their substance, in support of this unholy, and impoverishing warefare. How often, alas! do we see the rich become poor; the poor despoiled, not of property only but of the love of honest, well earned repute, and made insensible to shame; by the havoc, the demoralising, and humiliating picture, presented al the termination of a lawsuit, of what they are, and the scorching remembrance, of what they were? It is the duty of government to protect the simple, the ignorant, and the poor; against the snares of the cunning, the selfishness of the better informed, the power, and the opposition to the many; armed with the authority of the law, for the common good; but exerting it for the common destruction, and misery of the majority. If there be as much truth as pith in the remark of a profound and acute commentator on the philosophy of many, that, "in old, and established governments, the institutions form the men; as in the new, the men form the institutions;" a due sense of the part which we are about assuming to act on the theatre of human affairs, must naturally arrest, and hold, with the grappling hooks of philanthropy, the constant, and most intense solicitude of the patriot, that, our respective parts may be so performed, as to merit the plaudits of succeeding, and successive generations. That, the men who may be formed under, and by them, may not only succeed to an inheritance, worthy of freemen; but be made capable of transmitting it, greatly improved, and strengthened, and embellished, with every fresh, and abiding ornament, that can either endear it, or make it useful, to after times. "The whole art of Government," says one of Mr. Jefferson's papers lo the King of England, "consists in the art of being honest." Let us~ then, study, this art; and instead of aiming at the aggrandisement, emolament, and elevation of the few, so act, so proceed, and so fashion our measures, as to promote, "for the longest time, the greatest happiness of the greatest number." We shall then receive, and what is far more desirable lo the philanthropic patriot; we shall merit, the greateful plaudits, awarded to the benefactors of mankind. J am, Sir, with due consideration & respect, Your Most Obdt public Servl 't. Fort Goliad Dec. 28th 1835 P. Dimitt Comdg.
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