Virginia Argus. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1796-1816, 1812-08-24


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WASHING ron CITY, Aug 10.
The Secretary ofState arrived in this CT
ty on Sunday last. from his scat in Virginia.
1t is impossible to read the federal papers
az the present crisis. we mean the most of
them. and particularly some in New England,
without astonish ment at the falsehood, the
malice and the folly which their polluted CO.
lumns are daily disgorgng. If the declara
ton OF war did not produce an union of OPT
Mon in all the states, il was at least to be
expected that some decency and some bounds
would have been observed in candid and
constitutional opposition to 1t. But when a
portion of our citizens are seen openly To en-
list an active and wicked zeal in the cause
OF the public enemy, not merely shielding it
of its enormities, but making it out to be the
best, and at the same time loading the law
full authorities of the nation with libels and
abuse in a spirit still more vengeful, acrid
and turbulent. il is calculated to excite in
the bosoms ofthe sound and patriotic milli-
ons of the country who are doomed to witness
such baseness, sensations of the strongest
and most unqualified horror, mixed with the
deepest loathings of disgust. The press may
be challenged, the world may be Challeng
ed, to produce similar specimens with those
exhibited in their incenced, remorseless, de-
| nuDciations. They eXemplfy every species
of lying, from bold and positive falsehocds,
down to total and partial suppression of the
| truth, embracing in the infuriate range, the
| most malignant and criminal distortions of
| all the measures and policy of the govern
ment, no matter what their course, no mat
ter what their object. They yell out French
dictation, French alliance, Napoleon's pro-
carnations, Madison's mob, when In their
| hearts they do not believe a syllable of the
complicated nonsense which they shout, max.
| ing it merely an engine by which, in their
wicked and drunken hopes, they think to
| delude the honest part of their own body,
and secure the ends of their insatiate hatred
on unprincipled ambition. Constant in no
| thing but a headlong, prosecuting, indiscri-
! inmate opposition, rallying one season under
war as their atch-word, and the next I'M
der that of peace now for nothing but enar-
| gy and the sword, then most meeNly whin-
| ing out forbearanCe and submission, or any
thing in the whole compass of national de-
| graduation rather than war; by turns every
| thing, and steady in nothing but the fierce
ness, the b,.seness and the venom oftheir at
tacks-is the leading, well dressed dema-
gogues of such faction who are now inso-
| lently taking to themselves all the virtue, all
| the wisdom, all the patriotism of the coun-
try. These are the pure, the se,ec 1.-THE self
/ made, bioated patriots, who can bawl cut
\ from the high ways and the house tops, ty-
| ranny neutrality-suspicious. prescription
-fettercd tongues, fettered presses while
4 their own language and their own acts are
marked by an indecent fergetfulness of the
most common charities, by RIGHTEOUSNESS
in fault-hnding at which all but the most
callous are abashed ; by shameless prosti
4 fttftf oil ,xlD,, l. l.
\ sumption, looseness in the moral sense,
putting forth loathsome hypocrisy with the
front of piety and soberness,; by an audaci-
ty in false assertion, piling up III a black stu
pendous heap SANDER upon SANDER. one base
] invention upon another base perverson !;
here misrepresentation and there lie !;
| one day a false rumor, the next false
charge, always mixing the deadliest gall with
| the foulest defamation, in modes and shapes
| never before equalled, but in seasons of the
most portentous violence and depraved, vim
| dictive, intolerant rancor. These are the
| men who see every thing right in the con-
| duct OF the enemy, and every thing not sim
! ply wrong, but atrociously wicked in the
| measures of their own country: These are the
men, who, in their most deliberate resolves.
brand with the epithets of madmen and fools
| all those who legitimately hold the powers of
|
responsibilities, and at the hazard of all the
| dearest stakes, have legitimately exercised
| them. These are the men, who, from sane.
tined lips, preach order, and with unhallow-
| ed hands, practise outrage-mean, pitiful
unmanly outrage--taking advantage of the
| strength of accidental numbers over acciden-
tai weakness who cant about rights who
| invoke the law and the constitution who
have at last fixed it in their own belief, that
they are all general Washington's own sons,
| who are peacefully arming IN SeiEdcfence,
while in spirit of ferocious prescription and
with rude and savage force they are for
| putting down freedom of opinion where it
| suits not their lordly ears, and brutally in
| suit and bully, and hiss, and elbow public
functonaries in their streets THAI, fhrv
are the Only true and correct statesmen. the
sublimated, indebted patriots, whose tender
mercies are exclusively shocked, whose ten
der bowels exclusively yearn at the fate and
misery before their country; they alone
have wives and children and homes TO be
| torn up they alone breath the intelligence
that can guide the public councils, bind ND
the nations wound, they alone have estates
IN be impaired, precious blood 90 be split ;
they are the chosen few, inspired by an al
! ways ready, ever changing genius, blessed
| with every opposite virtue to suit every on
posite emergcncy-onc day viewing the hor-
rors OF strife with a nervous starting back.
the very lambs Of innocence, the friends OF
Ecnce md commerce. the next the resolute
Ihermopylg heroes, to stop the Widgeries.
The Seavers and the Turner's as they pass
The thrors, The blind throng the herd. the
numerous herd Of republicans who dared to
go TO war contrary 70 the high impercus
mandate from so pure fount of wisdom
why, what are they but dcsycradoes. mad