ページの画像
PDF
ePub

'Give it to me,' exclaimed Caius,' that I may preserve it as a literary curiosity for future generations.'

'Yes, with your own poetry!' roared Zotoff.

'Shall it be placed in the coffin?' enquired the President.

'Yes! yes!' was the general answer. "And be laid in a sepulchre," added Beppo. Nung Boah then drew from his pockets and hat paper after paper, which he arranged in four separate piles.

[ocr errors]

These, gentlemen,' said he, are contributions which have been received for the next No. This pile consists of Essays—this of Tales-this of Poetical effusions-and this of Nondescripts. With a little patience we shall be able'

Mr. Reader, we will thank you for the book of records, and as the remainder of our business must be transacted with closed doors you may retire.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.

"The Progress of Modern Liberty," "To Sarah," and a " Sonnet to Genevieve," are under consideration.

“The Weary One," is respectfully declined.

"Then think of me," is rejected.

"S." is informed that though we have been "able to decipher" his "Vision," yet we do not "think it worthy of publication." This according to the motto of his seal is "entre nous."

"A Review of the Vision of Death," shall be noticed in the next number.

An Essay by "Cleon," Stanzas by "S. W." and "A Fragment," are accepted. "J.W." is informed that we are not in such want of matter as to be obliged to republish articles which have been "printed in a village paper a thousand miles distant." We hope that this "village paper," has not a very extensive circulation. “S. J. C." is, perhaps, not aware that we cannot publish the first number of a series, until we know what is to be the character of its successors. We shall be pleased to hear from him again, or to have an interview with him at our room, on Friday next at 7 o'clock, P. M.

The "Bouquet" we must decline. Its flowers (of poesy) are neither beautiful, nor are they arranged with sufficient taste to gratify our readers. Hereafter, the author had better cull from a less barren soil.

"Virgil" is inadmissible. He has forgotten that his writings are now read in the preparatory school. Even his prefatory note could not secure our favor, though couched in terms like these :

"Messrs. Editors,

:

"You will confer a great kindness on an unworthy author, by publishing the following lines in your invaluable periodical."

[blocks in formation]

WHAT is democracy, is the oft-repeated inquiry, as well of the earnest seeker after truth, as of the crafty caviller whose design is to bewilder, and whose object is to betray?

Pointing to the life and character of that illustrious statesman with whose name we have graced this article, the liberal might reply, that in his principles and in his manners is to be found the truest compound of those qualities which should ever characterize the friend of freedom; that in his career we recognize those measures which should distinguish always the nation's guardian; and that in his efforts we perceive the means by which the interests of the people may best be secured, and their rights most effectually maintained. Although an answer of this nature to one whose search was after truth would prove eminently satisfactory, for it would be confirmed by a candid examination of biography, the artful obloquy of party zealots has rendered a speedy conclusion a matter of difficulty and almost impracticable. Confounding what is essential with what may have been accidental in the principles of Jefferson, his opponents have spared no exertions to blacken his fame, with the vain hope that thus they might transfer the odium which ought to be attached to the individual, to the principles he upheld. To this duty of detraction the partizans of federalism have brought all that the most refined subtlety could discover of error in his councils, and all that the most creative ingenuity could invent of inconsistency in his sentiments. Year after year were the poisoned shafts of personal animosity discharged against his unprotected bosom; year after year unmeasured and unmitigated were the slanders which malice hurled against this exalted advocate of Equal Rights. A rancor that time could not diminish, nor prudence allay, marked him out as the devoted victim of unfounded calumny and ceaseless persecution. Into the shades of retirement the angry passions of party

[blocks in formation]

followed the philosopher of Monticello, and even the quiet sanctuary of the tomb has been polluted by the frantic ravings of political malignity and the unhallowed invectives of factious defamation. It is a peculiar and distinctive feature of one political party in this country, that in all their attempts to obtain public confidence they direct their attacks not against measures, but against men; they assail private conduct, not open actions; they belie personal character, and not public motives: with a sacrilege that defeats its own impiety they violate the asylum of the grave, and while they seek to rake up the forgotten ashes of long buried and trivial differences of opinion, they lay themselves open to the charge of inveterate prejudice and unreasonable hatred. In unjustly attempting by ringing the changes on profligacy and irreligion to scatter to the winds the seed of real democracy, in wantonly endeavoring to affix to principles the stigma which if merited at all belonged to the man, that haughty and proscriptive faction which ranged itself against the Champion of democracy, sounded its own knell and signed its own death-warrant. It is a sure sign of a failing cause when the disputant has recourse to scurrility; and personality is the last resort of those who cannot argue, but who will not yield. In no instance was the violence of party spirit more fully displayed, and never was it more signally defeated. They err most fatally in their judgment of human nature who think to substitute the wild declamations of enthusiasm for the calm investigations of reason, and who would subvert a system by assailing its author. Forgetting that it is experience alone which can convince the masses of the truth or absurdity of a great political maxim, these blind guides, instead of persuading the people that Jefferson was a monster of inconstancy and vice, his followers all jacobins and disorganizers, have unintentionally co-operated with the advocates of democracy in investing the name of that great Apostle of liberty with an inviolable reputation, which censures cannot degrade, nor reproaches impair.

