Try a gentleman,
--We really think it would be worth while for the
North--that is, to use its own favorite vernacular, it would pay to offer a premium for a gentleman as the next Premier of the
United States.
As to the
President, it matters not much, as experience has shown, whether he be a philosopher or anass.
In point of fact, the two animals, in political positions, differ not much, except in the length of their ears.
Nor is it very important whether the
President is a high-minded statesman or a vulgar, demagogue.
If he is the first, the people will desert him, and if he is the last, he will desert the people.
A gentleman in the Presidency would give mortal offence to the magnificent vulgar.
It is the theory of the
United States that the People are
Kings, that the
Plug Ugly or Dead Rabbit is as much a monarch as ‘"Gentleman George,"’ and every attempt of the
President, who is but the upper servant of the people, to put on airs, wear a clean shirt, and behave himself with decency, dignity and ceremony, like
George Washington would naturally excite the suspicion of the populace and make them jealous of an attempt to usurp their sovereignty and introduce the One King Power into
America.
But the Premier, who, according to the
American theory, is only ‘"a servant of servants,"’ and, in the case of
Lincoln's Premier, is literally, a ‘"slave of the Devil,"’ might be a gentleman, without detriment to the public weal, however injurious it might be to his individual prospects.
At all events, it would be worth while to try the experiment.--If
Lincoln had appointed a
Secretary of State who was a gentleman, this civil war would not now be raging in
America.
Seward began his career by pandering to anti-Masonry, and wound up with Abolitionism, showing himself from first to last a cunning and unprincipled demagogue, capable of descending to any moral and political abyss, for the purpose of advancing his individual fortunes.
Since he has been Premier, he has lied — that is the only word which describes his deceptions — in the meanest and basest manner.
He lied in inducing the
Southern Commissioners to believe that
Fort Sumter would be evacuated, and he has just lied with great preciseness, and in the most formal and deliberate manner, to Lord Lyons, in denying that the outrage perpetrated by
Commander Wilkes was authorized by the
Government.
Now, it is impossible for a man to be at the same time a gentleman and a liar, and the fact that the
North is represented in its relations with foreign countries by the most shameless liar in the world, will cause its reputation to stink in the nostrils of all Christendom.
The foreign nations have some strong prejudices on the subject of having gentlemen at the head of Government, and as
the office of
Secretary of State brings him directly in contact with the outside world, it is highly important that he should not be a black-guard.
We therefore recommend the
North to offer a large reward for the discovery of a gentleman to succeed
Wm. H. Seward in his present office.
Time was when it would not have been difficult for them to find a proper person.
In the old days before universal suffrage had demoralized the whole race, there were such men in the
North as
DeWitt Clinton, and the Livingstons,
Van Rensealaers, Van Nesses, and other worthy Knickerbockers, who possessed every attribute of a gentleman, and who consequently would have cut off their right hands before being guilty of falsehood, or sacrificing the national honor as
Seward has done in the surrender of the
Southern Commissioners upon compulsion.
But a man who has no sense of personal honor can have no sense of national honor.
He is incapable of conceiving what it is, and thinks it sentimental and foolish.
Dollars and cents are his only standard of propriety.
Let the
North, if it can, find a man who has sucked in elevated ideas with his mother's milk, and it may yet retrieve its reputation.
