extending southward beyond the equatorial line, and northward to the arctic circle-will, at no distant period, have on our Atlantic and Pacific coasts necessary and naturally reciprocating markets for the productions of all its various latitudes. The same markets, situated midway between the ancient continents, and very soon to be connected with direct highways which will supersede a costly and dangerous navigation, will invite equally, and with irresistible attraction on the one side, the commerce of Europe and Africa, and on the other that of the rising insular communities in the Southern ocean, as well as the trade of the populous regions of China and the eastern Indies. An intellectual and active people, holding a position so favorable and possessingresources so boundless, could not fail to secure the freedom of the seas, without which no nation in modern times can be great; while they would furnish a political alembic which, receiving the exhausted civilization of Asia and the ripening civilization of western Europe, and commingling them together after their long separation, would disclose the secret of the ultimate regeneration and reunion of human society throughout the world. Population, not disturbed by arbitrary interference, increases. and declines with the abundance and scarceness of subsistence; but abundance and scarceness depend not on the relative fertility of the earth only, but also on the comparative temperance and vigor of the cultivators. The soil of the eastern and middle states is less fruitful than that of most of the western regions. Indeed, only the intelligent hands of freemen could have tilled the rugged hillsides of New England, and drawn forth wealth from its oreless rocks and treacherous seas. The population of the United States, if it should expand on the same ratio to the square mile which is maintained in New England, would be one hundred and twenty-six millions. It may increase above twice that number, and yet be less dense than the population of Italy, or of France, or of Austria, or of Spain, or of the British islands. When we consider the certainty of immigration from Asia, in addition to the torrent pouring in from Europe, and the constant flow into the western states and territories from our eastern communities -and when we consider also the permanence of these several sources of increase we have no room to doubt that it may be estimated for the future on the basis of calculation established by past experience. That basis demands a population of thirty mil lions in 1860, of fifty millions in 1880, of eighty millions in 1900, and of more than double that number in less than one hundred years. The Americans are a homogeneous people, and must remain so; because, however widely they expand, they swell in one great and unbroken flood. All exotic elements are rapidly absorbed and completely assimilated. The remnants of the aboriginal and African tribes, seeming incapable of such assimilation, have hitherto, in different ways, affected and modified the force of the superior and controlling race. Without speculating on the ultimate destiny of either of those unfortunate classes, we may assume that the feeble resistance they offer to the aggrandizement of the Caucasian family is becoming less and less continually, and will finally altogether disappear. Most other empires were composed, not of one homogeneous people, but of various tribes, races, or nations; discordant in language, religion, habits, and laws; reduced, after long conflicts, into more or less perfect combination, but seldom into entire unity. How inconceivably great must have been the waste of mental activity and energy, not to speak of numbers and treasure, resulting from such conflicts! The American people, on the other hand, are practically one family. The Roman people, like the Americans, were liberal in naturalization. Like the Americans, they granted all the rights of citizenship to strangers, and not only to individuals, but to families, to cities, and sometimes to nations. The Romans also planted colonies, as we do, in contiguous territories. Hence it has been well said, in view of those customs of naturalization and colonization, that it seemed as if it was not the Romans that spread upon the world, but it was the world that spread upon the Ro mans. But mere numbers, independently of moral elements, do not constitute strength; nor do population and resources combined. When Croesus ostentatiously showed his treasures to Solon, the Athenian replied, "If any other come that hath better iron than you, he will be master of all this gold." The Spaniard proved this in the halls of Montezuma, and the Anglo-American has proved it against the effeminate descendant of the Castilian, in the very scene of his primary extortion. The American people are free-not merely free, like a nation recently emancipated, but they always were free. Their political independence or nationality does indeed date from 1776; but their political liberty began with the plantation of the colonies at Plymouth, at Jamestown, on the island of Manhattan, on the banks of the Delaware, and on the shores of the Chesapeake. All men know and admit that slavery and oppression debase and demoralize; but it is seldom duly considered that freedom elevates and invigorates in proportion to the extent and duration of its enjoyment. The American people inherit the discipline, the energy, and the resolution, of freemen. I dwell on their martial ability, not because they are or ought to be a warlike people, but because courage and fortitude are equally elements of greatness, whether pacific or belligerent, and because no inert or effeminate nation can enjoy peace or security. War, therefore, is occasionally necessary, and sometimes inevitable. In such cases it is "danger to avert a danger, a present inconvenience and suffering to prevent a foreseen future and a worse calamity. These are motives that belong to a being who, in his constitution, is at once adventurous and provident, circumspect and daring; whom his Creator has made of large discourse, looking before and after."