legislation, and in the administration of the laws, and for many of those useful public works, of which our times make such boast? The philosopher, in his observations of the causes of human happiness, will not forget, nor fail to rejoice, that it should have been so ordered in the course of Providence, that even the bitter strifes of rival parties should beget a contest between them, which should produce the largest amount of benefit to the largest number of the people.

Parties also are useful, as they promote the discussion of public affairs, of the principles of government, and the rights and duties of citizens. In all free states, the people must be instructed in the truths to which they owe their freedom. They must know their rights, to be able to maintain them. They cannot make useful citizens, and be ignorant of the nature and principles of the government in which they take part; nor can they usefully exercise the rights of electors, when uninstructed in public affairs. What so likely to impart to them this knowledge as the earnest discussions of political parties? Who does not see, that beneath the stormy and foaming waves, which the tempest of an election heaves up, there are strong and deep under-currents of fundamental truths and great principles? Do we not all know, that previous to an election, every topic related to the question, and every argument that human ingenuity can discover, are pressed into the service by able and eager partisans? How many rare truths have been struck out in these conflicts? To this cause how much do we not owe of the political knowledge which is nearly universal in this country? Has not the mind been sharpened and invigorated by these endless discussions? And in England and France, has not the prodigious advance in this same knowledge, been more owing to the struggles of parties, and the discussions of the press which they have brought forth, than to any other cause whatever?

A political party is an organized body, which can often be turned to account for the noblest purposes. A mere individual can do but little. It is only great bodies of men that can bring about any great result. Nothing can be done without organization and concert. Now a political party presents such an organization ready at hand, and that organization the most perfect that can be made of any voluntary association. Here are bodies, capable of being wielded for the accomplishment of great ends. All reforms

certainly do not fall within the scope of a political party; but there are a great number which do thus fall, all connected with social ameliorations, all relating to the government or the laws, (and how wide a range may not these take,) and for the spread of these, a party is the readiest and most potent instrument. History is full of examples.

If these were their only consequences, we might consider parties an unmixed good. But there is a reverse to this picture, which has sometimes led good men to doubt whether, on the whole, the good that springs from them were not more than counterbalanced by the evil. The first and most prominent of these abuses is, the perversion of party from generous and patriotic to selfish purposes. Legitimate party springs from differences of opinion. Where there is no difference of opinion, there ought to be no party; there is no sufficient ground for party. But the power and the emoluments of office are great temptations. Under their influences, it is less to be wondered at, than deplored, that men will feign or conceal opinions, convert the means into an end, and clamor for principle, with hearts yearning for office. Principles there may be at the foundation of the party, and many good and true hearts there may be devoted to those principles, and contending only for their sake; but it is, nevertheless, undeniable that, in our day, parties have fallen into great corruption; that there are multitudes, and those, it has ever been remarked, the noisiest and most furious of all, who care nothing for the principles of their party, or indeed for any principles; whose only motive is the hope of gain to themselves-who preach the infamous maxim, that "to the victors belong the spoils"-who, on the first success, claim offices for themselves, as the reward of their partisan labors, and drown by their clamors the voices of the moderate and the unobtrusive. In the crowd, and during the struggle, it may be difficult to distinguish the disinterested patriot from the selfish politician. Zeal in the pursuit of one's private ends is mistaken for zeal in the public cause; the noise of demagogues, sedulous only to promote their own schemes, by making the people their instruments, stuns the ears of quiet persons, and in the enthusiasm of the triumph, they leap into the public seats. The number of these persons has come to be so considerable, and their shouts so loud, that the character of parties has been greatly affected by them. They have troubled the waters at the fountain,

and the stream runs clear no longer. A class of persons has sprung up, called "professed politicians"-politicians by profession-another name for adventurers, who choose a party, only after calculating the chance of its success, and who watch to turn every event to their own private advantage. A greater calamity can scarcely befall a people, than to have in its bosom a large body of such men ; and no public demoralisation can be more deplorable than such corruption of parties, as to convert them into mere combatants for places.

The danger to freedom is one of the most deplorable consequences of this dreadful corruption. Who that is familiar with the history of former commonwealths, weakened, and at last torn in pieces by the madness of faction, but must have admitted to his mind, rarely, perhaps, and in his darkest hours, the possibility of our own fair land being oppressed by internal disorders, and torn in pieces by the parricidal hands of her own children. When parties degenerate into factions, and the factions, forgetting the moral principles, which are the only safety of the world, sink all questions in the question of success, the country is put at imminent hazard. The vessel of the state is driving fast towards the fatal reef, which, though hidden from every eye on board, is shortly to break her, if her course is not changed, into a hundred fragments.

