Mr. Polk would have shrunk from offering fifty millions for the very land which he has now bougl\t at such a vast amount of blood and treasure. It is impossible to resist the conviction that, by honest negotiation, we might have become the masters of these territories without crime, without human butchery, and at a far less cost in money than the sum we have paid.
The mighty sum we have exchanged for glory and ter- ritory, has added not one cent, to the productive capital of the country, nor brought one new comfort or convenience within reach of its population. For all useful practical purposes, this amount of the nation's capital has been annihilated. But it is easy to imagine how such a sum might have been expended in modes resulting in a prodigious augmentation of the re- sources of the nation, and the virtue and enjoyments of i44 REVIEW OF THE MEXICAN WAR.
the people. Such a sum might have spread a net-work of railroads and telegraphic wires over the country, uniting in bonds of interest and intercourse the remotest in- habitants of our vast empire. It would have opened through Oregon a channel by which the commerce of India and China would in a few days have reached every portion of our Confederacy. Or it might have given security and facility to our magnificent inland na^^gation, and formed safe and capacious harbors on our mediter- ranean seas. Or it might have carried science and useful knowledge to the inmates of every dwelling in our Re- pubhc ; and in various ways have been made conducive to the diffusion of virtue and religion. The mere interest of this sum is vastly greater than is annually contributed by Christendom to evangehze the Avorld. The disposal of this treasure was a talent which, in the providence of God, was entrusted to our rulers : whether the use they have made of it proves them to have been good and faithful servants vrill be declared on that day in which they shall give an account of their stewardship.