inhabitants, which only there, perhaps, could be seen in complete verification of the boast of the ancient, "os homini sublime dedit, cœlumque tueri," at the same time developed, in their widest extent, the most useful and powerful energies of our nature. He learns that almost in a moment the whole face of things was changed "as if by touch of some enchanter's wand," as if some foul magician had breathed the breath of destruction over the land; and that this was the work of one whom the nation, in gratitude for services of a kind which ought never to have been rewarded in that way, invested with its highest honours-of one who, disqualified by temperament, education, and habits, for the post he was called to fill, and acting under the dictates of ignorance and passion, had conceived a bitter hostility to a principal instrument of the country's welfare, and assaulted it with all the eagerness and blindness of personal malice, hugging the idea that he was but executing the commands of patriotism. He learns that the infatuation of their favourite had communicated itself to the people, and that instead of staying the profane hand which was scattering their happiness to the winds, and desecrating their institutions, they had leagued with him in the fierce crusade against their own interests and their own reputation, and at the moment were even urging him on in the career of ruin. He hears cries of distress which are echoed by the laugh of scorn; he beholds turmoil made confusion worse confounded by those who might have calmed the tempest and poured oil upon the waves; he sees himself surrounded by all the mischief which results from the perversion of the best materials of prosperity, by all the consequences of ignorance, and vice, and delusion; and, if he does not, in a fit of disappointment and disgust, return at once to whence he came, but remains and endeavours to understand the causes of a spectacle so melancholy and so unexpected, he at length discovers, like Mr. Chevalier, that "an absolute people may, as well as an absolute king, disdain for a while the counsels of experience and wisdom; that a people as well as a king may have its courtiers; that a people that rules, when its authority is limited by no counterpoise, may also espouse blindly, and at every risk, the quarrels of its favourites of the moment." A mournful lesson to learn for those who have cherished the fond belief that a majority can do no wrong; that there is no such thing as that "worst of tyrants an usurping crowd," in countries where the people are recognised as sovereign. But it is a useful lesson for that people especially to learn, and, if duly remembered, must be their best preservative against the perils to which they are exposed by the freedom which is given to the evil as well as to the good attributes of their nature. Self-distrust, to a certain extent, is as necessary

for them as self-confidence. The intoxication of national presumption must make them reel, if not fall, in the path before them; and when once the idea that all they do is right because they do it, obtains possession of their minds, clouds will soon gather upon their horizon, and the storm will burst upon unprotected heads. Sincerely is it to be hoped, that the experience we have had will not realize the wise man's remark, that experience is like the stern-light of a vessel, only illuminating the track behind. May it cast its brightest effulgence before our feet, for dearly have we purchased the lamp.

Mr. Chevalier thinks that the unpopularity of the banking system, resulting from the injury which had been produced by the mismanagement of various banks, was so great and so general as to have been a principal cause of the eagerness of the people for the destruction of the bank of the United States. To a certain extent, undoubtedly, there was a strong dislike to the whole system, and some, if not many, would have rejoiced to see it entirely eradicated; but we are confident in the belief that, at the period of the late president's first election, had the vote of the country been taken, there would have been found a decided, perhaps an overwhelming, majority in favour of the institution. Its benefits had been too important, too palpable, not to have created a sentiment of good-will towards it among a people who, when not labouring under one of those illusions to which even the clearest sighted may at times be subject, have too keen a perception of their interests to be indifferent or hostile to the sources of their prosperity. Nothing but a fit of what may be termed insanity could have prompted them to the determination to dry those sources up; and, if ever there was an instance of national insanity, that was certainly one which the good people of the United States have just exhibited. It was not until they had become so enamoured of the idol they had fashioned with their own hands as to be willing to sacrifice even themselves upon its altar-it was not until fascinated with the idea that a single individual comprised all the wisdom and virtue of the country, they hesitated not to believe aught, however preposterous or monstrous, at his bidding-it was not until overtaken by this wretched delirium, that they loosed the silver cord of their tranquillity, and broke the golden bowl of their happiness. The people's president could not deceive the people. Those whom he chose to select as his enemies, must be their enemies. Those whom he denounced, they should denounce. Those whom he would destroy, they should destroy.

