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an unwise and over-strained diplomaey, not only these gentlemen, but the President who appointed them, will incur a fearful responsibility. But if, in the straight and easy path of duty, it should happen that war were forced upon us, the executive should be supported not only by the entire military and marine force of the country, but by the sympathizing spirit of the whole people. Party lines should be for the time utterly annihilated; for the next foreign war will determine the position of America upon the political map of the world.

In order, however, to secure either immunity from war, or unity in case of war, it is absolutely essential that the government be not entrapped into an alliance with any nation whatever. We have directed the course of our remarks against an alliance with England, not from any hostility to that country; for, in spite of the wrongs which she has permitted her statesmen to perpetrate, there is much in the character of her people to admire; but simply because the current, slight as it is, was setting in that direction, and writers of a certain class. have even attempted to turn it artificially thither. We have endeavored to show, moreover, that the government of Louis Napoleon was entitled to a cordial support from this country. There is every thing to indicate its stability, and its worst enemies cannot suggest any thing so good for the country over which it is instituted. In any event which may occur, let America be neutral, and let her enforce for herself and for other weaker nations the full RIGHTS OF NEUTRALS. If she succeeds in doing that, and she can succeed, she will accomplish a far more glorious mission than any, however seemingly proper, interference between a sovereign and a people would be, in the event even of its greatest success. In order to be completely independent of the nations which may be at war, our commercial relations with the ports on the Continent should be increased, if possible, by the acts of government; and we had intended to allude to the project for establishing a Continental depot for cotton, and new lines of steamers between this country and the Continent. Let us remember that friendships are sometimes more dangerous than enmities; let us consider the delicate relations of our internal organization; let us look to the guaranties which the

past affords, rather than to the professions of the present;and there will need no ghost to tell us, that a nation may be more dangerous as an ally than it is possible for her to be as

an enemy.

Liberty depends not upon this or that form of govern ment; it is neither at variance with the idea of a monarchy, nor inseparable from the idea of a republic. Forms of government depend upon the idiosyncrasies of nations, and the cir cumstances which surround their origin; but liberty may exist in all. It can no more be handed from one nation to another than language or morals can be so transmitted. We have but little faith in propagandism; for the laws of propagandism are, that if it succeed, it succeeds through blood, and if it fail, its failure buries its projectors in contempt. There is a theoretical and there is a practical liberty; and there is real happiness which is necessarily the adjunct of neither. The theory of the British Constitution is the liberty of the subject, independent of the sovereign; and the theory of the Russian autocracy is the liberty of the sovereign to dispose of the subject; yet the people of Russia are happy, and the people of England are wretched. Again, the government of England is a constitutional monarchy, and the government of Austria is an untrammelled despotism; but is not the merry and loyal peasant of the Tyrol an infinitely happier and higher being than the Yorkshire clown or the Cornwall miner? Are the smiling, light-hearted, music-loving Viennese, strolling of a summer evening along the alleys of the Prater, listening to a song of Meyerbeer's, or whirling about to a new waltz by Lanner, less happy, or less free even, than the skulking, scowling vagabonds that emerge after dark from the purlieus of St. Giles? And yet the class is the same. The truth is, the deeper our investigations go into the facts of human government and the facts of social life, the deeper is the conviction that the true history of the effect of political institutions upon the liberties and the happiness of man is yet to be written.

ART. VII.1. Life of MRS. ELIZA A. SETON, Foundress and First Superior of the Sisters of Charity in the United States. By REV. CHARLES J. WHITE, D. D. New York: Dunigan & Brother. 1853. pp. 581.

2. Memoir of MARY L. WARE, Wife of Henry Ware, Jr. By EDWARD B. HALL. Boston: Crosby, Nichols, & Co. 1853. 12mo. pp. 434.

3. The Sickness and Health of the People of Bleaburn. Boston: Crosby, Nichols, & Co. 1853. 16mo.

pp. 148.

"HOLY men of old, who have written the lives of Saints, universally begin by professing their unworthiness to be the historians of the marvellous deeds which the Holy Spirit has wrought in the Church. What then should we say, who, in these memorable times, from the bosom of our quiet homes, in the midst of our literary ease, venture to celebrate the glories of the Saints? We have much that is amiable and domestic among us; but Saints, the genuine creation of the Cross, with their supernatural virtues, are now to us a matter of history."

