Volume I Part 11 (1/2)
[29] Keble, in one of his poems, represents a mother seeing her sportive son ”enacting holy rites,” and thus describes her emotions:
”She sees in heart an empty throne, And falling, falling far away, Him whom the Lord hath placed thereon: She hears the dread Proclaimer say, 'Cast ye the lot, in trembling cast, The traitor to his place hath past,-- Strive ye with prayer and fast to guide The dangerous glory where it shall abide.'”
[30] It is the custom in Ma.s.sachusetts to tax men in the place where they reside, on the first day of May; as the taxes differ very much in different towns of the same State, it is easy for a man to escape the burden of taxation.
VIII.
A SERMON OF THE DANGEROUS CLa.s.sES IN SOCIETY.--PREACHED AT THE MELODEON, ON SUNDAY, JANUARY 31, 1847.
MATTHEW XVIII. 12.
If a man have an hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray?
We are first babies, then children, then youths, then men. It is so with the nation; so with mankind. The human race started with no culture, no religion, no morals, even no manners, having only desires and faculties within, and the world without. Now we have attained much more. But it has taken many centuries for mankind to pa.s.s from primeval barbarism to the present stage of comfort, science, civilization, and refinement. It has been the work of two hundred generations; perhaps of more. But each new child is born at the foot of the ladder, as much as the first child; with only desires and faculties. He may have a better physical organization than the first child; he certainly has better teachers; but he, in like manner, is born with no culture, no religion, no morals, even with no manners; born into them, not with them; born bare of these things and naked as the first child. He must himself toil up the ladder which mankind have been so long in constructing and climbing up. To attain the present civilization he must pa.s.s over every point which the race pa.s.sed through. The child of the civilized man, born with a good organization and under favorable circ.u.mstances, can do this rapidly, and in thirty or forty years attains the height of development which it took the whole human race sixty centuries or more to arrive at. He has the aid of past experience and the examples of n.o.ble men; he travels a road already smooth and beaten. The world's cultivation, so slowly and painfully achieved, helps civilize him. He may then go further on, and cultivate himself; may transcend the development of mankind, adding new rounds to the ladder. So doing he aids future children, who will one day climb above his head, he possibly crying against them,--that they climb only to fall, and thereby sweep off him and all below; that no new rounds can be added to the old ladder.
Still, after all the helps which our fathers have provided, every future child must go through the same points which we and our predecessors pa.s.sed through, only more swiftly. Every boy has his animal period, when he can only eat and sleep, intelligence slowly dawning on his mind.
Then comes his savage period, when he knows nothing of rights, when all thine is mine to him, if he can get it. Then comes his barbarous period, when he is ignorant and dislikes to learn; study and restraint are irksome. He hates the school, disobeys his mother; has reverence for n.o.body. Nothing is sacred to him--no time, nor place, nor person. He would grow up wild. The greater part of children travel beyond this stage. The unbearable boy becomes a tolerable youth; then a powerful man. He loves his duty; outstrips the men that once led him so unwilling and reluctant, and will set hard lessons for his grandsire which that grandsire, perhaps, will not learn. The young learns of the old, mounts the ladder they mounted and the ladder they made. The reverse is seldom true, that the old climbs the ladder which the young have made, and over that storms new heights. Now and then you see it, but such are extraordinary and marvellous men. In the old story Saturn did not take pains to understand his children, nor learn thereof; he only devoured them up, till some outgrew and overmastered him. Did the generation that is pa.s.sing from the stage ever comprehend and fairly judge the new generation coming on? In the world, the barbarian pa.s.ses on and becomes the civilized, then the enlightened.
In the physical process of growth from the baby to the man, there is no direct intervention of the will. Therefore the process goes on regularly, and we do not see abortive men who have advanced in years, but stopped growth in their babyhood, or boyhood. But as the will is the soul of personality, so to say, the heart of intellect, morals and religion, so the force thereof may promote, r.e.t.a.r.d, disturb, and perhaps for a time completely arrest the progress of intellectual, moral and religious growth. Still more, this spiritual development of men is hindered or promoted by subtle causes. .h.i.therto little appreciated.
