fending brethren.

The intelligence and the wealth of the United States are passive; they
are physically weak, and therefore succumb to the dictation of the rude
masses. And what keeps up this singular action, but the
constantly-recurring elections, the incessant balloting and voting, the
necessity which every man feels hourly of saving his substance or his
life from the devouring rapacity of those who think that all should be
equal!

If the government, acutely sensible that war is an evil which must
cripple its resources, is unwilling to engage in it, both from principle
and from patriotism, it must yield if the mob wills it, or forfeit the
sweets of office and of power. Hence, few men enter upon the cares of
public life in the States now-a-days who are of that frame of mind which
considers personal expediency as worthy of deep reflection. What would
Washington have said to such a system?

The batteries or fortalices of Niagara and of Mississagua have led to a
digression quite unintentional and unforeseen, which must terminate for
the present with a different view from that of the author of the Letters
above-mentioned: and let us hope fervently that the New World has not
yet arrived at such a consummation as that of surpassing the vices and
crimes of the Old, as we are certain it has not yet achieved such a
moral victory as that of outrunning it in the race of scientific or
mechanic fame. England is no more in her dotage than America is in her
nonage. The former, without vanity or want of verity be it spoken, is
as pre-eminent as the latter is honestly and creditably aspiring.

The writer above quoted says their ships sail better, and are manned
with fewer hands. We grant that no nation excels the United States in
ship-building, and that they build vessels expressly for sailing; but
for one English ship lost on the ocean, there are three of the venturous
Americans; for one steam-vessel that explodes, and hurls its hundreds to
destruction, in England or Canada, there are twenty Americans.

In England, the cautious, the slow and the sure plan prevails; in
America, the go-ahead, reckless, dollar-making principle prevails; and
so it is through every other concern of life. A hundred ways of
worshipping the Creator, after the christian form, exist in America,
where half a dozen suffice in England.

Time is money in America; the meals are hurried over, relaxations
necessary to the enjoyment of existence forbidden--and w