy founds, has fled to heaven, and faction riots even in the fanétum fanétorum, So frail a fubftance, so unsubstantial an effence, can exist but by fufferance: it is an ever-vibrating pendulum--a beam, now elevated by the cowardice and ignorance of enemies, now depreffed by the weak. nefs and inconftancy of friends, Accident alone has prolonged its duration; accident may yet prolong it. But it should be remembered, that it is equally liable to be fhaken down by accident, as by accident to be preferved. It was an accidental government from the out-fet; good governments are formed on ufage and experience. The vacuum which is difcernible to a greater or leffer extent in all parts of our country, in the place of thofe religious and moral inftitutions, which, in well ordered governments, fo powerfully fubferve the general good, cannot but fhock every man who has fenfe to difcern, and, difcerning, has a heart to feel. The moral inftitutions of a country have a far more important afpect on its conduct and character, than the wifeft political fystems, or the foundeff penal codes. In no Chriftian country but our own (and the term must be foon very much enlarged, to embrace us,) are moral inftitutions wholly difregarded, Even France, that vaft grave of religion, boafts at leaft of moral theory in her conftitution. Where minifters and priests hold that influence over society, which their felec, rather than fingular, learning entitles them to, and where men, yet remaining in happy ignorance of many of the beaftly propenfities of their nature, are confequently too un-illuminated to refift or defpife it, tyranny can never come; and where the facred pale of the church is guarded by national provifions, from the inroads of infidelity, profligacy, and fchifm, it reciprocates that protection and comfort which it receives, and returns good fruits of happiness and joy in an hundred fold, But when a herd of stock-jobbing priests have intruded themfelves into the temples of the most high, and the facred fanes of his religion are polluted by hypocrify and avarice; when infolent pretenders wrap themselves up in facerdotal veftments, only to aim more fecurely their infidious attacks upon the faith; then furely the whole order may be converted into a curfe, and its existence cease to be defirable. This vacuum might, however, be fupplied, by the powerful influence of the prefs; but here, too, all is hopeless; a more potent engine for the deftruction of this government and country does not exift. I do not advance a hastily formed opinion, when I affert that newspapers are in the abstract amongst the greatest curfes that can be vifited upon a country, This opinion I am ready to defend when called upon, at any fit time and place; but fhall pafs it by here, to dwell particularly on the peculiar character of the American Prefs, the tenor of its conduct, and its malign afpect upon fociety and go yernment. More than nine tenths of the fcanty literature of America is made up of newspaper reading; this powerful fact, one would imagine, fhould induce a fevere attention to the nature of that fole medium of instruction and information-initead of which it is left entirely at Joofe, in full abandonment to all its unnatural perverfenefs and tur pitude. pitude. The American newspapers are the moft bafe, falfe, fervile, and venal publications, that ever polluted the fountains of focietytheir editors the most ignorant, mercenary, and vulgar automatons that ever were moved by the continually rufting wires of fordid mercantile avarice*. The inftruments are worthy of the agents. The ignorance of both is fo confummate, that they unwittingly travail to mutual destruction. So complete a fpectacle of depravity is rare to be feen in the most tenebrous ftate of literature, fome few faturnine traits have fhone, and fhone the brighter, for the gloom which furrounded them, "like a good deed in a naughty world." The illumination of even a few fcattered ftars, however rarely fhining, is a vaft alleviation of the evils of night, if confidered only as marks to direct the wary; for although thousands are led away into the endless mazes of a devious career, by the immemorable ignes fatui which furrounded them, yet the few that are faved by their true lights have lived to latest times to blefs them. Such is the character of the American Prefs; to exemplify, were Superfluous; fince it is feen, felt, and confeffed, by the foundeft wif dom and cooleft judgement of the country. The conduct is worthy of the character; already has it effected the total fubverfion of every principle of diftributive juftice. To fatyrize folly, to unmask the covenanted foe of the public weal-in the manly garb of confcious integrity, to ftep forth the undaunted champion of virtue, and to ftab offenfive vice, even in the habiliments of a vestal, is diftorted into "perfonality" and " abufe of private character." If the independence of America is not to pafs away, the indif tinguishable ephemeron of revolutionary folly, it may perhaps one day be made a question whether every ignorant impoftor that comes along, is to be allowed unadvisedly to exalt himself into this aukward eminence, and utter undisturbed his reiterations of dullness, prejudice, and malice; whether men, without fufficient capacity to distinguish between right and wrong, are to be allowed, in ufurping an high and refponfible fituation, to fcatter the moft venomous flanders and lies, unchecked by any fupervifion or reftraint. But the disease has become chronical-it admits not of remedy from amputation-nor can even the knife nor the cauftic now eradicate it. Its influence upon the moral world is as much more fatal than the moft baleful bogs, fens, and moraffes, upon the natural, as the subject is more exalted. It is a folid mafs of corruption, which spreads and is fpreading whitherfoever mifchief yet remains to be done. I fpeak this from obfervation; and, while I thought it of any effect to oppofe, by ordinary means, I truft I have not been lax nor tame. But the wind has blown, the ftorm has beat, and the flood is rolling on. The howling of the wind might be lightly regarded, and the torm beat round the head without difmay; but to be overwhelmed for the good of the public, and in an abfurd ftrife, does not entitle to the merit of even that tattered attribute firmness, which needs not application to fuch a cafe, to render its