a

tice, and many of them have gone down in defiance of the protest of Mexico, to to their graves in pinching poverty for the Annexation of Texas to this counwant of their property, thus plundered try ?”_with no party interest in, or inby a foreign power, and reclaimed, but fluence over the measure, who can doubt never restored by their own government. that the result would have been an overWe regret to state that the House did whelming negative? But the President not concur in the passage of this bill. and Cabinet were first enlisted in the

interest of Annexation; then a few promiOf the action of the majority on the nent politicians of the party Mr. Tyler Texas question, what shall history say? had last joined ; and soon a little coterie Must it not be compelled to portray a of avowed Annexationists was formed, the flagrant sacrifice of high national con- Representatives of the Mississippi Repusiderations to subserve the lowest party dialors very properly taking the lead. By ends? And this by those who are eter- dint of the most industrious canvassing, nally mouthing of this matter of Annexa- backed by the power and patronage of tion as a great American question, far the Executive and the money of Texas above the sphere of party objects and land-jobbers and scrip-holders, the numparty struggles. But when the question ber had been gradually swelled, until fifof Annexation was, in truth, no party teen Senators, (nearly one-third of the question, but one of simply National body,) were induced to record their votes concern, and Texas appeared in 1837) for the confirmation of the Tyler Treaty. at our metropolis, an unsolicited applicant Probably a like proportion, say sixty in for Annexation, with a far smaller public all, might have been brought to the same debt and a much larger public domain point in the House, but at no time prior to than at present, and with less complica- May last, could any measure, proposing ted foreign relations, President Van Bu- Annexation in defiance of Mexico, have ren and Secretary Forsyth, the latter as received over one-third of the votes of thorough and ardent a Southron as the either House. But when, near the close sun ever shone upon, at once repulsed of May, the activity and resolution of the kindly proffer, and repulsed it for rea- the Annexationists had accomplished the sons of enduring force. You are at war overthrow of the man who stood in the with Mexico,' said the Secretary of State; way of their obtaining complete control “she claims rightful dominion over you; of the party machinery, the transformaand until this war is terminated, this pre- tion was complete. Thousands who, up tension abandoned, the question of An- to that moment, had been steadfast and nexation is for us a question of peace or open in their hostility to the project, now war with Mexico. We decline to com- joined in the hurrah for Annexation. promise our friendly relations with that Yet it is not wholly true that the Texas power.” Here was a great national ques. Question defeated Mr. Van Buren. It tion promptly and justly met as a national very probably turned against him the question, with the universal acquiescence nicely balanced scale; but his real or and approval of the American people. supposed unpopularity, his many invetSome years afterward (1843), the subject erate adversaries in the ranks of his own came before the Massachusetts Legisla- party, and the disgust excited by the ture, and a unanimous decision was given clumsy manner in which delegations to against Annexation, on grounds as valid Baltimore had been packed in his favor, to-day as then, and most sweeping in had already prepared the train which their range of hostility to the ineasure was fired by the fuse of Texas. Thenceand its incitements. Here was no party forward Annexation became to some exdifference-each party vied with the tent a party Shibboleth, though there other in the freedom and earnestness of were notorious instances of non-conformits assertion of the principles both deemed ity, as in the cases of Senators Benton essential, not to party but to national and Wright, the Evening Post, and the well-being. Some of the members who signers of the exposed Secret Circular were then foremost in condemning, are here. It was found necessary to use the now prominently zealous in approving strength wbich Mr. Wright had acquired the project! And thus is it also with by his opposition to Texas to bridge a many members of the Twenty-Eighth threatening chasm between the Texas Congress. Had the naked question been candidate and the Presidency, and the stated, and the vote taken on its first as- nomination thus made for Governor of sembling-"Will you advise and consent, New York was one without which Mr.

