COMMUNICATED

Age! thou art ashamed,
Rome! thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods

Is it then true, that the Legislature of Virginia have
shrunk from the question of secession? "O yes! The
proper time has not come."

Why, then, did the President lug it into his manifesto?
When a claim of right is denied by anticipation, the more
urgent is the necessity for asserting it. The more
unseasonable the attack, the more call for prompt defence,
and the more prompt, the more seasonable. It is dark
midnight: our sentinels are sleeping on their posts: our
camp is assaulted; and our martinets must wait for
daylight, that they may see to manoeuvre secundum artem.

"But there is no one in the Legislature qualified to
lead"!!! Is this so? Then, let them disband and go 
home. But is there no one in Virginia fit to lead? If
there is, let geese but cackle, and the men will show 
themselves. If not; why then Virginia is not FIT TO
BE LED, and there is nothing left, but to be slaves in 
condition, as sooner or later all slaves in heart are sure to
be. FUIMUS TROES, and there's an end.(a)

YES, WE HAVE BEEN. We have been men whose
"swords would have leaped from their scabbards," even
at a hint of the doctrines of the Proclamation. Now we
bless God, that is it poor South Carolina that is to suffer,
and not we, and are content to be kept "like a nut in the 
corner of a Monkey's jaw, first mouthed to be last
swallowed.

What are we doing? We are talking "about it, Goddess,
and about it," some evading the difficulty, like a sneaking
Judge working around a constitutional question, and some
who should show the war cry "VIRGINIA TO THE
RESCUE," are trying to lead men to peril "Life and 
fortune and sacred honor" by wire-drawn metaphysics.

"LIFE AND FORTUNE AND SACRED HONOR"!!!
How often and how freely have they pledged in this 
very cause! Aye; as freely as the spend-thrift gives his 
note on long credit. But pay-day comes, and all is changed.
PAY-DAY IS NOW COME.

How is the pledge to be redeemed, when the very
CITADEL of State Rights is beleaguered and summoned in
surrender on pain of the halter? How? By answering
the minions of power thus--

	"But if your Chief his purpose urge,
	Take our defiance loud and high;
	Our slogan is your lyke-wake dirge
	Our moat the grave where you shall lie."

The poet puts these words in the mouth of a woman.
Our mothers were such women. What are we? Each
turns upon his fellow's face an eye of death, and says,

	"Why man! he doth bestride the narrow world,
	Like a Colossus; and we petty men
	Creep under his huge legs, and peep about,
	To find ourselves dishonorable graves."

Aye creep, and peep, and hide! Yes, hide your shame,
and no more pretend to identify yourselves with those, who,
backed their resolves with laws, and put Dark's brigade in
requisition to sustain both.

Am I then for war? No. I am for avoiding war by
prudent boldness. I am for saying to our oppressors, on 
behalf of the whole planting and slave-holding country;
"If this is the way the bargain is to be read, we must be
off; and if you mean to continue the Union, the principles
of that Proclamation must be DISTRINCTLY AND FORVER
RENOUNCED."

Will this course endanger the Union? No. "I tell
you, my Lord Fool, that out of this nettle DANGER, we
pluck the flower SAFETY."

A FRIEND OF STATE RIGHTS

(a)Lord Chatham said that a people willing to be made slaves of,
were fit tools to enslave others. And what are they, who are waiting
to be employed as tools to enslave their countrymen? Are they not
slaves already? They may have to seek a monster; but it is always easy
to find one. A lamb may not always find his way into the wolf's jaws; a
wanton may not always find a paramour, but a slave is always sure to
find a master.