Hence, by reason of these outward or internal hinderances, you find persons and cla.s.ses of men who do not attain the average culture of mankind, but stop at some lower stage of this spiritual development, or else loiter behind the rest. You even find whole nations whose progress is so slow, that they need the continual aid of the more civilized to quicken their growth. Outward circ.u.mstances have a powerful influence on this development. If a single cla.s.s in a nation lingers behind the rest, the cause thereof will commonly be found in some outward hinderance.
They move in a resisting medium, and therefore with abated speed. No one expects the same progress from a Russian serf and a free man of New England. I do not deny that in the case of some men personal will is doubtless the disturbing force. I am not now to go beyond that fact, and inquire how the will became as it is. Here is a man who, from whatever cause, is bodily ill-born, with defective organs. He stops in the animal period; is incapable of any considerable degree of development, intellectual, moral, or religious. The defect is in his body. Others disturbed by more occult causes do not attain their proper growth. This man wishes to stop in his savage period, he would be a freebooter, a privateer against society, having universal letters-of-marque and reprisal; a perpetual Arab, his rule is to get what he can, as he will and where he pleases, to keep what he gets. Another stops at the barbarous age. He is lazy and will not work, others must bear his share of the general burden of mankind. He claims letters patent to make all men serve him. He is not only indolent, const.i.tutionally lazy, but lazy, consciously and wilfully idle. He will not work, but in one form or another will beg or steal. Yet a fourth stops in the half-civilized period. He will work with his hands, but no more. He cannot discover; he will not study to learn; he will not even be taught what has been invented and taught before. None can teach him. The horse is led to the water, or the water brought to the horse, but the beast will not drink.
”The idle fool is whipt at school,” but to no purpose. He is always an oaf. No college or tutor mends him. The wild a.s.s will go out free, wild, and an a.s.s.
These four, the idiot, the pirate, the thief, and the clown are exceptional men. They remain stationary. Meanwhile, mankind advances, continually, but not with an even front. The human race moves not by column or line, but by _echelon_ as it were. We go up by stairs, not by slopes. Now comes a great man, of far-reaching and prospective sight, a Moses, and he tells men that there is a land of promise, which they have a right to who have skill to win it. Then lesser men, the Calebs and Joshuas, go and search it out, bringing back therefrom new wine in the cl.u.s.ter and alluring tales. Next troops of pioneers advance, yet lesser men; then a few bold men who love adventure. Then comes the army, the people with their flocks and herds, the priesthood with their ark of the covenant and the tabernacle, the t.i.tle-deeds of the new lands which they have heard of but not seen. At last there comes the mixed mult.i.tude, following in no order, but not without shouting and tumult, men treading one another under foot, cowards looking back and refusing to march, old men dying without seeing their consolation. If you will lie down on the ground and take the profile of a great city, and see how hill, steeple, dome, tower, the roof of the tall house, gain on the sky, and then come whole streets of warehouses and shops, then common dwellings, then cheap, low tenements, you will have a good profile of man's march to gain new conquests in science, art, morals, religion, and general development. It is so in the family, a bright boy shooting before all the rest, and taking the thunder out of the adverse cloud for his brothers and sisters, who follow and grow rich with unscathed forehead.
It is so in the nation, a few great men bearing the brunt of the storm, and wading through the surges to set their weaker brothers, screaming and struggling, with dry feet, in safety, on the firm land of science or religion. It is so in the world, a tall nation achieving art, science, law, morals, religion, and by the fact revealing their beauty to the barbarian race.
In all departments of human concern there are such pioneers for the family, the nation or mankind. It is instructive to study this law of human progress, to see the De Gamas and Columbuses, aspiring men who dream of worlds to come and lead the perilous van; to see the Vespuccis, the Cortezes, the Pizarros, who get rank and fame by following in their track; to see next the merchant adventurers, soldiers, sutlers and the like, who make money out of the new conquest, while the great discoverers had for meet reward the joy of their genius, the n.o.bleness of their work, a sight of the world's future welfare from the prophet's mountain--a hard life, a bad name, and a grave unknown.
