Capt. Marryatt, Part I [pp. 253-276]

254 Capt. Ma~~~~~~~~~~att, and hi8 Diary. [APRIL,~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
pulse, were content to commit their just claims to the
chances of future legislation, and the spontaneous gratitude
of the republic. When, therefore, the army was peacefully disbanded, and our citizen-soldiers, resigning their
arms without a struggle, melted quietly into the popular
mass, such a phenomenon in the history of revolutions was
regarded with equal surprise and disappointment by the
monarchists and oligarchs of Europe. Finding that, contrary to their calculations, our new-born freedom had survived the dangers of military despotism, the politicians of
the old world still lacked confidence in its stability. They
predicted, that anarchy must be the necessary result of institutions so feeble and inefficient; and that the slender
ligaments which held our confederacy together would
speedily be snapt asunder, by the conflict of clashing interests and the shock of civil commotion. The astonishing spectacle, soon after exhibited in this country, of a
whole people assembling peaceably to discuss the principles of their political system, and to reform the defects of
their organic law, and, after an exciting contest, protracted
through months of animated debate, acquiescing calmly ill
the formation of a government, devised by representatives
of their own choice, and which cemented in a firm and
solid union the jarring elements of a community so diverse
in climate, soil, pursuits and interests, baffled all these
prognostics of evil; and was an achievement scarcely less
remarkable than our successful struggle with one of the
most powerful nations on the globe. Under the influence
of institutions, constructed with such deliberate forecast,
agriculture and commerce revived; credit, then almost extinct, was restored; vigor and efficiency were infused into
every department of the public service; and our relations
with foreign countries placed upon the most solid and satisfactory foundation. A few years of rapid prosperity convinced the most incredulous, that the American republic
was destined to assume a high place among the nations of
the earth, in enterprise, wealth, population, and all the elements of political greatness; and those who had so confidently foretold the approaching failure of our experiment,
were constrained to defer the fulfilment of their prophecy
to some remote and uncertain period.
The example of our success gave an impulse to liberal
opinions throughout Christendom; and emboldened those,
who were smarting under antiquated abuses and oppressions in the old world, to engage in the most daring schemes
of reform and revolution. Not reflecting that the stability
of republican government in this country should be fairly
ascribed to our physical circumstances, and still more to
the moral training of a people, habituated, from the first
settlement of America, to the enjoyment of freedom, they
rashly concluded that similar institutions in tle ancient
and densely populated monarchies of Europe would be
productive of equal advantages; and that nations, inured
for ages to the galling fetters of despotism, would remain
sober and tranquil while the process of emancipation was
going on. Upon such mistaken views of human nature the
French revolutionists proceeded, when they proposed those
rash and premature innovations, which, acting on a people
excitable and unprepared for liberty, hurried them in a
moment of frantic exultation to the most horrible excesses,
and quenched the hopes of the patriot and philanthropist in
a torrent of blood.
The spirit of inquiry and reform once awakened in countries, where millions of starving operatives and squalid peasantry present such apt materials for political agitation,
will never stop short with moderate and temporizing measures. Parties have, accordingly, sprung up in the European communities, who push their projects of change to the
wildest extremes, and maintain opinions subversive of all
order and security. These parties are composed of speculative politicians, who, deaf to the warnings of experience,
propose to reduce all human institutions to the standard of
certain abstractions, without regard to the circumnstances,
character and necessities of the people upon whom they
are to operate; of unprincipled demagogues, seeking to secure their own aggrandizement in the tumult of civil commotion; and of a discontented multitude, goaded by the
sense of multiplied grievances, and confounding the evils,
necessarily incident to the unequal conditions of society,
with the effects of political systems. These fanatical innovators do not consider that man is the creature of habit and
education; that, without previous moral preparation, the
turbulent peasantry of Ireland, the manufacturing poor of
Britain, and the serfs of Russia, are incapable of exercising
political rights with discretion; and that the only solid
foundation of republican institutions is to be found in the
virtue and intelligence of the people. They seem to suppose that all nations may be governed by the same maxims,
and will not admit that the fundamental principles of freedom should be controlled and modified by considerations of
expediency. Contrasting the opulence of the privileged
orders with the immense masses of want and misery, which
invariably accumulate in old and populous communities,
they persuade themselves that all exclusive possessions are
odious and oppressive monopolies; and hence the property
and political power of aristocracy are equally the objects
of their proscription. A party, prepared to invade the sacred rights of property, that great bond of civil society, will
speedily be taught to rebel against all moral and political
restraint, and to regard every curb upon their passions as
an arbitrary abridgment of natural liberty. To such violent
disorganizers, the friend of temperate reform, who consults
the condition of a country and the genius of its people in
the formation of a government, and advancing cautiously in
the career of improvement, applies his remedy only when
the grievance is evident and the necessity imperative, is
even more hateful than the bigotted adherent of old sys
terns and exploded errors. Our notions of liberty appear
timid and contracted, to these bold and reckless advocates
of change. In our declaration of independence, we have
proclaimed, as a general and abstract truth, that all men are
by nature free and equal, and we are charged by these zealots with a departure from our fundamental principle, because we have seen fit to tolerate the system of domestic
slavery, and have not admitted women to an equal share of
political as well as civil rights. With them peace, security,
and the moral tendency of measures, weigh nothing. They
make no allowance for the difficulties of our situation, nor
do they perceive how impracticable and pernicious, in any
society, the attempt would be to carry out this principle to
its remote consequences.
This school of radical politics has not been confined to
the continent of Europe, but has been recently imported,
like other foreign novelties, into some of our large cities.
As yet, however, its disciples consist principally of those
discontented refugees, whom crime, or penury, or political
proscription, have driven here from the old world. Its disorganizing doctrines have not found much favor with our
native-born citizens; but it is impossible to foresee how
far they may be disseminated by the active propagandism
,f such zealous apostles as Fanny Wright, Garrison and
Brownson. In Europe, its progress has been so rapid as to
excite the most intense alarm among the partizans of prerogative and privileged orders, and to inspire even the
friends of regulated freedom with the most melancholy forebodings. Two great parties, therefore, divide the old world,
(for the moderate party is too feeble in numbers and influence to be taken into the account,) namely: those who
uphold established governments with all their abuses, and
those who are striving to level all existing systems to their
foundations, that they may reconstruct out of their ruins a
fanciful edifice modelled on the newest principles of politi
254
Capt. Matnatt, and his Diary.
[APRIL,