Where such disagreement occurs in respect to those Statutes which have the dignity of constitutional regulations, the less that is said upon the subject the better for the Country.

But writers, who in such a case would gladly keep a silent course, are often forced out of it by wily hypocrites, and by others, who seem unconscious that, as there are Pedants in Literature, and Bigots in Religion, so are there Precisians in Politics--men without experience, who contend for limits and restraints when the Power which those limits and restraints were intended to confine is long since vanished.

In the Statute-books Enactments of great name stand unrepealed, which may be compared to a stately oak in the last stage of decay, or a magnificent building in ruins.

Respect and admiration are due to both; and we should deem it profaneness to cut down the one, or demolish the other.

But are we, therefore, to be sent to the sapless tree for may-garlands, or reproached for not making the mouldering ruin our place of abode?
Government is essentially a matter of expediency; they who perceive this, and whose knowledge keeps pace with the changes of society, lament that, when Time is gently carrying what is useless or injurious into the back-ground, he must be interrupted in the process by Smatterers and Sciolists--intent upon misdirecting the indignation of the simple, and feeding the ill-humours of the ignorant.