6

9

Polk would not have been elected. Anti- has assented to the House Resolutions.
Texas men mingled lovingly with An- That majority was made by the help of
nexationists in the canvass, and no ques- one recreant Whig,* who betrayed his
tions were asked implying an exaction constituents and spurned the emphatic
of conformity on this critical question. request of their Législature, with that
But the contest once over, and Mr. Polk of three Loco-Focos,t who notoriously
pronounced the President lect, there defied the will of heir constituents,
was an instant and important change. and the express instructions of their re-
It was now asserted that all who had spective Legislatures. Had these four
voted for Polk had thereby declared for votes been cast as they ought, the mea-
Annexation, and that the American people sure would have been lost by six ma-
had expressly approved of that measure ! jority, instead of being carried by two.
The latter assertion is as contrary to rea- Yet the smallest possible majority has
son as the former is to fact. There was been held sufficient to change the very
a very decided majority on the entire elements of our national existence-to
Popular Vote for President for the can- subvert the established balance of power,
didates opposed to Annexation, and if the and remove the centre of the Union-to
Anti-Annexation vote had not been di- place the American people practically un-
vided, Mr. Polk would have been beaten der a different government from that
by 146 Electors to 129. But this, though which their Constitution created, and
known to, is utterly unregarded by the to which alone they had assented. This
bestriders of what was originally Mr. is the crowning achievement of the
Tyler's hobby. Annexation is now pro- Twenty-Eighth Congress.
nounced the great issue in the late con- That there are men who, so that their
test, and repugnance to it hostility to the end be gained, laugh to scorn all scruple
incoming administration, to be punished as to means, is sadly true. These, being
by a denial of its smiles. That this new in favor of Annexation per se, regard as
phase should have won many friends to frivolous all considerations of illegality
the measure in Congress is not amazing and iniquity in the means of effecting it.
No where is there a larger proportion of But, to every reflecting, conscientious
anxious suitors for or expectants of Pre- patriot, it must be evident that the
sidential favor than in that body. Scores forcing of so momentous a measure irre-
of the Members have already been re- vocably on the country, through the
lieved from all farther care on behalf of action of a bare majority in one House
their constituents, and will sink on the of Congress, through the appliances of
4th inst. into a very dense obscurity, if Presidential smiles and frowns and the
unblessed by Executive sunshine. of severest party drill, is an outrage on the
the nine from this State who voted for spirit and the forms of our institutions,
the Joint Resolution of the House, only which cannot fail, if unrebuked, to draw
one (Mr. Maclay of this city) had been after it immeasurable evils.
reëlected. Melancholy as is the fact, it Whether Texas should, or should not,
is therefore not unaccountable that the at a proper time and under proper cir-
Joint Resolution, which could not, a cumstances, be admitted to a place in our
year before, have obtained sixty votes in Union, should she desire it, we need not,
the House actually passed that body in and do not here discuss. That a South-
1845 by the decisive majority of 120 to ern boundary might somewhere be found
98.

for us more acceptable than the line of the At last, the stupendous wrong and Red River and the Sabine, is quite possimischief devised by the Tyler dynasty, ble, though it is by no means certain that and rendered inevitable by the election the acquisition of Texas, with no single of Polk, have triumphed, so far as the boundary settled but that which has hithersingle action of our Government can effect to divided her from us, will give us, eventhat result. Congress has been coerced, tually, a better frontier. But no sane, hy a most flagrant exercise of executive considerate man, can doubt that if the power and patronage, into a consent novel step is to be taken of uniting two to the Annexation of Texas. Overriding independent nations, there should first be every consideration of constitutional a careful removal of all obstructions or limitation, or respect for popular sov. impediments to the union. If the juncereignty, a bare majority of the Senate tion be one dictated by nature and the

!

* Merrick, of Maryland.

