XXVIII. At present this appears the patent way Caucus commands, and thousands rush to do→ XXIX. It's an exceedingly convenient mode For those who choose to govern, but not quite The few retain, themselves, the loaves and fishes- XXX. This was once very fashionable-but It is now getting rather out of fashion- GENERAL LAFAYETTE. "The style in which General La Fayette has been received in America shows how little essential difference there is between republican and monarchical honours. The same flattery; the same pomp; the same ceremony; the same parade; but more servility and infinitely more of burlesque self importance." The foregoing pitiful effusion of spleen is extracted from the London Courier, of September 14th. The whole article is written in the spirit of vindictive chagrin, and betrays, in every line, the workings of a jealous and restless malevolence. In short, it is precisely the thing we anticipated; and we should have been much disappointed, if the gall of these creatures of the ministry had not been moved by a spectacle, which, as long as it lasts, will be wormwood and aloes' to the palates of the pandars of legitimacy. The attempt to conceal their vexation beneath a rueful risus sardonicus is truly deplorable, and compels us to believe that their sufferings are too serious to be laughed at; for perhaps it is ungenerous in freemen to rejoice in the torments even of the enemies of liberty. In the mean time, let us see to what extent the rites of republican honours can be said to resemble the pageants of the slaves and adherents of a monarch. The arrival of General Lafayette in America has given rise to the most singular display of natural feeling that the world has ever witnessed. That a private and unpretending citizen, unadorned with the dazzling appendages of wealth or of elevated station, unaccompanied by the pomp and circumstance' of political or military influence, should thus become the object of a nation's hospitality, and the theme of innumerable tongues, is one of those extraordinary events which are now and then developed to the notice of the world, to furnish matter of abundant inquiry to the curious philosopher, and subject for joy and exultation to the lover of mankind. The nature of the national enthusiasm, now in full operation from one end of the union to the other, is, perhaps, without its parallel in history, We do not mean to say, that the extent and the amount of the popular excitement, the noise and the bustle, the parade and the pageantry, the trappings and the suits' of counterfeited homage, have not been far and frequently surpassed. These may be commanded. The autocrat whose arm wields the powerful machinery of despotism, holds the lever that forces down the knees and extorts the exclamations of millions of miserabie puppets; but nothing but the folly of a tyrant can confound the forms of gratitude or the shows of love, with that spontaneous exhibition of a people's affections, which cannot, by its very constitution, be purchased or enforced. Not all the armies of confederated Europe can compel a single heart to throb with joy in the presence of an arbitrary tyrant; nor can all the wealth of Golconda or Peru bribe the eyes of a freeman or a slave, to shed a tear of affection at the approach of the proudest of the sovereigns of Europe. There have been, doubtless, occasions, in which as genuine and as generous demonstrations of public feeling have evinced the sincerity of a people's thankfulness, or the warmth of their regard. But in all these instances, it will be found, either that the tumult of popular applause has followed close upon the achievement that created it, and subsided shortly after into absolute indifference, or else that this object has been gained by the sacrifice of national humanity or justice, and secured by administering largely to the meanest appetites of a sensual and ignorant populace. In the honours we are now conferring on our guest, the circumstances are so different from those which give rise to the commoner developments of popular excitement, as to render the phenomenon unique in the history of political events. Nearly half a century has elapsed since our friend became entitled to our gratitude, and we are now returning our acknowledgements for benefits conferred, (although all of us partake of their results) at a time when but few of us were living. Again; it ought to be observed, that the display of our regard arises not from any exhibition of royal liberality. Our's is very far from being that worthless exultation (not unfrequently mistaken for the evidence of loy alty) which animates a selfish rabble, when their prince has provided for their amusement, or rather for the better security of his power, games and holydays and festivals, theatres and gladiator-shows, bull-baitings, sham naval victories, and autos de fe. We are neither shouting with indecent clamour at the triumphal entry of a conqueror who has annexed to our dominions a subjugated province, nor celebrating with unmeaning festivities the coronation of a monarch, or the marriage of a prince. The influence of a court or of a cabinet is not felt in our proceedings. So far from increasing or restraining us, our government has not even recommended the style in which our guest would be most suitably received. In every thing which characterises our rejoicings, the entire independence of the people, of their temporary agents, is abundantly manifested, and furnishes a palpable evidence of our national free agency. Such a demonstration of popular emotion could not possibly take place on the continent of Europe; for the interference of the ministry with a view to increase, to direct, to diminish or suppress it, would derogate much from its chief characteristic-its voluntary nature. The entire absence of all petty interests, which might render suspected the purity of our hospitality, is another peculiar feature in the event of which we speak. The popular excitement, so far from being created or biassed or promoted by political intrigue, has almost absorbed, for a time, the otherwise absorbing business of the day-the controversy for the presidential chair. But the unsuspected