Edwardsville Spectator

From the National Crisis

GOVERNOR CLINTON'S ADDRESS.

The following is the reply of his Excellency De Witt Clinton, to the address of Mr. Benham, delivered in the first Presbyterian Church, on Tuesday, the 19th instant.

CITIZENS OF CINCINNATI,

The favorable notice taken of my conduct, by the gentleman of distinguished talents who represents you on this occasion, has made an impression on my mind, which will endure with life, and which no event can obliterate. It is true that I have endeavored to deserve well of our country, and it is equally true that my exertions have been abundantly rewarded in its approving kindness. If my future course shall be marked with any beneficial results to the community, it must be ascribed to the animating and encouraging voice of my fellow citizens. But without further reference to myself, permit me to make a few remarks on a subject of some, and certainly much greater, importance.

The first object that strikes the view of the stranger, on entering the regions of the West, is the superior and extraordinary richness of the soil; evinced, if under cultivation, by the immense quantity and excellent quality of its vegetable productions, and if still unreclaimed, by the towering and wide spread forests which abound with trees of extraordinary dimensions, and with all kinds of plants applicable to the purposes of human accommodation. As he proceeds, he will find that these regions are uncommonly well watered--that a great proportion is not yet occupied, and that in some parts, settlements are, "like angels' visits, few and far between." and that in others, they assume a more compact character, and appear rising in gradation from the solitary mansion, to the hamlet, village and town; but surely he would not anticipate the view of a fair and extensive city, springing up on the beautiful river, like Venus from the ocean. Indeed, if it had been predicted some years ago, that in this place, the site of a military encampment, surrounded by hostile savages, and trodden over by the beasts of the wilderness, there would arise, in less than a quarter of a century, a city larger than the greatest secondary city of Atlantic America; carrying on an extensive commerce, and abounding with important manufacturing establishments; containing within its bosom, numerous, intelligent and enterprising population, and supplying all that can administer to the accommodation of man--if such a prediction had at that time been made, it would have been set down as the vision of eccentric folly, or the dream of a distempered imagination.--But absurd as it might have appeared at the time, it has been fully realized, and as the traveller enters this place, his attention and admiration are divided between an elegant and prosperous city, and the fair river on which it is situate. It has been remarked as the uniform course of human affairs, that the march of knowledge, like the sun, travels from East to West; and truly it would appear in this case, that the embellishments of taste, as well as the acquisitions of intellect, have taken a similar direction. And you have indeed risen into notice, not like a meteor emitting evanescent corruscations, or on Aurora Borealis, dazzling with occasional splendor; but with the steady illumination of a star of the first order.

This favorable state of things must have arisen from the felicity of your situation--from the enterprising character of your population--from an intelligent view of your relative as well as abstract condition;--from a determination to improve advantages--to surmount difficulties, and to avail yourselves of the beneficence of nature, and the ingenuity of art. You have created accommodating steam vessels by which you have a rapid and lucrative intercourse with the great valley of the Mississippi and its connecting regions. You have also applied the power of steam to the establishment of important manufactories, and the demonstrations of your enterprise are witnessed, not only in the remote regions of the West, but on the shores of the Atlantic.

Will you permit me to remark, that the sources of your prosperity lie in the continuance of the same career and in the encouragement of the means of communication.--The contemplated Canal between Lake Erie and the Ohio, is essential to your trade with the great markets of the North. It will give you an easy and prosperous intercourse with the great cities of Philadelphia, New-York, Baltimore, Montreal and hundreds of intermediate and subordinate markets. A Canal round the Falls of Ohio will facilitate your trade with the regions of the West. Roads in all directions will be indispensable auxiliaries for the accomplishment of the object. In one word, your philosopher's stone is not to be found in the crucibles of alchemy, but in the products of soil and in their advantageous disposal. Your Dorados or mountains of gold are to be seen not in the follies or fictions of ignorance and fatuity, but in the cultivation of a vast inland trade, now at your command, and opening still more extensively for your benefit.

That you may make such a disposition of these great blessings, as may conduct you to an eminence of prosperity, is my sincere prayer; and greatly will I be disappointed in my estimation of men, and in my view of futurity, if a different fate await you.