Part 7 (2/2)

But ould believe there are signs of a revolution beginning; a her principle and its expansive impulse toward a wide and remote beneficence, than the ordinary events of that name What have commonly been theblow in a deadly competition of equally selfish parties; actions and reactions of ae; the fiat of a conqueror; a burst of blind fury, suddenly sweeping away an old order of things, but overwhel to all attempts to substitute a better institution; plots, massacres, battles, dethronements, restorations: all actuated by a fermentation of the ordinary or the basest eleency has there been, with one or two partial exceptions, in these hty commotions; how little wisdom or virtue, or reference to the Supreme Patron of national interests; how little nobleness or even distinctness of purpose, or consolidated advantage of success! But here is, as we trust, the approach of a revolution with different phenomena It displays the nature of its principle and its ambition in a conviction, far more serious and extensive than heretofore, of the necessity of education to the mass of the population, with earnest discussions of its scope and methods by both speculative and practical ood designs ont to be, for spreading useful knowledge over tracts of the dead waste where there was none; in exciting tens of thousands of young persons to a benevolent and patient activity in the instruction of the children of the poor; in an extended and extending system of means and exertions for the universal diffusion of the sacred scriptures; in ular and all uncanonical ways, to render it next to i soion; in the formation of useful local institutions too various to come under one deno of the vast prison-houses of hu to the test of principles many notions and practices which have stood on the authority of prejudice, custoe of the new and powerful spirit which has come on the world to drive its affairs into commotion and acceleration; as bold adventurers have sometimes availed themselves of a formidable torrent to be conveyed whither the stream in its ordinary state would never have carried the the h the enenia by which it stands distinguished out and far off from the rank of ordinary revolutions

We are not unaware that, with certain speculators on this sa the state and character of the people, sos here specified will be of se, or asactivity of a humble class of laborers, who seek no fa process, almost invisible in the survey The multiplied, voluntary, and extraordinary efforts to diffuse soar, appear to them, if not even of doubtful tendency, at least of such impotence for corrective operation, that any confidence founded on them is simple fanaticism; that the calculation is, to use a commercial terreat note and influence flung conteuine expectations entertained fro the inferior population At the hopeful ious kind especially, the class of speculators in questiontalk of calling up spirits to perform his will; or (should they ever have happened to read the Bible) of the people who seized, in honest credulous delight, thea city, to the last stone, into the river with ropes, as a prieneralshi+p

When we see such expedients rated so low in the process for raising the populace froradation, we ask what means these speculators themselves would reckon on for the purpose And it would appear that their scheme would calculate mainly on some supposed dispositions of a political and economical nature Let the people be put in possession of all their rights as citizens, and thus advanced in the scale of society Let all invidious distinctions which are artificial, arbitrary, and not inevitable, be abolished; together with all laws and regulations injuriously affecting their te_ in the great social order, a direct palpable interest in the honor and prosperity of the conified sense of independence; the generous, liberalizing, ennobling sentiments of freedom; the self-respect and conscious responsibility of hts; the manly disdain of what is base; the innate perception of what is worthy and honorable, developing itself spontaneously on the reenial circumstances in the constitution of society, which have been as a long winter on the intellectual and moral nature of its inferior portions All this will conduce to the practicability and efficacy of education It will be an education _to fit theress of that fitness; intellectual culture finding a felicitous adaptation of the soil We may then adopt with some confidence a public system, or stimulate and assist all independent local exertions for the instruction of the people in the rudiion too, if you will

But, to say nothing of the vain fancies of the virtues ready to disclose themselves in a corrupt mass, under the auspices of improved political institutions, it is unfortunate for any such speculation that what it insists on as the primary condition cannot as yet, but very i portion of the community have, very naturally, the utmost aversion to concede to the people what are claihts They have, indeed, latterly been constrained to make considerable concessions in nareat and various poill be strenuously exerted, for probably a long while yet, to render the acquisitions made by the people as nearly as possible profitless in their hands And unhappily these predoe the mental and moral rudeness of the lower, in vindication of this deter the consequences of their own crilect into a defence of their injustice They will say, If the subordinate rown up into a rational existence; if they had been rendered capable of thinking, judging, distinguishi+ng, if they were in possession of asense of duty; then ht, in the social constitution be yielded to therossness they are unfit for the possession, because unqualified for the exercise, of any such privileges as would take them from under our authoritative control

Since they can and will, for the present,power, to the extent of nearly invalidating any political advancerades, a speculation that should place on that advancee in the mental condition of the people, would be, to adopt a hu us to cli us not to climb at all And while this supposed pre-requisite will be refused, on the allegation that the uncultivated condition of the people renders thee will be little desirous to have the obstacle rehly ies withheld, a constantly aug force of popular opinion, and therefore a diminution of their own predominant power They will deem it much more comhtened and raised as to come into any such competition And since they, with these dispositions, have the preponderance in e denominate the State, we fear we are not to look with much hope to the State for a liberal and effective system of national education

