The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1869-11-21
upoh j us; conaider: and behold our re,

upon us; consider and behold our re,
proach. "''''" 't'''S'' "'i .!
"Our inheritance IL turned to
strangers; our houses to aliens" a.,4 aa
sour necks are under persecution: we
labor and havo no rest. /"
"Wo have given the land to the Egyp-
'tians and to the Assyriaus to be satisfied
with bread" il : III ~ H"r
Servants have ruled oyer us, md
there is none that doth deliver US out Of
their hands. we looked for peace, but
no good came, ind for time OF health,
rand behold ttoublef' s.. .,.t
Such without exaggeration WAS our
condition, and it was one that might we'll
have appalled, the stoutest heart, but
thanks be to God, our people are of
sterner stuff than to yield themselves
prey to. unmanly despair. Girding up
their rloins, and gathering around them
their shattered household gods, they set
themselves to ''put their house III order,
not to die, but to live" Difficulties va
nished before their fixed purpose to
overcome them. lin. spite ofipimical le.
gislntion. in spite of unjust taxation, in
spite of that horde of political adven-
turers who Aocke6 here to drain the life
blood of our people, like the vultures of
old which gathered around the bound
and prostrate giant, tearing with bloody
beaks his still living heart; in spite Of
the seasons themselves, which seemed to
war against them, they have passed in
safety through tho narrow straits of po-
verify, and not far distant they behold the
golden waves of an ocean of prosperity.
Let me not be understood, my friends,
whilst holding up to your view the pro-
mise of this prosperity, which seems to
be already within your grasp, and indi-
eating anything beyond that material
prosperity which comes from q wide and
general diffusion of wealth among q peo-
pie. That higher and nobler prosperity
which only liberty gives, and which a
free and virtuous people alone can en-
JOY, you will have to achieve by slow and
painful steps; by patient endurance; by
ceaseless vigilance; by stern adherence
to principle. National wealth, bringing,
as it does, material prosperity to peo-
pie, is to be desired; not for the case and
luxury which follow in its train, but as n
means of giving national power, by
which people can secure and maintain
their Liberties. It then becomes an
honorable end; but we should ALWAYS
bear in mind that it will be dearly bought
if, in exchange for it, we barter away
faith, and honor, and truth. Better-a
thousnndfold better-to live poor, vir-
tuous and free, rather than rich, vicious
and enslaved. All history is full of ex-
amples to
''Teach US that States, Of native strength DOS
sest,
ihough very poor, may still be very blest;
And self-dependent power can Time defy,
As rocks resist the billows and the sky'
The dawn of n brighter day for the
South begins to dispel tho gloom in
which she WAS left by the war, and to her
agrlculturists more than to any other
class, is she indebted for this auspicious
change; for. after all, the true and per-
manent wealth of q people springs from
the product of the soil. We cannot, it
is trne, grow "greenbacks, nor do we of
the South comprehend that wondrous al-
chemy which transforms these pictured
promises to pay" into these precious
metals, which, among nations behind us,
perhaps, in political economy, are alone
regarded as money; but We, and We alone,
grow in perfection those great staples
which the world demands as necessaries
or luxuries. Cotton may, perhaps, be
no longer King, for in these days when
mobocracy has dethroned laws and con-
stitntions, he, too, may have shared the
same late, OUT ne DlQS talr to remOunt
his throne long before his fellow-suffer-
ers are re-instated on theirs. Already,
be grasps his sceptre with no unsteady
hand, and we may hope to see him, ere
long, resume the imperial purple and
royal diadem. How can we, as legal
subjects, hasten bis resumption of au-
thority7 For an answer, 1 point to the
men of whom Georgia may we'll be proud
the Dicksons, the Locketts, the Pen
dletons, and others of her eminent plant
ers; the men who have taught not only
theoretically, but practically, the great
lessonlhow to produce the greatest am ount
of cotton on the smallest area of ground.
with the most economical expenditure of
labor. They have shown how even our
exhausted lands, under judicious and
scientiOc culture, can be made as pro-
ductive as the virgin and teeming soil
of the great Delta of tho Mississippi,
and if he who makes two blades of
grass to grow where only one grew before
is entitled to the gratitude OF mankind,
what a debt does the South owe to
those who have made this true of her
great staple? With the example of their