and of very doubtful utility. Besides the sore burdens entailed upon posterity to pay the annual interest, the practice encourages war, and leads to extravagance in public expenditures. The debt of Great Britain, in 1857, was some eight hundred millions of pounds sterling, and the annual expenses thereon some twenty-eight millions. In 1817 it was eight hundred and forty-eight millions. The debt has been reduced a few millions by the government taking advantage of the decline in the rate of interest. The debt of France, in 1859, was some seventeen hundred millions of dollars, and the annual charges thereon some one hundred millions. In 1814, it was only two hundred and forty millions. The enormous cost of war may be appreciated by the fact, that in the war with France, from 1793 to 1815, Great Britain increased her national debt from two hundred and thirty-nine to eight hundred and forty-eight millions of pounds sterling, the increase being about equal to three thousand millions of dollars. The population of Great Britain is some twenty-eight millions, and that of the United States some thirty-one millions; and yet the annual interest upon her national debt is nearly double the yearly expenses of the Federal Government in time of peace.*

We have escaped the frequent wars that have so much desolated Europe. This impunity has arisen from the advantages of our position. Although our fathers suffered many privations. in the Revolution, they did not endure the extreme exhaustion

*"What are the chief sources of expense in every government? What has occasioned that enormous accumulation of debts with which several of the European nations are oppressed? The answer plainly is, wars and rebellions; the support of those institutions which are necessary to guard the body politic against these two most mortal diseases of society. The expenses of those institutions which relate to the more domestic police of a State, to the support of its legislative, executive, and judicial departments, with their different appendages, and to the encouragement of agriculture and manufactures, (which will comprehend almost all the objects of State expenditure,) are insignificant in comparison with those that relate to the national defence. In the kingdom of Great Britain, where all the ostentatious apparatus of monarchy is to be provided for, not above one-fifteenth part of the annual income of the nation is appropriated to the class of expenses last mentioned, the other fourteen-fifteenths are absorbed in the payment of the interest of debts contracted for carrying on the wars in which that country has been engaged, and in the maintenance of fleets and armies." -(Hamilton, Federalist, No. 34, p. 160.)

It will be observed that these remarks were made by Hamilton before the enormous increase of the debt of England, arising from the twenty-one years' war with France, had occurred. They are, therefore, more just at this time than when they were made.

felt on the continent of Europe, particularly in France. Our country was new, rich in soil, and too extensive to be thoroughly overrun; and there was, consequently, little or no starvation. France contributed one-twentieth of her entire population during the times of Napoleon, and lost one million seven hundred thousand men upon the field of battle. One-twentieth of our entire population during the Revolution, would have given us an army of about one hundred and seventy-five thousand men, a greater number than we lost during that memorable period. In the late war with England our sufferings were comparatively slight. We lost but few men in comparison to our population, and expended but a small amount of treasure, creating a national debt so small that the country, without exorbitant taxation, was enabled to pay it off in some sixteen years after the close of the war in 1815. But before the termination of the present unhappy contest, our people may know, perhaps, the real miseries of war, and be capable of estimating, with tolerable accuracy, the legitimate results of a permanent dissolution of the Union. This will be but one of many wars that must result in the future from such a misfortune.

§ 8. Effects of dissolution upon national credit.

With a divided Union, each section being invadeable by land, the credit of each would be bad, and high interest upon national loans the necessary result. Great Britain can borrow money at three per cent., while France, and other powers on the continent, are compelled to pay from five to six. In the course of a few centuries, this disadvantage is severely felt. All the countries of Europe, invadeable by land, have been invaded within the present century; and several of them more than once. Each successful invasion costs the country invaded about the labor of a generation, and destroys, for the time at least, the ability to pay the interest upon its bonds. People who invest their funds in government loans, are generally persons who seek repose in retirement from business, and who desire a safe and certain income. If they obtain only a low rate of interest, they can manage to live within their income, when the interest is punctually paid. Security, not profit, is their primary object.

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§ 9. Effects of dissolution upon the investment of capital.