+ Tappan and Allen, Ohio ; Niles, Connecticut.

enduring interests of the two nations re- of Congress, and rush to consummate spectively, there can certainly be no dan- their project. Who can fail to discern ger in awaiting such removal. The in these proceedings the elements of junction should clearly not take place future convulsion and calamity ? while one country is at war with a nation But no remonstrance will avail. The with which the other is at peace, nor first act of the Annexation drama has while the territory of one is claimed to been played out by Tyler and the be the rightful property of a third power. Twenty-Eighth Congress, and these inAll such difference should be settled be- different performers have retired from the fore the untrammeled nation should ven- stage, leaving to Polk and a new Conture to complicate its relations with the gress the task of concluding their work. cther. But, should it farther appear that That it will be pressed with zeal by the a very large proportion of the people of former, we need not remark; and already the one country were utterly averse to we have significant whispers that the any such union, then a decent self-respect new Congress must be called together, in should impel those of the other to decline extra session,

at an early day, to receive it; while no wise and just government, the assent of Texas, and perfect the ensurely, would force its own citizens into terprise. The cost of this may well be so intimate a relation, for which so disregarded, in view of the aggregate of many of them entertained a deep aversion. expenses which this acquisition is to Thai no effort should first be made to fasten upon us. Bravely ended, then, is secure the favorable regard of other the first act of Annexation, amid roar nations, with whom these two had dif- of cannon and shouts of approving thouferent and perhaps irreconcilable treat- sands! What, think you, shall be the ies, would seem impossible. And yet, end of the next ?—and the next? the people of the United States are sud- Enough for the day is the evil thereof. denly and recklessly involved in this In the next Congress—before, its close, union, while a full half of them are if not at its outset-three new Statesresisting and struggling against it; while Iowa, Florida, and Texas—will be reTexas is at open war with Mexico, and presented in either House. Florida has her independence unacknowledged ; and a deficient population; but a slave State when it is known that other and far was insisted on to balance Iowa, and more powerful nations are greatly averse now the admission of Texas will give us to this union. No effort is made to con- fifteen slave to fourteen free States-in ciliate adversaries, to terminate the War, all twenty-nine. And here, with the or to quiet the internal resistance. With exception of mere business of routine, an indecent haste, which the whole world like the passage of the Annual Approwill understand, our Annexationists have priation Bills, closes the record of the screwed a consent through the Houses doings of the Twenty-Eighth Congress.

And lo! the dazzling picture ! Every tree
Seems carved from steel, the silent hills are helm'd,
And the broad fields have breastplates. Over all
The sunshine flashes in a keen white blaze
Of splendor, searing eye-sight. Go abroad !
The branches yield erisp cracklings, now and then
Sending a shower of rattling diamonds down
On the mail?d earth, as freshens the light wind.
The hemlock is a stooping bower of ice,
And the oak seems as though a fairy's wand
Away had swept its skeleton frame, and placed
A polish'd structure, trembling o'er with tints
Of rainbow beauty, there. But soon the sun
Melts the enchantment, like a charm, away.
Then the gray snow-cloud from the dim Southwest
Rises, and veils the sky. The vapory air
Is freckled with the flakes, till o'er the scene
There steals a gradual hue of white, like sleep
Muffling the senses. From the freezing North
The mighty blast now tramples, whirling up
In mist the snow, and dashing it along,
As the lash'd ocean dashes on its spray.
Through the long frowning night is heard the war
Of the fierce tempest.

Wo! oh, bitter wo
For Poverty !-here shivering in sheds,
And cowering, there, by embers dying out
In the white ashes. Wo! oh, bitter wo!
The starving mother, and the moaning babe !
The aged, feeling in their veins the blood
Freezing forever! Thou whose board is spread-
Who sittest by thy household fire in peace
Think of thy brother's lot, condemned to die,
Hungry and shivering in a pitiless world,
Made for the use of all by Him who saith,
That not a sparrow falleth to the ground
Unnoted; think, and let sweet Charity,
That white-winged angel, keep her blessed watch
Beside the kindled altar of thy heart.

