bilities implied in success, seems disposed to reconsider its position and essentially recast its plans of action. In the speeches made the other night by Messrs. Hoffman and Tilden, but particularly in an article in the World' of this morning- an article of great penetration, thoughtfulness, and candor, which we have read with unaffected pleasure we discover evidences of forecast, and of a sense of duty to the country, which are encouraging. Listen to these words, evidently sincere and well considered."

Then follows the extract from the "World"

"The democratic party must be wise enough to recognize the moulding influence of great events on public opinion, and the permanence of some of their consequences. Even in the most tranquil times, society and public opinion are in a state of constant, and in a new country like this, of rapid growth. In a period of convulsive turbulence and upheaving, opinion advances with an accelerated velocity. It is not possible that the mighty struggles of the last six years should not leave a deep imprint on succeeding times. The future of this country is not to depend on the opinions of men who were over forty when the war broke out, but on the opinions of those who were under thirty. Though built after the same plan, our older men will say, like those of Israel, that the second temple is not like the first. We must nevertheless recognize facts. It is a fact that all the flower of our young men were engaged in, and educated by, the war. All the youthful vigor, daring, enterprise, love of adventure, thirst for honor, pride of country, marched with our armies. In the army they lived a deeper life than falls to the lot of ordinary sluggish generations. Their whole manhood was a hundred times put to the proof; the experience of four years was more than the common experience of a life. And it came at an age when the character is yet pliant and yielding; when opinions are either not formed, or have not settled into dogmatic stiffness. The mould was applied while the clay was yet soft, and it will continue to bear the impress. There is an ineffaceable difference between the generation of men that is going out and the younger generation that is coming in; and no party which ignores this difference will be in sufficient sympathy with the rising future to guide its politics. Our elderly men, whose habits of thought became fixed before the war, will be every year deserting, in obedience to a summons they cannot resist. As between the old epoch and the new, they will be a constantly dwindling minority; but as between the living and the dead, they are 'passing over to the majority.' Their indurated habits of thought will pass with them, and the country will be ruled by the generation whose character was shaped in these later stirring times.

"The democratic party, in its brightest and palmiest days, was preeminently the party of progress. In spite of the croakings and forebodings of its opponents, it extended the suffrage to white citizens till suffrage became universal; it abolished imprisonment for debt; removed the property qualification for office; made the State judiciary elective; brought new territory into the Union until its original area was quadrupled; made vigorous war upon the protective system, although many of its early leaders had supported it; and until the slavery question became predominant, its favorite employment was to supply fresh fuel to the engine rather than to put on the brakes. In complaisance to its southern wing it made mistakes on the slavery question and lost the advantage of leadership. In its attempts to prevent opinion advancing too fast it fell behind; and there could not be a more fatal blunder, at present, than an attempt to carry the public opinion of the country back to the point where it stood when, to save the train from destruction in moving down a declivity, the democratic party went from the engine to the brakes." Upon which the "Post thus comments:

"What does all that mean? Why, that copperheadism, which has made the democratic party odious, must be thrown overboard; that a dead and stagnant conservatism is to be abandoned; that the old pro-slavery affinities, which have been a clog and a mistake, must be cut loose, and that the life and vigor of the young men of the nation, of the men who fought the battles of the Union, must be taken as the inspiration and guide of policy. We congratulate the World on the gracefulness with which it lets itself down, or, more properly, on the manliness with which it raises itself up to the position which the Evening Post long since predicted it must occupy if it and its party wish to place themselves on a level with the real democratic sentiment of the nation."

These papers

There is certainly a significance in this. claim to be among the leading journals of the country. And such positive assertions respecting the future of the democratic party, by the leading conservative paper of that party,-assertions which cause such jubilation in the radical organ of the other wing, so radical that it has differed in nothing from the most superlatively radical of the republican press, except in the name, must have a meaning respecting the course and policy of the country, of a very important character.

It is true, that the matter is vague enough in some of its particulars. But in others it is clear.

