a minister of
the Crown, "that if he wished for a guide in a system of neutrality he
should take that laid down by America in the days of Washington and the
secretaryship of Jefferson;" and we see, in fact, that the act of
Congress of 1818 was followed the succeeding year by an act of the
Parliament of England substantially the same in its general provisions.
Up to that time there had been no similar law in England, except certain
highly penal statutes passed in the reign of George II, prohibiting
English subjects from enlisting in foreign service, the avowed object
of which statutes was that foreign armies, raised for the purpose of
restoring the house of Stuart to the throne, should not be strengthened
by recruits from England herself.

All must see that difficulties may arise in carrying the laws referred
to into execution in a country now having 3,000 or 4,000 miles of
seacoast, with an infinite number of ports and harbors and small inlets,
from some of which unlawful expeditions may suddenly set forth, without
the knowledge of Government, against the possessions of foreign states.

"Friendly relations with all, but entangling alliances with none," has
long been a maxim with us. Our true mission is not to propagate our
opinions or impose upon other countries our form of government by
artifice or force, but to teach by example and show by our success,
moderation, and justice the blessings of self-government and the
advantages of free institutions. Let every people choose for itself and
make and alter its political institutions to suit its own condition
and convenience. But while we avow and maintain this neutral policy
ourselves, we are anxious to see the same forbearance on the part of
other nations whose forms of government are different from our own. The
deep interest which we feel in the spread of liberal principles and the
establishment of free governments and the sympathy with which we witness
every struggle against oppression forbid that we should be indifferent
to a case in which the strong arm of a foreign power is invoked to
stifle public sentiment and repress the spirit of freedom in any
country.

The Governments of Great Britain and France have issued orders to their
naval commanders on the West India station to prevent, by force if
necessary, the landing of adventurers from any nation on the island of
Cuba with hostile intent. The copy of a memorandum of a conversation on
this subject between the cha