Then the bland wind comes winnowing from the South,
And the snow melts like breath. The wither'd grass
Is bare ; in forest paths the moss is green.
And in old garden nooks peers tearful out
The frozen violet; purlings low, of rills
Flashing all round from vanishing banks and drifts,
Are heard. May's softness steals along the air,
And the deep sunshine smiles on limb and earth,
As it would draw the leaves and blossoms forth;
But soon the mellow sweetness dies away,
And Winter holds his bitter sway again.
Yet is he not a foe. Behold, he casts
His ermine robe o'er Nature's torpid sleep;
That, when again he draws his mantle warm
At Spring's command, a glory shall burst forth,
And the wide air be filled with breath of praise-
The delicate breath of tree, and plant, and flower
Rising to Heaven like incense.

MR. EMERSON AND TRANSCENDENTALISM.*

1. PERHAPs some of our readers are still universe to be so dependent upon the inignorant of the meaning of the term Tran- dividual soul that we might properly be scendentalism. We will, for their sakes, said to create it ourselves. He thought attempt a definition. Transcendentalism that we ourselves produced all forms and is that form of Philosophy which sinks the world, that we might create whatGod and Nature in man. Let us ex- ever we would, isolatedly and instantaplain. God, man, and nature, in their neously, and hoped to construct a system mutual and harmonious relations (if in- of magic on this fact as a basis. In truth, deed the absolute God may be said ever if all outward things depend for their beto be in relations) are the objects of all ing and manner of existence upon ourphilosophy; but, in different theories, selves, and upon our inward states, a greater or less prominence is given to one change in those states involves a change or the other of these three, and thus sys. in outward nature. If we discover, theretems are formed. Pantheism sinks man fore, the connection of our thoughts and and nature in God; Materialism sinks feelings with outward nature, the whole God and man in the universe ; Transcen- universe is in our power; and we may, dentalism sinks God and nature in man. by a modification of ourselves, change In other words, some, in philosophising, the world from its present state into what take their point of departure in God we all wish it might become. Mr. Alalone, and are inevitably conducted to cott thinks the world would be what it Pantheist ;-others take their point of should be were he only as holy as he departure in nature alone, and are led to should be; he also considers himself perMaterialism; others start with man sonally responsible for the obliquity of alone, and end in Transcendentalism. It the axis of the earth. A friend once is by no means difficult to deny in words,' told me, while we watched the large the actual existence of the outward uni- flakes of snow as they were slowly fallverse. We may say, for example, that ing, that, could we bút attain to the right the paper on which we write has no spiritual state, we should be able to look more outward existence than the thoughts on outward nature, and say, “I snow, I we refrain from expressing; we may af- rain.” To Mr. Emerson a noble doubt firm that it has merely a different kind of perpetually suggests itself, “ whether existence within our soul. When I sayl nature outwardly exists.” In the eighth perceive an outwardly existing tree, I number of the Dial we find a beautiful may be mistaken; what I call a tree poem touching upon this theory, from may have no outward existence, but may, which we make an extract :on the contrary, be created by my perception. Who knows that a thing which

“ All is but as it seems appears red to me may not appear blue The round, green earth, to my neighbor? If so, then is color

With river and glen;

The din and mirth something which I lend to the object. But why stop at color? Perhaps hard

Of busy, busy men; ness and weight have no existence save

The world's great fever,

Throbbing for ever ; that which the mind gives. " Whether

The creed of the sage, nature enjoy a substantial existence The hope of the age, without (says Mr. Emerson), or is only All things we cherish, in the apocalypse of the mind, it is alike All that live and all that perish, useful and alike venerable to me. Be it These are but inner dreams what it may, it is ideal to me so long as I cannot try the accuracy of my senses.

“ The great world goeth “What differs it to me (he asks on an

To thy dreaming.

To thee alone other page) whether Orion be up there in

Hearts are making their moan, heaven, or some god paint the image in Eyes are streaming. the firmament of the soul?'”

Thine is the white moon turning night Fabre d'Olivet believed the outward

to day,

6

Essays : Second Series. By R. W. Emerson. Boston: James Munroe & Co. 1944,