tried to escape us; but at sunrise we see, far to the south, a schooner,
and soon the flagship signals that a prize has been taken by one of our
fleet. It looks very much like the schooner we let go yesterday, and our
head officers swear, if it _is_ that schooner, never to let another go
so easily. One declares the vessel is loaded with cotton, and worth at
least $100,000, but that, notwithstanding, he will sell his share for
$500 in good gold. No one bids so high. Our ensign offers his for one
dollar, and the paymaster sells his to the surgeon for fifty cents, the
magnificence of which bargain the latter learns from the captain, who
says his share will be about seven and a half cents! We steam alongside,
and learn that our prize is the schooner St. George, bound for
Wilmington, via the Bermudas, with a cargo of salt, saltpetre, etc., and
worth perhaps four thousand dollars. We send our prize list on board the
flagship, and have a nice chat over the capture. It puts us in good
humor, and our vessels _chassée_ around each other till afternoon, when
we separate, to hear shortly that the schooner, on being searched, has
disclosed rich merchandise, gold, Whitworth guns, &c., hidden under her
nominal cargo of salt. So hurra again for our prize list! This _almost_
makes up for the loss of the steamer.
As we are on the point of letting go our anchor, the distant boom of
cannon is heard, and the flagship orders us to repair to the seat of
danger with all speed. We haste away, and as we go, hear a third gun
fired. It comes from the direction of the brig Perry, and we cut through
the water toward it, at a twelve-knot rate, for a good half hour, but
hearing no more firing, put in near the shore to watch for the rebel
vessel, as we think those guns were intended to put us on our guard. It
soon grows dark; lights are ordered out, and each man blinds his port.
No talking above a whisper must be heard; we are to be still as an
arctic night. Midnight passes, and lights still flicker along the shore.
It is so dark we cannot see the land, though not more than a mile from
it, and only know what it is by our compass and bearings, and the fires
which lighten up the clouds in spots right over them. One, two, and
three o'clock have passed; no sail or sound yet, and the night so dark
we cannot see a ship's length away. Half past three, and we begin to
heave anchor. The rattle of the chains is just enough to drown the sound
of paddle wheels should a steamer approach, and the sound of her own
wheels would in turn drown our noise; so if one does run in to land, it
may be over us, for any warning we should have of its whereabout.
Suddenly the acting master jumps, looks for an instant across the bows
into the thick darkness, and bids a boy report to the captain and
lieutenant 'a vessel almost on us.' The man at the windlass is stopped,
unshackles the chain, and lets the anchor go with a buoy attached.
Captain and lieutenant come on deck, and order to blaze away with our
fifty-pound Parrott. Crash! through the still air rings the sharp
report, and the ball goes whizzing through the gloom, in the direction
the vessel was seen. The bright flash of the gun, and the thick cloud of
smoke make the darkness tenfold more impenetrable. For half an hour, we
chase in every direction, then fire again toward the shore. It is just
four; a gray light is working up through the mist, and we catch the
faintest glimpse of the Daylight, one of our fleet. A few minutes later,
and we see a speck near the shore, which the spyglass shows to be the
steamer we chased and fired after in the night. The surf beats about
her; in her frantic efforts to escape, she in the darkness has been run
ashore by our close pursuit. We steam up, to get within range and
destroy, if we cannot take her, when the Daylight, now discovering her,
opens fire. Once, twice, three times she has banged away a broadside at
the rebel sidewheel, and now the batteries on shore in turn open fire on
her. The sea fog hangs like a shroud over and between us and the land,
which looms up mysteriously, stretching its gray length along the
western horizon. Spots of fire bursting from the midst of it, tear
through the fog cloud right at us. It seems, in its vast, vague
undefinedness, rather an old-time dragon, with mouth spouting fire and
thunder, than harmless earth. The smoke of our own guns settles around
us; our ears ring with our own firing: the excitement of the moment is
intense. The jets of flame seem to spout right at one, and the
inclination to dodge becomes very strong. The Daylight has stopped
firing: what is the matter? The fog lifts slightly, and as the flagship
advances to join in the fight, we see that the Daylight is moving back
to reload and let her pass in, which she does, entering the circle of
the rebel fire, between us and them. She finds it out quickly, for their
guns are brought to bear on her, and the balls strike the water
frightfully near. She turns, but, as she leaves the fiery circle,
delivers, one after the other, a whole broadside of guns, followed by
the Penobscot, who too gives them a few iron pills.
