1843.] Our Social, Political and Educational System. Ill 



" the greatest good to the greatest number;" our editors, who 

 wield a more potent influence upon the destinies of the nation 

 than any and every other class of our citizens, will be selected 

 for their erudition and trustworthiness, and will perform their 

 arduous duties in a faithful discharge of the weighty responsi- 

 bilities resting upon them; our preachers of the gospel — casting 

 aside the disgraceful prejudice which, except in partial instances, 

 has so long kept them in ignorance, or bigotry worse than igno- 

 rance — will be able instructors in spiritual things, and fully com- 

 petent, for the execution of the sacred trusts of their high mission, to 

 carry forward the glorious cause of their Master; our lawyers, — 

 thoroughly impressed with the truth of the sentiment, " Sat cite, 

 si sat belli','''' which, through life, guided the action of one of 

 England's most learned and distinguished judges, — will patiently, 

 imweariedly, and in the spirit of patriotism, devote themselves 

 to the study and practice of their noble profession; our doctors, 

 disdaining quackery and empiricism in every shape, will give 

 themselves up, with devoted ardor, and in the true spirit of hu- 

 manity to the responsible art of soothing the distresses, and alle- 

 viating the " ills which flesh is heir to;" and our citizens, gene- 

 rally, while striving fairly and honestly to improve their individual 

 circumstances, will labor, also, to advance the common welfare 

 of their kind. Then, too, when the general and correct inform- 

 ation is diffused among our people, they will see the folly of 

 looking to foreign countries for our literary and scientific read- 

 ing. And, in this connection, however irrelevant it may appear, 

 I cannot withhold the expressive, that it is humiliating in the 

 extreme, and unworthy of the land of Channing and Upham, of 

 Bancroft and Prescott, of Halleck and Bryant, of Irving and 

 Cooper, to look to England, or any European country, for our 

 standard authors in philosophy, poetry, history or fiction. It is 

 nothing less than literary suicide; and must ever have the effect, 

 so long as this state of things continues (and continue it will 

 until our people become more generally and correctly informed), 

 to repress the genius and energy of our native authors. 



A glorious heritage have we from the hands of our patriot an- 

 cestors — the freest and greatest republic upon which the sun has 

 ever shone. 



" Land of the Free ! — beneath the Heaven 



There's not a fairer, loviier clime j 

 Nor one to which was ever given 



A destiny more high, sublime." 



When we cast our eyes over the vast expanse of our country, 

 and behold the wonderful combination of land and water — of 

 mountains and valleys, of oceans, seas and lakes, and behold, 

 also, the multiplied and rapidly multiplying millions of enter- 



