The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-01-18
SPIRIT OF THE PRESS.
HDrToRIAL OPINIONS oY TBB LEADING joUSNALs
UFoN CURRENT roPiCs-ooMPILEp EVERY
DAY FOR THB EVENING TELEGRAPH.
General Grant and the Republican Party.

publican party are tiUkiish and uncomfortable,
portebdipg an open rupture as soon as he an
nOuDces his Cabinet. Whether the close So
orecy in which he wells his Intentions proceeds
from wish to postpone the quarrel as long as
possible we do not know; but his absolute ST.
lence on matter Of SO much public interest
seems as strange a. it is unusual. 1t cannot
easily be accounted for on any avowable
public grounds. Obvious considerations and
a reasonable respect for public opinion re-
quire different course. Cabinet officers
ought to have some tirue TO prepare for their
duties. Ii the Presdent-elect, like his pre-
decessors, would allow his intended seec-
tions to leak ont, he wonld have the ad-
vantage of public criticism on their fitness
and their adjustment to each other. He would
walk with securer steps when his path was
thus illuminated by all She torches OF public
intelligence. Why be chooses to JurrOU, to
move by dark subterranean passages instead
of walking above tts ground, is o mystery
known to himself. He is perhaps profounder
statesman than any OF the Presidents who
have preceded hm; VS. should be- sorry to
think bis secrecy is like that of a quack doc
tor. 1t is more reasonable to suppose that he
sees himself bemmed in with peculiar difficult
ties; that he finds so many of the Repu blican
leaders restive and Suspicious, that 1t is his
chief study to avoid schsm, or, If it cannot
be wholly prevented, to postpone and miti-
gate it.
That his sepsitiveuess on this subjec. is
extreme, and Gas he is man not to bo deeply
moved by trihes) that the danger Of q rup-
ture is too real, Is proved by his breaking his
extraordinary reticence towards the public on
what would seem to be- so trivial an occasion
as report of his private conversations by an
anonymous newspaper correspondent. II, as
General Grant AYERS those alleged conversa-
tiOns never took place, it is impossible to un-
derstand why they have put him into such
AutNa Tha ID. n mt 20
give the precise language of General Grant,
but only its substance. There are cases in
which the most positive denials prove nothing
but that the maker of them has strong mo
tives for conoealmept. Sidney Smith, for ex-
ample, clergyman though he was always de-
MED that he wrote the Peter Plymley" letters
but in the preface to his works be naively
said, 81 have always deuied it., but finding
that deny it in vain, have thought it might
be as we'll to include the letter in this cOllec-
tion." Walter Scott did not Justify his denial
of the authorship of the Waverley novels
with such arch simplicity, but resorted to
oasuistry. "Either | must have surrendered
my secret" he said 'or have returned an
equivOcatiDg answer or, fually, must have
stOutly and boldly denied the fact. The first
was sacrifice which conceive no one had a
right to force from me, since alone was con-
oerned in the matter. The alternative OF re-
turning q doubtful answer must have left me
unwilling TO assume the merit Git there was
any, which dared not absolutely lay claim to-
or those who might think more Justly Of me
must have received such an equivoosl answer
as an indirect avowal. therefore considered
myself entitled, like an accused person put
upon trial, to refuse giving my own evidence
to my own conviction, and hatly to deny all
that could not be proved against me-"
II the man of arms has initiated those dis
tinguisbed men of letters, and thinks himself
entitled fatty to deny call that cannot be
proved against him" his plea of not guilty
must stand good by the non-appearance of
witnesses. He may justify himself by casu-
istry as plausible as Sir Walter Scott's. A
private conversation, he may say, is, by the
laws of social intercourse, held sacred. If
those who listen to it repeat it to third per-
son, and he publishes it, he can prove his
story only by his informants, whose violation
of confidence would be brought home to them
if they consented to testify. The actual
hearers of the conversations would be ap
pealed to in vain to substantiate the report.
plump denial is therefore perfectly safe,
since there Is no possibility of disproving it,
Being safe, ii may be held justifable on the
ground that a man may pro cot the secrecy
of his confidential intercourse. This is the
best argument we can make for General
Grant, and it seems to us as valid as that
used by Scott.
But what is the great stress upon General
Grants feelings which lmpelled him TO tul5
elaripg deviation from his habitual course
Here is person who passes for the most i'm
pefturbable man on the continent, a person
who has never broken silence under provoca-
tions which touched his honor and his military
pride rushing into print to contradict the
statements of an anonymous newspaper cor
respondent on subject of no more Importance
than his opinions of various public men.
Horace in an oft-quoted passage of his "Art
of Poetry" cautions his tunefal brethren
against the improperly of introducing the
gods except on occasions of sufficient
dignity to warrant their awful in
tervention. 1t would violate all poetic pro-
liability to make those sublime beings de-
scend from their serene elevation uDless The
occasion were one of frst-rate dignity. FOl
General Grant, who has kept silent on &c
many occasions when other men would have
spoken TO come before the public about {
matter which every other statesman wOulc
have slighted, is an enigma which admits 0
no rational solution, except on the hypothesis
that his relations with the public men OF hi
party are so slippery aud insecure that sligh
causes OF disturbance are OF OminOus import
IL he we're not totteripg on the edge of preci
pice, why has he made this great ado owe
a matter which seems on its face 81
trivalY 1t is only the violence OF the tempes
that snatches u chips and s'raws and lift
them to a great height. General Grant ha
been touched in a very sore spot; and IN
more this self-possessed. stoieal mar cries on
at the brush of feather, the more cl5srly h
notifies the public of the location of his wound
II is too evident that he has got to suocumb I
the Republican leaders or break with them
and this prospect goes farther to shake an
l.