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m mend ei Tiiiiiux
-■tniE ii
For The Friend of the Family.]
AN ESSAY.
The true and lasting glory of a
I ..;oa consists in that superior civi
,; iUI which is the offspring of a
intellectual refinement. Ex
;.|ve dominions, affluent resour*
a (rigantic commerce, and a
• inS population may conduce to
vel ‘pethe sinews of her physical
I rength, and secure a temporary
| ~) Un ; but they are impotent to
e y her against the blasts of time,
r e ccue from ruin her declining
I jn es. Her attainments in nni
,r;al knowledge, and the achieve
rs of her illustrious minds in
ice and philosophy, in letters
j arts, these alone constitute those
I rishable monuments which are
I pitied to survive the wreck of her
I wer, and the of her em
>, Greece, once invincible in
I'.-iij, now bends in inglorious vas-
I the barbarian Turk, but
■ -classic land of Homer and De
. jsthencs, of Socrates, Plato and
I \ristotle, still lives revered in the
I recollectioti of mankind, and oft
I Totae remnants of her splendors past,
a >:■;///'■ ’rims pensive,but unwearied throng,
a i/I her annals and immortal tongue
I y.H with her fame the youth of many a
I shore.”
1 R me, whose victorious legions
3 reared upon every field of
hly the memorials of her prowess,
sow lies
■■Childless and crownless in her voiceless
woe.”
>at the foster mother of Tully and
fir oil, of Ovid and Horace, of Tac
l:us and Livy, still claims the pious
r,ornate of the literary wanderer
alter soil, while the noble maxims
of her written reason have become
engrafted upon the civilization of
Europe. And when the collossal
empire of Britain shall have been
broken upon the wheel of fortune,
and her tributary dependencies
erected into sovereign States, the
names of her great and wise, of
Bacon, Newton, and Locke, of
Shakspeare and Milton, of Gibbon
and Hume, will beam with inextin
anishaßle lustre upon the historic
page, and go down to distant ages
as the representatives of her former
dav.
The intellectual prospects of our
native land is a subject, accordingly,
which the patriot equally with the
scholar must ever contemplate with
clings of unaffected solicitude. It
‘ s proposed in this article to consider
riefly some of those incentives to
dental culture, afforded by the cir
cumstances of her national condi
ti°n. Upon a theme which has al
ready engaged so much of profound
thought and philosophical enquiry,
u cannot he a just occasion for sur
prise if in tlie progress of our re
! we should indulge in some re
• actions no longer susceptible ol the
L b irm of novelty or the grace ot
ori ginality. Os all the multiplied
a gentswhich contribute to the pro
, and formation of national
character, and in like manner na-
L!j nal literature, there is perhaps
I Tljne which operates at once so
f T 3 %fully and uniformly as politi
institutions. A truth exempli
ed and attested by universal histo
-0 can require no elaborate argu
ment to commend it to the intelli
gent reader. It may suffice to re
mark, that the manners, tastes and
sentiments of a people have ever
been strikingly mod iff ed by the sys
tem of government and the artifi
cial structure of society under which
; U^ T have been reared. And when
u is considered that literature, in its
niore comprehensive sense, is but
the aggregate embodiment and ex
pression of those prevailing quali
ties which determine the character
\ man collectively, the correct”
Uniatrii to jCiternturt, Irinirt anil M, tjjr mm nf Cnitpmutrr, m /rllnuisjjip, 31!asiinnj unit (frnmTl 3ntclligrnrr.
ness of the proposition advanced,
will he readily conceded. Con
spicuous therefore among those
agencies which are acting to un
fold the mind of our country is the
exhilirating and fostering influence
of our popular institutions. The
declaration of American Indepen
dence stands in the volume of hu
man history as the era which dates
the introduction and establishment
in the world of a purely elective
government. Though the rigorsof
arbitrary power had been softened
down by a series of ameliorations,
and mankind had seen the absolute
despotisms of the east —the iron
sway of imperial Rome, and the
stern sovereignties of the feudal
ages, succeeded by the milder mon
archies of modern Europe, yet no
former period had ever furnished
the precedent of a system based
upon the supremacy of the people.
The great popular element, in its
complete cflicac} 7 , had indeed been
a stranger to all the political forms
of the old world, and it was re
served for the founders of our hap
pier institutions to make upon this
new theatre the first practical ex
periment of a representative repub
lic. And well may this generation,
encircled with the manifold bless
ings that experiment has already
conferred, and standing in view of
the gloiy-ffooded eminence to which
it is so speedily conducting, apply
to those illustrious ancestors the ex
clamation of the latin hard “ O for
tunatos nimium sua si bona norint! ”
Who now can comprehend in all
their force and variety those incen
tives which must stimulate the men
tal energies of this nation under a
system having its foundation laid in
•j vj
the political equality of its citizens?
