Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. II.djvu/92

Rh they do is the important thing, not what they are not, or what they cannot do. One and all have to turn their own talent to good account:—We all know that; but we so often forget it,—while we blame and criticise.

Mr. Carey, the political economist, talked with me yesterday for certainly more than an hour about the true States' formation. According to him, the true and permanent States' erection must not resemble the pillar, but the pyramid. The pillar corresponds with the European monarchical form of government. But it cannot support any large additional weight without falling to pieces under it. Some years ago, when Carey saw Louis Philippe in France, concentrating the power and dominion upon himself and his dynasty, he remarked, “That can never last long! That will go to pieces!”

And so it did in very short time. The true form of government, that which will defy time and tempests, must have a broad basis, and from this build upwards; such is the form of the pyramid; such is the form of the United States government—from which, raised on the basis of public education and equal civil rights, the national weal ascends firmly and immovably on its foundation, like the Andes and the Alps of the earth. This comparison is good, and the argument is just. Less striking appears to me his theory of national economy, which would make the productions of the earth equal to its population, and render death, at least as far as his great agents, war and pestilence, go, unnecessary there,—unnecessary especially as the means of making breathing-room for the survivors. I rejoice in all theories, and all efforts which tend in this direction, because they always admit light and breathing-room and hope upon earth. But, nevertheless, it seems to me clear that an island which will very well support ten persons, never can support equally well ten hundred.

Yes, but say they, an island, a little circumscribed