The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1866-07-16
WHEELING. WEST Va MONDAY MORNING. July l6 1866

was unsurpassed by the prairIes of the
great West, her rivers were large
enough to float the commerce of a con-
unent, her mountains were the deposit
tories OF aggregated millions of mineral
wealth.. These were to be developed
by an energy, sublime in the stupentl-
ous operations of its fertile agency.
AVar1ce may be justly styled the lever
that moves the world, and self-interest
the handspring of human action, and.
It Is only necessary for the revolutions
ist TO convince people or community,
or lead them to think they are nconyin-
ced, that their pecuniary interests are
involved in an issue, to cause them to
risk every present happiness in a
struggle for prospective greater ac-
cumulation. q .Sl@Ez1-a
This appeal, then, to the Virgiuian,
who was always anti-cosmopolitan and
Thought his State the pride of the uni
verse, and yet had seen it in.the short
space OF half a century sink from u
hrSt rate to a fourth rate power in the
Union, was peculiarly attractive. He
had long been accustomed to hear his
State reproachetl as a waning power
and an inactive senility, Common
weRlths had risen from the Wilderness
on the Northern and Western boundar-
les Of his State, and usurped her power
In the national councils by sheer force
OF a ltvelter vitality. Now, indeed, the
golden hour had arrived the great
wealth of the cotton States was to be
poured in her Golfers, and ere long the
cities of the State would rival in mag
nttcence the cities of the Italian Repu6-
lies during the middle ages, to which
the treasures of the Orient were trfbu-
tary. Towns, villages and hamlets, in
which wealth and afnuence greeted the
eye at every turn, would be Constantly
in the travellers view. Great factories
whose stately furnaces would pierce the
heavens and whose ponderouS engines
revolved with a conscious nobility,
would spring their lofty fronts to catch
the smiles of the morning sun.
Ihere was another, and a powerful
party too, which was pleased by the
graceful illusions to the influential
position accorded the State. All of the
speakers in their remarks, endeavored
to impress the idea that by the union of
Virginia with the Confederacy, the dis
solution would be peaceful. To the
party, therefore, which desired seces-
sion and believed the interests of the
State would be enhanced thereby, this
was grateful announcement, and it
chung tenacionsly to the hope. An
other party there was also, which dep
recated secession and believed it to be
an unmitigated evil, and which would
not consent to permanent abrogation
of the Union, YET thought the Federal
Constitution required some amend-
ments, and with a view to reconstruc-
tion, the present temporary secession
OF Virginia in q peaceable manner,
might bring about the formation of
still closer union of all the States for
getting what human experience has in
variably demonstrated, that reyolu-
ttons never go backward, and that
one false step in the political, as in the
moral world, Is more disastrous than a
hundred passive wrongs addressed, and
Is retrievable only by the sacrifice of
principle or the more sanguinary sacri-
hce of the battlefield.
But to the party of determined rest
less spirits, which had, from inclination
and by following the perverted teach
ings of ambitious statesmen, learned
the lesson of national diSintepratiou
and false honor, the occasion was most
suspicious. This party was high in
hopes from the misrule and unwise
found men who regarded themselves as
the guardians and the sacred reposito-
rtes of what had come down to modern
times from the foolish mists and pruri-
ent courage of the age, when men
sought no higher objects of ambition,
than to tilt lance against the steel
corselet OF an opponent, or to compose
sickly sonnets TO the pearly whiteness
of home fair DANES rounded shoulders
or the graceful arching of her eye
brows. Chivalry was the great sun of
their existence, and so far their adora-
ton extended, that, not to resent
tancied insult by an annihilating of the
offender, as equivalent to being forever
bantshed from the presence of all that
high array of virtues which Is present.
ed for an example to men. When men
entertain such over wrought dist;nc-
tions of the duties of life, they are
necessarily led to shun those employ.
ments and pursuits which bring them
into contact with opposite minds in
the affairs of the race; and hence thew
discard all forms of manual labor and
steady continuous, intellectual effort.
From this state of feeling to that of
disgust and contempt for those who are
thus engaged, the transition is EASY,
Therefore, the chivalry of Virginia
hailed with almost inexpressible de-
hght, the opportunity to sever them
selves socially and politically from the
association of their northern brethren,
who were renowend for their high de-
yelopment of those qualities which go,
in the detail and the aggregate, to con-
stttute the very greatness of a nation
by their Individual weakness. Such
were the various classes and grades of
excited. - = So
The project to make Virginia the
manufacturing power of the Southern
ern Union was fallacy which the
veriest tyro in political economy ought
to have seen. The very States that
were inviting her to that exalted and
profitable office, were those that had for
years SO retarded the industry of manu-
featuring States at tile North by a sys-
tenn of free trade, that at one time II
threatened to almost wholly impoveFish
them. Aud had that choice band OF
chtvalrous spirits, been SO far prescient
to haVR tho - ak =,
Illusions that were produced by four
years OF terrible combat, rise from the
trenches of hundred bloody engage
ments, they could, perhaps, have real
lied that. in this age at least, the senti-
ments that neryed q free mans arm to
strike for the rights of the whole hu-
man race, were the eembodiment of far
more potent and enduring energy, than
the spurious imitation Of the ephemeral
charms of an hour of triumph at a
tournament or banquet, in the pres
ence of kingly power or a queenly
court. And the peaceable secessfonfst
In his happy dreams, could he have
drawn aside the veil of the future. and
seen the hand of destiny in the fierce
flames which writhed over the roof Of
his ancestors, or hid their furies amid
the crashing walls of sacked and burn-
ing cities, or the bowling wilderness
which sprang up in the track of pnssing
armies where all had been an Eden,
might have been awakened to that
sense OF startling reality which few
short years demonstrated to his horri-
fed vision.
Whilst the convention was stillpour-
ing resolutions relating to the great
subject OF union, upon the committee
OF Federal relations, and before it had
maoe any report, an event took place
az the Federal Capital which was de-