Gazette Of The United States, & Philadelphia Daily Advertiser

Justum et tenacem propositi virum,
Non civium ardor prava jubentium,
Non vultus instantis tyranni,
Mente quatit solida.
THE CONTRAST
Between Great Britain and France.

"On the one hand we behold the great fabric of Religion and ancient Monarchy rapidly dissolved and annihilated; apostate blasphemy and anarchy erecting their bloody standard, and desolating the earth; the rulers, ridding themselves of every restraint and notion of religion, honor, and conscience, debasing their minds with every deliberate kind of cruelty, perfidy, violence, exaction; undermining the happiness of other nations, as well as that of their own, by every contrivance of cunning; through their policy, causing craft to prosper in their hands, and magnifying themselves in their hearts, and by peace destroying many: also standing up against the Prince of Princes; crushing the weaker and hardly-resisting powers; attacking the neutral, and defying the opponent, nations; extending and enlarging the career and compass of victory and aggrandizement; sunk in the very gall and bitterness of guilt. On the other hand, we view a great nation, the protectress of the afflicted, persecuted, and exiled, mistresses of the ocean, the crowning island, whose merchants are princes, and whose traffickers are the honorable of the earth; the nursing-mother of God's church, which is neither darkened with superstition, nor bewildered with enthusiasm; a nation, holding the steady reins of sober, moderate, and well attempered government, which is ripened by the accumulated wisdom and experience of ages, and confirmed by the three-fold cable of the sovereign, the nobles, spiritual and temporal, and the commons of the realm; this nation, forced into the dreadful conflict by an insulting anti-christian foe, who spurns with scorn at every proffered condition of peace; this nation, amidst great vices, cultivating many virtues; munificent in occasional, as well as permanent, charities of various descriptions; diffusive in private benevolence, and in public contributions, through the whole mass of the people; a nation, famous for arts, arms, industry, erudition, and valor; and retrieving, I hope and trust, its good old former character for piety, wisdom, and true religion. Such, I believe, may be fairly stated as the contrast."

The above is not an exaggerated picture: though the coloring is high, it is executed with the pencil of truth. From which of these stocks were the first settlers, as well as the principal part of the actual inhabitants of these States descended--which are we proud of resembling in religion, laws, government, customs, manners--to which are we bound by the ties of nature, of honor, and interest--to which are we indebted for all that we possess, that is truly wise, virtuous, and dignified--and in which can we confide, most safely, for the faithful performance of stipulated engagements, or look to for protection, in case of need? To a mind that is not brutified by the foulest malice, or contaminated by modern systems of religion and politics, these questions must appear superfluous.