The only excuse to be made for all our mendicant diplomacy is the
same as in the case of all other mendicancy;--namely, that it has been
founded on absolute necessity. This deserves consideration. Necessity,
as it has no law, so it has no shame: but moral necessity is not like
metaphysical, or even physical. In that category it is a word of loose
signification, and conveys different ideas to different minds. To the
low-minded, the slightest necessity becomes an invincible necessity.
"The slothful man saith, There is a lion in the way, and I shall be
devoured in the streets." But when the necessity pleaded is not in the
nature of things, but in the vices of him who alleges it, the whining
tones of commonplace beggarly rhetoric produce nothing but indignation;
because they indicate a desire of keeping up a dishonourable existence,
without utility to others, and without dignity to itself; because they
aim at obtaining the dues of labour without industry; and by frauds
would draw from the compassion of others what men ought to owe to their
own spirit and their own exertions.