From six to eight A. M., the vessels gather in a cluster at
safe distance from the land, and the commanders of the different vessels
repair on board the flagship to consult what next shall be done.
Meanwhile the spyglass shows crowds of rebels along the shore, and great
efforts seem to be making to get the steamer off. Puffs of steam and
clouds of black smoke from her chimneys show that she is blowing off
steam, firing up, and pushing hard against the shore. Now her paddle
wheels are working; her stern is afloat. Again and again it is reported,
'She's getting herself off the beach; she'll soon be off!' but it does
not appear to hasten the powers that be, who apparently have decided
that, as it will not be high tide till nearly one P. M., she is
safely aground till then.
Finally, after long delay, it is decided that all hands shall be piped
to breakfast, and we go in for a regular fight afterward. So the
boatswain blows his whistle, and each man goes to his mess. Breakfast is
leisurely gone through with, and then the drum beats all to quarters.
And now it looks like serious work. Men gather round their guns eager
for battle, and the surgeon stands ready, instruments before him, for
whatever may come. But hardly are they ready for the fight, when the
rebel steamer, with its traitor flag floating high in air, has
extricated itself from the beach, and is steaming down the coast as fast
as it can go. The golden opportunity is lost--was lost when the morning
hour was spent in unnecessary discussion, eating, and drinking. Still
they try to make up for lost time by rapid firing now, for she may be
taking in a precious and comforting cargo of arms and other stores of
war. The shots fall close about her, but a little short. Whitworth guns
protect her as she goes, for our steamers dare not venture too near
land, lest some long-range ball smash through their steam chests. The
batteries from which the rebels fired were mostly erected after the
steamer ran ashore, and seemed to consist principally of field pieces
and guns hastily drawn to the spot, with no earthworks to protect them.
This speedy work of theirs was in strong contrast to our slow motions.
With a spyglass we could see telegraph poles stretched along the shore.
The steamer had probably not been ashore one hour, when eight miles
south to the fort, and eight or ten miles north to Wilmington, the news
had spread of its arrival, and busy hands bestirred themselves, dragging
up guns and ammunition to cover their stranded prize. As soon as
sunlight lit up the beach, squads of men were seen pulling at ropes to
work the vessel off the sandy beach. While they were thus engaged,
breakfast was being quietly eaten on board our vessels! We kept up our
fire till the steamer got under the guns of the fort and out of our
reach, and then retired; and so ended our chase in nothing but noise and
smoke.
We have given the reader a clue to a little of the inefficiency of the
Wilmington blockade. In our next paper, we shall endeavor to picture
some of the effects of naval life on character, and the strange
experiences one can have on shipboard, even in the monotony of life on a
blockader.
BUCKLE, DRAPER; CHURCH AND STATE.
_FOURTH PAPER._
In the first paper of this series, reference was made to the Principles
of _Unity_ and _Individuality_ as dominating over distinctive epochs of
the world's progress; and certain characteristics of each epoch were
pointed out which may be briefly recapitulated. Up to a period of time
which is commonly said to commence with the publication of Lord Bacon's
_Novum Organum_, the preponderating tendency in all the affairs of
Society--in Government, in Religion, in Thought, in Practical
Activities--was _convergent_ and toward Consolidation, Centralization,
Order, or, in one word, _Unity_; with a minor reference only to Freedom,
Independence, or Individuality. A change then took place, and the
Tendency to Unity began to yield, as the _major_ or _chief_ tendency in
society, to the opposite or divergent drift toward Disunity or
Individuality, which gradually came to be pre-eminently active. The
Spirit of Disintegration which thus arose, has exhibited and is still
exhibiting itself in Religious affairs, by the destruction of the
integrality of the Church, and its division into numerous sects; and in
the State, by the Democratic principle of popular rule, as opposed to
the Monarchical theory of the supremacy of one.