There is, or is to be, a new epoch. The future of the country is not to depend on the opinions of men who were over forty when the war broke out. The opinions of men under thirty are to be the ruling opinions. They were educated by the war, and have lived a deeper life than falls to the lot of ordinary sluggish generations. In the army, within the period of four years, they have had more than the common experience of a life. Their characters were then pliant and yielding. The mould was applied while the clay was soft, and the impress exhibits an ineffaceable difference between the incoming and outgoing generation, which last is to become a constantly dwindling minority among the living, but with the encouragement that its members may, by dying, attain the acme of a politician's aspirations, that is, pass into the majority. "Their indurated habits of thought," it is stated, "will pass with them,” which is, I suppose, the democratic mode of expressing the scriptural benediction, "their works do follow them." The country is to to be ruled by the "generation whose character was shaped in these later times,"

So far, so clear. Curiosity might inquire whether persons over forty, who administer a sufficient amount of flattery to the men under thirty, who have acquired such a large experience in the science of government by serving four years in the army, are not expecting to share in the offices, and whether those men under thirty, whose characters have received the mould, and will continue to bear the indelible impress (and who of course must have their indurated habits of thought by the time they are forty), are, in the same remorseless way, to be consigned over to that majority which never troubles the active politician, giving way to another set under thirty, who, in order to possess equal qualifications, must be educated in another war, in which they can obtain the experience of a long life in four years? But I am not curious on these subjects.

You will note that all this is said of those portions of the incoming generation which participated in the active service of the war, not in relation to the acquisition of vigorous constitutions, readiness of action, strong will, and manliness of character, but in regard to the experience and qualifications which will enable them to govern the country, to mould anew its institutions, to direct its policy, and to shape its destiny.

There is to be a second temple, which our older men will say is not like the first. The worship, of course, is to be adapted to the new order of things, and I have anxiously explored the text, and the commentary, to ascertain, if possible, wherein the temple and the worship are to differ from those of the fathers.

The oracle of the text, and the oracle of the commentary are to some extent uncertain, but by a careful study we gain some insight into our future.

The democratic party, which was preeminently the party of progress, is to be so again. Copperheadism (the true signification and meaning of which term, in its most usual application to persons at the North, is, ardent disinterested patriotism, and sincere love of the country and its political institutions,) is to be thrown overboard; the conservatism which fears untried experiments upon the institutions founded by the fathers, is to be abandoned; the wisdom of the past is to be ignored and disregarded; the life and vigor of the young men who fought the battles of the Union are to be the inspiration and guide of its policy.

The talk about cutting loose from the old pro-slavery affinities is mere clap-trap, unless it means that we are to have no consideration for the people of the Southern States; for slavery having been abolished by an amendment of the Constitution, there can be no pro-slavery affinities to cut loose from, and there can be no blunder, fatal or otherwise, of returning to a support of slavery.

But the democratic party is not to attempt to carry the public opinion of the country back to the constitutional principles which were admitted and acknowledged before the war, it is not to commit the fatal blunder of putting on the brakes, when the train is running down a declivity, even to save it from destruction, — but it is to follow up its favorite employment of supplying fresh fuel to the engine, and to hasten with increased velocity on the downward grade. In other words, it is to enter into a lively competition with the radical wing of the republican party, in the hope of once more obtaining the Presidency and Treasurership of the company, and the power of appointing the engineers, conductors, ticket sellers, switchmen, lamplighters, &c.

Well, the track of a nation, like that of a railroad, is not a

straight, level, smooth line for any great distance. It has its deep cuts and embankments to run through and over, its curves and its sidings, its defective rails, and its occasional obstructions. Upon the principle suggested, the trackmen and the switchmen should cast away their old conservatism, as well as the engineers. The conductors must busy themselves exclusively in collecting and pocketing the fares,—and the national train must rush down the declivity at a rate of speed never before conceived of in the progress of nations.

If a bent axle causes an Angola disaster, by which a train is thrown down an embankment and the imprisoned passengers burned alive, what must be the terrible catastrophe and ruin, the horrible torture of those who are crushed to death under the wreck of the nation, and what the lamentations and wailings of the survivors, which must inevitably follow a national progress like this!

But, dropping the very significant metaphor in which these advocates of progress have seen fit to clothe their conceptions of the glorious future, to which they are to add their contributions, let us inquire in plain prose, what is to be done, in fact, by this party of progress.

We are left to learn this in a great measure by what it is said has been done by the democratic party heretofore. What it has done, it may continue to do, so long as there is room for its enterprise. We are told that it extended the suffrage to white citizens until it became universal. This is certainly a strange declaration, in the face of the fact that all the young men who in the army led that deeper life, four years of which better qualifies a man to guide its politics, than the common experience of a whole life passed elsewhere, have not yet a constitutional right of suffrage, unless they have attained the age of twenty-one years. If suffrage is to be made universal, there is much to be done here.

Next it is said that the democratic party abolished imprisonment for debt. That, certainly, is not to be done over again. The only progress to be made in this line is to abolish imprisonment for non-payment of damages for wrongs committed (if it has not already extended to that), which would make no very marked change in the life of the nation; and to abolish it, likewise, as a punishment for crimes committed, which certainly