I now doubt it much, and see the event at no great distance. My only comfort and confidence is, that I shall not live to see it." De Tocqueville, in many passages, expresses his opinion that the Union could not endure indeed, he says: "The history of the world affords no instance of a great nation retaining the form of republican government for a long series of years."

Writers of the present day, whenever they consider the subject, express their doubts of the durability of the Union. Grattan observes: "The day must no doubt come when clashing objects will break the ties of a common interest which now preserve the Union. The districts of South, North, and West are joined like some wall of incongruous material, with a cement insufficient to secure perpetual cohesion. They will inevitably crumble into confusion, though no man may foretell the period of dissolution." Even the period has been predicted with remarkable accuracy. Ꭺ Russian writer, Ivan Golovin, made the remark, six years ago: "A visit to the United States has the strange property of cooling democrats. Again. I tell you that the manifest destiny of the States is disunion. I do not give the Union eight years to last." Sterling, in his able letters from the Slave States, writes thus: "It appears to me that amid so many elements of uncertainty in the future, both from the excited state of men's minds int he States themselves, and the complication of surrounding circumstances, no wise man would

venture to foretell the probable issue of American affairs during the next four years." This was

written in 1857, and just within the four years the disruption has occurred.

Indeed, let any one take the map of America, and consider that the valley of the Mississippi, alone, is capable of containing and supporting a population equal to that of the whole of Europe, and let him ask himself if it be in the nature of things that a continent, embracing so wide a range of latitude and climate, should permanently remain under a single rule. From the earliest ages the other continents have been the abode, each of them, of many distinct communities; and whenever the attempt has been made to aggregate many of these under one government, it has, though successful for the time, invariably ended in division. There are clearly principles, inherent in our nature, which throughout all periods of history, and in all quarters of the world, have worked out this same result. If the American be one of ourselves, the same law will apply to him, the same influences will affect him. They may not come into action for a time, during a period of rapid growth, when men's minds are absorbed in their own pursuits,-the backwoodsman in clearing the forest, or the farmer in ploughing up the prairie, but all this has an end. The question is simply one of time, unless we assume that American nature is different from what human nature has elsewhere proved to be. In this view of the

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subject, when estimating the value of the Union, we cannot but regard it as a political condition, essentially temporary in its nature and this costly and terrible effort to preserve it, if successful, can have no other result than to defer for a time that which, sooner or later, is inevitable.

The object of the present inquiry is to form a judgment of the real value of the Union, not as an abstract question, but in connection with the existing struggle for its maintenance. We pro

pose, in the first place, to consider what its effects have been politically and socially,-what are the actual results of its institutions, and what influence they have exercised on the character of the people in public life. After this examination, it will naturally follow to consider the causes that have led to its disruption at the present time. Assuming that these causes have proved sufficient, in the judgment of the people of the South, to create on their part a strong desire for self-government, the question will arise, whether they have really a constitutional right to secede from the Union. After examining that subject, to whatever conclusion we may come, as the right of revolution is admitted, we may proceed to inquire whether the Southern States possess those resources, and that military power, without which any attempt at either secession or revolution might prove abortive. This subject being investigated, we may pass to a consideration of our own interest, first weighing whether or not we are bound by any

obligations; and we may then take a general view of the probable results of the contest, both in the event of the restoration of the Union, or in that of its separation into two powers.

We believe that no cause really exists that prevents the people of this country from forming an impartial decision on American affairs. The majority of the people of that country are cousins. of ours, only thrice removed. No Englishman ever thinks or speaks of an American as a foreigner; nor is it without a feeling of surprise, and of some degree of pain, that on landing on their shores he hears himself called a "foreigner." They may not attach precisely the same significance to the word, but still the sound of it grates upon his ear. We have no other than an earnest desire that this convulsion may eventually result, as we believe it will, in the true welfare of the whole people. Their prosperity is part of ours, for we have buried the commercial jealousy of bygone days with other errors of the past. Happily, we have learned to look for good to ourselves in all that promotes the good of the great family of mankind. As they grow in numbers we shall expect a more extended commerce; and as poverty was never yet a good customer, we may look for some advantage in all that adds to their wealth. Nor does there exist any political contingency to awaken distrust or alarm, If Canada were to express clearly and calmly, through the voice of a majority of her people, a desire to leave us and to

join the Union, though we might question her taste, and greatly doubt her judgment, we should have nothing else to deplore. We should institute no blockade, nor embark in any war, to retain her against her will; we should be more inclined to say farewell, and bid her God speed. We have no such mean opinion of the dignity of our household as to constrain those to remain in it who like it not. In the direction of rivalry on the ocean, no political apprehensions can arise in the case of a power whose policy it has always been to avoid the cost of maintaining any serious naval force. Commercial rivalry cannot be greatly feared by those who have striven for many years to invite competition by every effort of legislation. In all these things there is nothing to preclude a strong, earnest desire to see the Americans a prosperous and a great people,-to see them not only enforcing the respect of Europe, but also, and still more, to see them in possession of its admiration and esteem.

What, then, have really been the effects of the Union and the Constitution of the United States on the welfare and character of the people? Have they really worked for good, or for evil? We know something of the period of Washington. Are the people now the same; have they advanced in common with the social and political advancement of other nations; or have they retrograded as a people during the eighty years that have elapsed?

It seems an invariable rule with those who come

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