as one--the faith which
brightened the six and thirty stars round the forehead of liberty, and
flung the broken fetters of the last slave beneath her feet. If the
church keep the people in their allegiance to those awful virtues,
America shall still be the enlightener of the nations, the beautiful
pioneer in the vanguard of the progress of the world. But if she spread
a table to Fortune, or enshrine Mammon above her altars, if her commerce
become dishonest, and her press debased, and her society frivolous, and
her religion a mere twilight of wilful and self-induced delusion--she in
her turn shall fall like Lucifer, son of the morning, and the double
oceans which sweep her illimitable shores shall only plash to future
empires a more sad, a more desolate, and a more unending dirge."

We suspect that this eloquence is expressive not only of impartial
admiration, but of the pride that is partial. The parties concerned have
common interests in the matter of grandfathers.

The presidential message has met, as might have been anticipated, with a
very varied reception from the great political parties, from the
many-minded press, and from what may be designated the non-partisan or
politically colorless section of the American people. Nor has it been
more fortunate in securing unanimity of judgment as to its political
merits and significance from the public organs which reflect with more
or less precision and exactitude the opinions of the great community of
nations on the other side the Atlantic. Party feeling, unless it be of a
very enlightened, patriotic, and unselfish kind, is apt to breed the
worst types of mental perversity, and give birth to paradoxes of the
most startling character. And when a great national document, discussing
matters vital to the well-being, prosperity and political advancement of
the republic is declared by one influential paper to contain "no
pregnant thought of statesmanship, no conspicuously original idea, no
new issue to inspire discussion in Congress and among the people," and
by another equally competent to frame a judgment to be "a model of good
English, and forcible statement," while a third hesitates not to
pronounce it "a message that will rank among the best documents of its
kind," one naturally wonders what can be the cause of this curious
conflict of sentiment; and after looking at the matter for a moment one
is driven to the conclusion that the reference of the phenomenon to an
invincib