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id Mrs. Campbell. "The question now is," continued Alfred, "as two of the parties, France and England, have proved so short-sighted, whether the Americans, having thrown off their allegiance, have not been equally so in their choice of a democratical government?" "How far a modern democracy may succeed, I am not prepared to say," replied Mr. Campbell; "but this I do know, that in ancient times, their duration was generally very short, and continually changing to oligarchy and tyranny. One thing is certain, that there is no form of government under which the people become so rapidly vicious, or where those who benefit them are treated with such ingratitude." "How do you account for that, sir?" said Alfred. "There are two principal causes. One is, that where all men are declared to be equal (which man never will permit his fellow to be if he can prevent it), the only source of distinction is wealth, and thus the desire of wealth becomes the ruling passion of the whole body, and there is no passion so demoralizing. The other is, that where the people, or, more properly speaking, the mob govern, they must be conciliated by flattery and servility on the part of those who would become their idols. Now flattery is lying, and a habit equally demoralizing to the party who gives and to the party who receives it. Depend upon it, there is no government so contemptible or so unpleasant for an honest man to live under as a democracy." "It is my opinion, sir, and I believe a very general one," said Alfred. "How far the Americans may disprove such an opinion," continued Mr. Campbell, "remains to be seen; but this is certain, they have commenced their new form of government with an act of such gross injustice, as to warrant the assumption that all their boasted virtues are pretense. I refer to their not liberating their slaves. They have given the lie to their own assertions in their Declaration of Independence, in which they have declared all men equal and born free, and we can not expect the Divine blessing upon those who, when they emancipated themselves, were so unjust as to hold their fellow-creatures in bondage. The time will come, I have no doubt, although perhaps not any of us here present may see the day, when the retribution will fall upon their heads, or rather upon the heads of their offspring; for the sins of the fathers are visited upon the children, even to the third and fourth generation. But it is time for u
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