Who shall estimate those quicken
ing inffuences which must elicit the
intellectual resources of our coun
try, under a government distributing
in equal degree throughout the mass
of the community, the rights and
privileges of the social union.—
But this dream of heathen philoso
phers, improved and perfected, lias
in our day, and upon our soil, been
converted into a living reality. It
is our felicity to live amid those be
nignant principles which reject, as
intrinsically vicious, all the artificial
distinctions recognised in the civil
polity of monarchic countries. No
odious system of monopoly —no
hateful feature of exclusion is here,
to blight with its baneful prejudice
the rising hopes and aspirations of
our brethren. No hereditary and
pampered nobility is here to wall
out with its alpine harriers the un
titled sons of nature from a partici
pation in the honors and emolu
ments of the land. No jealous fa
voritism is here to taint with its in
fection the pure and elastic atmos
phere of freedom, and press with
all the weight of a moral incubus
upon the spiritual energies of our
countrymen. A juster equality of
equal laws smiles upon a race of
freemen, imparting vigor, anima
tion and hope to every member of
the body politic. Our institutions
present the proud spectacle of a
vast community blended into one
harmonious brotherhood, in which
the representatives of every walk
of life are seen meeting upon a
common platform to run the race of
honorable emulation. The trusts of
office and the rewards of station,
(elsewhere claimed as the preroga
tive of noble birth) hold out their
allurements equally to all ; and the
humble inmate of the cottage, whose
limbs may be clad in the meanest
vesture, may still, if Heaven has
implanted the inspiration, burn to
win the loftiest prize, and wear the
brightest wreath of laurel. The
SAVANNAH, GA., SATURDAY, MAY 4, 1850.
doors of Honor, like the celebrated
gates of Milton’s paradise, fly apart
spontaneously at the approach of
all; and every persevering votary
may ascend her most exalted seats.
The temple of Fame stands with
open portals and every sincere wor
shipper may go up to her sanctuary
and lay his offerings on the shrine.
In view of a system so felicitously
arranged, carrying by its wise equal
ization of political privileges, the
motives to exertion down through
every department of society, we
may with propriety adopt the lan
guage of a gifted poet (changing
however, the region indicated) and
exclaim :
“ Man is tlie nobler growth our realms sup
piy*
And souls are ripened in our Western skja”
Such are the opportunities and
inducements our institutions offer.
The spirit of mental enterprise
will be animated with a fresh ardor
by the sure expectation of adequate
reward; individual opinion will be
emboldened to speak out by its ex
emption from the savage rebuke of
chains and tortures : talent will he
cheered to tread the path of patient
toil, by the assurance that its labors
will he esteemed ; and genius will
be inspired with a more fervid en
thusiasm, and plume anew her
heaven-born wing from the con
sciousness that there will he hearts
to admire, as well as eyes to wit
ness her etherial flight.
We are not ignorant of the en
couragement which monarchic gov
ernments have occasionally shown
to literary merit. We are not in
sensible to the fact that there have
been crowned heads who have
evinced a becoming regard for the
true dignity of humanity, and hon
ored the pursuits of literature by
munificent bestowments. But how
few comparatively have been the
number of those the history of learn
ing, in its deplorable vicissitudes,
gives us, unhappily, too vivid an
intimation. A dramatic poet, Met
astasio, whose representations of the
struggles of human feeling Voltaire
pronounced unsurpassed, remarked
under the stings of a bitter experi
ence “ that princes and their sa
tellites were not disposed to con
fer benefits at all correspondent to
the expectations men were pleased to
indulge.” Ah! the gloomy inscrip
tions carved over the graves of em
pires, recite a melancholy story of
the ruling propensities of princes.
