motives, or sit regardless of the consequences of their actions, because we are convinced that their intentions are pure? So far otherwise, Mr. Chairman, that, in my opinion, their honesty is an additional reason for dreading them. Of your cool, calculating, political knaves I am never afraid. Such men are not apt to be much trusted; and moreover, they never do mischief, but when there is something to be gained by it. They never do mischief for mischief's sake; and being, for the most part, men of sense and reflection, you may generally convince them that their own interest lies in avoiding mischief. But it is the sincere, the honest fanatic whom I dread, and whom I think myself bound to restrain, as I would confine a maniac. His honesty, his zeal, and his good character, enable him to inspire confidence and gain proselytes. The consciousness of upright intentions renders him as bold as he is blind. He rushes directly forward, without looking to the right hand or the left; pulls down all that stands in his way, regardless on whom it may fall; destroys a country, in order to make it free; inflicts unheard of calamities on the present generation, for the happiness. of posterity; and makes experiments on governments and nations, with the calm indifference of an anatomist dissecting the body of a malefactor. These are the men of whom I am afraid, and whom I think it my duty at all times and places to withstand: men whose projects and experiments have brought ruin on other countries, and will bring it on this, unless they are resisted and restrained, by the sober and reflecting part of the community.

After all, Mr. Chairman, I am not much afraid of these men. There was, indeed, a time when their ef forts might have been formidable; because that phrensy of revolution which seemed to have been poured out upon the earth like a vial of wrath, which had fallen upon mankind like a plague, did once extend its dreadful influence to this country, where, in a greater or less degree, it infected every description of people, and

made them eager for change and ripe for revolution. But it has passed away never to return. Fortunately, before the disease had risen to its height here, time was given for observing its terrible effects elsewhere; and the American people, profiting by example, and aided by the peculiar happiness of their situation, first resisted and have finally subdued this dreadful malady, the love of revolution.

In this, I repeat again, they have been aided no less by their own happy situation, than by the mournful experience of other countries. For, revolutions, Mr. Chairman, are brought about in all countries, by three descriptions of men, philosophers, jacobins and sansculottes. They exist in all countries, and accordingly, in all countries are to be found the materials of revolution; but they exist in different proportions, and according as these proportions are greater or less in any country, so is the danger of revolution with which it is threatened.

The philosophers are the pioneers of revolution. They advance always in front, and prepare the way, by preaching infidelity, and weakening the respect of the people for ancient instructions. They are, for the most part, fanatics of virtuous lives, and not unfrequently of specious talents. They have always, according to the expression of an ancient writer," Satis cloquentiæ, sapientiæ parum ;" eloquence enough, but very little sense. They declaim with warmth on the miseries of mankind, the abuses of government, and the vices of rulers, all of which they engage to remove, provided their theories should once be adopted. They talk of the perfectibility of man, of the dignity of his nature; and entirely forgetting what he is, declaim perpetually about what he should be. Thus they allure and seduce the visionary, the superficial and the unthinking part of mankind. They are, for the most part, honest, always zealous, and always plausible; whereby they become exceedingly formidable. Of the three classes employed in the work of revolution,

they are infinitely the most to be dreaded; for until they have shaken the foundations of order, and infused a spirit of discontent and innovation into the community, neither the jacobins nor the sans-culottes can produce any considerable effect. The army cannot find entrance, until these forerunners have corrupted the garrison, to open the gates. Of these men we, in this country, have enough and more than enough.

Of jacobins we also have plenty. They follow close in the train of the philosophers, and profit by all their labors. This class is composed of that daring, ambitious and unprincipled set of men, who, possessing much courage, considerable talents, but no character, are unable to obtain power, the object of all their designs, by regular means, and therefore perpetually attempt to seize it by violence. Tyrants when in power, and demagogues when out, they lie in wait for every opportunity of seizing on the government per fas aut nefas, and for this purpose use all implements which come to their hands, neglect no means which promise success. Unable to enter at the door of the sheepfold, they climb in at the windows, and devour the flock. Although they use the assistance of the philosophers in gaining entrance, they dread their honesty, their zeal and their influence with the public; and accordingly, the first use they make of power, when they can obtain it, is to destroy the philosophers themselves.

