THE WAR WITH MEXICO REVIEWED.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTION.

"The principles of true politics are merely those of morality enlarged." BURKE.

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HISTORY has assumed, under the light of the Gospel, a new value. It is no longer regarded as owing its chief interest to its royal genealogies, or its bloody record of battles. It is beginning to be understood, that the Providence of God is manifested through the rise and fall of nations. The actors in the scenes of the past have been the agents of a higher power than they themselves recognized. "The hoary registers of time" are the map of the grand march of humanity. To draw the moral of history, therefore, becomes of equal importance to the office of narrating its events. If it be "philosophy teaching by example," it becomes a question of the first importance to learn what the examples teach; what warning of evil, what encouragement to hope; what lessons for rulers, or for the people. And since the light has shone down out of Heaven upon the dark confusion of hu