"I have never made an effort," he says, "and never
propose to make an effort; I have never countenanced an
effort, and never mean to countenance an effort, to disturb
the arrangement as originally made, by which various States
came into the Union." Still thinking of the sanction which
the Constitution gives to slavery, he says, "Because it was
part of the original compact--let it stand."
Notwithstanding his special acuteness and ability, he is
unable to take a fact out of its merely political relations,
and behold it as it lies absolutely to be disposed of by the
intellect--what, for instance, it behooves a man to do here
in American today with regard to slavery--but ventures, or
is driven, to make some such desperate answer to the
following, while professing to speak absolutely, and as a
private man--from which what new and singular of social
duties might be inferred? "The manner," says he, "in which
the governments of the States where slavery exists are to
regulate it is for their own consideration, under the
responsibility to their constituents, to the general laws of
propriety, humanity, and justice, and to God. Associations
formed elsewhere, springing from a feeling of humanity, or
any other cause, have nothing whatever to do with it. They
have never received any encouragement from me and they never
will." [These extracts have been inserted since the lecture
was read -HDT]
They who know of no purer sources of truth, who have
traced up its stream no higher, stand, and wisely stand, by
the Bible and the Constitution, and drink at it there with
reverence and humanity; but they who behold where it comes
trickling into this lake or that pool, gird up their loins
once more, and continue their pilgrimage toward its
fountainhead.
No man with a genius for legislation has appeared in America.
They are rare in the history of the world. There are orators,
politicians, and eloquent men, by the thousand; but the
speaker has not yet opened his mouth to speak who is
capable of settling the much-vexed questions of the day.
We love eloquence for its own sake, and not for any truth
which it may utter, or any heroism it may inspire. Our
legislators have not yet learned the comparative value of
free trade and of freedom, of union, and of rectitude, to a
nation. They have no genius or talent for comparatively
humble questions of taxation and finance, commerce and
manufactures and agriculture. If we were left solely to the
wordy wit of legislators in Congress for our guidance,
uncorrected by the seasonable experience and the effectual
complaints of the people, America would not long retain her
rank among the nations. For eighteen hundred years, though
perchance I have no right to say it, the New Testament has
been written; yet where is the legislator who has wisdom and
practical talent enough to avail himself of the light which
it sheds on the science of legislation.
The authority of government, even such as I am willing
to submit to--for I will cheerfully obey those who know and
can do better than I, and in many things even those who
neither know nor can do so well--is still an impure one: to
be strictly just, it must have the sanction and consent of
the governed. It can have no pure right over my person and
property but what I concede to it. The progress from an
absolute to a limited monarchy, from a limited monarchy to a
democracy, is a progress toward a true respect for the
individual. Even the Chinese philosopher was wise enough to
regard the individual as the basis of the empire. Is a
democracy, such as we know it, the last improvement possible
in government? Is it not possible to take a step further
towards recognizing and organizing the rights of man? There
will never be a really free and enlightened State until the
State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and
independent power, from which all its own power and
authority are derived, and treats him accordingly. I please
myself with imagining a State at last which can afford to be
just to all men, and to treat the individual with respect as
a neighbor; which even would not think it inconsistent with
its own repose if a few were to live aloof from it, not
meddling with it, nor embraced by it, who fulfilled all the
duties of neighbors and fellow men.