Now while there are those men in the van of society, who aspire at more, chiding and taxing mankind with idleness, cowardice, and even sin, there are yet those others who loiter on the way, from weakness or wilfulness, refusing to advance--idlers, cowards, sinners. If born in the rear, afar from civilization, they are left to die--the savages, the inferior races, the peris.h.i.+ng cla.s.ses of the world. If born in the centre of civilization, for a while they impede the march by actively hindering others, by standing in their way, or by plundering the rest--the dangerous cla.s.ses of society. They too are slain and trodden under foot of men, and likewise perish.
In most large families there is a bad boy, a black sheep in the flock, an Ishmael whom Abraham will drive out into the wilderness, to meet an angel if he can find one. That story of Hagar and her son is very old, but verified anew each year in families and nations. So in society there are criminals who do not keep up with the moral advance of the ma.s.s, stragglers from the march, whom society treats as Abraham his base-born boy, but sending them off with no loaf or skin of water, not even a blessing, but a curse; sending them off as Cain went, with a bad name and a mark on their forehead! So in the world there are inferior nations, savage, barbarous, half-civilized; some are inferior in nature, some perhaps only behind us in development; on a lower form in the great school of Providence--Negroes, Indians, Mexicans, Irish, and the like, whom the world treats as Ishmael and the Gibeonites got treated: now their land is stolen from them in war; their children, or their persons, are annexed to the strong as slaves. The civilized continually preys on the savage, reannexing their territory and stealing their persons--owning them or claiming their work. Esau is rough and hungry, Jacob smooth and well fed. The smooth man overreaches the rough; buys his birthright for a mess of pottage; takes the ground from underneath his feet, thereby supplanting his brother. So the elder serves the younger, and the fresh civilization, strong, and sometimes it may be wicked also, overmasters the ruder age that is contented to stop. The young man now a barbarian will come up one day and take all our places, making us seem ridiculous, nothing but timid conservatives!
All these three, the reputed pests of the family, society, and the world, are but loiterers from the march, bad boys, or dull ones.
Criminals are a cla.s.s of such; savages are nations thereof--cla.s.ses or nations that for some cause do not keep up with the movement of mankind.
The same human nature is in us all, only there it is not so highly developed. Yet the bad boy, who to-day is a curse to the mother that bore him, would perhaps have been accounted brave and good in the days of the Conqueror; the dangerous cla.s.s might have fought in the Crusades and been reckoned soldiers of the Lord whose chance for heaven was most auspicious. The savage nations would have been thought civilized in the days when ”there was no smith in Israel.” David would make a sorry figure among the present kings of Europe, and Abraham would be judged of by a standard not known in his time. There have been many centuries in which the pirate, the land-robber and the murderer were thought the greatest of men.
Now it becomes a serious question, What shall be done for these stragglers, or even with them? It is sometimes a terrible question to the father and mother what they shall do for their reprobate son who is an offence to the neighborhood, a shame, a reproach and a heart-burning to them. It is a sad question to society, What shall be done with the criminals--thieves, housebreakers, pirates, murderers? It is a serious question to the world, What is to become of the humbler nations--Irish, Mexicans, Malays, Indians, Negroes?
