They may gravely deny this, but do not
believe them.
In the midst of all this disorder and imperfection in human affairs which he
would rather avoid to think of comes the Reformer, the impersonation of
disorder and imperfection; to heal and reform them; seeking to discover the
divine order and conform to it; and earnestly asking the cooperation of men.
No doubt the evil is great and manifest, and something must certainly be done;
and his zeal is in proportion to the urgency of the case — but I know of
few radicals as yet who are radical enough, and have not got this name rather
by meddling with the exposed roots of innocent institutions than with their
own.
The disease and disorder in society are wont to be referred to the false
relations in which men live one to another, but strictly speaking there can
be no such thing as a false relation if the condition of the things related
is true. False relations grow out of false conditions. The inmate of a
poorhouse would be more pauper still on a desolate island, and the convict
would find his prison and prison discipline there.
It is not the worst reason why the reform should be a private and individual
enterprise, that perchance the evil may be private also. From what southern
plains comes up the voice of wailing — under what latitudes reside the
heathen to whom we would send light — and who is that intemperate and
brutal man whom he would redeem?
Now, if anything ail a man so that he does not perform his functions;
especially if his digestion is poor, though he may have considerable nervous
strength left; if he has failed in all his undertakings hitherto; if he has
committed some heinous sin and partially repents, what does he do? He sets
about reforming the world. Do ye hear it, ye Woloffs, ye Patagonians, ye
Tartars, ye Nez Percés? The world is going to be reformed, formed once
and for all. Presto — Change! Methinks I hear the glad tidings spreading
over the green prairies of the west; over the silent South American pampas,
parched African deserts, and stretching Siberian versts; through the populous
Indian and Chinese villages, along the Indus, the Ganges, and Hydaspes.
There is no reformer on the globe, no such philanthropic, benevolent and
charitable man, now engaged in any good work anywhere, sorely afflicted by
the sight of misery around him, and animated by the desire to relieve it,
who would not instantly and unconsciously sign off from these pure labors,
and betake himself to purer, if he had but righted some obscure, and perhaps
unrecognized private grievance.