A second abuse of parties, is the debasement of the moral sentiments, in regard to the use of means, which in our times they tend to produce. A pure mind is shocked at the first proposal to use immoral or unfair means, for the accomplishment of any, the best end. In the transaction of business, among men of fair characters, stratagem or deception is looked upon as dishonest and degrading. Nor is any truth in morals better established, independent of the positive injunctions of Christian ethics, than that dishonest means are never justifiable, even though they were necessary to the attainment of the noblest enda truth so clear and universal, that it has passed into a proverb, that "the end never justifies the means." But in parties, are not all these rules practically reversed? When, or rather we would say, how rarely, has it been known, that a politician or a partisan has scrupled to use any means whatever, that seemed to promise him success? That "all is fair in politics," is a new maxim, engrafted upon the code of morals under the dictation of

partisan leaders. Even high-minded and virtuous men are misled or pushed into consenting to this wicked doctrine; a doctrine that will, if not checked, find its way from elections and parties to business, trades and professions. The heat and zeal of the struggle beget indifference to the judgments not only of a severe morality, but of common probity. The right and the wrong are merged in the question of success. Who, in his quiet hours, can reflect upon the scenes which every election presents, upon the falsehood, gross and monstrous, the libels and the slander, the bribery, direct and indirect, the deception and the intimidation, the appeals to jealousies, prejudices, passions, and fears, the insincere declarations and arguments, put forth with affected earnestness to excite the sober and to mislead the unsuspecting; who can reflect upon all these, and not turn from them with disgust? It is a part of the plan of politicians, to keep the country always in a ferment, never to let the people rest, and to rage fiercely themselves so as to infect others by the contagion of their example. What unnecessary alarms, what causeless indignation, what misspent vehemence, are not inflicted upon popular states, by these abuses!

The

The interference of party with the freedom of the individual is another abuse. That is the best government, which interferes least with private actions and opinions. nature of parties requires nothing more, than that men should agree upon certain principal questions, waiving others, or rather leaving every member, in respect to those others, free to act as his judgment shall dictate. The abuse seems to consist in an extension of their power and influence to actions and opinions with which they ought not to intermeddle. The whirlpool is so strong as to draw everything within its influence. This is one of the greatest evils of our times, that every question that may be started, every reform that may be proposed, is made a party question, and its fate depends altogether upon the strength of parties. Can anything be worse? Can anything be more demoralizing? If the mind preserves its sense of justice or its love of virtue, in the midst of so many causes to obscure its moral perceptions, we may rejoice for its escape. It is the boast of republics, that every man may do whatever is not forbidden by the laws. His actions, so that he does no wrong to others, may be as free as his thoughts. But under the present practice, the tendency of parties is to abridge this freedom, and to

force every man to govern himself in all things by the will of his party, or, by what is too often the same thing, the will of that party's leaders. This coercion is more or less strong, according to circumstances. Pride of opinion, disdain of control, an independent spirit, will always lead many of those who are earnestly devoted to the principles of their party, to resist this universal interference with their actions and opinions. They will assert their undoubted right to speak freely of both measures and men, without either abandoning their party, or submitting to account to it for their conduct. Nevertheless, it requires much moral courage to defy party authority. It is the interest of the leaders to make it disgraceful for a man to separate from his party on any question, and they are sure to let loose upon all such, every furious and malignant spirit which they can command.

We have already said, that an honorable man may feel himself sometimes obliged to support measures which he does not approve, for the sake of keeping his party together. This evil is increased tenfold, by its interference with concerns that should be left to themselves. As you extend the circle of a party's authority, you multiply occasions of real disagreement in opinion, and the oftener do violence to the moral sense and the judgment. That there should ever be occasion to conceal one's real opinions, is a positive evil; but to multiply these occasions, is a tyranny in itself, and a degradation to those who bear it.

The present system of party discipline makes an avowed change of opinion embarrassing and difficult. Whoever ventures upon it is pretty sure to be called knave and traitor, as if the thoughts could be confined within fixed limits, or the human mind were stationary. Whoever is most sensible of the weakness of the human understanding, and of the need that we all should use the lessons of experience for the correction of our judgments, is most liable to change his opinions, and the least likely to bear with patience, any restraint upon his intellectual and moral freedom. He feels that it is his pride to gather wisdom, as he increases in years, and that it would be his disgrace, if in no respect the judgment of his riper age were better than the impulses of his youth. How great, then, is the misfortune, that an almost insurmountable obstacle should be placed in the way of an open change of opinion, and a temptation therefore held out to stifle or misunderstand the voice of our reason. What shall we say of those whose vocation it is to denounce such of their