Page:The American Democrat, James Fenimore Cooper, 1838.djvu/165

Rh intention of the institutions, which are based on investigation and common sense.

Whenever the government of the United States shall break up, it will probably be in consequence of a false direction having been given to publick opinion. This is the weak point of our defences, and the part to which the enemies of the system will direct all their attacks. Opinion can be so perverted as to cause the false to seem the true; the enemy, a friend, and the friend, an enemy; the best interests of the nation to appear insignificant, and trifles of moment; in a word, the right the wrong, and the wrong the right.

In a country where opinion has sway, to seize upon it, is to seize upon power. As it is a rule of humanity that the upright and well intentioned are comparatively passive, while the designing, dishonest and selfish are the most untiring in their efforts, the danger of publick opinion's getting a false direction, is fourfold, since few men think for themselves. Perhaps there is not, in all America, apart from general principles, a sentiment that is essentially just, and which is recognized as publick opinion; a sufficient proof of which is to be found in the fact that publick opinion is constantly vibrating around truth, which alone is unchangeable.

Publick opinion has got a wrong, if not a dangerous direction, already, in this country, on several essential points. It has a fearfully wrong direction on the subject of the press, which it sustains in its tyranny and invasions on private rights, violating all sanctity of feeling, rendering men indifferent to character, and, indeed, rendering character itself of little avail, besides setting up an irresponsible and unprincipled power that is stronger than the government itself. One of its consequences is a laxity of opinion on the subject of wrongs committed by the press, that amounts