Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1860-03-10

mcrcc and social intercourse. These arc strong
indeed, but its chieiest Instruments Of cohesion
those which render it inseparable and indi-
visiblc-are the millions of fibers of millions OF
contented, happy human hearts, binding by
their affections, their ambitions, and their best
hopes equally the high and the low, the rich
and the poor, the wise and unwise, the learned
and the untutored, even the good and the
bad, to a Government, the first, the last, and
the only such one that has ever existed, which
takes equal heed always of their wants, their
wishes, and their opinions and appeals to them
all, individually, once in two years, or at least
in four years, for their expressed consent and
renewal, without which it must cease. No, go
where you will, and to what class you may,
with commissions for your fatal service in one
hand, and your bounty counted by the hundred
or the thousand pieces Of silver in the other, a
thousand r~esisters will rise up for every recruit
you can engage. On the banks equally of the
st. Lawrence and of the Rio Grande, on the
Atlantic and the Pacific coasts, on the shores Of
the Gulf of Mexico and in the dells of the
Rocky Mountains, among the fishermen on the
banks of Newfoundland, the weavers and spin
ners of Massachusetts,, the stevedores of New
York, the miners of Pennsylvania, Pixies Peak,
and California, the wheat g growers of Indiana,
the cotton and sugar planters on the MISSISSIPPI
pl. ullOIS III NOlulNull NlNlnOuo lbIh WI
other land not less than the native born, the
Christian and the jew, among the Indians on
the p%rairies, the contumacious Mormons in
Deseret, the Africans free, the Africans il bon
dage, the inmates of hospitals and almshouses,
and even the criminals in the penitcntiaries, re-
hearse the story of your wrongs and their own
never so eloquently and never so mournluliy,
and appeal to them to rise. They will ask you,
as this all ?" care you more just than Wash
ington, wiser than Hamilton, more humare
than Jefferson Pr "What new form Of govern
ment or of union have you the power to estab-
lish, or even the cunning to devise, that will be
more Just, more safe, more free, more gentle,
more benifcent, or more glorious than this ?"
And by these simple interrogatories you will be
silenced and COMPOUNDED.
Mr.. President, we are perpetually forgetting
this subtle and complex, yet obvious and natu-
raj, mechanism of four Constitution; and because
We do forget it, we are continually wondering
how it is a Confederacy of thirty and more
States, covering regions so vast, and regulating
interests so various of so many millions of man
constituted and conditioned so adversely, works
right on. We are continually looking to see it
stop and stand still or fall suddenly into pieces.
But, in truth, it will not stop; it cannot stop;
it was made not to stop, but to keep in motion
in motion always, and without force. For
my own part, as this wonderful machine, when
it had newly come from the hands of its almost
divine inventors, was the admiration of my
earlier years, although it was but imperfcctly
known abroad; so now, when it forms the CEN
trail figure in the economy of the worlds civiliz-
alton and the best sympathics favor its contin-
uance, l expect that it will stand and work right
on until men shall fear its failure no more than
we now apprehend that the sun will cease to
hold his eternal place in the heavens.
Nevertheless, | do not expect to see this pure
ly popular, though majestic, system always
working on unattended by the presence and
exhibition Of human temper and human pas
sions. That would be to expect to enjoy re-
wards, benefits and blessings, without labor,
care and watchfulness, an expectation contrary
to divine appointment. These are the Discipline
of the American citezeu, and he must inure
himself to ii. When. as now, a great policy
fastened upon the country through its doubts
and fears, confirmed by its habits, and strength
ened by personal interests and ambitions, is to
be relaxed and changed, in order that the ma
ton may have its just and natural and free de-
%velopments. then, indeed, all the winds Of con-
%troversy are let loose upon us from all points of
the political compass, we see objects and men
only through hazes, mists, and doubtful and
lurid lights.
The Earth seems to be heaving under our feet,
and the pillars of the noble fabric that protects
us to be trembling before my eyes. But the
appointed end of all this agitation comes at last,
and seasonably the tumults of the people sub
side the country becomes calm once more
and then we find that only our senses have
been disturbed, and that they have betrayed us.
the earth is firm as always before, and the won
dcrful structure, for whose safety we have feared
so anxiousiy, now more firmly fixed than ever,
still stands unmovcd, enduring, and immovable.