ithin his reach to render his services efficient?
That the affirmative would be the popular answer is sufficiently proved
by a recurrence to the zeal with which we organized drill-clubs and
practised military tactics in the early stages of the war. It was not
long before the zeal died away. It soon proved a bore to people who
could not help perceiving, that, however perfect they might become in
the manual exercise, their efficiency as soldiers could hardly amount to
much, when most of them had never fired a gun in their lives. And so the
drill-room was quietly abandoned,--the conduct of the war was left to
the Government and the army, while we looked on as mere spectators,--and
the future was left to take care of itself.

We do not mourn greatly at the decay of the drill-clubs, which, in the
form they assumed, were likely to be of little practical benefit; but we
do most sincerely regret the decay of the spirit which led to their
formation, for it was founded on the universal conviction of the fact,
which exists at this moment in still stronger force, that every man
ought to make himself ready for the possible contingency of his services
being demanded in the field.

No man can foretell the chances and changes which are before us; but he
must be ignorant indeed of human nature and human history, who does not
perceive, that, even if our success in the present contest is all that
we can hope, there are issues involved in the weighty questions which
must ensue before the storm subsides, which may render the preservation
of our liberties dependent upon our ability to resist the attempts of
factions or of ambitious and unprincipled military leaders to overturn
them. We have had evidence enough, since the struggle began, (if any one
doubted it before,) that selfishness and ambition are not unrepresented
among us; and if such spirits are abroad, they are working for evil, and
we are worse than foolish to trust to virtue and patriotism to encounter
them unarmed. Do we not owe it to that fatal error, that we are in our
present condition? Were not ambition and lust of power secretly
strengthening their hands for years, in the hope to spring upon us
unawares, and bind us fast before we could prepare for resistance?--and
can we again suffer ourselves to be caught in the same trap?

The question implies its own answer, and the practical reply should be
the immediate and universal instruction of the people in the use of
arms; and t