existence_;' and you say 'every change of Administration, at every
election, exemplifies this great truth'!

By Government, I suppose you here unconsciously mean something different
from what you had before defined as its 'ordinary meaning,' for you
would hardly talk of the 'life' and 'health' of an abstract scheme of
polity, of a set of 'rules and principles.' I take it, therefore, that
you mean, or ought to mean, a living, acting something. Now imagine a
Government without an Administration, with its Administration 'utterly
destroyed,' 'swept out of existence.' How long afterward would it
continue to exist? One day? One hour? One moment? No; the 'life' of a
Government implies the perpetual, uninterrupted exercise of the supreme
powers of the state, and that depends upon the undying official life of
living administrative functionaries; and therefore to say, as you do,
that the Administration is 'utterly destroyed,' 'swept out of
existence,' every time new members are elected to fill the place of
those whose term of office has run out, is an absurd exaggeration of
language, and certainly serves no good purpose, but only affords to
those who are capable of being deceived by it a fallacious show of
support to a distinction which I have proved to be irrelevant and futile
in this case.

It seems to me it is not for you to talk about 'the prejudices and
befogged intellects' of those who are unable to see 'in the light' of
your notable 'explication' that 'opposition to the Administration'--such
as you now make--'is not opposition to the Government.' And your
pretension 'to rally in support of the Government,' and to 'uphold and
strengthen' it, by such opposition, will, I am afraid, be looked upon by
intelligent men and good patriots as absurd and impudent to the last
degree-an outrage, in fact, on language and on common sense.

* * * * *

But enough for your verbal distinctions--a great deal too much, indeed,
were it not that if you can put forth such things in good faith, it is
to be presumed that there may be others of easy faith enough, through
disloyal predisposition of feeling, to take them as sound and valid, and
so find comfort in error and an evil course.

To come now to the real merits of the case. You denounce the
Administration, and seek to stir up popular disaffection to it, not for
heartlessness, hesitation, and feebleness in prosecuting the war, but
precisely for whatever of