Scarcely had Jefferson attained to majority, when we find him in the house of Virginian burgesses, the ardent supporter of open resistance to the unauthorized tyranny of the British crown. With a patience that fatigues could not exhaust, he labored incessantly to prepare the public mind for that collision which a wise foresight told him was inevitable. Facts, arguments, illustrations, his fertile mind supplied him with, and amid the boldest revolutionists he stood forth the most fearless; amid the most determined rebels he appeared the most resolute. Animated by such sentiments while acting within the limited sphere of his native colony, it was not to be expected that Mr. Jefferson would relax aught of zeal, or abate aught of exertion, when his talents were transferred to a wider theatre, and when the interests of a common cause, and the sufferings of a common country, had lent strength

to the feeble, and imparted courage to the most timid. Accordingly we find the Virginian delegates in congress active in procuring a separation from the mother country. On the 7th of June, '76, it was moved by one of their number that a select committee should be appointed to prepare the draught of a Declaration of Independence; and first on this committee we find the name of Jefferson, as being one who was best acquainted with the story of our wrongs, and one whom former services fairly entitled to so dangerous an honor. Pause we a moment to contemplate this scene-the wise and the great, and the virtuous of that day, convened without the emblems of regal authority, the axe of the pretor or the fasces of the consul, calmly to deliberate upon their country's injury, and to provide the safest and quickest remedy. Can earth's annals present us with a spectacle more sublime, a sight more grand than this? It was no temporary outbreak of tumultuous passion, no transient effervescence of popular indignation, which had summoned together that august assemblage. Theirs was not the restless agitation of desperate adventurers whose safety was in revolution, whose hopes were in rapine, who had all to win and naught to lose in the impending contest;-sordid interest had not leagued them together, wild ambition was not their watchword, self-aggrandizement was not their rallying cry; but the grand principles of human liberty they were striving for, and heart and hand they went for the Declaration.

While serving as governor of Virginia, Mr. Jefferson exhibited all that promptitude in action, all that energy and decision of character, which the distracted condition of the state required from the executive in order to preserve the semblance of hostility to the royal arms. Invaded on the south by Tarleton, while Arnold pressed upon the north, a crisis had arrived which was soon to seal the fate of republicanism in Virginia. In this emergency Mr. Jefferson was found to possess not only the faculties of the statesman, but the qualities of the general: from post to post and from county to county he hurried, inspiring all with his own dauntless spirit and breathing into the Whig party the breath of life. When we consider the combined influences against which the governor had to contend, success in such circumstances appears deserving of more than ordinary commendation. Throughout all the southern states the tory party was numerous, and in the 'old Dominion' their power was generally felt and feared. The hereditary aristocracy which the crafty policy of England had fostered in that country, the insolent laws of entail and the prerogatives of primogeniture which had been engrafted upon their legislation, the pernicious union of a favored sect with the government, offered powerful, and to a common mind, insurmountable obstacles to that concert and harmony of effort which were necessary to ensure a prosperous issue. Concentrating in himself the divided

energies of his party, he reconciled the jarring feelings of the state, and directed its united efforts to the defeat of aristocracy, usurpation and hereditary succession. No man but one who possessed, like Jefferson, a thorough knowledge of human nature, who knew how to appeal to the pride and patriotism of Virginians, who knew how skillfully to blend their passions and their interests, could have gained a triumph in that dark hour. The fortunate result of the struggle which terminated with the capture of Cornwallis and the downfall of tory ascendency, cannot be too highly estimated, and to him who was the chief instrument in obtaining it too much praise cannot be awarded. Shortly after the conclusion of the war we find Mr. Jefferson serving in the capacity of ambassador to the French court, a station which at that time, and in his peculiar situation, required a rare union of tact and firmness, of condescension and dignity. The city of Paris was almost frenzied with the opening acts of the Revolution, and the eyes of her philosophers and literary men were directed towards him who in the new world had proclaimed the principles of genuine liberty. Coming fresh from a contact with republicanism in his own land, and a foe by nature to the oppression which for centuries had been practiced by the privileged few upon the nation at large, it would have been most singular had the author of the Declaration remained a cold and impassive spectator of the approaching conflict between a people struggling for freedom, and a king ruled by the dogmas of Austrian despotism. He saw around him the very men who had struck a blow for our liberties, now, taught by our example, ready to emperil all in the attempt to establish their own, and he withheld neither the wisdom of his counsels nor the influence of his name from that party which numbered among its supporters a La Fayette, among its ornaments a Mirabeau. He remembered, however, that as the representative of a foreign state, it was not within the compass of his duty personally to mingle in the strife, and while he counselled moderation, lest by grasping at shadows substantial good might not be gained, he deprecated those enormities which tarnished the page of human nature, and hurried France from the lethargy of the sternest despotism into the wildest excesses of unbridled licentiousness.

As Secretary of State, his services to the country were no less valuable. In this capacity he introduced into diplomacy that manly simplicity which, strange as it seemed to the tortuous minds of European ministers, is the safest as it is the easiest path to honorable distinction both for nations and for individuals. Thoroughly versed in all the intricacies of international law, his instructions to our plenipotentiaries abroad have ever been regarded as models of diplomatic style, and as containing the elements of whatever is necessary to regulate the intercourse of civi

« 前へ次へ »