he who runs may read, the fool may understand, and even, the way-faring man need not err;" then, if such be the fact, is it not time the citizens of this free, and, as yet, happy government, should pause in their reckless and downward career, before they reach the goal, and plunge the gulf of everlasting national destruction?

Go, gentle reader, and consult the history of all the long list of republics that have arisen, flourished and fallen before the establishing of our own, and enquire for the cause of their overthrow! And you will, invariably, date the commencement of their decline with the same period at which vicious men began to intrigue for office and power; and assign their final overthrow to the corruptions of men in high places. The intrigues of corrupt and wicked men will, as necessarily, corrupt the morals of the people, as the substance, standing in the brilliant noon-day's sun, will cast its shadow; and the corruptions of the people, who in governments purely republican, are the source and living fountain of all political power, will as necessarily corrupt every depository, and fill every chamel and avenue of administrative authority, with a turbid and desolating stream of wickedness and villany.

Thus the cause and the consequence progresses conjointly. The citizens are first corrupted by bad men, and being corrupted fill all the offices of the government with corruptions, and these corruptions in high places, flow out and deluge the whole political surface, like floods of water breaking loose from the summits of the mountains and overflowing the valleys below.

It is a trite saying that mankind are governed more by example than precept. Let us, then, look back the stream of time, through the medium of history, and take lessons

of experience from the conduct, character and final catastrophe that mark the rise, progress, decline and utter annihilation of all the republics that have gone before us.

What has been the fate of the Jews, the once chosen and favored people of the living God? Alas! though they had just escaped from the iron hand of Egyptian servitude, they suffered themselves to be corrupted by the counsels and intrigues of ambitious and wicked men.Not content, even, with the LIVING GOD for their Governor, (through the instrumentality of his chosen prophets) but setting their affections upon the noisy and oppressive pomp of power, and the gaudy glitter of titles, they must have a King to be like other nations. After a long series of tyrannical oppressions, awful afilictions and terrifying judgments, their kingdom was overthrown, their country desolated, their temples polluted by the profane, their altars trampled under foot by the heathen, and they themselves made to drink the bitterest dregs of the cup of their iniquities. They are now sojourners and wanderers in every land, the scorn of every people, and without a government or a national name on the broad face of the whole earth.

Where now are the ancient republics of Greece, once the seat of science, of song and the arts? Once their fame filled the earth, and the glory of their name covered the land as the waters do the channels of the great deep. They ran a brilliant and grand career; but in the midst of prosperity, glorying in their mental and physical superiority, and slumbering in self security, wicked and ambitious men began to intrigue for office and scramble for power. The citizens were soon corrupted-feuds and factions sprang up, intestine broils and internal commotions rendered them an easy prey to surrounding nations; and, ere long, their highly cultivated and flourishing

country was strewed with the splendid wrecks of their ruined grandeur, the land drenched in blood, and the earth itself, seemed, almost, to groan beneath the mighty weight of their mournful and awful desolation. True, Greece yet lives in the eloquence of her Demosthenes and the song of her Homer! But the rich and mellow strains of her poet fall upon the ear like a sound from the fathomless and illimitable void of nonentity, and the soul stiring eloquence of her orator comes up like a voice from beneath the lethean sea of everlasting forgetfulness. Greece endured a long night of servitude and oppression. For ages the long beard of the barbarous Turk waved over her liberties, and the haughty foot of the proud Mahometan trampled upon her rights. At length, being goaded to desperation, she has partially broken her shackles; but it cost her an ocean of blood; and, after all, she has but changed her master; the advantage being that she now has a civilized instead of a barbarous monarch, and a government tolerating the christian religion, and securing individual rights and personal property.

But it is needless to recount examples; for the ruins of liberty lie strewed on either side of the long vista of ages, as we look back the stream of time! Let one other suffice! The Roman Republic once stood the proud mistress of a subjugated world! Her conquering sword glittered in every land-her banners were a terror to all nations-by the power of her arms she carried her conquests over the greater part of the then known habitable globe-her very name became the wonder, admiration and dread of the whole earth. And where, now, is Rome, this mighty colossus of nations! She, too, has fallen. True, she still lives in name, but stripped of her power and shorn of her grandeur. "Her cloud-capt towers, her gorgeous palaces and solemn temples," have

all tumbled into ruins; and she herself, has dwindled into a petty sovereignty, too feeble to excite either the envy or jealousy of other nations. Inquire for the cause of the downfall and overthrow of this mighty government, and you will find first an enslaved people, before a fallen nation. The citizens, led astray and corrupted by ambitious, unprincipled aspirants, placed vicious men in power, and thus both the people and the government became, by degrees, corrupt. The love of country and national honor were swallowed up in devotion to men; and then came intestine feuds and contentions for power. Internal commotions and party contentions harassed the people, until one portion sought refuge in the establishment of a monarchy, and the remainder were beguiled into it by their devotion to partisan leaders.

Political liberty must be based upon the virtue and sustained by the intelligence of the citizens. A vicious people can no more enjoy free government, than the eagle can subsist upon the briny waves of the broad-bosomed ocean. And the first step towards the corrupting of the people has its origin in the intrigues of ambitious men for power. Who is a public functionary but a public servant? And is it fit, is it becoming, is it dignified, for a man to supplicate, cringe, fawn and flatter, to become a servant? But this is not the light in which aspirants view it. They intend, in fact, to become our masters, and not our servants; and hence, their great exertions to obtain office.

If the foregoing observations and arguments be true, it follows, that all the vices and evils that have crept into the administration of our government, have had their origin in the intrigues of wicked and ambitious men for power; and that electioneering, is the door through which the intriguer enters, and that, therefore, the practice should be discountenanced, and scowled out of existence.

CHAPTER XVIII.

SATIRICAL BURLESQUE UPON THE PRACTICE OF ELECTIONEERING.

If any here chance to behold himself,
Let him not dare challenge me of wrong,
For, if he shame to have his follies known,
First he should shame to act 'em.

B. JOHNSON.

It was in the year 18—, that an empty-sculled, vain, conceited ignoramus, determined to become a member of the Legislature of the State. When the community in which he resided, ascertained that it was the intention of our hero to offer himself as a candidate for a seat in their legislative councils, they were struck, for a time, with dumb astonishment; and when they recovered their vocal powers, the idea was so perfectly ridiculous, that it excited universal scorn and contempt; and our would-be legislator was made the butt of sarcasm, ridicule and vulgar merriment. Nothing daunted, however, he persevered in his attempts at becoming popular, and in a short time procured his friends, or rather a few individuals, who found they could use him as a tool to accomplish some sinister purposes, to speak of his pretensions pretty freely. And finally, a small squad of individuals, composed, in part, of loggerheaded dolts, and in part of designing men, determined to solicit this sage politician to announce himself as a candidate; and having come to this determination, they forthwith sent a committee of their own body to inform him that it was the wish of the citizens of