schools, her science, her letters, her men, are, as classes, all

prosperous.

We may safely conclude, therefore, that that course which is necessary for any nation in order to reach true strength, and which is specially necessary for us, and which, moreover, is so emphatically urged upon us, by the experience of the past, is the course which this nation ought ever to pursue.

Plain, however, as the course of true and permanent prosperity is, there are yet, to the thoughtful mind, causes for apprehension that this nation may eventually be drawn into the aggressive policy, some of which we proceed to name.

There are certain things which predispose the nation to this policy.

Our course hitherto has been onward, and upward, with few reverses. We have achieved height after height of progress. We have run past many of the nations, that were even with or before us when we began the race, with the speed of a swift destiny, and now we are side by side with the foremost rank. This marvelous unfolding of greatness out of littleness has been attended with an equal growth of pride and an exacting spirit. We are like a youth who has won only triumphs and flattery, and now will put up with only triumphs and flattery. We have done something, are a power on the earth; and we know it, and want that other nations should have due regard to this fact also. We have reached just that point when we want them to take off the hat civilly to us, but are not particular if our's remains on; and any slight neglect or disrespect sends the hot blood through us in a moment. It is easy for a people so sensitive and so exacting, to get entangled in difficulty with its neighbors, be drawn away from developing its own resources to foreign strifes.

Closely connected with this is a singular infatuation. We are beginning to draw that strange inference, which nations as well as individuals, long signally favored by Providence, are wont to draw, and which is the precursor of a fall-viz, that we have a charmed life, that we are the favorites of Heaven-and have been raised up for a great, glorious, mysterious, but "manifest destiny." We are more than an Achilles, for we acknowledge no vulnerable point. The pillars of the Universe would about as soon fall, it seems to us, as we, who are so manifestly pillared on the favor of destiny. We begin to feel that we could repose our volcanoes soon to open their fiery throats, or await the shock of contending nations, and experience no damage. And this infatuation is dangerous; for we must be an exception to the general rule, if we are not swept

on, in our dealings with other nations, from infatuation to recklessness, and from recklessness to madness, and from madness to destruction.

Again, we have among us, natives of our own land, a large number of restless spirits, desiring adventure, having nothing to lose, reckless, fired with the passion for distinction, but too indolent to earn it by toiling worth, and busy in fomenting strife abroad. These are the grappling-irons by which free governments are wont to be drawn alongside into hostility with other nations. For such we have not, like England, large armies, and distant colonies in a tropical climate, whither by means of a commission we can send them, and have absence, and finally, perhaps, a fever save the country from their restlessness and dangerous ambition. The swamps of Florida once promised something of this sort, but no longer. The uneasy elements have no provided outlet. They are kept within us, where they form into knots, heads, marauding parties and expeditions, and finally drag the nation into embroilments.

Besides this natural element, there is also a large percentage of foreigners in our population-some of them the political charlatans, others the true patriots, of the old world, who have been driven out thence, and have found a home here; and others having more or less sympathy with those they have left behind them. These all live a divided life, partly here, partly there; and under certain circumstances might rush like an avalanche into the contests of Europe, drawing the nation after them.

Moreover, one of the noblest of our national sentiments is sympathy for the oppressed nations in their struggles for freedom. The whole heart of America burns when such a contest is raging; and it is with difficulty that she can hold down and back the impulse that spontaneously leaps up to help them. But this very sentiment, so admirable and worthy in itself, and backed as it often may be by easily aroused feeling, that, as we are the sole representative of republicanism, therefore we ought to be its defender and propagator, may very easily, in some crisis of freedom, incite us to arms and propagandism. When we remember that, at the time when Kossuth rang the mingled notes of his patriot-wail and war-blast through the land and aroused so much sympathy for his unfortuuate country, if the issue had been still pending and doubtful, or with the chances against freedom, it would have been difficult, if not impossible, to have kept America this side of the waters,-it is evident that the danger of which we speak is not imaginary. Finally, there is the temptation to every administration to

try to mark its existence by the splendor of some achievement. It wants to write its name among our annals with illuminated letters. It desires to go down to posterity standing out in some way from other administrations, as being more illustrious, more brilliant, as having done some greater thing for the country. But as little that is imposing or magnificent can be accomplished in four years by the self-developing process, there is a strong temptation to avail itself of any excuse for striking a speedier and bolder blow, and snatching that lustre from abroad which could not be wrought out from within.