What then is to be done?--We earnestly wish itin the earth, co the dominant powers in the nations to an order of institutions and ady of the state to so noble a purpose Nor can we iine any test of their ree, they do this; nor any test by which they may more naturally decline to have those merits tried But since, to the shame of our nature, there is no use to which we are so prone to turn our conde a license for it in another, the persons who are justly arraigning the powers at the head of nations should be warned that they do not take frouilty o Let them not suffer an imposition on theirto be no otherwise accounted of than in a collective capacity, acting by a governency of a nation becaan, an affair altogether foreign to the will, the action, the duty, the responsibility, of the persons of whoht that whatever is the duty of the national body in that collective capacity, acting through its government, is such only because it is the duty of the individuals co that body, as far as it is in the power of each; and that it would be their duty individually not the less, though the governlect it But rees of possible exception, we lectful of a great duty but because the individuals constituting the coovernlectful of the e, and through every change of its adenerality of the individuals of intelligence, wealth, and influence, have all the while been of a quite opposite spirit, zealously intent on rerant evil, would be instantly rejected as a contradiction Such an enlightened and philanthropic spirit prevailing widely a the individuals of the nation would carry its iovernment in one manner or another It would either constrain the administrators of the state to act in conformity, or ultimately displace theeneral_ activity of the respectable and locally influential orously prosecuted such a purpose, it would have compelled the administrators of the state to consider, even for their own sake, whether they should be content to see so i on independently of thelect

But at the worst, and on the supposition that they were obstinately inaccessible to all rand improvement would have been accomplished, if many thousands of the responsible members of the co exertion The neglect, therefore, of the i in the review of our conduct as a nation, has been, to a very great extent, the insensibility of individuals to obligations lying on them as such, independently of the institutions and administration of the state

And are individuals _now_ absolved from all such responsibility; and the more so, that the conviction of the importance of the object is coent force? When they say, reproachfully, that the nation, as a body politic, concentrating its powers in its governlects a most important duty, is it to be understood that this accusatory testi equivalent in substitution for their share, of that very duty? Does a collective duty of such very solid substance, vanish into nothing under any atte it into fractions and portions for individuals? And do they theht thus be distributively assigned,--do they themselves, in spite of self-love, self-estimation, and all the sentie of their own inly surrender to a feeling of cruuishable existence in the ion, say to the State, ”In thee we live, ?” Or, will they, (in assians, who hold that a divinity so pervades the the mere human vehicle without power, duty, or accountableness,) will they account themselves but as passive s necessitated, by a sovereigndenos It is not so that they feel with respect to those other interests and projects, which they are really in earnest to proreater proportion than the one in question does within the scope of their individual ability The incubus has then vanished; and they find theree of pohich they will not patiently hear estimated in any such contemptuous terms What is there then that should reduce thenificance in the affair of which we are speaking? Besides, they may form themselves, in indefinite number, into combination And is there no power in any collective form in which they can be associated, save just that one in which the aggregation is constituted under the political shape and authority denominated a state? Or is it at last that some alarrow uneasy in conscience at the high-toned censure they have been stimulated and betrayed to pronounce on the state; that they relapse into the obsequiousness of hesitating, whether they should presuood of a kind which the ”Power ordained of God” has not seen fit to do; that they reat exa theainst the vandalisanis the people?

But if such had always been the way in which private individuals, single or associated, had accounted of theeneral improvements, but very feould ever have been accomplished For the case has coinated with persons not invested with political power; have been urged on by the accession and co-operation of such individuals; and at length slowly and reluctantly acceded to by the holders of donant fatality, the last to ad men no less than dee of the reformation

In all probability, the improvement of mankind is destined, under Providence, to advance nearly in proportion as goodon themselves as individuals, and are actuated by a bold sentiment of independence, (humble at the same time, in reference to the necessity of Divine intervention,) in the prosecution of it Each person who is standing still to look, with grief or indignation, at the evils which are overrunning the world, would do well to recollect what hewhere a prompt movement, with the comparatively slender force at his own co to the success of the warfare, could not endure to lose the tireat sultan should find it convenient to come in slow march, and the pon

In laying this eood overnment of states, if ever they did co the condition of society better and happier, could not contribute beyond all calculation to the force and efficacy of _every_ project and rand purpose How far froht do and do not But it is because their history, thus far, affords such feeble prognostics of their becoe, actuated by such a spirit,--it is because the Divine Governor has hitherto put upon the the instruood, and the exhortations to attempt it, are so peculiarly directed to its promoters in an individual capacity

Happily, the accusatory part of such exhortations is beco, less extensively applicable; and we return with pleasure to the ani the introductory signs It is a revolution in thethe souls of the people, and consequently in the judgment of what should be done for both their present and future welfare Through es, that immense multitude had been but obscurely presented to view in any such character as that of rational, inized no otherwise than as one large uishable into individuals; existing, and to be left to exist, in their own manner; and that manner hardly worth concern or inquiry Little consideration could there be of howto waste, absorbed in the very earth, all over the wide field where the inferior portion of huross medium of an economical estimate, by the more favored part of the race

But now it is as if athe raded ht in which they were never seen before, except by the faithful promoters of Christianity, and a few philanthropists of a less special order

It is true, this ic a vision, that if we had only to behold it _as a spectacle_, we ht well desire that the ain, to shroud it froinations by dwelling on the pohty empires, the heroes, the victories, the triuhly cultivated of the race; the brilliant perfor reach of science So the teuiled our Lord into a colories of the world But he was come to look on a different aspect of it! Nor could he be withdrawn froood reason why For the sole object for which he had appeared in the only world where tein in operation, and finish in virtue, a design for changing that state of degradation and n, and in the spirit of that divine benevolence in which it sprung, he could endure to fix on the melancholy and odious character of the scene, the contemplation which was vainly attempted to be diverted to any other of its aspects

What, indeed, could sublunary polories be to him in any case; but emphatically what, when his object was to redeem the people from darkness and destruction?

