have nothing." And here again I would be understood | ward it, labor will become discontented, and the war to speak not of individuals, but of classes. There is no upon capital will commence. Liberty cannot survive form of regular government, which can preserve an this contest; she must perish when the only right equality of wealth among individuals, even for a day; which gives her any value ceases to be respected. In and it would be absurd to say that domestic slavery slave-holding countries this contest cannot easily arise. can produce any such result. But it approaches that In them, labor and capital unite in the same person. result much more nearly than any other civil institution, The laborer is the slave, and the capitalist is the owner and it prevents, in a very great degree, if not entirely, of the slave. Capital has a direct interest to see that that gross inequality among the different classes of labor be not oppressed, and labor has nothing to hope society, from which alone liberty has any thing to fear. from an attack on capital. So far from being hostile, Indeed there is but one class in our slave-holding states. they aid and support each other; so far from shaking Merchants, mechanics, manufacturers, and all the vari- the foundations of government by their strifes and conous modes of industry, are found in all of them; but tentions, they have a common interest to sustain it, and their numbers are comparatively small, and their influ- they necessarily work together for the establishment of ence, as classes, is scarcely felt. Besides, these are all good order and the maintainance of right. It is owing slave-holders themselves, and land-owners also. The chiefly to this cause, that the condition of society at one great interest of all our communities is agriculture; the south has always been more tranquil and less disan interest so predominant in extent, and embracing so turbed by factious breakings of the people, than it large a portion of our people, as to be, to all practical has been at the northpurposes, the sole interest. The difference in the wealth even of individuals in such a state of society, is never very striking. The profits of agriculture are comparatively small, and its returns, although very certain, are also very slow. The most successful farmer becomes only moderately rich, by the labors of a whole life; the few exceptions which we see, serve only to prove the truth of the general rule. The fluctuations of value; the spirit of speculation; the daring enterprise which seeks to become suddenly rich by putting every thing to hazard; do not belong to agricultural life. That life demands industry, patience, economy, prudence; and it seldom fails to reward these qualities with independence and comfort, though it rarely rewards them with wealth.

When the Almighty decreed that man should eat bread by the sweat of his face, he laid the foundation of all the differences which we see in the orders of society. It is the necessary consequence of this decree, that one portion of mankind shall live upon the labors of another portion. Such is the case all over the world, and such it will continue to be, until the world shall either abandon its civilization or become one Eden, yielding all fruits spontaneously. It is then an object of first importance, that the regulations of society should be such as to render the lot of the laborer as free from discontent as possible. This is not to be done by any change in that lot itself. You may indeed benefit the individual in that way, but the class must still remain. The laborer of yesterday, who becomes There is then, in truth, nothing in the condition of the capitalist of to-day, does but make room for another our slave-holding states, upon which the jealousies of laborer in his place. If the condition of society were the different classes into which societies are usually such as to hold out the hope of this change to every divided, can act. We have among us, but one great laborer, it would indeed be the best means of reconciling class, and all who belong to it have a necessary sympa-him to his lot. But this cannot be, so long as it shall thy with one another; we have but one great interest, and all who possess it are equally ready to maintain and protect it. Equal in our rank, the spirit of levelling sees nothing to envy; equal in our fortune, the spirit of agrarianism sees nothing to attack. All rights are safe and all interests are secure, because there are none who can assail, except those who possess them.

There is a natural jealousy between labor and capital; a jealousy which, in a particular condition of society, amounts to actual hostility. It is a strange hostility too, since labor lives only by the aid of capital, and capital yields no return without the assistance of la bor. This mutual dependence is felt and acknowledged by both, so long as there is a due proportion between them. So long as there is labor enough to employ capital, and capital enough to give labor its due reward, they work together in perfect harmony. Even where capital superabounds, their harmony is not destroyed, for labor then soon becomes capital. This has been, and probably now is, the condition of the United States, but it is not the usual condition in any thickly peopled country, and probably will soon cease to be our condition. Whenever labor shall superabound, and when of course capital can no longer employ and re

* St. Pierre, Studies of Nature. VOL. V.-87

be the pleasure of God that man shall work for his subsistence. The free laborer always has his hopes, and it is the disappointment of those hopes which renders him discontented and factious. He sees before him the thousand roads of industry, perfectly open and free; he feels secure that he will be protected in the enjoyment of all that his industry may earn; and he knows that even the distinctions of high place and preferment are not interdicted to him. These reflections certainly encourage his exertions and often make him a wealthier and more valuable man. But they as often inspire him with unfounded hopes, and teach him to look above the realities of his condition; to struggle for some distant good which eludes his grasp, and leaves him a prey to disappointment and mortification. Seeing constantly before him a class in the enjoyment of that ease, comfort and distinction, for which he sighs and labors in vain, can it be expected that he will charge his humbler fate to his own demerit? This would require a degree of candor which is found in very few, for it belongs only to the best order of intellect and to the highest moral culture. Most men in such circumstances, would be apt to charge their misfortunes to errors in the systems around them; to the laws which recognize and maintain differences of condition among men, odious to them, because they feel them to be oppressive

them coercive labor would require the exercise of a degree of power incompatible with freedom; and this power would, in its operation, necessarily produce, in a great majority of the people, a degree of discontent under which no popular government could stand. But even this evil is avoided by the institution of domestic slavery; for that coercive energy, dangerous to freedom, which under different systems must be lodged in

found in the frame of society.