Our author mentions two striking instances of the degree in which every thing, whatever its real colour, looks yellow to jaundiced eyes. It may be useful to recur to them as samples of the whole treatment of the "faultless monster."

Last year the government of the United States sold to the bank a bill upon the French government that the latter refused to accept, which caused a protest, the result of which was that the correspondent of the bank took up the bill in order to prevent the signature of the institution from being discredited. In this affair the executive of the United States was wrong. 1st. He committed an act of indiscretion in drawing upon the French government before the chambers had appropriated the funds necessary to pay the indemnity agreed upon of twenty-five millions. 2d. Instead of drawing by a bill of exchange upon the French government, and selling this bill to the bank without knowing whether it would be accepted, the executive would have acted more suitably towards itself, towards France, and towards the bank, by authorizing the last to receive the payments of the French government in its quality of agent or of fondé de pouvoir. In virtue of commercial usages in all countries, and the United States in particular, the bank was entitled to a claim for damages. She made it. Her object in this was doubtless much more to exhibit all that was censurable in the executive proceedings than to put a sum of fifty or eighty thousand dollars into her coffers. But immediately the adversaries of the bank began to exclaim that, not satisfied with extorting from the sweat of the people immense sums for the benefit of its stockholders, (remark that the dividends of the bank are moderate compared with those of the other financial associations of the country, and the federal government is the largest of its stockholders,) it wished, in its cupidity, by means of miserable chicanery, to seize upon still more of the public revenue, and bury the money of the people in the breechespockets of Mr. Biddle.' To this reasoning, for it is considered perfectly demonstrative reasoning, the multitude answered by imprecations against monopoly and the aristocracy of money, and by the cry, a thousand times repeated, of Hurrah for Jackson!1

"A few days since, another episode of a similar kind occurred. The bank is charged, by act of congress, with the care of paying the pensions decreed to the old soldiers of the revolution. It is a service which it performs gratuitously, and which is notoriously onerous. It has received

various sums for this purpose, and has at present about five hundred thousand dollars ready for the next payment of the pensions. The administration wished to deprive it of the duty, and demanded the funds, books, and papers, appertaining to it. The bank replied, that, having been constituted the depositary of them by congress, she neither could, nor should, nor would give them up, except directed to do so by the authority of congress. The bank was right; but hear what happened. Its adversaries set up dolorous lamentations upon the hard fate of the illustrious remnants of the army of Independence, whom the outrecuidance of the bank, they say, is about to plunge into the most frightful destitution at the close of their lives. They uttered pathetic groans over these glorious defenders of the country, from whom a monied corporation wishes to ravish the gifts which a grateful country delighted to offer them in the days of their old age. You may imagine all the inflated arguments, all the patriotic tirades, which may be put forth on this text. The fourth of February the president sent a message to congress in this spirit. All this, however, is sheer declamation of the vulgarest and most hypocritical kind; for who is to hinder the liberators of America from receiving their pensions, but those who will refuse them drafts upon the

1 An admirable commentary upon this "demonstrative reasoning" has been recently furnished by the unanimous acknowledgment by congress of the rights of the bank in regard to the damages.

bank, which the bank would immediately honour? But an infatuated people does not wait for logic. It is, therefore, ascertained now by the multitude that the bank has resolved to starve to death the noble veterans of independence; and again, anathema upon monopoly ! curses upon monied aristocracies! Hurrah for Jackson! Jackson for ever!"