As the philosophers are the pioneers, these men are the generals of the army of revolution: but both pioneers and generals are useless without an army : fortunately, the army does not exist in this country.

This army is composed of the sans-culottes; that class of idle, indigent and profligate persons, who so greatly abound in the populous countries of Europe, especially the large towns, and being destitute of every thing, having no home, no families, no regular means of subsistence, feel no attachment to the established order, which they are always ready to join in subverting, when they find any one to pay them for their as

sistance. These were the men who, in the pay of a wealthy jacobin, and under the guidance of fanatic philosophers, overturned all order and government in France, and will overturn it in every other country, where they exist in great numbers, and are not opposed with great force and unceasing vigilance. But, fortunately for America, there are few sans-culottes among her inhabitants; very few indeed. Except some small portions of rabble in a few towns, the character is unknown among us; and hence our safety. Our people are all, or very nearly all, proprietors of land, spread over a vast extent of country, where they live in ease and freedom, strangers alike to oppression and want. Those who reside in the largest towns are possessed of property, have homes, families and regular occupations; and among such a people, the principles of sans-culottism never did, and never will, make much progress. If a new duke of Orleans were here, with a Mirabeau for his privy-counsellor, and an annual revenue of three hundred thousand guineas to supply the means of corruption, he could not raise a mob sufficient to drive this body from their seats, or overawe their deliberations. We have jacobins in plenty, and philosophers not a few: but while we are free from sans-culottes, and it is probable that the nature of our government, and the abundance of untilled land in our country, will secure us from them for ages, we need not apprehend great danger. We ought, no doubt, to watch and withstand the enterprizes of the pioneers and generals; but while they remain without troops, they are not much to be dreaded.

Having made these observations on the purity of gentlemen's motives, observations which were due not only to candor and truth, but to the respect I feel for their personal characters, I hold myself at full liberty to explain the tendency of the present amendment, and of that system of policy of which it is a part. I mean not to impute any ill intentions to gentlemen, when I declare, and atter pt to prove, that this tendency is to

the utter subversion of the present government. It is my firm and most deliberate opinion, that the amendment now under consideration, and the principles of that system to which it belongs, lead directly to the introduction of anarchy and revolution in this country; and if not steadily opposed, must sooner or later produce that effect. This opinion it is my purpose to support, by the observations which I am about to of fer; and it is by a full conviction of its truth, that I have been induced to consider it as a most sacred duty, to combat the system at all times, and by all the means in my power.

The gentleman from Pennsylvania, (Mr. Gallatin,) has denied this to be the tendency of his system, and contends that our principles, not his, lead to revolution and anarchy. Revolution and anarchy, he tells us, in emphatic language, are the results of a system of expense, of war, of oppression and of arbitrary sway; the last leaf of that book, in which are written the excesses of tyranny. I agree fully with the gentleman in this position; but there is another question anterior to this, which he has omitted to discuss. It is, by what means tyranny, by what means the excesses of arbitrary government, are most likely to be produced? This question I propose to discuss with the gentleman from Pennsylvania. I mean to compare his system, his principles with ours, and to inquire which of the two is most likely to introduce arbitrary government into this country. And I hope to convince, not that gentleman himself, but the House, that if ever arbitrary government should exist here, it must owe its existence to the system of policy which that gentleman supports.

How, let me ask, Mr. Chairman, have the governments of other countries been converted from free, into árbitrary governments? By one of two ways; either a military chief, possessing little political authority, but hereditary, and having at his disposal the military force of the state, has availed himself of the frequent wars by which neighboring states are so apt

VOL. II.