proftitution complete, * Mi. Fenno, we fear, never read all our English new papers -Ed. The The innumerable fophifms and prepofterous dogmas, by which, through thefe media, truth, and every femblance of it, has been fo formidably affailed, prefent to us a profpect the more alarming, when we reflect that they figure not lefs confpicuously amongst the caufes, than the effects of thofe painful diforders, which have gained with fuperlative and indelible reproach, the name, forms, and character, of republican governinent. Every fyftem of law, morals, and politics, every emanation of reafon, every refult of long and anxious experiment, every establishment of wisdom, every attribute of virtue, has, at one time or other, been the prominent object of affault to a thousand poisonbreathing Hydras, Gorgons, and Chimeras dire. Againft even the minuteft inftitutes of human prudence, fophifms the most base, and herefies the most damnable, have fwarmed like the locufts or the lice of Egypt, or a horde of French fans-culottes at a maffacre; the untiring perfeverance, the incalculable zeal and fury, and that demoniac industry, which backs uncounted millions by millions still uncounted, have gained them an afcendancy, which, in lefs enlightened ages, not the lacerating fcalpel and the boiling ladle, the nerve-rending pincers, nor the agonizing rack, nor the Bull of Phalaris, nor the Bed of Procruftes, no the wheel of Ixion, nor the more hellish intervention of flow-confuming fires, could, after three centuries' experiment, aspire to, The peculiar protégés of republics, they are proudly exhibited by their depraved votaries in contraft and hoftility, to every other principle, fentiment, and fyftem. It is this arena that has been felected, for the exhibition of their gladiatorian exercifes; and here, has the refult of their exhibitions decided a point fo, long contefted of old-the fuperiority of the Retiarii, over every antagonist: it is this floor that it has been chofen, in a particular manner, to croud with forms obfcene and fights unholy it is here, thefe vile priests have delighted to fulminate the lewd vifions of the Academics, and the daring blafphemies of the Tub it is here they have travailed to put down all decency, and to exalt all indecency-to reverfe all good under the foot of evil--to abolish mind, and fubftitute paflion—to confound fenfe, and enthrone brazen folly. The fuccefs of this formidable propagande will have reared a hidepus and fhapelefs image, formed of fculls, and cemented by blood, mifery, and tears, the head of which, more fublime than the Great Angel of Mahomet, will frown difmay through endless ages and innumerable worlds. The newspapers of America are admirably calculated to keep the country in a continued ftate of infurrection and revolution. And if it ever again fettles into quietude, it will not be till their influence is counteracted. The ultimate tendency of their labours, in their now general direction, appears marked in characters as strong and clear as they are formidable and alarming. pot I have not the vanity to recommend any prefervative; but I canconcede the propriety of requiring fome qualifications and pledges fron from men on whom the nation depends for all the information and much of the inftruction it receives. To well-regulated Colleges we naturally look, for a fource whence fuch qualifications might in pro per form be derived; but even this ground is no better than a dreary wafte, not barren, but uncultivated-in its best eftate, it bears the femblance of a worn-out field, the fences decayed or broken down, and the traces of useful and laborious industry almoft effaced. The fcience of this country confits, for the most part, of frigid poetical imitations, or the dulier dreams of a lunatic philofophy, which paffes current as profound, merely because it is laboriously obfcure. American literature wears the gloom of the dark ages; and novels and dreams, like the mists of evening, have overshadowed fenfe, genius, and tafte. Out of the frailties of our government, the degenerating influence of fervile and mercenary Gazettes, and the defolating force of the demoralizing principles that prevail, has grown an evil, politically, greater than all, inafmuch as it daily threatens the fubverfion of the whole fyftem: this is the perfect non-entity of national character. Perhaps there is not on record a fingle inftance of a nation main. taining its independence discernibly diftinct, under fuch circum. ftances, for even the fhort term during which the American government has been in operation. Love of country is the fountain of na. tional life, and the germ of every virtue; where it is not, is the foil to engender every malicious propenfity, and man bound to a scene where he cannot entertain this exhilirating principle of life, is more to be commiferated than the flave that is chained to the labouring oar, or the miferable fubject of French defpotism. Where this fpirit is wanting no efficient barrier can ever be erected against the inroads of decay. When this fentiment lives not, and lives not in unlimited energy, the humbleft existence partakes of mifery, and life itself is loathfome. When men can no longer dwell with pleasure and with pride on the character of their country, when they can no longer look on it as an auguft image to which their ever-recurring imaginations can never re cur in vain, for a fource of confolation in every extremity; when they cannot, in the loudest tones of exultation and joy, proclaim its glories, and its spotlefs renown, its unfullied honour, its bravery, its magnanimity, its wisdom, the boast of having a country is a delufion; it is a deceptive fhadow which will continually fly purfuit. Man, in every fituation he can be placed in, will have fome great point to pride himfelf upon, fome temporal object of adoration. His country is the nobleft and fitteft; but where this is degraded in his eyes, and funk in avarice and cowardice, he turns from it in difguft, and his affections dwell on fome other. What exifted of this temper amongst us, rofe indignant against the deadly infults of France. Its inftinctive impulfe was adequate to decide the point that presented itfelf, and, on a question of honour and shame, it difdained to deliberate, Then blushed the dawn of morning on the fame of America-the radiance of noon was haftening on, and the young fplendours of her name |