Those who, actuated by a spirit in some humble resemblance to his, have entered deeply into the state of the people, such as it is found in our own nation, have often been appalled at the spectacle disclosed to them

They have been astonished to think, what _can_ have been the direction, while successive ages have passed away, of so ilant ht should scarcely have been descried They have been aware that in describing it as they actually saw it, they would be regarded by soloomy fanatics, tinctured with insanity by the influence of some austere creed; and that others, of kinder nature, but whose sensibility hasrefinement than tendency to active benevolence, would al an exhibition had never been h the fact be actually so There may have been moments when they themselves have experienced a temporary recoil of their benevolent zeal, under the i the feebleness of their remedial means and efforts, and of its noisome quality At tiracious reception and thankless requital of their disinterested labors, aggravating the general feeling of theso much misery, have lent seduction to the teence Why should they, just _they_ of all men, condemn themselves to dwell so much in the most dreary climate of the moral world, when they could perhaps have taken their ale, taste, and refined society? Then was the tih he was rich, for our sakes becaain, theyin the bitter her and ns to proceed as they can, in the th of private individual exertion And they s after the fervor of indignant ones; for such indignation, unless qualified by the purest principle--unless it be the ”anger that sins not”--is very apt, when it cools, to settle into misanthropic despondency

It is as if (they have said) ariants would stand aloof to amuse themselves, while we are to be committed and abandoned in the ceaseless, unavailable toil of a conflict, which these ariants have no business even to exist as such but for the very purpose of waging We are, if ill,--and if e may let it alone--to try to effect in diminutive pieces, and detached local efforts, a little share of that, to the accoht be applied on system, and to the widest compass So they have said, perhaps, and been tempted to leave their object to its destiny

But really it is now too late for this resentful and desponding abandonnity of despair It must be sorace of rhetoric in saying, as in parody of Cato, ”Witness heaven and earth, that we have done our duty, but the stars and fate are against us; and here it becoenerate into the ridiculous, if prosecuted against iin so onerous a work, and prosecute it thus far, could not now re under its temporary semblance of bravery Is it for the projectors of a noble edifice of public utility, to abandon the undertaking when it has risen froround; or is just come to be level with the surface of the waters, in defiance of which it has been coned to control, or the unfordable depths and streams of which it was to bear people over? Let the pro the inferior classes, reflect what has already been accoe It is s;”

and shall they despise it, froreat powers had been directed to its advanceood cause thus unaided they have not wholly labored in vain; that it _can_ be brought in contact with a considerable portion of ould otherwise be so much huaroes out of it Let them recount the individuals they have seen, and not despond as to ns of a destination to the lowest debase animated thanks, and will do so in the hour of death, for what these, their best hu to them Let them recollect of how ly, and in sohtfully amended And let them reflect how they have trampled down prejudices, nearly silenced a heathenish clamor, and provoked the imitative and rival efforts of h for all such schemes to lie in abeyance to the end of time Let them think of all this, and faithfully persist in the trial what it may please God that they shall accomplish, whether the possessors of national poill acknowledge his demand for such an application of it or not; whether, when the infinite importance of the concern is represented to them, they will hear, or whether they will forbear

But let them not doubt that the time will come, when the rulers and the ascendant classes in states will comprehend it to be their best policy to proiven to thelory of those at the head of great communities, enerally, in whatever it is that constitutes the worth, the honor, the happiness, of individuals; a glory hich would be co over such a nation could be administered in a liberal spirit They will one day have learned to esteem it a far nobler forent minds, than to delude, coerce, and drive a vast seress of society, confer on it such wise and virtuous rulers as can feel, that it is better for them to have a people who can understand and rationally approve, when deserving of approbation, their systenorance could henceforward suffice (which it cannot) to retain the people in that posture; better, therefore, by a still stronger reason, than to have a people ferovernors to be in the wrong, and without the sense to coht be addressed in the shape of bribes to corruption And a time will come when it will not be left to the philanthropic or censorial speculatists alone, to make the comparative estimate bethat has been effected by the enormously expensive apparatus of coercive and penal administration--the prisons, prosecutions, transportations, and a large s quite necessary in our past and present national condition,)--and what _ht_ have been effected by one half of that expenditure devoted to popular reformation, to be accomplished by means of schools, and every practicable variety of ment and conscience as the ”lion in the way,” when they are inclined and teth And if the prons see cause to fear that the time is rely the admonition that no time is _theirs_, but the present