treasures of plundered Gaul, to be poured into the laps of rotten
politicians. There was no longer a popular government; and in taking all
power himself, he only took advantage of the state of things which
profligate politicians had produced. In this he was culpable, and paid
the forfeit with his life. But in contemplating his fate, let us never
forget that the politicians had undermined and destroyed the republic,
before he came to seize and to master it."

We could point to numerous instances, where the benefits of war have
more than compensated for the evils which attended it; benefits not only
to the generations who engaged in it, but also to their descendants for
long ages. Had Rome adopted the non-resistance principle when Hannibal
was at her gates, we should now be in the night of African ignorance and
barbarism, instead of enjoying the benefits of Roman learning and Roman
civilization. Had France adopted this principle when the allied armies
invaded her territories in 1792, her fate had followed that of Poland.
Had our ancestors adopted this principle in 1776, what now had been,
think you, the character and condition of our country?

Dr. Lieber's remarks on this point are peculiarly just and apposite.
"The continued efforts," says he, "requisite for a nation to protect
themselves against the ever-repeated attacks of a predatory foe, may be
infinitely greater than the evils entailed by a single and energetic
war, which forever secures peace from that side. Nor will it be denied,
I suppose, that Niebuhr is right when he observes, that the advantage to
Rome of having conquered Sicily, as to power and national vigor, was
undeniable. But even if it were not so, are there no other advantages to
be secured? No human mind is vast enough to comprehend in one glance,
nor is any human life long enough to follow out consecutively, all the
immeasurable blessings and the unspeakable good which have resolved to