The rivers of blood that have
washed, and the pyramids of bones
that have whitened the soil of too
many a stricken land, teach a
mournful lesson of the dominant
passions of kings. The gigantic
schemes of conquest and plunder
pushed on to appease the cravings
of rapacious ambition —the flagrant
usurpations practised to gratify the
unholy lust for power —the desola
ting wars waged to acquire domin
ion, to maintain infamous preten
sions, or uphold detestable alliances,
all speak with convincing emphasis
of the wanton idol upon which roy
alty has ever been too prone to pros
titute its affections. But surely,
whatever may have been the splen
did liberality of individual sover
eigns, no safe reliance can be
placed upon such precarious aid for
the steady progression of literature,
when it is remembered that a Dante
wandered an outcast from the land
his epic muse had ennobled—a Car
tesius suffered proscription and ban
ishment from the country of which
his genius had been the glory, and
even a “ starry Gallileo ” pined as
a convicted heretic in the prisons of
a cursed inquisition for the an
nouncement of a fact in physical
science. When we ponder such
melancholy instances of heartless
ingratitudeanddesertion,how touch
ingly truthful becomes the com
plaint of the poet who mourned the
neglect of a kindred spirit, in these
moving lines :
k< Iu the woods of the North there are in
sects that feed
On the brain of the elk, till its very last
sigh,
Thy patrons, oh Genius, more cruel than
they,
First felon thy brain, then leave thee to
die.”
In truth, an appeal to histor\ r ,
which the limits of this article will
not permit us to make, would abun
dantly establish that the most origi
nal and vigorous productions of the
human intellect have been struck out
in periods of the fullest popular
freedom. The classical scholar of
this day invariably points for the
finest monuments of literary excel
lence to the records of a people
among whom “liberty subsisted in
its excess and delirium, terrible in
its charms, and glistening with the
blaze of the very fire that con
sumed it.” But the truth of the
above assertion is most amply illus
trated in the nature and extent of
our ovn attainments. Notwith
standing our youth as a nation, and
the serious obstacles it has inter
posed to retard our literary devel
opement, we have already effectu
ally taught mankind to acknowl
edge the inherent energy and crea
tive power of American genius.—
The ribald taunt and malignant sar
casm has been triumphantly retor
ted, and our claims to a respectful
recognition in the republic of letters,
proudly sustained and vindicated.
Though we may not compete at
this early stage with the rich treas
ures of English lore, the accumu
lated contributions of ages, yet it is
no extravagant encomium upon our
national acquirements to affirm that
in almost every department of in
tellectual effort we have produced
names upon which “ late time a
kindling eye will turn,” yea, which
“ posterity will not willingly let
die.” Under the stimulus of her
free institutions, America has al
ready, even in this her morning
hour, exhibited a galaxy of gifted
and ingenious minds, the splendors
of which, the just and enlightened
of every clime aie fast uniting to
admire. Scholars who have gath
ered flowers of choicest hue and
fragrance from the fields of elegant
taste and learning. Historians who
have recorded in graphic strains the
slorv of our struggles and our tri-
J O
umphs. Statesmen who have evol
ved the true principles of legisla
tive wisdom. Jurists who have il
lumined the dark and complicated
labyrinths of legal science. Di
vines who have enforced with melt
ing unction the majestic doctrines
of Christianity. Poets who have
drawn out thrilling echoes of min
gled pathos and sublimity from the
lyre of Apollo. Artists who have
embodied in the breathing marble
and the speaking can vass, forms of
ideal grace and beauty to vie with
the master pieces ot the chisel or
the pencil. And orators, whose
splendid appeals* glowing with fires
caught altars of antiquity,
have roused a nation to the loftiest
transports of resentment, or, anon,
chained the halls of legislation and
even the chambers of justice “ to
the chariot wheels of all conquering
eloquence.” With such results
flowing from our republican system
we may confidently affirm that ge
nius needs no smiles of imperial
favor to warm and quicken it into
life. A Roman philosopher, Lon
ginus, ages back, declared that lib
erty was its true nurse, and the
course of its fortunes has amply
evinced that it requires no stronger
aliment* Give it hut a free soil in
which to strike its roots, and a
healthy atmosphere in which to di
late, and like the mountain plant,
that untended by the care of man,
watered only by the rains of heaven,
and vivified by its sun, starts up in
to vigor amid the storms and tem
pests of the sky, it will shoot forth
into a growth of prolific luxuriance
even amid the freezing chills of
neglect or the scorching blasts of
envy and malice.
Another circumstance propitious
to the developement of American
talent, and which cannot he too of
ten noticed by the political essayist,
may he found in those facilities for
mental intercourse and communion
so largely afforded in this country.
The intellectual gloom which over
spread the middle ages, is probably
in no small degree attributable to
the diversity of tongues and juris
dictions which marked that period.
Those barbarous tribes were split
up into innumerable provinces, each
under the control of seperate mas
ters, and drawn together bv no
community of interests or of lan
guage. The stern policy of the feu
dal system, tended also by the. oner
ous exactions it imposed to discour
age all habit of international inter
course. Thus detached and insula
ted we may not wonder that their
history presents such a barren waste
to the eye of the literary student.
