Gazette Of The United States

THE CONTRAST.

FROM hostile fields, where mercy prostrate lies,
We shout returning victors to the skies;
But patriot Sages, kill'd in arts of peace,
Whose godlike labors, happiness encrease,
Too often find, that where they merit fame,
The blasts of envy echo to their name.

What a train of pleasing ideas rushes upon the mind of every American, in contemplating the effects of the late glorious Revolution. With respect to our own countrymen, there is no doubt that a conscious dignity pervades the bosom of every freeman, to which in our dependent State they were strangers : When we cast our eyes Westward, Northward, and Southward, we behold a boundless theatre, on which a numerous race of happy and enlightened citizens, are to exult in all the blessings of Liberty and good Government—

Virtue, Science, and Peace unite their beneficent influences to render the present and future condition of human nature, more eligible than it has ever been in any former period:—Europe from America has caught the sacred flame of Freedom : It has kindled into a blaze-it has illuminated their darkness, and where tyranny erected her throne, and bigotry, ignorance, and superstition supported her infernal reign, the sun of a glorious day has arisen—and Liberty rejoices in the divine light and resplendent beams.

The foundations of tyranny are laid in ignorance; and the superstructure is supported by the same means —knowledge and freedom go hand in hand.—The state of darkness in which the eastern world has long been plunged, has prevented many of those kingdoms from succeeding in their efforts to obtain the just rights of human nature. In modern times, if the resistance of the people to the tyrants that oppress them. should prove unsuccessful, it will generally be found owing to traitors among themselves; and the danger from this quarter arises from the too general want of all principle, and the predominant love of money among all ranks of people.

Faction, properly speaking, is the offspring of disappointment, pride, inordinate ambition, and the whole train of the malevolent passions : Its object is in the first place the promotion of its own individual advantage, without any regard to that of the community at large : To attain this object, there are no considerations, however sacred, which will not be sacrificed—characters will be defamed—measures reprobated—jealousies excited, and the public confidence in their rulers will be assailed, and destroyed if possible till its views are accomplished : When SELF is not the prime motive to faction, a vindictive spirit of revenge often designates its baneful manoeuvres— disappointed in its aspiring ambitious schemes, it precipitates its votaries into all the excesses of a wild, blind, and implacable enmity to its successful rivals, and nothing short of involving the body politic in that anarchy and confusion which may afford a favorable opportunity to carry its designs into execution, will check the progress of its accursed machinations.