The period of Mr. Monroe’s administration, from the 4th of March, 1817, to the 4th of March, 1825, is justly regarded as the golden age of our political history. It will be well for the present generation to make themselves familiar with its incidents and their lessons. It was the transition-period between the patriotic devotion of the Revolution and the dominant selfishness of the present day. The native sagacity with which our early statesmen baffled the diplomatic skill and intrigue of Europe had ripened by the practical experience of thirty years in the administration of affairs. Private interests had not swelled to such enormous magnitude as to keep the ablest of our men from engaging in the public service. Party-spirit had not eaten out a just concern for the honor of the country. Slavery had not extinguished patriotism in half of the States of the Union. John Adams, Jefferson, Marshall, and others, who had been the pilots of the nation through the stormy sea of the Revolution, and the fathers of the Constitution, were still alive. Madison, Monroe, Rufus King, William Pinckney, and many others, had participated in the organization of the Government, and shared the anxieties of the “Second War of Independence;" by which, whatever else it did or failed to do, the public contempt of Europe, that had been our shield from aggression, was exchanged for the profound conviction that we were best to be “let alone.”