Alexandria gazette & advertiser. [volume] (Alexandria [D.C.]) 1822-1824, 1822-09-28

the prospects ofthe country SO sombre as ne
. represents them. We ,riW not despair of the
repdbiic.
: Philadelphia Union.
LETUS LOOK, AT HOME.
Youth and independence are some.
times excusable for the errors, into
which they may be reduced by the pas
sions but, soeietiesi Or nations cannot
properly claim the like indulgence
Yet, our own country has perhaps more
than any nation in existence, overlook
ed its means Of prosperity and disregar.
ded experience. We speak alike of the
government and of the people, for if
the government had acted wisely, they
might have saved the nation from the
evils which it has had to suffer, and un.
der which itstill suffers, and must yet
suffer more; or had the people been as
truly virtuous, as wise as they preten.
ded to, and as their fiatterers tell them
they are: had they been as much de-
voted to the liberty and prosperity OF
their country. and duly impressed with
knowledge of their own rights and re-
gard for them, as they pretend they
are the governments ofthe union or OF
| the States, could not have pursued the
fatal course which involves the whole
country in its present evils. The cause
isin the people themselves-as the COR
receive is in them; but, it IS to be fear
| ed, that, with all the vain glory that is
INDUCED in our 4thi of. July orations &
toasts, upon a close examination, we
shall find that the blessings which we
have possessed, were not SO much the
fruit of our national wisdom-nor of
any intellectual superiority over other
nations, nor Of any circumstance DEEPEN
dant on our own virtues or sagacity,
wisdom, or intelligence; though it is
the vain glorious practice Of every day
to boast of our superiority over other
nations: of our greater independence;
of our most perfect constitution-our
surest Of laws-our profoundest policy
lin shsrt, that more than any empe-
ror or king, we are moie great, more
wise, more learned, more every thing"
The Athenians were reproached of
inordinate vanity-but, it would be diff
ficult to find any nation any more than
any man without it; and certainly our
own nation is not to be excluded from
the list Of the vain-g 10 ious.
Itohas become sort of trade 20 feed
this inordinate appetite, and the Asia
tic satrap never swallowed fiattery with
more culibility. The adulation be-
slowed by Persian satraps on their sui
tans, and by the courtiers of imperial
and royal monarchs on their idols has
always been a theme of derision, of CON.
tempt or execration. Yet, it is only in
the form or terms of thehyperbole, and
not in the measure or degree of the de-
ceit or the folly that our rational suver.
eign people are insidiously cajoled, by
the fraud and ffattery, and the delu-
.sions by which men are made miserable
or ridiculous.
This national egotism has become SO
exsravagant that no praise excites sus
ipicion, but it is received with much the
same complacency of delusion, that the
consumptive female hears the flattering
compliment on the hetic which suffu-
sos her face, as an attribute of health
and beauty, while tits but the certain
evidence of a too deadly decline. bNa
The very conviction of this state OF
social disease ought perhaps to deter
public writer from the hopeless service
of admoDition or Standardization :
Truth, would you teach--to save sinking
land. jusl iH8psg ts
Allfear-few al d-and fewer understand.
The very desperation of the case re-
lakes the zeal that would with better
auspices encounter the greatest sacrif,
ces; and leaves but tho cold and retired
sense of duty and love of truth, to COM
pensate the heart alone for effort.
Among the great errors by which
our country suffers is that of a want Of
due regard to the trae nature Of those
circumstances which distinguish the u
nited States from other countries; and
the want of due discrimination, be-
tween what is due to nature-or to po.
sition Ito the absence of the artificial
causes which 80 much afaict other ma
land what may be fairly claimed
on the score Of intellectual or moral
merit. ~
= There is a certain quantity ofartifce
compounded with Ignorance every
where, and there is some in our ma
gtional notions. Thus we hear that we