It is almost impossible, at this time especially, when the country is suffering from the full effects of the disastrous course that has been pursued, to speak of it with the requisite calmness; but we hazard little in affirming that future historians will consider the matter with no less astonishment than reprobation. They will say that, though less in degree, the infatuation of the people was of the same kind as that which drove the French during their first revolution to the destruction of what was indispensable for their welfare, as well as to the most degrading submission to ignorant, fool-hardy, unscrupulous despotism. They will be struck, as was Mr. Chevalier, "with the resemblance between most of the speeches and newspaper articles against the bank and the republican tirades in France in '91 and '92-the same declamatory, turgid style, the same appeal to popular passions, with this difference, indeed, that the facts alleged in the one case are vague, crude, and intangible; whilst in the other the griefs were real." They will say, that, in both instances, the demon of mischief seemed to have gained absolute sway over the minds of men, and to have filled them with that mania for devastation which could only be appeased by the sight of the smouldering ruins of the temples of their prosperity, to which they themselves had applied the ruthless torch of Alecto. They will remark the evidence afforded in both instances of the profanity of the assertion that the vox populi is always the vox dei, as well as of the manner in which men, when labouring under such paroxysms, appear to revel in the commission of the follies and the crimes most opposed to their predominant characteristics of virtue. How true is the observation of Luther, that the human mind is like a drunken man on horseback; put him up on one side he is sure to fall on the other.

We are now experiencing, in all their bitterness, the consequences of our frenzy. The fury of the tempest that howled so fiercely has subsided to a degree, but the sky is still overcast, and the swell of the ocean which ever succeeds is more terrible in its destructiveness than all the raging of the wind.

The conclusion of Mr. Chevalier's sixth letter is worthy here of translation.

"I am more and more convinced that the United States will turn this crisis to profit. Sooner or later, a principle of organization will issue from it for the system of banks. Very probably the national bank, if it be retained, and the local banks, will thenceforward be less isolated from the federal authority and the local powers; that is to say, the general and state governments will enter into the constitution of the banks;

and, in consequence, the banks will enter into that of the government of the country. Thus many of the abuses of the banking system will be reformed, and the normal and legitimate influence of the banks reinforced. It would be easy to cite a crowd of facts which already concur towards this result. It is thus that in some states the legislatures have established, or are busied in establishing, banks in which the state is a stockholder to the amount of one half or two fifths of the capital, names a large number of the directors, and reserves for itself an extensive control. I have already mentioned that there are states, such as Illinois, where every other species of bank has been formally forbidden by the constitution.

"Writers on the representative form of government recognise only the executive, legislative, and judiciary powers. In the United States there will soon be also the financial power; or at least the banks will there soon form a branch of the government as vigorous as any other. The bank of the United States is more essential to the prosperity of the country than the executive power such as it exists. The latter does a little diplomacy, good or bad, with the European governments, appoints and removes modest functionaries, manœuvres an army of six thousand men in the deserts of the west, adds from time to time some bits of wood to a dozen vessels upon the stocks at Portsmouth, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Washington, Norfolk, and Pensacola, (the seven arsenals of the federal navy). All this might, in effect, cease to exist without endangering the security of the country, and without seriously shaking its prosperity, that is to say, its industry. On the contrary, take from the country its institutions of credit, or only that one which rules and regulates all the rest, the bank of the United States, and you plunge it into a state of commercial anarchy which might end by producing political anarchy.

"The word policy cannot have the same meaning in the United States as in Europe. They are not engaged like the Europeans in combinations of territory and continental equilibrium. They have nothing to unravel in any treaty of Westphalia or Vienna. They are free from all those difficulties which in Europe spring from differences of origin and religion, from the conflict of rival pretensions, of old and new interests. They have no neighbour to give them umbrage. The policy of the United States is the extension of their commerce, and the invasion by their agriculture of the immense domain which nature has granted them. The mass of their general and particular interests is there. There is the object which excites their political and personal feelings. As the banks are the soul of their commerce, of their growing manufactures, and even of their agriculture, it is evident that the success of their policy is intimately and directly linked with the proper organization of their system of banks. The true and real government of the country, that is to say, the direction of its essential interests, resides as much in the banks as in any other body or power created by the constitution. The moment has arrived when this fact should be acknowledged and sanctioned. In the same way as among a warlike people the office of grand constable or field marshal is first in the kingdom, so among a people whose business is industry, that of president of the central bank, for instance, ought to be a public political post, in the acceptation of the word political which is best adapted to the character of this people, as well as a post of the highest order.

In this point of view it may be said that what is passing in the

'This of course is a picture of constitutional executive power-not of the "responsibility taking" system, which truly, in our author's phrase, might cease without endangering the security of the country."

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