The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1875-01-29


tant question of General Grants resigna-
ton of the Presidency the more fas-
cinating it appears to us in its har-
mony with his own circumstances and
those of the country. Thinking of that letter
of resignation, which would give such univer-
sal delight to the people, we say to ourselves,
slightly altering the words in which Milton
makes Adam address Eve in Paradise:-
or this converstng we forget all time
All seasons and their change, ali please alike.
And yet, seeing how day alter day His Excel
lency puts off that stepping down and out
which, as we have repeatedly assured him,
and as we cannot doubt he knows, would be
the most popular act of his life we ore
tempted to exclaim:-
Look round the bapitable world how few
Know their own good, or knowing II, pursue.
It is pitiful to see man hesitating to do
that which is so certain to crown him with ap-
plause and holding fast to power ut the daily
expense of his reputation, and we cannot re-
slst the impulse which once more bids us to
represent to His Excellency the critical situa-
ton in which he stands In the first place,
and to begin with himself, as he usually
does. we observe that His Excellency
has by this time found comfortable places
for all on Early oil his needy relatives and
friends. has acquired a pretty, or, in
deed. unleIU his intimates belle him, large,
fortune in the White House. He has had, on
the whole, q very good time, with great
many more heavy dinners than at one time Of
his life he dared look forward to. Throw in
the fact that he has entertained king, and
General Grant would, doubtless, confess, If
he were asked, that he has made very sue
cessful career.
One of the most marvellous things about
him is the constancy with which Fortune, the
tickle dame, sticks to him. He has been
literally pelted with good luck; there has
been nothing like it since Marlborough, that
great commander, who was called the most
fortunate and the most greedy Of mankind.
And now, at the very close of his career, she
remains faithful to him, and, indeed, she
seems to have reserved her greatest, her most
precious, favor for her last Not Pittsburg
Landing not Cold Harbor, not the blunders
of Pemberton nor the incapacity of Halleck,
not the mulishness of Andy johnson nor the
folly of republican managers, nor the greater
folly of the Cincinnati men who nominated
Greeley or of the democrats who accepted the
nomination-not all these favors of Fortune,
which gradually raised His Excellency, without
conspicuous abilities, with but slender educa-
ton, with the most astonishing and absolute
ignorance Of civil affairs, with curious con-
tempt for constitutional limitations and for the
law. with an almost incredible incapacity to
learn even the rudlmental principles of civil
government, from an obscure adventurer to
be President, and to second term in that
ofice-not all these favors Of. Fortune to-
gether compare with the opportunity she now
holds out to him with her most fascinating
smile.
We allude, of course, to his magnificent OPP
portunity to leave public life by resigning the
Presidency.
In the first place, Is everybody secs, it
would be absolutely the most universally ap-
plauded act of his life. 1t would make him
at once, as we have before pointed out, the
most popular man in the country. It will be
said, indeed, of His E1cellency, when he has
resigned, that nothing in all his career fitted
him so well as the leaving OF it We need not
tell him, of course, that he would confer an
inestimable benefit on his country by resign
ing He is not so dull as no. to understand
that. But consider only some of the other
elements of the problem.
There are, we are aware, INSCRIPTIONS fat
terers who still whisper to His Excellency
| of hrfx ebD -
of General Grant if we thought it necessary to
repeat to him our often and faithfully given
warning-that the American people do not
favor third term. He can reach it only by
revolutionary and disgraceful means; by
acts which would make his name obi
Gus, not in this country alone, but
all over the world. Before he can be
reelected he must stiae the voice of. the
people and confuse public sentiment and
PROSTATE the country in all its interests, eithe-
by needless war or by desperate and criminal
attack upon the peoples liberties Whenever
Casey and Harrington and Conkling and Will
liams and Shepherd whisper third term in his
ear we beg His Excellency to put them to the
test let him ask them whether it is the act Of
friends to advise him to perpetuate the power
by which they gain profit and security at so
ruinous an expense to his reputation? We
will not promise that they shall blush, but
certainly they ought to.
If, through the insidious Vaccinations Of
some of his ill-chosen ntimates and Aatterers,
His Excellency should still find in his heart
lingering doubts about this miserable third
term delusion, let him ask-not Secretary
Fish, or Secretary Bristow, or the Postmas-
ter General or Speaker Blaine, or that most
faithful and ablest of his defenders IN the
House, the Honorable Eugene Hale, not any
of these, though they would all tell him that
1t is q worse snare, a more wretched fraud
than Katie King hersef-no, let him ask only
the wisest. the shrewdest, the most faithful