A country, invadeable by land, is not an inviting field for the employment of large amounts of capital. Capitalists are men who examine carefully, and judge dispassionately. They seek a safe and permanent investment for their money. They are not generally speculative men. Taken as a whole, the soil of France is of superior quality; and the productive part of it bears a larger proportion to the entire extent of the country than in most European States, being as 41 to 52; and yet the want of large capital has been severely felt in both manufactures and agriculture. (New Am. Cy., art.. France.) This fact is but the legitimate result of her geographical position. The knowledge of the fact that a country is invadeable by land, that it has been invaded repeatedly, and (judging the future by the past) that it will be invaded again, will necessarily deter large capitalists from investments there so long as other opportunities, more safe, are available. It does not matter how brave and skilful the people of a country invadeable by land may be, there will arise, in the progress of human affairs, some untoward crisis, when a successful invasion can be made. Factions among the people, a weak, rash, or irresolute cabinet, superior talent at the head of a rival nation, and many other causes, may arise. Had England been invadeable by land, could her people, with all their conceded skill and valor, have resisted the army led by Napoleon against Russia? A people thus situated always work under the dispiriting reflection that their country may be successfully overrun at any time, and the results of their industry either greatly impaired or totally swept away. During the Peninsular war, the factories of Spain were mostly destroyed by the military operations of the hostile forces.

The advantages of her position is the reason why the capital of the world is mainly concentrated in England. Capital is safer there than at any other easily accessible point. Hence the greatest houses, financial and commercial, are found there. Our country united possesses like advantages in respect, at least, to many portions of the globe. Capital has been steadily accumulating, and commerce and manufactures have increased in a corresponding degree. But let the Union be permanently sev

ered, and the disastrous results will become, in due time, too palpable to be mistaken.

§ 10. Dissolution fatal to supremacy at sea.

No country, invadeable by land, can reasonably hope, at this late day, to become the leading naval power among the maritime nations of the earth. A people thus situated must, of necessity, keep up a large standing army, and cannot, therefore, support, at the same time, the most efficient navy in the world. These two burdens together would be more than any people could well bear.

Had the position of the French and English been reversed, the result of their rivalship on the sea might have been very different. As it was, the English had the more powerful motives to impel them to victory. They knew that, if successful, not only honor, but safety from invasion at home, would be the result. On the contrary, the French knew success at sea would still leave their country open to invasion by land; and that, therefore, the necessity for keeping up a large standing army would not be obviated.

United, we will be able, in the course of another century, if not sooner, to put afloat a navy equal, if not superior, to any on the ocean. But with a divided country, that great prospect vanishes.

§ 11. Despotism the ultimate result of dissolution.

It has long been the fixed opinion of the best English and American statesmen, that large standing armies are inimical to free government. Mr. Pulteney, as cited by Mr. Hallam, declared in 1732 that he "always had been, and always would be, against a standing army of any kind; it was to him a terrible thing, whether under the denomination of parliamentary or any other. A standing army is still a standing army, whatever name it may be called by; they are a body of men distinct from the body of the people; they are governed by different laws; blind obedience and an entire submission to the orders of their commanding officers is their only principle. The nations around us are already enslaved by those very means; by

means of their standing armies they have every one lost their liberties; it is, indeed, impossible that the liberties of the people can be preserved in any country where a numerous standing army is kept up."

The opposition to standing armies has often been carried to extremes. One of reasonable size is not dangerous to liberty, but necessary to security. It is true, that no government can be beneficially administered, unless it gives general satisfaction to at least a majority of the governing class, whatever that class may be; but it is equally true, that no government can long rule by universal consent; and every practical government must, therefore, have the means to promptly put down mere factions, and to render revolution, in the beginning, difficult to minorities. A standing army, sufficient for this purpose, is necessary to every well-regulated State. The extreme right of revolution is very often abused. Masses of men are often governed by passion and not by reason. Suffering men must and will complain; and from whatever cause these ills may arise, they are generally prone to attribute them to the government. The burdens of government are plainly seen and felt; while its blessings "fall silently like the dews of heaven," and are often unseen or under-estimated by the governed.

The dangerous character of a large standing army arises from the nature and purposes of its organization. Strict discipline and ready obedience are absolutely necessary to military efficiency. There must be perfect unity in the organization, and the mighty mass must move as one man, impelled by a single will; and, therefore, to secure this essential unity of action, the command can only be given to a single mind. This fact makes the government, whatever may be its form, a practical despotism. There may be a legislative body, and the people may be allowed to elect its members; but they will not vote freely under the gigantic shadow of a large standing army; and a majority of the members, when elected, will not oppose the determined will of the commander-in-chief. Until the army itself becomes demoralized, or the people come to the united and desperate resolution to risk all to carry their point, they will not even begin any serious opposition to the measures of government. The natural instincts of men will force them, under such circumstances, to side with power.