Yet, O Eagle! whose early flight showed this clear sight of the sun, how often dost thou near the ground, how show the vulture in these later days!  Thou wert to be the advance-guard of humanity, the herald of all progress; how often hast thou betrayed this high commission!  Fain would the tongue in clear, triumphant accents draw example from thy story, to encourage the hearts of those who almost faint and die beneath the old oppressions.  But we must stammer and blush when we speak of many things.  I take pride here, that I can really say the liberty of the press works well, and that checks and balances are found naturally which suffice to its government.  I can say that the minds of our people are alert, and that talent has a free chance to rise.  This is much.  But dare I further say that political ambition is not as darkly sullied as in other countries?  Dare I say that men of most influence in political life are those who represent most virtue, or even intellectual power?  Is it easy to find names in that career of which I can speak with enthusiasm?  Must I not confess to a boundless lust of gain in my country?  Must I not concede the weakest vanity, which bristles and blusters at each foolish taunt of the foreign press, and admit that the men who make these undignified rejoinders seek and find popularity so?  Can I help admitting that there is as yet no antidote cordially adopted, which will defend even that great, rich country against the evils that have grown out of the commercial system in the Old World?  Can I say our social laws are generally better, or show a nobler insight into the wants of man and woman?  I do, indeed, say what I believe, that voluntary association for improvement in these particulars will be the grand means for my nation to grow, and give a nobler harmony to the coming age.  But it is only of a small minority that I can say they as yet seriously take to heart these things; that they earnestly meditate on what is wanted for their country, for mankind,—­for our cause is indeed, the cause of all mankind at present.  Could we succeed, really succeed, combine a deep religious love with practical development, the achievements of genius with the happiness of the multitude, we might believe man had now reached a commanding point in his ascent, and would stumble and faint no more.  Then there is this horrible cancer of slavery, and the wicked war that has grown out of it.  How dare I speak of these things here?  I listen to the same arguments against the emancipation of Italy, that are used against the emancipation of our blacks; the same arguments in favor of the spoliation of Poland, as for the conquest of Mexico.  I find the cause of tyranny and wrong everywhere the same,—­and lo! my country! the darkest offender, because with the least excuse; forsworn to the high calling with which she was called; no champion of the rights of men, but a robber and a jailer; the scourge hid behind her banner; her eyes fixed, not on the stars, but on the possessions of other men.