their true object,—­the maintenance of the idea of Government.  We are not merely suppressing an enormous riot, but contending for the possibility of permanent order coexisting with democratical fickleness; and while I would not superstitiously venerate form to the sacrifice of substance, neither would I forget that an adherence to precedent and prescription can alone give that continuity and coherence under a democratical constitution which are inherent in the person of a despotick monarch and the selfishness of an aristocratieal class. Stet pro ratione voluntas is as dangerous in a majority as in a tyrant.

I cannot allow the present production of my young friend to go out without a protest from me against a certain extremeness in his views, more pardonable in the poet than in the philosopher.  While I agree with him, that the only cure for rebellion is suppression by force, yet I must animadvert upon certain phrases where I seem to see a coincidence with a popular fallacy on the subject of compromise.  On the one hand there are those who do not see that the vital principle of Government and the seminal principle of Law cannot properly be made a subject of compromise at all, and on the other those who are equally blind to the truth that without a compromise of individual opinions, interests, and even rights, no society would be possible. In medio tutissimus.  For my own part, I would gladly—­

Ef I a song or two could make
  Like rockets druv by their own burnin’,
All leap an’ light, to leave a wake
  Men’s hearts an’ faces skyward turnin’!—­
But, it strikes me, ’tain’t jest the time
  Fer stringin’ words with settisfaction: 
Wut’s wanted now’s the silent rhyme
  ‘Twixt upright Will an’ downright Action.

Words, ef you keep ’em, pay their keep,
  But gabble’s the short cut to ruin; 10
It’s gratis, (gals half-price,) but cheap
  At no rate, ef it henders doin’;
Ther’ ‘s nothin’ wuss, ’less ’tis to set
  A martyr-prem’um upon jawrin’: 
Teapots git dangerous, ef you shet
  Their lids down on ’em with Fort Warren.

’Bout long enough it’s ben discussed
  Who sot the magazine afire,
An’ whether, ef Bob Wickliffe bust,
  ’Twould scare us more or blow us higher. 20
D’ ye spose the Gret Foreseer’s plan
  Wuz settled fer him in town-meetin’? 
Or thet ther’d ben no Fall o’ Man,
  Ef Adam’d on’y bit a sweetin’?

Oh, Jon’than, ef you want to be
  A rugged chap agin an’ hearty,
Go fer wutever’ll hurt Jeff D.,
  Nut wut’ll boost up ary party. 
Here’s hell broke loose, an’ we lay flat
  With half the univarse a-singe-in’, 30
Till Sen’tor This an’ Gov’nor Thet
  Stop squabblin’ fer the gardingingin.

It’s war we’re in, not politics;
  It’s systems wrastlin’ now, not parties;
An’ victory in the eend’ll fix
  Where longest will an’ truest heart is,
An’ wut’s the Guv’ment folks about? 
  Tryin’ to hope ther’ ‘s nothin’ doin’,
An’ look ez though they didn’t doubt
  Sunthin’ pertickler wuz a-brewin’. 40