We have now arrived, in the course of our development as a race, at the
culminating point of the second Stage of Progress--the Era of
_Individuality_. The predominant tendency of our time in things
Religious, Governmental, Intellectual, and Practical, is toward the
utter rejection of all clogs upon the personal freedom of Man or Woman.
This is seen by the neglect into which institutions of all kinds tend to
fall, and the disrespect in which they are held; in the movements for
the abolition of Slavery and Serfdom; in the recognition of the people's
right of rule, even in Monarchical countries; more radically in the
Woman's Rights Crusade, and in the absolute rejection, by the School of
Reformers known as Individualists, of all governmental authority other
than that voluntarily accepted, as an infringement of the individual's
inherent right of self-sovereignty.
This Spirit of Individuality, this desire to throw off all trammels, and
to live in the atmosphere of one's own personality, exhibits itself in a
marked degree in the literature of our day. It is the animating spirit
of John Stuart Mill's work 'On Liberty'--a work which, as the writer has
elsewhere shown, was substantially borrowed, although without any openly
avowed acknowledgment of indebtedness, from an American publication. It
is this spirit which has inspired some of the most remarkable of Herbert
Spencer's Essays; and is distinctively apparent in the Fourth one of the
Propositions which Mr. Buckle affirms to be 'the basis of the history of
civilization;' and in the general tenor of Prof. Draper's _Intellectual
Development of Europe_.
The gist of this doctrine of Individuality, as it is now largely
prevalent in respect to the institutions of the Church and the State,
and which is squarely affirmed in the proposition above mentioned, is
this: Men and Women do not wish nor do they need a Spiritual Society to
teach them what to believe, nor a Political Society to teach them what
to do. If they are simply left alone, they will thrive well enough. An
Ecclesiastical Organization is not only useless, but positively
injurious; it is a decided hinderance to the progress of humanity; and
the same is true of a Civil Organization, except in so far as it serves
the purpose of protection to person and property.
It is intended to show in this article the erroneousness of this
doctrine; to point out that Religious and Political Institutions have,
in the past, been great aids to human advancement; that they are still
so; and will be in the future. In this manner we shall meet the
arguments of those who regard such institutions as having always been
unnecessary and a hinderance; and of those who, while considering them
as essential in the past, believe that they are now becoming obsolete,
are detrimental to the cause of human progress, and in the future to be
wholly dispensed with.
Mankind in its entirety resembles a pyramid. At the base are the
ignorant and superstitious nations of the earth, comprising the great
majority of its inhabitants. A step higher includes the next greatest
number of nations, in which the people are less ignorant and less
degraded, but still very low as respects organization and culture. So,
as we rise in the scale of national development, the lines of inclusion
continually narrow, until we reach the apex, occupied by the most
advanced nation or nations.
That which is true of nations is so of classes and of individuals
composing classes. Every community has its natural aristocracy, its
superior men and women. These constitute the top of the pyramid of
Society; and comprise those in whom intellectual powers, moral purposes,
and practical capacities are most highly developed and combined. Below
them comes the somewhat larger body of persons who are less endowed in
respect to the qualities just enumerated. Below these comes, in turn,
the still greater congregation who are still less gifted; and so on, the
number increasing as the range of general capacity decreases, until we
reach the layer which embodies the great mass of Society; who, though
measurably affectionate, well-intentioned, and docile, are ignorant,
superstitious, and simple minded, wanting in any large degree of high
moral purpose, and constantly prone to the development of the vicious
and depraved passions incident to this lower stratum of life.
