The Wheeling repository — Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.], 1807-07-02 00:00:00, page 3

JNo matterto what extent our knowledge
on speculative subjects is increased; no
matter what advantages we derive from
useiul inventions and discoveries ; we
still continue to disregard our true in
terest, and madly refuse to profit by the
experience oi others.
W hoever is acquainted with the his
tory oi former times, knows that the
mass oi mankind have alwavs been lia
ble to be acted upon by the same means,
find influenced by the same motives.—•
In all civilized countries, the shafts of
the satirist have been levelled against
tire same object ; the same topics have
furnished matter oi complaint and re
Kret, tor the pen of the moralist. The
labours oi neither have, at anv time, ef
fected more than a partial reformation*
I could illustrate the truth of the a
bove reflections, by reference to the his
tory oi all civilized people ; but it is
more to my purpose at present, to lay
before the readers of the Junkkt the
following essay* It was written by Ad
dison, and published in the Spectator,
in the.year 1711,—nearly an hundred
years back. It was intended to describe
the condition of England at that time ;
vet it is scarcely possible to deliver sen
timents more exactly applicable to the
ytatc oi America for the last fourteen
Nears. K
“ 1 here cannot a greater judgment
befal a country, than such a dreadful
spirit ol division as rends a government
into two distinct people, and makes
them greater strangers and more averse
* *° one another, than if they were actu
ally two different nations. The effects
of such a division are pernicious to the
last degree, not only with regard to
those advantages which they give the
common enemy, hut to those private e
x ils which they produce in the heart of
almost every particular person. This
influence is very fatal both to men’s mo
rals and their understandings; it sinks
the virtue of a nation, and not onlyso,
but destroys even common sense.
UA furious party spirit, when it rages
in its full violence, exerts itself in civil
War and bloodshed ; and when it is un
der its greatest restraints, naturally
breaks out in falsehood, detraction, ca
lumny, and a partial administration of
justice. In a word, it fills a nation with
spleen and rancour, and extinguishes
nil the seeds of good nature, compas
sion, and humanity.
“ Plutarch says very finely, that a man
should not allow himself to lxatc even
his enetnles ; because, says he, if you
indulge this passion on some occasions,
it will rise ot itself in others : if you hate
\ our enemies, vou will contract such a
vicious habit ot mind, as by degrees will
breakout upon those who are your friends
or those who are indifferent to you. I
might hero observe how admirably this
precept of morality (which derives the
malignity of hatred from the passion it
self, and not from its object,) answers to
that great rule which was dictated to the
world about an hundred years before
this philosopher wrote; hut instead of
that, I shall only take notice, with a real
grief of heart, that the minds of many
good men among us appear soured with
party principle.*, and alienated from one
another, in such a manner as seems to
me altogether inconsistent widi the dic
tates either of reason or religion. Zeal
for a public cause is apt to breed passions
in the breasts ol virtuous persons, into
which the regard of their own private
interest would never have betrayed
mem.
“If this party spirit has so ill an ef
fect on our morals, it has likewise a very
great one upon our judgments. We of
ten hear a poor insipid paper or pam
phlet cried up, and sometimes a noble
piece depreciated by those who are of a
different principle from the author.—
One who is actuated by this spirit is al
most under an incapacity of discerning
either real blemishes or beauties. A
man of merit, in a different principle, is
like an object seen in two different me
diums, that appears crooked or broken,
however straight and entire it may be in
itself. For tnis reason there is scarce
a person of any figure in England, who
does not go by two contrary characters,
as opposite to one another as light and
darkness. Knowledge and learning suf
fer in a particular manner from this
strange prejudice, which at present pre
vails amongst all ranks and degrees in
the British nation. As men formerly
became eminent in learned societies by
their parts and acquisitions, they now
distinguish themselves by the warmth
and violence with which they espouse
their respective parties. Books are va
lued upon the like considerations ; and
abusive scurrilous style passes for satire,
and a dull scheme of party notions is
called fine writing.
“ There is one piece of sophistry prac
tised by both sides, and that is the tak
ing any scandalous story, that has been
ever whispered or invented of a private
man, for a known, undoubted truth, and
raising suitable speculations upon it._'
Calumnies that have been never proved*
or have been often refuted, are the or
dinary postulatums of these infamous
scribblers, upon which they proceed as
upon first principles granted by all men*
though in their hearts they know they
are false, or at best very doubtful. When
they have laid these foundations of scur
rility, it is no wonder that their super
structure is answerable to them. If thin,
shameless practice of the present age
endures much longer, praise and re
proach will cease to be motives of ac
tion in good men.
1 here are certain periods of time in
all governments when this inhuman spi
rit prevails. Italy was long torn in pieces
by the Guelses & Gibellines,and France
by those who were for and against the
League ; but it is very unhappy for a
man to be born in such a stormy and
tempestuous season. It is the restless
ambition of artful men, that thus breaks
a people into factions, and draw s several
well-meaning persons to their interest
by a specious concern for their country;
How many honest minds are filled with
uncharitable and barbarous notions, out
ol their zeal for the public good ? What
cruelties and outrages would they not
commit against men of an adverse par
ty, whom they would honour and esteem,
il, instead of considering them as they
are represented, they knew them as they
are ? Thus are persons of the greatest
probit) seduced into shameful errors
and prejudices, and made bad men by
that noblest of principles, the love of
their country. I cannot here forbear
mentioning the famous Spanish proverb,
“ H there were neither fools nor knaves
in the world, all people would be of one
mind.”
“ hor my own part, I could heartily
wish that all honest men would enter in
to an association for the support of one
another against the endeavours of those
whom they ought to look upon as their
common enemies, wh itsoever side they
may belong to. Were there such an
honest body of neutral forces, we would
never sfee the worst of men in great fi
gures of life, because they are useful to
a party; nor the-best unregarded, because
they are above practising those methods
which would be grateful to their faction.
We should then single every criminal
out of the herd, and hunt him down,
however formidable and overgrown he
might appear: on the contrary, we should