[From _The Spanish Conspiracy_ (Cincinnati, 1891)]
The grief of the reader in learning from the _Political Beginnings_,
that Humphrey Marshall was "violent, irreligious and profane," will be
mollified by the assurance given in the same work that Harry Innes
"was a sincerely religious man." It might with equal truth have been
stated that Caleb Wallace, who had abandoned the Presbyterian pulpit
to go into politics, kept up his church relations, and practiced his
devotions with the utmost regularity. Sebastian also, who had cast off
the gown of the Episcopal ministry in his pursuit of the "flesh pots
of Egypt," continued, it is believed, the exercise of all religious
observations, and, in the depth of his piety, deemed a treasonable
overture entirely too good to be communicated to an infidel. While
John Brown, who had absorbed faith as he sat under the very droppings
of the sanctuary, it will be cheerfully conceded was the most devout
of the four. On the other hand, John Wood, one of the editors of the
_Western World_, whom they afterwards bought, was a reprobate; and
young Joseph M. Street, whom they could neither bribe nor intimidate,
and the attempt to assassinate whom proved a failure, was a sinner. It
is distressing to think that, like Gavin Hamilton, the latter "drank,
and swore, and played at cards." It may be that the wickedness of the
editors of the _Western World_, and the contemplation of their own
saintliness, justified in the eyes of the four Christian jurists and
statesmen the several little stratagems they devised, and paid Littell
for introducing into his "Narrative," in order to obtain the advantage
of the wicked editors in the argument. The contrast of their
characters made innocent those little mutilations by Innes of his own
letter to Randolph! The same process of reasoning made laudable John
Brown's suppression of his Muter letter, his assertion that it was
identical with the "sliding letter," and his claim that the acceptance
of Gardoqui's proposition would have been consistent with the alleged
purpose to make some future application for the admission of Kentucky
into the new Union! While the suppression of the resolution of Wallace
and Wilkinson in the July convention, and the declaration that such a
_motion never was made_, in order to prove the unhappy editors to be
liars, became as praiseworthy as the spoiling of the Egyptians by the
Israelites! The scene of those four distinguished gentlemen seated
around a table, with a prayer-book in the center, planning the screen
for themselves and the discomfiture of the editors, would be a subject
worthy of the brush of a Hogarth.