freedom of the language of the nation, curious and novel as it is, is by no means the proudest or most important circumstance by which it is attended. It is the cause, the holy cause of our rejoicings, that consecrates the jubilee. It is this which places it, at once, above the festivals of every other people on the face of the earth; and it is this which constitutes an ample reply to the cold-hearted sneers of some of our good fellow citizens, who have suddenly discovered how exceedingly anti-republican it is to display so much joy at the arrival of one single man. It is not the man. The man is nothing: with all his merits, nothing-when compared to the glorious principle which governs our applause. He must be very little skilled in the knowledge of the nature of popular excitement, who does not understand the motive which impels the people of America to exert their whole strength, and their whole soul, in the present demonstration of their feelings. In the honours we confer on Lafayette, America is seizing a happy opportunity to give vent to the noblest of emotions that ever influenced the actions of a people. She has witnessed, an unengaged, but not an unconcerned spectator, almost from the date of her political existence, the most disgraceful spectacle that ever was or ever can be exhibited to the eyes of an indignant world. With shame, with sorrow, with wonder and disgust, she has watched the progress of an infamous conspiracy against the rights and happiness of freemen wherever they are found. She has seen this execrable object partially accomplished in the extinction of the liberties of Europe. A doctrine unknown, until now, even in the annals of despotism, has been boldly and unblushingly set up in the very centre of the civilized world. A strange and portentous alliance of arbitrary monarchs is established in the face of mankind; and the members of this unprecedented league, finding in their hands the means of almost unlimited oppression, scruple not to utter and maintain, with the most amazing insolence, maxims which the autocrats of ancient Macedonia and Persia had neither the wickedness to conceive, nor the measureless effrontery to avow. The tyrants of antiquity either limited their domination to their own enslaved subjects, or at least, when the lust of dominion urged them to schemes of foreign conquest, the attempt was made under pretences not half so insulting as the modern 'monarchical principle.' No American can hear, without shuddering, the potentates of Europe openly declare, that if every man, woman and child, in Spain, for example, shall ask to-morrow with one mind and with one voice, for a change in the existing government however inconsiderable, or the abolition of a law however oppressive, they shall not be indulged in their most moderate request, if one certain man, who is among them, a weak, wicked, ignorant and bigoted wretch, is unwilling to comply. And not only this, but if one of them dares to complain, his estate shall be confiscated, and he shall be imprisoned; and if he resists, he shall die. Yet with all our love of liberty and hatred of tyranny and tyrants, we have been compelled by an obvious and a necessary policy from forcibly opposing those iniquitous pretentions. Indignant as we feel at the profligate avowal of a doctrine so abhorrent to every feeling of a freeman, and afflicted as we are, that the blasphemous menaces of Austria and her despicable satellites should be promptly followed up by the actual execution of their threats, we are constrained by the first of obligations-our duty to ourselves-to avoid all active interference in the unnatural and dishonourable controversy. Perhaps a more enlarged and liberal philanthrophy might require, that in a case where the commonest principles of justice are flagrantly and impudently outraged, any nation has a right to interfere in behalf of the oppressed; as instances not unfrequently occur in which every individual is justified in rescuing a fellow creature, by force, if he sees him exposed to the brutal assault of a ruffian. Whether this be a rule for the conduct of a nation or not, no one will deny that every comfort and encouragement we can possibly afford to the suffering nation without the overt act of actual hostilities, is not only freely allowed, but specially required. Of this right, America has always availed herself, and we confess that so far from desiring to oppose the demonstration of what, unjustly, has been termed the vanity of freedom, we never can regard as extravagant the extremest self-complacency which the nation can exhibit. For ourselves, we respect and would warmly encourage the most exuberant admiration of the principles of democracy; nor ever seek to restrain the most vehement detestation and abhorrence of the maxims set forth by the potentates of Europe. These are the feelingsthe love of liberty and the hatred of oppression-which animate the soul of every citizen who joins in the jubilee that welcomes Lafayette to our shores; and we doubt not, but even the meanest and most ignorant of them all, feels when he gazes on the festival of freemen, a wish that the tyrants of the old world were condemned to be spectators of the scene. We feel assured that many voices are lent to the general acclamation, with a desire, and almost a belief, that the cry may cross the sea and reach the ears of the enemies of freedom; and we candidly acknowledge that, cold and circumspective as age and experience have rendered us, we are still boy enough to anticipate with pleasure the annoyance and chagrin which the tyrants of Europe must endure, in contemplating a spectacle, in which a mighty republic uncontrolled by the influence or advice of its government, rises up with one accord to salute the approach of the champion of liberty. It is by no means improbable, that the time is not far distant, when the whole of the civilized world will be deeply and immediately interested in the great question of the proper source and disposition of national sovereignty. This controversy involves interests too powerful, relations too complicated, and prejudices too firmly established, to be settled by the influence |