In the world and in society the question is answered in about the same way. In a low civilization, the instinct of self-preservation is the strongest of all. They are done with, not for; are done away with. It is the Old Testament answer:--The inferior nation is hewn to pieces, the strong possess their lands, their cities, their cattle, their persons, also, if they will; the cla.s.s of criminals gets the prophet's curse: the two bears, the jail and the gallows, eat them up. In the family alone is the Christian answer given; the good shepherd goes forth to seek the one sheep that has strayed and gone, lost upon the mountains; the father goes out after the poor prodigal, whom the swine's meat could not feed nor fill.[31] The world, which is the society of nations, and society, which is the family of cla.s.ses, still belong mainly to the ”old dispensation,” Heathen or Hebrew, the period of force. In the family there is a certain instinctive love binding the parent to the child, and therefore a certain unity of action, growing out of that love. So the father feels his kins.h.i.+p to his boy, though a reprobate; looks for the causes of his son's folly or sin, and strives to cure him; at least to do something for him, not merely with him. The spirit of Christianity comes into the family, but the recognition of human brotherhood stops mainly there. It does not reach throughout society; it has little influence on national politics or international law--on the affairs of the world taken as a whole. I know the idea of human brotherhood has more influence now than hitherto; I think in New England it has a wider scope, a higher range, and works with more power than elsewhere. Our hearts bleed for the starving thousands of Ireland, whom we only read of; for the down-trodden slave, though of another race and dyed by Heaven with another hue; yes, for the savage and the suffering everywhere. The hand of our charity goes through every land. If there is one quality for which the men of New England may be proud it is this, their sympathy with suffering man. Still we are far from the Christian ideal. We still drive out of society the Ishmaels and Esaus. This we do not so much from ill-will as want of thought, but thereby we lose the strength of these outcasts. So much water runs over the dam--wasted and wasting!
In all these melancholy cases what is it best to do? what shall the parents do to mend their dull boy, or their wicked one? There are two methods which may be tried. One is the method of force, sometimes referred to Solomon, and recommended by the maxim, ”Spare not the rod and spoil the child.” That is the Old Testament way, ”Stripes are prepared for the fool's back.” The mischief is, they leave it no wiser than they found it. By the law of the Hebrews, a man brought his stubborn and rebellious son before the magistrates and deposed: ”This our son is stubborn and rebellious: he will not obey our voice. He is a glutton and a drunkard.” Thereupon, the men of the city stoned him with stones and so ”put away the evil from amongst them!” That was the method of force. It may bruise the body; it may fill men with fear; it may kill. I think it never did any other good. It belonged to a rude and b.l.o.o.d.y age. I may ask intelligent men who have tried it, and I think they will confess it was a mistake. I think I may ask intelligent men on whom it has been tried, and they will say, ”It was a mistake on my father's part, but a curse to me!” I know there are exceptions to that reply; still I think it will be general. A man is seldom elevated by an appeal to low motives; always by addressing what is high and manly within him. Is fear of physical pain the highest element you can appeal to in a child; the most effectual? I do not see how Satan can be cast out by Satan. I think a Saviour never tries it. Yet this method of force is brief and compact. It requires no patience, no thought, no wisdom for its application, and but a moment's time. For this reason, I think, it is still retained in some families and many schools, to the injury alike of all concerned. Blows and violent words are not correction, often but an adjournment of correction: sometimes only an actual confession of inability to correct.
The other is the method of love, and of wisdom not the less. Force may hide, and even silence effects for a time; it removes not the real causes of evil. By the method of love and wisdom the parents remove the causes; they do not kill the demoniac, they cast out the demon, not by letting in Beelzebub, the chief devil, but by the finger of G.o.d. They redress the child's folly and evil birth by their own wisdom and good breeding. The day drives out and off the night.
Sometimes you see that worthy parents have a weak and sickly child, feeble in body. No pains are too great for them to take in behalf of the faint and feeble one. What self-denial of the father; what sacrifice on the mother's part! The best of medical skill is procured; the tenderest watching is not spared. No outlay of money, time, or sacrifice is thought too much to save the child's life; to insure a firm const.i.tution and make that life a blessing. The able-bodied children can take care of themselves, but not the weak. So the affection of father and mother centres on this sickly child. By extraordinary attention the feeble becomes strong; the deformed is transformed, and the grown man, strong and active, blesses his mother for health not less than life.
Did you ever see a robin attend to her immature and callow child which some heedless or wicked boy had stolen from the nest, wounded and left on the ground, half living; left to perish? Patiently she brings food and water, gives it kind nursing. Tenderly she broods over it all night upon the ground, sheltering its tortured body from the cold air of night and morning's penetrating dew. She perils herself; never leaves it--not till life is gone. That is nature; the strong protecting the feeble.