Sept 24 1836 to Oct 24 1836 - PTR, Vol. 9

fertility, and a consciousness of their own invincible energies, assure them ofa prompt renewal of fortune, when it may be lost or spent. They worship at the shrine of liberty, not on account of the richness of its appointments, nor the vacant domain she offers as a reward to her followers, but on account of her own intrinsic loveliness and beauty; and they do not love her less because she wears the form of woman. They love their country, because it is the richest and the most beautiful in the world, and because love of country is a generous emotion and rises spontaneous in their bosoms. They have been educated in the theory, and reared in the practice of those principles of "civil and political liberty' taught by the pure and eloquent pens of Franklin, Jefferson, and Madison, and established by the invincible sword of the illustrious Washington. Many of them have learned them too, in the courts of justice, in the executive despatches, and in the Legislative halls of these U.S.; and, if Messrs. Wilson and Poslethwaile would have had the highest proof which man can give of their devotion to such principles, if they had gone to the plains of San Jacinto, to Goliad, and to the Alamo, they would have found it recorded there. These are the men whom they charge with being "wholly incapable of a just idea of civil and political liberty" and "animated alone by a desire of plunder from the highest functionary to the humblest citizen." Would it not have been highly praiseworthy and benevolent in Messrs. Wilson and Postlethwaite, finding this state of things in Texas, if they had remained even but a short time in the country, to give the Texians a few lessons of morality drawn from their own disinterested, philanthropic, and magnanimous bosoms, and a few just ideas of "civil and political liberty," from their own more luminous understandings? They have ventured to inform the world, "that even now there is really no organized government in the country-no laws administered." Yet the world knows that a regular constitution was adopted on the 17th day of last March, and that a provisional government was organized under it. True it is, that the best friends of the country have to lament that the policy of the late administration has been unwise and impolitic, and I was at one time of opinion, that it was criminal and even treasonable. Certainly no person has suffered deeper injury from it than I have, or should be less inclined to excuse or palliate its blunders or its crimes; but it has ceased to exist, and justice requires that I should say that recent circumstances have induced me to suspend my opinions until I return home and hear a more complel'e devclopement of the facts; and I sincerely hope that what now seems to be crime, may prove

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