It is said that war sweeps off the idle, dissolute, and vicious members of the community. Monstrous argument! If a government may for this end plunge a nation into war, it may with equal justice consign to the executioner any number of its subjects whom it may deem a burden on the state. The fact is, that war commonly generates as many profligates as it destroys. A disbanded army fills the community with at least as many abandoned members as at first it absorbed. It is sometimes said that a military spirit favours liberty. But how is it, that nations, after fighting for ages, are so generally enslaved? The truth is, that liberty has no foundation but in private and public virtue; and virtue, as we have seen, is not the common growth of war. But the great argument remains to be discussed. It is said that without war to excite and invigorate the human mind, some of its noblest energies will slumber, and its highest qualities, courage, magnanimity, fortitude, will perish. To this I answer, that if war is to be encouraged among nations because it nourishes energy and heroism, on the same principle war in our families, and war between neighbourhoods, villages, and cities, ought to be encouraged; for such contests would equally tend to promote heroic daring and contempt of death. Why shall not different provinces of the same empire annually meet with the weapons of death, to keep alive their courage? We shrink at this suggestion with horror; but why shall contests of nations, rather than of provinces or families, find shelter under this barbarous argument? I observe again: if war be a blessing, because it awakens energy and courage, then the savage state is peculiarly privileged; for every savage is a soldier, and his whole modes of life tend to form him to invincible resolution. On the same principle, those early periods of society were happy, when men were called to contend, not only with one another, but with beasts of prey; for to these excitements we owe the heroism of Hercules and Theseus. On the same principle, the feudal ages were more favoured than the present; for then every baron was a military chief, every castle frowned defiance, and every vassal was trained to arms. And do we really wish that the earth should again be overrun with monsters, or abandoned to savage or feudal violence, in order that heroes may be multiplied? If not, let us cease to vindicate war as affording excitement to energy and courage.--_Channing._ * * * * * Suffer not your spirit to be subdued by misfortunes, but, on the contrary, steer right onward, with a courage greater than your fate seems to allow. * * * * *