The Southern Literary Messenger, Vol. II., No. 9, August, 1836Various
History
The Southern Literary Messenger, Vol. II., No. 9, August, 1836
Various
American literature -- 19th century -- Periodicals
Let me say with plainness, I who am no longer in a public character,
that if by a fair, by an indulgent, by a gentlemanly behavior to our
representatives, we do not give confidence to their minds, and a
liberal scope to their understandings; if we do not permit our members
to act upon a _very_ enlarged view of things, we shall at length
infallibly degrade our national representation into a confused and
scuffling bustle of local agency.
Again, in the same speech—
What, gentlemen, was I not to foresee, or, foreseeing, was I not to
endeavor to save you from all these multiplied mischiefs and
disgraces? Would the little, silly, canvass prattle of obeying
instructions, and having no opinions but yours, and such idle,
senseless tales which amuse the vacant ears of unthinking men, have
saved you from the “pelting of that pitiless storm” to which the loose
improvidence, the cowardly rashness of those who dare not look danger
in the face, so as to provide against it in time have exposed this
degraded nation?
Again—
I did not obey your instructions. No—I conformed to the instructions
of truth and nature, and maintained your interest against your
opinions, with a constancy that became me. A representative worthy of
you ought to be a person of stability. I am to look indeed to your
opinions; but to such opinions as you and I must have five years
hence. I was not to look to the flash of the day. I knew that you
chose me, in my place, along with others, to be a pillar of the state,
and not a weathercock on the top of the edifice, exalted for my levity
and versatility, and of no use but to indicate the shiftings of every
fashionable gale.
And farther—
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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