equire no logic from me, to
understand the effect that must be, and is produced, by this
contradiction between the language that is studiously used--used to
nauseous affectation--at home, and so much of the language that is used
by too many of the agents abroad.

I very well know that the government of the Union guarantees neither
the civil nor religious liberty of the citizen, except as against its
own action; that any state may create an establishment, or a close
hereditary aristocracy, to-morrow, if it please, the general provision
that its polity must be that of a republic, meaning no more than that
there should not be an hereditary monarchy; and that is quite within the
limits of constitutional possibilities, that the base of the national
representation should be either purely aristocratical, purely
democratical, or a mixture of both. But in leaving this option to the
states, the constitution has, in no manner, impaired the force of facts.
The states have made their election, and, apart from the anomaly of a
slave population, the fundamental feature of the general government is
democratic. Now, it is indisputably the privilege of the citizen to
express the opinions of government that he may happen to entertain. The
system supposes consultation and choice, and it would be mockery to
maintain that either can exist without entire freedom of thought and
speech. If any man prefer a monarchy to the present polity of the
nation, it is his indefeasible right to declare his opinion, and to be
exempt from persecution and reproach. He who meets such a declaration in
any other manner than by a free admission of the right, does not _feel_
the nature of the institutions under which he lives, for the
constitution, in its spirit, everywhere recognises the principle. But
One, greater than the constitution of America, in divine ordinances,
everywhere denies the right of a man to profess one thing and to mean
another. There is an implied pledge given by every public agent that he
will not misrepresent what he knows to be the popular sentiment at home,
and which popular sentiment, directly or indirectly, has clothed his
language with the authority it carries in foreign countries; and there
is every obligation of faith, fidelity, delicacy, and discretion, that
he should do no discredit to that which he knows to be a distinguishing
and vital principle with his constituents. As respects our agents in
Europe, I believe little is hazarded