So says a late devout chronicler of the English Saints; and it seems a strange admission for one whose Church claims, to this day, miraculous powers for her faithful sons and daughters. What are "supernatural virtues?" Why are they not to be looked for in our day? More interesting for us, as well as more germane to our present purpose, is the inquiry,what constitutes a Saint? Is it the gift of miracles, or asceticism, or pure humility? Is it devotion, charity, labor for the good of others? Is it a recluse life, a literal separateness from the world, for the sake of a more entire renunciation of its pleasures and honors? Our own short answer would be, something of all these; the power of working miracles being at least represented by the overwhelming potency of a true life in silencing all cavils, and enlightening the minds of those who witness it.

The term Saint has been, and is now, occasionally applied, in a contemptuous sense, to persons who profess a deeper sense of religion and more complete submission to its laws than their

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neighbors, and who show more piety than the world believes to be sincere and practical. It is not difficult to account for the feeling which has thus sought to cast odium upon a prominent profession of religion. The very name of sainthood involves the supposition that the world in general is "lying in wickedness," supine in alienation from God, and impatient of his laws and government; that not merely that abstraction "the world," but we, with our friends and neighbors, are in this state to such a degree, that if one be found among us, whose life is carefully, and, saving human frailties, fully conformed to the standard which we all pretend to acknowledge, he stands out conspicuous, a peculiar person, worthy of praise and honor. The writer, with whose words we began, states the matter thus: "To the generality of the world, many of the commandments of Christ are precepts of perfection, but to the Saints they are precepts of OBLIGATION. This is the true distinction of Saints." There is then a broad line to be drawn between those who admire and those who imitate the Divine Saviour; and the world recognizes the distinction without horror or self-condemnation, even while confessing, with cold lips, the duty and the rationality of imitation. The ridicule, but too general, is therefore only one of the poor sops with which sin attempts to silence conscience. The best lives have yet so much of human frailty, that we get rid of the reproach of their goodness by calling up and insisting upon their imperfections, which we make as black as possible, in order to throw the shadow of hypocrisy over the bright side.

But, do what we will, the Saint is always recognized. He is a distinct person. Whatever be the amount of his astuteness, industry, thrift, fine manners, desire of popularity, he is not the man of the world, but a different creature, because his supreme, his ruling idea, the philosophy of his life, is different. He may even be, to the distant or prejudiced eye, undistinguishable from his neighbor who worships Mammon with heartiest service; but those near enough to feel the spirit of his life, know better. A man is what he believes and aims at, on the whole, with whatever short comings or even relapses. If wealth be his main object, occasional paroxysms of generosity must be referred to occasional causes; if pleasure, serious interests will occupy him only under the pressure of

circumstances; if selfish ambition, all the tender affections and disinterested virtues are in abeyance, and must wait or bend, or be annihilated, if the greedy god smile not without such propitiation. So when one vows the allegiance of his soul to God and his fellow-man, all else is, so far as his wish and intention go, put in subordination to this upper purpose; and however riches, pleasure, selfish instincts, boiling ambition, human weakness, or obstreperous passions, may beguile, becloud, or pervert for the time, there is still the grand, holy, leading idea, in distant brightness, like the polestar, shining in blackest skies, and over the billows mountain high, that only for the moment blind and confound the bewildered mariner. It is convenient, for purposes of ridicule or depreciation, to draw the line as between "Saints" and "Sinners," that the respect accorded to the former may seem absurd; but the world knows very well that although Saints are Sinners, Sinners are none the more Saints for all that; and that, with all his sins, the man who is determined to be on God's side, and a worker for Him in this life, is unhappily always a remarkable personage.

The Saint is especially a worker. He is somebody who does something; not who fasts, or prays, or talks, or preaches merely, but who does what he finds to do for his fellow-creature, under the guidance, and as the humble follower, of a Divine Master. His having a Divine Master is what alone can preserve him from blundering arrogance in the performance of his work, and from fatal self-complacency in the contemplation of it. As well might the worker at the Gobelins throw away the exquisite painting that hangs behind him, and attempt impromptu flourishes and flowers unknown to botany. With a perfect pattern, even the most ignorant may attempt something, if only his eye be single. With all his errors, there will be a general resemblance, such as a Master whose love is boundless, and whose compassions fail not, will accept and bless.

Seeing, then, that Saints are still, as they have ever been, but sparsely scattered up and down in the world,- here presenting a green spot for the eye to rest on amid the glare and heat of life, there making "a sunshine in a shady place,”—it is surely well to speak of them when they are gone and can no longer feel painfully humbled by praise; to draw them

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