The Rise and Fall of NauvooRoberts, B. H. (Brigham Henry)
History
The Rise and Fall of Nauvoo
Roberts, B. H. (Brigham Henry)
Latter Day Saints -- Illinois -- Nauvoo; Nauvoo (Ill.) -- History
Trouble, vexation, perplexity, and contention, mingled with hope,
fear, and murmuring, rumbled through the Union and agitated the whole
nation, as would an earthquake at the center of the earth, the world
heaving the sea beyond its bounds and shaking the everlasting hills;
so, in hopes of better times, while jealousy, hypocritical pretensions,
and pompous ambition were luxuriating on the ill-gotten spoils of
the people, they rose in their majesty like a tornado, and swept
through the land, till General Harrison appeared as a star among the
storm-clouds for better weather.
The calm came, and the language of that venerable patriot, in his
inaugural address, while descanting upon the merits of the Constitution
and its framers, thus expressed himself:--"There were in it features
which appeared not to be in harmony with their ideas of a simple
representative democracy or republic. And knowing the tendency of power
to increase itself, particularly when executed by a single individual,
predictions were made that, at no very remote period, the government
would terminate in virtual monarchy.
"It would not become me to say that the fears of these patriots have
been already realized. But as I sincerely believe that the tendency
of measures and of men's opinions for some years past has been in
that direction, it is, I conceive, strictly proper that I should take
this occasion to repeat the assurances I have heretofore given of my
determination to arrest the progress of that tendency, if it really
exists, and restore the government to its pristine health and vigor."
This good man died before he had the opportunity of applying one
balm to ease the pain of our groaning country, and I am willing the
nation should be the judge, whether General Harrison, in his exalted
station, upon the eve of his entrance into the world of spirits, _told
the truth, or not_, with acting President Tyler's three years of
perplexity, and pseudo-Whig-Democrat reign to heal the breaches or show
the wounds, _secundum artem_ (according to art).
Subsequent events, all things considered, Van Buren's downfall,
Harrison's exit, and Tyler's self-sufficient turn to the whole, go
to show, as a Chaldean might exclaim--"_Beram etai claugh beshmayauh
gauhah rauzeen_." (Certainly there is a God in heaven to reveal
secrets.)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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