* The Divinity that presides over states "loves courage, but commands counsel." It requires that they should know how war may, best upheld, Move by her two main nerves, iron and gold, It is, nevertheless, in social and civil life that the mental activity and resolution of our countrymen are fully illustrated. Freedom organizes all the great springs of action in the human system. Seventy years ago we were a nation without capital, without credit, with very indolent agriculture, without manufactures, and with a commerce struggling for life under restrictions which bound this whole continent and its islands in colonial vassalage to paternal states in Europe. We were without a navy, and without canals or roads, and were hemmed in between the forest and the ocean by savage tribes. Our schools gave scarcely more than rudimental education, and we were without libraries or literature, and without invention. It is not presumptuous to say that now we possess adequate capital, prosperous agriculture, and rising manufactures; that we have redeemed our country and most of the continent from colonial dependence; that we * Burke. enjoy a commerce second only to that of Britain, and a navy equal to any but hers; and that we have canals and railroads spread like network over all our populous territory; that the Indian tribes are our stipendiaries; and that we have a system of general education, with universities nobly endowed, charities vigorous and comprehensive, literature aspiring to excellence, and mechanical invention that has brought the world under grateful obligation. The influence of freedom is manifested in the moral elevation, social order, and domestic virtues, of the people. The religion of the Redeemer of mankind has been left to perform its functions by purifying the motives and refining the affections, free from restraint and corruption by the civil power. Thus we have seen atheism rebuked and repelled by the reason to which it presumptuously appealed; law sustained without force; and woman restored to her just influence without the licentious aid of chivalry. Our subject demands, not an exposition of our complex system of government, but only a consideration of its influence upon the national progress, and its own probable durability. The successful establishment of a republican government, adapted to an expanded state, is itself a demonstration of national greatness. All history describes indefinite and perpetual aspirations of the wise and the good for the establishment of some durable system, in which the people should exercise sovereignty over themselves without turbulence or imbecility. At a period quite recent the failure of all kindred attempts had induced an acquiescence almost unbroken, though reluctant, in the belief that mankind were incompetent to self government, and a consequent reference of all authority exercised over them to the appointment of God. These principles drew after them a universal obligation of implicit obedience to arbitrary and even despotic power-and therefore allowed unlimited and unmitigated oppression. At length philosophy sought an escape from a theory so derogatory from the providence of the Creator, and so pernicious to the happiness of men, and attempted to substitute in its place the doctrine that government, whatever might be its form, had been originally founded in a contract between the supreme authority and its subjects, which contract contained mutual obligations, and was dissolved whenever the ruler transgressed the conceded boundary of authority. This theory was unsatisfactory and insufficient, because it was easily shown that the contract assumed was purely imaginary, and of course that the supposed obligations were incapable of being defined. The American Revolution cut, at a blow, the Gordian knot, which science had found it impossible to unloose, and demonstrated to mankind that the only foundation of authority was the consent of the people, who had lawful right to subvert, modify, or change civil institutions, at their own pleasure. It was well understood that the only true object of government was the happiness of the people, and that "its four pillars were religion, justice, counsel, and treasure;" but the possible establishment of those pillars in a republican structure still remained to be demonstrated. This was happily done by the institution of a democracy, based practically on the principles of universal toleration of conscience and universal suffrage, which is the perfection of political justice, because it is political equality. This democracy was made to act with counsel by means of the principle of representation; and the representatives in the various departments of the government were made more or less independent of popular control according to the danger of passion and prejudice. This system was established in each of the several states, clothed with powers adequate to the maintenance of order, the protection of personal liberty, life, and property, and the conduct of municipal affairs. The same system was distinctly embodied in a precisely similar federal structure comprehending all the states, relying on the self-renewing action, not of the states, but of the people, and limited in its powers to the management of foreign relations and others important to the general welfare. The institution of a judiciary in each state, to hold all the representative agencies within their prescribed spheres, and a supreme independent tribunal at the seat of the federal government, with appellate jurisdiction, enabling it to decide all conflicts between state and federal authority, completed this complex and extraordinary structure. Under its shade property has been safe, life secure, and liberty inviolable; social equality has continually increased, and national power has become firm, effective, and immovable. Such are the instructions which our country has given to the world in the philosophy of government. They are universally received, and they are more precious than any other VOL. III.-2 |