Weekly national intelligencer., 1850-02-09

If the Annexation and the War have had the
effects which the Address" ascribes to them, they
are exclusively attributable to the instrumenality
and active agency of Southern statesmen.
The position, however, in which the South now
finds itself, Of reduced political power relatively to
the Union, is not, in reality, the result of any or OF
all the causes which are skilfully arrayed in the
Address before us. The cause OF it lies deeper
even than the source of the " conflicts which is
the subject of that Address. 1t is to be found in
the law of progress in the order of Providence;
in the course of events which gave birth to the An
plo-Saxon race, and translated its offspring to this
Western Hemisphere. Ii we Of the present age
have not been sufficiently awake TO the silent ope
ration of these causes, they foreseen and fore
told by the philosophers Of other days. It is not
long ago that, in casual perusal Of a chapter in
Kames' Sketches on " The Progress Of States from
Small to Great"-writen and published in Edin-
burgh some years before our Declaration of lnde-
pendence-we were absolutely startled at lighting
upon the following passage:
ssOur North American colonies are in prosper
Gus condition, increasing rapidly in population and
Gin opulence. The colonists have the spirit of
! free people and are infamed with patriotism.
!. Their population acW equal that Of Britain and
Ireland in less than century, and they will then
be match for the mother country, if they choose
to be independent; every advantage will be on.
their side, Al the attack must be by sea from q
7 very great distance. Being thus delivered from
foreign yoke, their first will be the choice Of
< a proper Government; and it is not difficult TO
see what Government will be chosen. people
animated with the new blessings of liberty and
ernment. NE may pronounce Dith assurance
!. that each colony soiN choose FOR ITSELF REPUB-
sLIcAN Government. And their present constitu-
z ton prepares them for it; they have Senate,
! and they have an Assembly representing the
people. No change will be necessary but to drop
I the Governor, who now represents the King OF
/. Britain
Is not this curious and interesting! But the fol-
lowing, from the next page Of the same writer, to
which we chiefly desire to call the readers atten-
ton, is yet more SO:
France is eminent above all other nations for
: the encouragement which it affords to good wri-
ters," &c. "But let not the British despond for
I. doth not glorious prospect Re before them !?
The demand for English books IN .a.merica is
considerable and is increasing daily. Population
goes on vigorously the number of British settled
!. the delicious country from hhqt riuer doscn to
the mouth Of The Mississippi ,ciH be filled acith
people achose natiue tongue Is English. So fine
"a climate and SO rich soil will be productive of
readers in plenty. Such prospect ought to
rouse our literary ambition &c.
With what sagacity did this acute metaphy-
scian, reasoning from analogy, penetrate the veil
which hung the future, and thus in letters Of
living light predict the existence and the fortunes
of this Republic In the ten thousand British al
ready on the Ohio he beheld the nucleus of great
race which was to people the country drained by
the Father of Waters the growth of great people
in what was then wilderness. But even he, with
his intnitive wisdom, could not have foresecn ha.
the gentlemen Of the South seem hardly yet to be
aware of, and what we ourselves can scarcely
realize, that the progress Of the settlement and po
pulation Of the West would be rapid as, in little
more than half century, to endow her with poll
tical power of magnitude, in comparison (not
"confict' with which the whole galaxy of existing
colonies of Great Britain would, before long, pale
and grow dim. That change in the balance ol
power in our Union is rapidly approaching. Its
influence is already felt The South feels it, but
i
which is silently divesting the South Of its wont.
ed ascendency in the councils of the Nation, but
it is the West. It is not to Disunon, or to South.
ern Confederation, or any wild scheme of that
sort, that the South should look for the
ton Of its political power and for the protection
and salvation of its true interests; but on the con-
trary,to more cordial understanding with the North
for the security and protection of those interests
which are common to both, and to promote aohich,
as indispensable to their common Degfare, this
Union acas established. The great West itself,
too, has deep in this concord for its in
teress and its prosperity are intimately associated
and interviewer with those of the Atlantic States
SO Intimately that the States of the West can never
and wiH never, permit this Union to be sacrificed,
either to the whims or the passions Of the North
the South, or Of both Of them put together. The
West has interests Of its own, of vital importance
to il, which would be annihilated were the mouths
Of the great rivers which empty into the Atlantic
the Gulf of Mexico to become subject, by any po-
ltcal revolution, to the absolute CONTROL in their
respective latitudes, Of either Northern or q
Southern Confederation
We fear that our readers will think that we are
straying now TOO far from our main object, which
has been, in this paper as well as the preceding tc
give to them just idea of the present state Of
controversy that is distracting the councils of the
General Government, well as Of many Of the
State Governments, to degree which, with all the
information we have upon the subject and all the
thought which we have bestowed upon it, is ye
49, IL L.