in their own persons. Not so with the slave. He is born to his condition; he grows up with the conviction that it is unchangeable; he submits to his destiny with resignation, because he has no hope that he can ever make it materially better. Even freedom is scarcely a blessing to him, for the eternal brand is upon his facehis caste is irrevocably fixed-and although he may cease to acknowledge a master, he can never cease to belong to the lowest class of mankind. It is the deep convic-the frame of government, is, in slave-holding states, tion of this truth which so often induces the slaves of kind masters to refuse freedom, when it is offered to A still farther security to public liberty may be found them. Freedom is no boon to them, since it brings in the character of that discipline by which our slave with it all the cares and difficulties of self-dependence, population is controlled. The slave is protected by the without any of the usual advantages of independence law, against all wanton abuses of his person, and is anin thought and action. The African slave is contented swerable in his person for whatever crimes he may from necessity. He has no motive to quarrel with a commit. So far he is recognised as a responsible agent, lot which he knows that he cannot change, and the bur- and but little farther. In most other respects, his master thens of which are best relieved by a cheerful discharge is responsible for him. In slave-holding states, the laborof the duties which attend them. The history of ing class are in effect parcelled out and assigned to the slavery in the United States, attests the truth of this care of competent guardians. These guardians have a reasoning. In no part of the world has the laboring two-fold interest to take care of them and to manage them class been more distinguished for contentment, cheer-properly; they receive the profits of their labor, and fulness, and even gaiety; and such the negro slave are responsible for their misbehavior. No system can will always be, if he be not taught to feel or to ima- be imagined, better calculated to insure a well-managed gine other evils than those which his condition itself and orderly laboring class. Indeed it is impossible imposes on him. that any disorder can prevail among them, calculated I am aware that this view of the subject is liable to seriously to endanger or disturb the authority of gothe objection, that a system of society cannot be good, vernment, since they are placed, by the law itself, under if it condemn the laboring class to unchangeable servi- the immediate and personal supervision and cotrol of a tude, and cut them off from all hope of improving their class by whom that law was made, and who have the condition. I am not called on to meet this objection strongest interest to maintain it. An enlightened friend* here. Even granting it to be true, in the view of the once remarked to me, that in slaveholding states agramoralist, it does not apply to slavery as a political insti- rianism is divided against itself. There is great truth tution, nor does it meet the argument by which that and force in this idea. Even if there could be found in institution is shown to be favorable to public liberty.those states a class interested to break down the estab And it is well worthy the consideration even of the lished order of society, they will always be too weak moralist, whether, as labor is necessary by an immuta-in numbers and resources to accomplish any thing by ble law, he will add any thing to the happiness of those who are condemned to perform it, by imbuing them with feelings above their condition, by inspiring them with hopes which can never be realised, and by rendering them dissatisfied with a lot from which there is no escape. The curse which condemns us to labor, is tempered with infinite mercy; for whatever be our condition in life, our true happiness must be found in the proper employment of our faculties. To all those who think that they advance the cause of humanity by per-arm of the agrarian and the leveller. petual endeavors to disturb the order which Nature herself has established among men, I have no counsel to offer. If they cannot be made wise by the lessons of experience, taught in the history of all such attempts, they will scarcely profit by those of any other teacher. There is a condition of society in which the wages of labor will purchase but an insufficient supply of food and clothing. Coercion then becomes necessary. But in a free government coercion must operate alike on all classes of the people, for any discrimination between them would be wholly inconsistent with equal rights. And yet coercion to the wealthier classes would be felt as gratuitous tyranny; and indeed every class, except the very lowest, would feel in the same way, and would be anxious to shake off a government which imposed upon them such an unnecessary and degrading burthen. In non-slaveholding states, therefore, liberty could not exist under such a condition of things. With

their own efforts. The only class to whom they could look with any hope of assistance, is that class over whom they are usually placed as temporary masters, and by whom they are least trusted. The last man with whom the slave would unite, is his overseer. There is then, in this institution, something which courts and solicits good order; there is a principle in it which avoids confusion and repels faction; its necessary tendency is to distract the purposes and to bind the

In contemplating the future decline of liberty in the United States, it cannot escape us that there is a want of perfect analogy between our republics and those of every other age and country. Many of the causes of decline are indeed common to all, and we may learn many lessons of wisdom and caution from the fate of those which have preceded us. Different as they were from us in many important particulars, we may derive much information from the study of their institutions, their manners and their character. But liberty in the United States will probably not perish as it has perished in the republics of the old world. Our form of government has no example among theirs; it is peculiar in its structure, and we may well hope that it is much more solidly founded and better balanced. We have the advantage too of being withdrawn from the neighborhood of all strong powers, whose ambition might *Judge Beverley Tucker of Williamsburg.

fabulous as Gulliver's Island of Laputa, or Sancho Panza's Island of Barataria. To explain-The words 'The Tuckahoe' in the original manuscript, were intended to be the generic heading of sundry small pieces, the first of which happened to be styled 'Colony of Virginia,' which was of course meant to be printed underneath and distinct from the words 'The Tuckahoe.'

