The People and Progress of the United States.
By Editor
[Everything relating to the prosperity and rapid rise of this Republic will be interesting to our readers, especially, viewed in the light of prophecy, Rev. xiii, 11, &c. We extract the following from an article in the U. S. Magazine for August, 1855. The results here given may be depended on as correct, being compiled from the last census.] Among all nations, and in all times, the facts usually collected under the head of census statistics, have the deepest value and significance wherever their accuracy can be depended on. All the varying conditions which mark the development of a community in numbers, health, morals, and enlightenment, throughout their infinite details, are thus indicated; and, as it were, daguerreotyped in figures, for the benefit of the historian, the philosopher, the political economist, and of the people themselves. Unfortunately, such statistics were rarely attended to among the nations of antiquity, except as the exigencies of revenue or military power required some knowledge of the numbers and wealth of the State; and it is on this account chiefly that we must always remain perplexed, and often totally ignorant, of the condition of the earlier communities in many important respects. Statistical science, as it now exists among the most cultivated nations, is at once the fruit and the exponent of a higher civilization. It owes its origin to a couple of Prussian Savans—Achenwall and Schlozer—who lived about a century ago. It has since been further developed, both on the Continent and in Great Britain. In the United States of America, where, for obvious reasons, this science should be thoroughly attended to, the system of collecting statistics has been poorly arranged, though it has steadily improved from one decade to another. The superior intelligence of30our people, however, may balance the errors of system, and render our statistics as accurate as those of the Old World. And whenever our means for pursuing statistical investigation shall be as well adjusted as they are at present in England, we may look for results more satisfactory and important than have yet been obtained in any part of the world. Though a large force has been employed much of the time during the last four years by the Census Bureau at Washington, the returns are not yet all reduced, and the statistics of crime and mortality would each fill a volume the size of the compendium;—at present, the results given under these heads are very limited. Figures are sometimes said to be eloquent—they are never more so than when made to exhibit the character and progress of a distinguished people—the figures and the results of the historian often speak more forcibly, and to the point, than the most labored display of words. Besides, it is in tables that the aggregated and compared results of the census are most easily exhibited, and many important elements brought together within reach of the eye on a single page.