to the
impeachment. It is not long since a great majority of our free
population, servile to the opinions of those whose opinions they had
been accustomed to follow, would have admitted slavery to be a great
evil, unjust and indefensible in principle, and only to be vindicated by
the stern necessity which was imposed upon us. Thus stimulated by every
motive and passion which ordinarily actuate human beings--not as to a
criminal enterprise, but as to something generous and heroic--what has
been the result? A few imbecile and uncombined plots--in every instance
detected before they broke out into action, and which perhaps if
undetected would never have broken into action. One or two sudden,
unpremeditated attempts, frantic in their character, if not prompted by
actual insanity, and these instantly crushed. As it is, we are not less
assured of safety, order, and internal peace, than any other people; and
but for the pertinacious and fanatical agitations of the subject, would
be much more so.

This experience of security, however, should admonish us of the folly
and wickedness of those who have sometimes taken upon themselves to
supersede the regular course of law, and by rash and violent acts to
punish supposed disturbers of the peace of society. This can admit of no
justification or palliation whatever. Burke, I think, somewhere remarked
something to this effect,--that when society is in the last stage of
depravity--when all parties are alike corrupt, and alike wicked and
unjustifiable in their measures and objects, a good man may content
himself with standing neuter, a sad and disheartened spectator of the
conflict between the rival vices. But are we in this wretched condition?
It is fearful to see with what avidity the worst and most dangerous
characters of society seize on the occasion of obtaining the countenance
of better men, for the purpose of throwing off the restraints of law. It
is always these who are most zealous and forward in constituting
themselves the protectors of the public peace. To such men--men without
reputation, or principle, or stake in society--disorder is the natural
element. In that, desperate fortunes and the want of all moral principle
and moral feeling constitute power. They are eager to avenge themselves
upon society. Anarchy is not so much the absence of government, as the
government of the worst--not aristocracy, but kakistocracy--a state of
things, which to the honor of our nature, has s