" He had no petty
selfishness--no pitiful revenges to exhaust with the hand of power--no
contemptible motives for elevating or advancing the interests of one
section of his country by oppressing another. "All his aims were his
country's," and his whole country's. He desired that every act of that
country should bear the broadest light, and challenge the closest and
most searching scrutiny; that each should be a new and brighter gem in
the diadem of her glory, and that her magnanimity should be most
conspicuous in her transactions with the weakest. This he especially
desired, and labored to effect, in all her transactions with the
Indians. He viewed these as the primitive proprietors of the soil, and
possessors of the entire country. He knew they were fading away before
a civilization they were by nature incapacitated to emulate, and this,
he felt, was in obedience to the inexorable laws of Divine Providence;
and, in the wonderfully capacious compassion of his nature, he desired,
in the accomplishment of this fate, that no act of national injustice
to them should stain the nation's escutcheon, and determined to
signalize this desire in every act of his when giving form and shape to
national policy.
Pages:
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279