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decessors in their westward journey, the vast internal improvements of our land; as if, forsooth, Irishmen had dug and built our thousands of miles of canals, and our tens of thousands of miles of railroads, had tunnelled our mountains, and bridged our rivers, out of pure benevolence and kindness, to assist our helpless nation! He informs them that their coming here is a voluntary tribute to our republican institutions; that, instead of being accidentally related to our form of government, as, according to the Demagogue, the natives are, they, the immigrants, occupy the superior position of those who select with great care the form of government under which they choose to live.

Readily swallowing such pleasant flatteries, the gullible foreigner loses all respect for the men or the institutions of his adopted country. Every necessary prescription of the law is resented; its power, although the legitimate will of the majority, is as odious as if emanating from his European rulers, and never having learned any selfrestraints, he neither can nor will make nor appreciate the sacrifices which freemen are daily called upon to make for the sake of the public weal.

Amongst the natives of his own country, our Demagogue does not find so fertile a field for the exercise of his snaky gifts. Yet, even there, as there are always many less wise than the wisest, the Demagogue, although he may not be able to cram his patients with such gross concoctions as he serves up to the degraded foreigner, contrives to accomplish much evil by dexterously gilding the pill he administers. Whatever may be the weakness of his audience, whatever their error; whether they are right or wrong, he preaches their doctrine. Vox populi, vox Dei, he cries-the people's voice is God's voice he demonstrates to them that they must be right, and modestly intimates that his complete conviction of that fact makes him the only fit man to accomplish their will. They may safely trust in him, and in his servile obedience, until there shall appear something or somebody offering a higher bribe.

The American Demagogue is a shameless monster, without par

allel, without

compeer.

corruption of his heart.

He stands alone in the infamy of his con

duct, solitary in the sublime prostitution of his intellect, in the utter His is the double guilt of the sinner, who sins against clear light. Born in a nation peculiarly founded, and maintained by disinterested patriotism, he considers the love of country only narrow-mindedness, and almost thinks it treason to be proud of being born a citizen of the Republic. In a commonwealth, of which integrity and disinterested public spirit are the very life, he lives without principle or patriotism, whiffling about at every wind of political doctrine, and outwardly bowing with supple knees to the popular idol of the hour, while all the time, careless either of the nation or of right, the secret devotion of all his little selfish heart is expended in the idolatrous worship of his own purposes. Believing nothing, he puts on by turns the semblance of belief in every thing. He manufactures facts, statistics, history, philosophy, religion, to order, to suit his customers. He has passions always at command. Tears or smiles are squeezed out, to suit the occasion, and the doctrine of the day "commands his hearty support and consistent advocacy," as did the doctrine of yesterday, and as also will the doctrine of to-morrow.

At the magnetic touch of interest he flies, like a telegraphic dispatch, back and forth from one end to the other of the longest and most divergent lines of belief. Is a law popular? it is precisely what he always knew was needed. Does it become unpopular he had always considered it oppressive, unconstitutional, and unnecessary. He would sacrifice the well-being of the nation for an office; the prosperity of the whole commonwealth, and his own conscience into the bargain—no great addition, to be sure— for a better salary or a fat job. He would defame his native land to secure an election; he would spit on the graves of his forefathers to gain a vote. For the base support of foreign priests, the votes of besotted immigrants, he will falsify history, and belie the fame of a thousand heroes. To gain such an object, he can find but one American who was distinguished in our Revolutionary struggle,

He would

and he would name as that one, Benedict Arnold! announce that the brunt of that fearful strife was borne by foreigners, and that our Revolutionary battles were won for us by the personal prowess of Lafayette, of Montgomery, of De Kalb.

Do our naturalized citizens murmur at any restraints upon their actions, at any laws and legal prohibitions, unusual to them-the Demagogue seizes the occasion, and eagerly strives to ride into office. He inflames the brutal rage of the mob; he goads angry men to murder and sedition; he shrinks not from awaking all the horrors of licentiousness and anarchy, from stirring up whirlwinds of baleful passions, if only his own dear objects may be attained by the crime. It is always easier to persuade to evil than to persuade to good. Poor human nature needs very little impulse in the path of wrong. Our laws and constitutions are not made as iron fetters and shackles are .made, to grip and chain the ferocious violence of stubborn felons or murdering maniacs— they are made to guide the wise and congenial conduct of men seeking to do right. The Demagogue takes advantage of this to pervert the privilege of goodness into an occasion of crime; to the downward tendency of all the lower and viler parts of men's nature; to the exaggerated passions and blind brutality, the foolish prejudices and dogged obstinacy, of all the dregs of the community, of the untaught, the vicious, and the lawless; to the fearful momentum of this mass of dangerous and explosive elements, the Demagogue lends all the energies of his being. He throws all his weight to sink the fortunes of his country; he drags downward with all his might, towards the destruction of his native land. With the recklessness of the madman, but with more method in his madness, and therefore more dangerous effect, he "casts firebrands, arrows, and death." He cares not if he witness the conflagration of the whole Republic; for he intends to fill his own pockets by the thefts which he hopes to commit with impunity during the confusion.

God has not left any evil without providing a remedy, although he often leaves men to use it. The dark portrait which we have

drawn, is not that of a necessary incubus upon our body politic. The Demagogue, the scourge of republics, only exists by sufferance. When the good and true men of the nation arise and act, this villain is crowded off the stage. It is now as it was in the homely but inspired parable of the Scriptures: “While the husbandman sleeps, the enemy sows tares." It is only when the right men neglect their duty, and leave their posts vacant, that the Demagogue can occupy the scene of action; can perform his fantastic tricks, and concoct his unprincipled schemes; can marshal his foolish regiments, and accomplish his vile undertakings. He lives by sufferance, and although his guilt is his own, yet honest men must remember that upon them rests the responsibility of permitting his sin to succeed. Upon their heads, after all, will lie the fearful responsibility of having, by criminal supineness, permitted the enactment of all the wickedness which Demagogues perpe

trate.

WHAT CONSTITUTES THE RIGHT TO VOTE?

"The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of gov ernment, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment intrusted to the hands of the American people."-WASHINGTON.

ALL human rights are either natural or acquired. They must either reside in the individual, co-equal with his life and the varied faculties of his nature, or become delegated to him by concession, by compromise, or by some specific compact to which he is a legitimate party.

Natural rights are absolute and inalienable: they rely on no presumptions of an arbitrary character, but are fully prescribed and ordained with the existence of man. Whether exercised or not, a man cannot, by any enactment, be divested of their proper and positive possession. They may be yielded to the unlawful encroachments of other men, but the concession is merely temporary, and cannot be considered to invalidate the individual's privilege of resuming their exercise at such time as he may think proper.

All men, says the Declaration of Independence, are born free and equal; they possess certain inalienable rights, such as life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. These are their natural endowments, and by no lawful process can they be taken from them. The Bill of Rights, which was adopted by the Colonial Deputies at Philadelphia, previous to the Declaration, declared that the people were entitled to life, liberty, and property; and that they had never ceded to any sovereign power whatever a right to dispose of either, without their

consent.

These inheritances, therefore, belong to us by nature. One man possesses them as largely as another. Factitious circumstances can

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