It is evident that to meet the needs of these widely different grades of
individuals, widely different manners, customs, and institutions are
indispensable. Culture, delicacy, and intelligence have their own
attractions, which are wholly diverse from those of crudeness,
coarseness, and simplicity. The surroundings which would bring happiness
to the lover of art or the man of large mental endowment, would render
miserable the peasant who still lacked the development to appreciate the
elegancies of refinement; while the tidy cottage and plain comforts
which might constitute the paradise of the humble and illiterate rustic,
would be utterly inadequate to the requirements of larger and more
highly organized natures.
The Constitution and Structure of Society should be of such a nature,
therefore, for the purposes of human growth and happiness, as to allow
the needs and wants of every one of its members to be adequately
supplied. As yet there has been no such arrangement of our social
organization. In nations governed by Monarchical or Aristocratic rule,
the institutions of the country are made to satisfy the demands of the
privileged classes; with scarcely any reference to the wants of the
masses. In Democratic communities, the opposite method is adopted; and
the character of their public organizations and of their public
opinion--the latter always the most despotic of institutions--is
determined by the average notions of the middle class, which ordinarily
furnishes the bulk of the voters; with little consideration to the
desires of the higher or the necessities of the lower orders.
The institutions of any people, civil or religious, are, therefore,
representative, in the main, of the state of development of the dominant
and controlling class in the community. In a Monarchical or Aristocratic
nation it is the upper portion of the body politic whose condition is
chiefly indicated. In this case, the manners, customs, laws, etc., of
the country are _in advance_ of the great body of the people, who have
yet to grow up to them. In Democratic states, the manners, customs,
laws, etc., conform to the stage of advancement which the majority of
the people have reached. They are thus _above_ the level of the lower
classes, who are not sufficiently developed to participate in their full
benefits; and _below_ the capacity of the superior ranks, who, though
fitted for the right use and enjoyment of more liberal and higher social
adaptations, are nevertheless obliged to cramp their natures and dwarf
their activities to the measure of the capacities of the more numerous
circle of citizens.
Three classes have thus far been named as the _personnel_ of any
Society. There is, however, a body of individuals which, although made
up of persons from the three classes above indicated, constitute, in a
peculiar sense, a distinct order. This includes the Philosophers, Poets,
Scientists--the Thinkers of all kinds--who are in advance of the best
institutions of either Monarchical or Democratic countries; who see
farther into the future than even the great bulk of men of intelligence
and high development; who especially understand the transient nature and
inadequate provisions of existing societies, and feel the need of better
conditions for intellectual, social, and moral growth.
It is from this body of men that the incentives to progress chiefly
spring. They behold the errors which encumber old systems--they are,
indeed, too apt to conceive them as _wholly_ composed of errors. To
them, the common and current beliefs appear to be simply superstitious.
It irks them that humanity should wallow in its ignorance and blindness.
They chafe and fret against the organizations which embody and foster
what they are firmly convinced is _all_ false. The Church is, in their
eyes, only a vast agglomeration of priests, some of them self-deceived
through ignorance; most of them not so, but deliberately bolstering up
an obsolete faith for place, profit, and power. The State, both as
existing in the past and now, is likewise, in their understanding, a
tremendous engine of tyranny, keeping the light of knowledge from the
masses; withholding liberty; and hindering the prosperity of mankind.
That there is much truth in such opinions, too much by far, is not to be
denied. That Society needs regeneration in all departments of its
life--political, religious, industrial, and social--is plainly apparent.
But there is an essential omission in the kind of reform which is
spontaneously taking place at this time, and which is lauded by Mill,
Buckle, Spencer, Draper, and the advanced Thinkers of the day generally,
as the true direction in which change should be made; an omission which
will bring Society to disastrous revolution, even, it may be, to fatal
overthrow, unless supplied.