But passing on from these predisposing causes, we come to the much more serious consideration of fact. We have already begun on the aggressive policy, and are plotting an extension of it. As we have already stated, this has ever been the policy of one section of the Union; and the Government has followed that section; and the other section has followed the Government. The nation has had a taste of spoil, and is now at least no insignificant portion of it-as ravenous for more as a hungry lion that has just dipped his tongue in blood. We have gained Louisiana with all west of the Mississippi, Florida, Texas, Northern Mexico and California-whether wisely or not, is not our present purpose to discuss. But one thing is certain, that the appetite for acquisition thus whetted, will not be easily allayed, and is even now urging to expedients for further gratification. Private enterprises are formed, keeping their organization and objects secret, and hoping to surprise the nation by some movement that shall ultimately lead to the acquisition of new territory. Secret enlistments are made in our large cities, proclamations framed, and bonds of republics having no existence save in the imagination of adventurers, issued. The Government also is active, now busy with concealed diplomacy, now offering large sums of money to gain by purchase what at other times has been gained by arms, and now availing itself of some small difficulty as a pretext for a quarrel and the seizure of foreign lands. Thus the American Eagle, having but just disposed of its last morsel, is again turning the eye piercingly and hungrily, now towards the Sandwich Islands, now towards Cuba, and now towards-it may be-Central America, or the region of the Amazon, or still more of Mexico; and shows a restless movement of its feathers and gives signs of darting off soon and swooping up the one or the other of them, or some other alien territory.

No passion develops itself in a nation more rapidly or powerfully than that for national acquisition; and our's has begun. Where and when shall it end?

Now this fact of a begun movement towards enlargement and aggregation to the neglect of growth, is countenanced by another still more ominous. It is that good men seem to have a secret relish for this imposing and showy kind of prosperity. They make a demonstration of opposition, as the Government sometimes does, to satisfy conscience and keep up the appearance of good faith in treaties. But when large sections of rich territory fall into our lap, they soon experience a quiet satisfaction with the result, and in their hearts would not much care if men should soon follow. There is something fascinating and brilliant in the process; and instead of rising up and resisting it with united strength and voice, they-the better portion of citizens, whose opposition alone can be expected or would be worth much-are charmed into apathy, acquiescence, good humor, pleasure. And when the good are thus swept away in the general tide, what shall restrain and steady the nation?

Such are some of the dangers that we may in the end be drawn into the aggressive policy, which would arrest all progress towards a higher kind of civilization and culture, and finally reduce us to weakness and ruin. It becomes us, therefore, as a nation, to beware of our danger and avoid it. Let, then, every citizen, who wishes well to his country, not be captivated by the present brilliancy of acquisition. Let him not sacrifice for this the good and the glory of our future America. Let him be content with the greatness coming from growth, with the slow but true unfoldings of strength from within. Let him not fail to rebuke with his whole soul, for his country's sake, for humanity's sake, for posterity's sake, every reckless attempt at foreign acquisition, and every enterprise, private or governmental, calculated to draw away the national enthusiasm and energy from quietly developing our resources, religious, and moral, and intellectual, as well as physical. Let him do what he can to check and put down in high and low, in wild adventurers and cunning diplomatists, in reckless borderers and equally reckless Senators, in marauders and Executives of the nation, every manifestation of the aggressive disposition, already developed and developing still more;-and God may yet permit us to realize the high destiny of being the greatest, strongest, freest, and happiest nation.

ART. VII.-PICTURES OF EUROPE, FRAMED IN IDEAS.

Pictures of Europe, Framed in Ideas; by C. A. BARTOL Boston: Crosby, Nichols & Company, 111 Washington street. 1855. New Haven: T. H. Pease.

THE design of this book is thus described by the author, better than in the fanciful title:

"I have written no exact Itinerary; I have drawn no word maps of geogra phy; I have not been careful to tell where I went, or what I did next; but, venturing to imitate some of the poets, have left the unities of time and place whenever I could so observe the higher unities of thought and reality, without, I trust, ever violating the proportions of any fact within my reach. In short, I have not told everything, but the things which made on me the strongest impressions; letting all the rest, like the showers I passed through on my way, flow off. Like the paddles of the ship, I have taken hold of nothing which did not move me; or like a child, who, from a thousand scenes he has witnessed in the street, comes back to tell his mother in the loud eagerness of juvenile eloquence what especially caught his fancy, so I hope only to interest others in what interested me. I have found the almost chaotic mixture of numberless particulars in my mind under reflection, stirring itself and forming into distinet cystallizations around separate points. I have given many delineations of my experience; but my pictures, such as they were, framed themselves in my contemplations, and hung of their own accord under the light of ideas which showed them better to me, as I believe they may to others. Accordingly they will succeed each other in separate headings, like the several apartments of a hall, in which I have endeavored to include, under each particular theme, only what touches the broadest human concerns." pp. 7, 8.

This plan, which has been in many respects happily executed, elevates the work above the ordinary plane of traveler's tales, into the sphere of moral instruction and even of theological literature, and thus becomes deserving of more particular inspection, especially from the position of the author himself, who is a colleague Pastor with the venerable Dr. Lowell, over a church designated in the Boston Almanac as the Congregational Church of that city, in distinction from those both of the Orthodox and of the Unitarian denomination. The themes discussed, commencing with physical beauty, ascend to the loftier subjects of the church, mankind, history, and destiny.

We must, at the outset, enter a serious protest against the portion of this volume, which, from the arrangement of lines, we supposed to be poetry, and which we are even yet compelled to believe was intended to produce this impression, though whether it was designed to be blank verse, or simple rhyme, we are still somewhat at a loss to decide. It is a curious phenomena, that one, so keenly sensitive to beauty in nature.