THE YOUNG AMERICAN. 367

I shall not need to go into an enumeration of
our national defects and vices which require this
Order of Censors in the State. I might not set
down our most proclaimed offences as the worst.
It is not often the worst trait that occasions the
loudest outcry. Men complain of their suffering,
and not of the crime. I fear little from the bad
effect of Repudiation; I do not fear that it will
spread. Stealing is a suicidal business; you can-
not repudiate but once. But the bold face and
tardy repentance permitted to this local mischief
reveal a public mind so preoccupied with the love
of gain that the common sentiment of indignation
at fraud does not act with its natural force. The
more need of a withdrawal from the crowd, and a
resort to the fountain of right, by the brave. The
timidity of our public opinion is our disease, or,
shall I say, the publicness of opinion, the absence
of private opinion. Good nature is plentiful, but We
want justice, with heart of steel, to fight down the
proud. The private mind has the access to the to-
tality of goodness and truth that it may be a bal-
ance to a corrupt society ; and to stand for the pri-
vate verdict against popular clamor is the office of
the noble. If a humane measure is propounded in
behalf of the slave, or of the Irishman, or the
Catholic, or for the succor of the poor; that senti-
ment, that project, will have the homage of the