14 ADDRESS. 



voyages, and cut with daring keels unknown oceans, with the 

 same hardihobd that impelled them to pierce unexplored forests 

 and tame the howling wilderness. 



The sylvan nursery philosophy did not suit the high-toned 

 feelings of our people, and with an impetuous rush they trod this 

 Arcadian theory under foot. They saw that the little island, from 

 which a goodly proportion of our ancestors came, had arisen from 

 a speck in the ocean to the empire of its tides ; and that now no 

 longer the obscure spot on the outskirts of Europe, the 



"Ultiraos orbe Britannos," 



of the Romans, it directs the fate of nations who at first were 

 dazzled by the display of its wealth, and awed by the eloquence 

 of its cannon. With such an ancestral example, they would not 

 remain contented with the character of tillers of the earth, how- 

 ever eloquently some Utopian enthusiasts might declaim upon the 

 purity of a primitive people, and the contaminating effects of 

 commerce and manufactures. They might read an hundred times 

 the lamentations of the muse over the decay of villages, and the 

 rise of populous cities ; but, however the feelings might be inter- 

 ested, and the fancy warmed by the elegance of the style of such 

 effusions, their arguments failed to convince the reason. Their 

 pines had no sacred character which prevented them from being 

 hewn down and fashioned into masts and spars. Nor were their 

 oaks consecrated by any mistletoe to deter them from uprooting 

 the monarch of the forest. A sober, business spirit is abroad, 

 and neither Fauns nor Dryads can protect the grove when it is 

 wanted for the saw or axe. It must fall if utility require the 

 sacrifice. If any there be who mourn over these changes, we 

 are not among them. The great branches of our national 

 industry will constantly go on, destroying and recombining the 

 elements of productiveness, till every atom is made to bear its 



