So favored and god-blest, and dear as thine.
And still to me, thy worshiper, oh, Beautie!
Come as a guest divine—an angel-friend;
Give me to see thee, in each darker duty,
And radiate my life-path to the end!
WHAT GLORY COSTS THE NATION.
In the February number, we gave a short extract from Upham’s Manual of Peace, in relation to the cost of the Army and Navy of the United States. That article has brought out an officer of the Navy, with the following—in which we get abuse for facts, and sharp sentences for figures. We can stand a moderate amount of flaying without blubbering, and have no faith in the theory that a drop of ink will raise a blister, except upon persons exceedingly thin-skinned. But our correspondent, who takes a narrow view of both time and figures, appears to think the question a new one, and settled by his article, and both Upham and Graham demolished.
“Sir,—Freedom of speech, and freedom of the press, are among the best privileges guarantied by a republican form of government; but freedom of speech is not to be taken as a license to state for fact what is not true without possibility of contradiction. Nor is freedom of speech to be construed into a privilege of saying sharp or impertinent and impudent things with impunity. It has been said as a rule, ‘joke as much as you please, but never trespass on fact,’ which means, when you fall into an error, you are bound to correct it.
“With these notions fresh upon me, I venture to point out an erroneous statement in the first page of the February number of Graham, which is calculated to prejudice a large number of people against the Navy and Army of the country. Graham (Upham) states that the cost of maintaining the Army and Navy of the United States is equal to eighty per cent., that is, four-fifths of the entire revenue. This must strike every reflecting mind to be an expense so enormous as to render it desirable to be rid of both Army and Navy. But the statement is entirely erroneous, as a moment’s thought will show. If four-fifths of the revenue are absorbed in maintaining the Army and Navy, only one fifth is left to meet the expense of the ‘civil list,’ president and officers of the cabinet, foreign ministers and consuls, custom-house officers, light-houses, etc. etc.