"It is stated in the above article, that in 1605, 'Capt. Smith came over, and remained three years.' Now Smith, page 150, states that 'on the 19th of December, 1606, we set sail from Black Wall, with the first supply in Virginia.""

"It is also stated by Rees, (article Carolina,) that no permanent settlement seems to have been made in Ca

by his first charter, dated 24th of March, 1662-1663, granted to Edward, Earl of Clarendon, and seven others, all the lands lying between the 31st and 36th degrees of north latitude, and extending westerly to the South Seas."

An article under the cabalistic title of "The Tucka-rolina, until after the restoration of Charles II, who, hoe Colony of Virginia" appeared in the Messenger of April, 1837; and now, after so long an interval, while it was quietly dropping down the stream of time into the ocean of oblivion, it has all of a sudden been snapped at, by the tooth of one of those voracious, critical, privateering pikes, who are ever skimming the surface of literature in quest of small game. The writer of the obnoxious article, begs leave in respect to certain of the errors charged, to put himself upon the confessional, and in respect to the rest, to offer such apology as the case may seem to demand. The reply' consists of some nine points, (counts of the indictment,) which will be adverted to, one by one, according to the order in which they stand.

"THE TUCKAHOE COLONY OF VIRGINIA.-My attention has been called to a publication in your Messenger, for the month of April, 1837, under the above title, which contains so many historical inaccuracies, as to induce me to correct them."

The critic has evidently fallen into a misunderstanding of the passage in 'The Tuckahoe Colony' here referred to. For his adducing authorities to show that no permanent settleinent was made in Carolina until after the restoration of Charles II, would seem to imply that it had been asserted in the text that the Huguenot settlement mentioned was a permanent settlement, but that no such assertion was therein made, but expressly the contrary, will sufficiently appear from a quotation of the passage itself, which is as follows:

"In 1502 a settlement was effected in South Carolina by some French Protestants called Huguenots. They fled from France to escape persecution. This was the first attempt to colonize North America; it was undertaken for the sake of freedom of conscience, and like

many similar enterprizes, failed. These refugees, worn out by sufferings, and distracted by dissentions, at their own request were taken back to Europe in an English ship."

That there was such a Huguenot settlement in 1562, see Keith's History of Virginia, p. 29, and Marshall's Life of Washington, vol. 1, p. 186. The mistake of 1502, for 1562, though important, it is conceived might occur in a work in general accurate, but it is so long a time since those scraps of history were compiled, that it is impossible to recollect from what book the date was copied or miscopied.

Answer:-It is an observation of Dean Swift, that "a man has no reason to be ashamed of confessing himself in the wrong, as it is only admitting that he is wiser to-day than he was yesterday." Yet while the writer of the erroneous article in question cannot fail to appreciate the obligations he is under, for corrections of so important a nature, made by so competent a hand, yet his gratitude is not unmingled with a certain degree of regret, that these corrections should have been postponed to so late a day as the present, which is two years and four months since the promulgation of the errors complained of. It is true, however, that a "Under the head, Newfoundland, it is stated that considerable period of time may be necessary to com- that place was discovered by Sir Humphrey Gilbert in plete a work, where the object is by a series of cerebral 1583. Now Marshall, in his American Colonies, (page percolations to reduce it to a state of crystalline, sta-13,) states, that in May, 1496, John Cabot, sailed from lactical perfection. Bristol, and discovered the islands of Newfoundland and St. John's."

"Where the writer of the article referred to, obtained his account of the above named colony, I am at a loss to know. Smith, in his second voyage up the Chesapeake, found a tribe of Indians called Tockwoghes, on the river Tockwogh."

Answer: The critic has here again fallen into a misconception of the passage he is criticising, which is undoubtedly owing to the obscure manner in which an unpractised writer has expressed himself. The text The writer of the article referred to, is quite as much does not state that Sir Humphrey Gilbert discovered in the dark, as to the existence of this enigmatical | Newfoundland, but simply that he landed there, which "Tuckahoe Colony of Virginia,' as the critic, and it is submitted is a very different thing. Exempli gratiá, having never elsewhere heard of any such Colony, he if a writer should assert that Napoleon Bonaparte is persuaded it is a terra incognita, a mere chimera, as landed at St. Helena on a certain day of a certain year,