Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1849-02-07
AMERICAN GENIUS.

lie great peculiarly U! 'i'e h'''e' 'c"''
character is, that ills genius is inventive
and always adequate to emergencies.
Where others halt in the beaten. path
way of pursuit or profession; the Ameri-
can suddenly strikes out new goal, and
drives on to fame and fortune. Who
would have thought of carrying clocks
and ready-made shirts to China for a
market, or bringing Connecticut, with
its sharp>faccd soil, into competition with
the age fortified manufactures of Great
Britain.
No other man on the globe, with The
same amount of means and chances, will
or can perform as much for himself and
the world, as an American. Not 10 in.
di. ilualizc, but take him in the national
aggregate. Quick, fertile, AID ever
ready, he needs but suggestion; The
details which others must investigate be-
fo,e they dare to make the experiment,
he let's follow and illustrate the expert
ment, as Tie sparks Of fire flow in the
trail of The locomotive al night.
WHO ever heard Of an American being
conrourdcd by the ihtricacy or magni-
tudc Of the cnlcrprizc? In tie arts of
peace and war alike The same prodigal
flow of invention, the same sagaclty,
prudence ard daring, blended in a sort
of hunanic>heroic frcsco, mark the acts
and apiiludes oflhe American. His in
slincts alc fresh where others weary; and
tracing his Developments industrial, in
ventive, and philosophic. as displayed
in the short life Of the. republic, it must
be admitted he transenjs all other spcci-
men of the genus homo. II is the result
of many causes.-tlis position, physical,
mental, moral and social, is favorable to
activity and decision Of character; and
his political equality Of sell-sa'istylng
conviction that he is equal to the best OF
men on earth, as man, gives him inde>
pendcnce in action that is everywhere
dividing line between him and other
men.
Talk of coa1.founding an American
with difficulty or danger in enterprise,
D5s<ca or land-in art, science, malhe-
malics. .tarobIem, or even a bundle OF
the hist erorSc ch;erog lyphics-,he idea
would be -ylicplnus4 he may never
have7seen map Of. the wol ID, nor ee'd
= peopranhy. but he will find, with a
Nantucket schooner, any port on the
globe, by a shorter cut tIan is laid down
in the charts; anG if he finds himself in
the West Indies with.a cargo oil bed
warming pans, be will have the wit to
strip of The covers, and sell them for
sugar ladies, at an advance Of expected
profit.
The tactics of the American arc not
laid down in books. In peace or war,
his ingenuity frames the plan of opera
ton on The instant, from the nature Of
the circumstances, andif he is defeated
it must be by sheer force. To him tue
pillar of Hercules would have been less
Than TO the Macedonian; he would have
guessed ins,anicr tie riddle Of Sphynx,
and united between his teeth aud finger
double Gordian knot. A writer in
Blackwood has well said, that if sufll>
cient prize we're offered for the best
treatise upon any subject in any Ian
guage, the American would get il, even
If lie had 10 learn the language, study
the subject, and wri1e the wor X within
three months. This universal energy,
endurance invention, and power TO adapt
himself TO any and every end, give the
American his underworld prestige Of
superiority as man.-N Y. Sun