When we contrast with these un
toward circumstances our own more
fortunate condition—when we re
flect upon the universal prevalence
throughout our confederacy, of the
Saxon tongue —when we contem
plate that grand chain of sympa
thetic feelings and sentiments by
which similar institutions have con
nected its wide extremes, what a
noble pathway is opened up for the
diffusion of thought and intelligence.
Let it not be supposed that an un
due importance is ascribed to this
all-exciting and animating view of
our subject. Long since has it
been made the occasion of proud
and exultant expectation with our
patriot statesmen and orators. And
surely he has reflected to hut little
purpose upon the nature of the hu
man mind who docs not readily
perceive in these facilities for men
tal communion, the assurance of a
rapid and brilliant progress.
A further important reflection
which must he instrumental in kind
ling and keeping alive a literary ar
dor in this and coming generations,
is to he derived from a considera
tion of the precise point to which
our country has attained in her on
ward career. The history of na
tional progress, discloses so many
successive epochs, each marked by
its own characteristic features. In
the incipient stages of national ex
istence the structure of government
and the establishment of laws for
the protection and security of in
dividual rights, constitute the chief
care of society. A ong with this
primary chject of public concern
the attention of an infant community
is naturally directed to the devel
opement of its resources, and the
improvement of its physical con
dition. It is not until these earlier
claims have been provided for, and
the comforts and conveniences of
life multiplied by means of the
more useful arts, that intellectual
pursuits become an object of lively
or permanent regard. From this
period, however, begins that steady
diffusion of knowledge, which re
sulting in the refinement and the el
evation of the public taste, renders
literature attractive, causes its dig
nity to he felt and its advantages
appreciated. It is at this aus-
picious point of national progress
our country now stands. Her po
litical organization has settled down
upon a firm, and as we believe, en
during basis—the resources of her
wealth and power have been large
ly unfolded—the wants and neces
•J
sides ot her population extensively
provided for, and the improvement
of the national taste,effected through
the medium of a widely dissemina
ted intelligence, is exhibiting itself
in a growing appreciation of litera
ture and the polite arts. The do
minion of a coarse and narrow util
ity has given place to a more eleva
ted standard ot thought and lee ling,
and a noble passion for the produc
tions of cultivated intellect is ta>i
possessing the educated classes ot
society. The literary scholar ol
America is therefore, no longer to
feel his enthusiasm chilled and hi -
zeal repressed by the neglect or in
difference ot those to whom the
ties of country have united him. —
He is no longer to look for consola
tion and encouragement to the
equivocal praises of a foreign press,
or it may be, the late admiration ot
a distant posterity. But lie is hence
forward lobe stimulated in bisex
ertions by the prospect of having
his own panegyric pronounced hv
the approving lips of his country
men. He is to be animated in his
vigils by the reflection that be stands
within a circle of generous atiden
lightened minds capable of estima
ting bis worth, and burning with an
eager impatience to award the meed
of distinction.
There is still one remaining con
sideration growing out of the recent
political changes which have rive
ted the attention of mankind, too
interesting in this connection to be
wholly overlooked. The world has
J
perhaps never before been called
to witness such startling events as
have transpired under the late tre
mendous re-action in the popular
feelings of Europe. The whole
framework of European society,
shaken by a mighty internal convul
sion, has been seen rocking upon
its deepest base. Thrones have
been demolished and governments
subverted with a rapidity unexam
pled in the annals ot nations. —
States which a “thousand years
scarce served to form,” a single
hour has been seen to disrobe of
their splendors and lay prostrate in
the dust. In tins grand movement
toward political emancipation—this
general breaking up of monarchic
institutions arid prejudices, the new
born republics, together with the still
struggling victims ot power are
turning, and will continue to turn to
our example for guidance aud di
rection. As they sever their chains
and throw off their oppressions,
new forms of civil polity will he
built up ou the ruins of their shat
tered fabrics fashioned upon the
model of our own cherished insti
tutions. Thus politically assimila
ted, it requires no prophetic pen to
anticipate the influence American
literature is destined to exert upon
the public mind of Europe. We
may not so entirely obliterate the
oast as to substitute essentially new
i ~
modes of thought, but we will as
suredly produce a marked modifi
cation in its prevailing intellectual
tastes. Our literature in the-matu
rity of its manhood will undoubted
ly impress with its own peculiar fea
tures and tinge with its own native
hue the progressive science, philos
ophy and learning of the old world.
And what nobler stimulus can the
American scholar crave than that
which is furnished in the reflection
that he is contributing to swell the
resources of an intellect which in
its mighty workings is yet to stamp
KUIIBER fl