The Arkansas banner., 1843-12-16

our posterity. II IS duly WHICH DFlnSs it' own reward in it's christening, purifying, and humbling, yet eleva.ing and ennobling iniiu- snce on our hearts. It teaches us to prlZe our rights at the full value of the sacrifice fhey cost: 1t renews the love of liberty Ill our bosoms and. above all, we are encour- aoed to feel, that all obstacles to success in good cause must go down before the con centrated energy of people resolved to live free or die.
 Such, gentlemen, is the lesson taught It's by the history of our revolutionary struggle, and we'll does it deserve that we should keep it fresh in our memories, and warm in our hearts. By no passage in that history is this lesson so strikingly inculcated, as in day reminds us. Was it glorious for the Congress of the United States, that on the fourth day of July, l776, they adopted the bold and hazardous resolve which establisl- ed their independence Was 1t glorious that the representatives of three millions oi people, new to the tasks of government, un- provided with the organization, the lmple- ments, and the resources Of war, thus naked and defenceless, dared defy the wrath of nation armed to the te9ih in all the panoply of war; nation whose power encircled the globe; whose flag floated over every sea; whose arms had triumphed on every shore, and whose co1ers overflowed with contrIbu- tions from the commerce of the whole earth Was this an act to be remembered with won- der, and with grateful praise by us, Was this all act which should fill our hearts with pride while We trace our descent from its A,,1 ha,, he, who, on the records of that day, can point to some time-honored name, and say, ssThus my father spoke, and thus he acted here he fought, and here he fell. ,
 What then, gentlemen, should be our pride of heart in the remembering, that 1t was not on the 4th of July, l776, but on the 10th of May in the same year; not by the concur rent voice of three millions of people, but by that of one fifth of that number; not by the unanimous resolve of thirteen colonies, but by her own sole and separate act, that Vir- ginia took her independent stand among the nations of the earth.
 We do injustice to the dignity of this theme, we do wrong to our fathers and to ourselves, when we permit the memory of this event to fade away in our minds. It we'll deserves to be remembered, and com memorated, not as topic of vague and emp ty Reclamation, but as an occasion for sober thought, and serious seli-examination. IL calls upon us as in the presence of the sacred dead, to look into our own hearts, and esti- mate the value, which we set nj this day on the heritage purchased by the blood of our fathers. That. heritage is the independent sovereignty of VIRGINIA, and the inquiry to which l have invited your thoughts, is to lead you to just sense of its importance, and wise choice of the means ot preserving it. It Is question on which depends the value Of all those charters to which you look as the monuments of your liberties. ' You owe 1t to yourselves to understand all these alright, that you may transmit unlmpalred to your children the blessings which they have so far secured to you.
 No people should ever permit themselves to feel secure in the enjoyment of their rights. They are always in danger from some quarter The rights of men are always the natural prey of the worst passions of the human heart, whether aspiring or base. Am bitlon, Ill its eagle-flght, is ever lowering over them, and ready al any unguarded moment, to bounce upon them. The serpent-guile, of avarice, that creeps upon its belly, and eats the dust, is always seeking to invade the nest where all our dearest blessings lie. If we mean to preserve them, we must watch over them; we must learn to know and number them; we must study the tenure by which we hold them; we must qualify ourselves 70 scent afar off the dangers that threaten them to trace the serpent by his slime, and to know the eagle by his portentous scream.
 The rights of Virginia have been more than once invaded, and the assault has al- ways been on the same quarter. The device of the enemy has always been to question her sovereignty to deny her right to self government, and to establish claim to hold her, (always as 1t has been pretended, for her own good,) in state of pupilage. Whe- ther the object were to bring her under the dominion of a low-bred tyrant in distant land, the murderer of his king, and the felon usurper of his country's rights; or to lay open her resources to the plundering rapacity ofa foreign parliament, claiming the right to give what was not their own; or to transfer her very hearts blood, by sort of political suction-pipe, to fertilize the barren shores of neighboring State; in each and every n stance, the device of the adversary has been to deny and to derlde her claim of sovereign ty. Here they saw was her tower of stregth. and all their art has been employed to vile her from it, and to tempt her to put her trust in other delences, and to rely on the justice and benevolence of those who offered pro- tecton in the words and tones of friendship. Happily for her, she has been always no less sensible than they of the consequences of such reliance, and has always, in her hour of need, sought safety behind the bulwark of her sovereignty Therefore it is that have been thus careful to lay bare to you its foundations to remove the rubbish that con ceals them, and to show that it is built upon rock.
 Genilemen-if have so far succeeded in embodying the idea of the sovereignty of Virginia, that it is palpable to your under standings, that your minds s' can lay hold of itby faith "-then say to you, < Consecrate