The tendency of modern reform in reference to the institutions of Church
and State--and these, in the sense in which they are here used, include
all other institutions--is, as has been said, to do away with the former
altogether, and to restrict the latter to the sole functions of
protection of person and property. Reformatory ideas come, it has also
been said, from that small circle of men and women in Society, who are
in advance of the general development of the age even as represented in
the superior class--meaning by this, the class which, in the average
estimate, occupies the highest position; as, for instance, the
Aristocracy in England, and the Wealthy Families of America.
Human Society, in all its Institutions, has been, thus far in the
history of the world, a thing of spontaneous, instinctual, or automatic
growth. There has never been and is not to-day, so far as is publicly
known, any _Science_ of Social Organization; any System of Laws or
Principles embodying the true mode of Social Construction. There has not
been, in other words, any discovery of the right Principles upon which
the affairs of mankind should be conducted in reference to their mutual
relationships; and hence, there is no real _knowledge_, but only
conjecture, of what are the right relations. _Might_ has always been the
accepted Right and the only Standard of Right in the regulation of
Society. The opinions of the Ruling Power give tone to human thought and
action. While Kings and Oligarchies were in the ascendency, the Standard
of Right--the King's or the Oligarchs' will--were based on his or their
ideas of right. Later, when the People secured the conduct of their own
affairs, the voice of the Majority became the voice of God, as expressed
in the popular motto: _Vox populi, vox Dei_.
Having then no Standard of true Social Organization, it is natural,
though short sighted, that the reformatory party--perceiving the
insufficiencies and drawbacks of our present Societary Arrangements,
feeling that _they_ have no need of the Governmental and Religious
institutions of the day, that these are, indeed, rather hindrances than
aids to _their_ progress--should think that the people of the whole
world, of the civilized nations, or of one civilized nation, at least,
were in like state of preparation, and that those Institutions could be
safely and advantageously dispensed with. There could scarcely be a
greater mistake. There are but comparatively few individuals in the
world who are so highly developed in their intellectual and moral
capacities, and in practical ability also, as to be competent to be a
law unto themselves in the general conduct of life. The great mass of
mankind, even in the most advanced communities, need still the guiding
hand of a wisely constituted and really paternal Government, and the
religious admonitions of a true priesthood. The greatest danger with
which Society is threatened in modern times, arises from the lack of
these essential concomitants of any high civilization. The degradation,
squalor, ignorance, and brutality of the lowest classes; the
irreverence, disrespect, dishonesty, and moral blindness of the middle
orders; and the apathy, heartlessness, unscrupulousness, selfishness,
cupidity, and irreligion of the upper stratum of Society, are alike due
to the absence of a rightly organized State, which should command the
allegiance, and of a rightly constituted Church, which should absorb the
devotion, of the whole community.
The Constitution of Society must be moulded with reference to the
character of the individuals in it. Of these, some are sagacious,
executive, intelligent, benevolent, sympathetic, philanthropic,
self-reliant; possessed of all the qualities, in fine, which inspire
respect and confidence in their fellow men, and cause them to be
recognized as leaders. Others are timid, ignorant, feeble-minded,
credulous, prone to lean upon others, hero worshippers; people whose
natural bent it is to follow some one in whom they put faith. The
sentiment of loyalty is inherent in the human breast, and will find an
object whereon to fasten. At one time it is an Alexander; then a
Washington, a Napoleon, or a Wellington; at another, a Clay, a Webster,
or a Grant. There are ranks and orders in Society as there are ranks and
orders among individuals. And as the inherent rank of an _individual_
is, as a general rule, recognized and accorded, no matter what may be
the social constitution of the land in which he lives, so it is with
_classes_. Theoretically, all individuals and orders are equal in the
United States. But the Law of Nature is stronger than the laws of man;
and the men and women of superior endowment in moral power, intellectual
force, or practical ability, receive the voluntary homage of those who
feel themselves to be inferior.