A peaceful intercourse with the nations of the earth points to that inspiring day which philosophers have hoped for, which poets have seen in their bright dreams of fancy, and which prophets have beheld in holy vision—when men shall learn war no more. Who can contemplate a state of the world like this and not feel his heart exult at the prospect? I am against war, because peace—peace is, above everything else, our policy. Our great mission as a people is to occupy this vast dominion—to level the forests and let in upon their solitudes the light of day; to clear the swamps and make them ready for the plow and the sickle; to spread over hill and dale the echoes of human labor and human happiness; to fill the land with cities and towns; to unite its most distant points by turnpikes and railroads; to scoop out canals and open rivers that may serve as highways for trade.
If we can preserve peace, who shall set bounds to our prosperity or our success? With one foot planted on the Atlantic and the other on the Pacific, we occupy a position between the two old continents of the world—a position which necessarily secures to us the commerce and the influence of both. If we abide by the counsels of common sense, if we succeed in preserving our liberties, we shall in the end exhibit a spectacle such as the world never saw.
I know that this one great mission is encompassed with many difficulties; but such is the energy of our political system, and such is its expansive capability, that it may be made to govern the widest space. If by war we become great, we cannot be free; if we will be both great and free, our policy is peace.
—John C. Calhoun.
A LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW.
