The Bedford gazette. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1805-current, 1864-02-05
The Prospect.

Mr.Liacoln, like Mrs. Partington, never opens
his mouth without putting his foot in it. For
weeks IL was heralded throughout the country
that he was going to write letter which was to
BE- the "Key note to tho Presidential campaign" !"
Il was to bs sort Of political oil with which TO
smooth the troubled waters. Well, it tappeared,
ana straightway gold advanced aad stocks tam
sled! The bankers do not look upon his negro
balm as sovereign remedy for national ills
The northern people have but one heart, and its
first pulsations are felt in Wall Street. All the
nobler emotions of the human heart--all rea-
son--aii judgment, is there stifed by the golden
bolus that quenches all qualns of conscience,
while it suffocates the national soul. Not in
India, where the truo believer throws himself
under the advancing wheels Of Juggernaut, nor
in Japan, where the No-Kamis are addicted to
the solitary vice of hari-kari, does one find in
the national idolatry SO much that is contempti-
bic, SO much that is dishonorabie, as in the wild
hunt and blind worship Of tho ssaln;ghty dollar
in the free states of the Union. All transac-
subject to tho gauge Of this Procrustean Idol.
Of project it is seldom inquired--is is homer
ablei but often, will 1t payi
Scarcely a step has been taken in this miser-
able war, by the party in power, that has not
been justified in the minds of the people by this
sordid consideration, even to the employment Of
negroes as soldiers at two dollars less per month
than whites. Now let Mr. Chase, whose brain
is as fertile as if he had leathered his head with
bird fime instead Of bears grease, originate some
project, by which he can show the New York
bankers how it will pay to keep the wheels of
the Abolitien-sedition-c scation-emancipation
cars creased, and they will keep the National
Locomotive labeled "NEGRo,' with sufficient
head of steam on to carry it through or ''burst
her boiler" The philosophy Of her politicians,
the theology Of her divines, and the morals of
her citizens, all blend in harmony with the ad-
vice of Iago to Cassie: ''put money in thy
purse" This national sin is expressed in one
word-materialsm--an is entailed upon us by
the cahting, snivsling, whining vagabonds, who
were spawned from the May Flower in 1920,
apon the shores Of New England. Not satis-
fed with the work Of Luther or King James,
they set themselves up as more holy in their
faith, even as they now profess more loyalty than
their neighbors. Their pernicious and glaring
selfaggrandizement, under the garb of religion,
has demoralized the head, permeated the limbs,
snd corrupted the heart Of the nation. This
war may be traced directly to the spirit of New
England, which, through constant, persistent
agitation in pulpit, press, and hustings, has led
the honest, unsuspecting public to believe that
the form Of civilization at the South was antag-
onistic to that Of the North that black slavery
was injurious to free white labor: that the lat
ter increased the wealth Of the nation whilo the
former decreased it, The long list of figures ex-
tracted from the census tables, published in the
Helper Book, which attempted to prove that the
hay crop Of the North was more valuable than
the cotton crop Of the South, is an illustration
Of tAeir plausible lying philosophy. The people
now see, alaa too late, that 1t is not the aggre-
gate product Of the people that constitutes real
wealth, but the surplus. 1t was in this that the
South was ricbsr than the North, not in the ar
raT Of big figures.
But we hsve fsArfully digressed--it was not
sr iptsatim 70 write bonily on pufitanism.
kr kaoeln has written ais great letter, and
the barometer in Wall Street goes down. This
as every body knows. indicates the Judgment of