II.

The way is now prepared to consider the character, conditions, and

limitations of this law, the duties it enjoins, and the encouragements

it affords.

Let me state the law as I understand it. Man, as an individual, is

capable of indefinite improvement. Societies and nations, which are

but aggregations of men, and, finally, the Human Family, or collective

Humanity, are capable of indefinite improvement. And this is the

destiny of man, of societies, of nations, and of the Human Family.

Restricting the proposition to the capacity for indefinite improvement,

I believe I commend it to the candor and intelligence of all who have

meditated upon this subject. And this brings me to the remarkable

words of Leibnitz. He boldly says, as we have already seen, that man

seems able to arrive at perfection. Turgot and Condorcet also speak of

his "perfectibility,"--a term adopted by recent French writers. If by

this is meant simply that man is capable of indefinite improvement,

then it will not be questioned. But whatever the heights of virtue

and intelligence to which he may attain in future ages, who can doubt

that to his grander vision new summits will ever present themselves,

provoking him to still grander aspirations? God only is perfect.

Knowledge and goodness, his attributes, are infinite; nor can man hope,

in any lapse of time, to comprehend this immensity. In the infinitude

of the universe, he will seem, like Newton, with all his acquisitions,

only to have gathered a few pebbles by the seaside. In a similar

strain Leibnitz elsewhere says that the place which God assigns to man

in space and time necessarily limits the perfections he is able to

acquire. As in Geometry the asymptote constantly approaches its curve,

so that the distance between them is constantly diminishing, and yet,

though prolonged indefinitely, they never meet, so, according to him,

are infinite souls the asymptotes of God.

* * * * *

There are revolutions in history seeming on a superficial view

inconsistent with this law. From early childhood attention is directed

to Greece and Rome; and we are sometimes taught that these two powers

reached heights which subsequent nations cannot hope to equal, much

less surpass. I would not disparage the triumphs of the ancient mind.

The eloquence, the poetry, the philosophy, the art, of Athens still

survive, and bear no mean sway upon earth. Rome, too, yet lives in her

jurisprudence, which, next after Christianity, has exerted a paramount

influence over the laws of modern communities.

But exalted as these productions may be, it is impossible not to

perceive that something of their present importance is derived from

the early period when they appeared, something from the unquestioning

and high-flown admiration of them transmitted through successive

generations until it became a habit, and something also from the

disposition, still prevalent, to elevate Antiquity at the expense

of subsequent ages. Without undertaking to decide if the genius of

Antiquity, as displayed by individuals, can justly claim supremacy,

it would be easy to show that the ancient plane of civilization never

reached our common level. The people were ignorant, vicious, and poor,

or degraded to abject slavery,--itself the sum of all injustice and all

vice. Even the most illustrious characters, whose names still shine

from that distant night, were little more than splendid barbarians.

Architecture, sculpture, painting, and vases of exquisite perfection

attest an appreciation of beauty in form; but our masters in these

things were strangers to the useful arts, as to the comforts and

virtues of home. Abounding in what to us are luxuries, they had not

what to us are necessaries.

Without knowledge there can be no sure Progress. Vice and barbarism are

the inseparable companions of ignorance. Nor is it too much to say,

that, except in rare instances, the highest virtue is attained only

through intelligence. This is natural; for to do right, we must first

understand what is right. But the people of Greece and Rome, even in

the brilliant days of Pericles and Augustus, could not arrive at this

knowledge. The sublime teachings of Plato and Socrates--calculated in

many respects to promote the best interests of the race--were limited

in influence to a small company of listeners, or to the few who could

obtain a copy of the costly manuscripts in which they were preserved.

Thus the knowledge and virtue acquired by individuals were not diffused

in their own age or secured to posterity.

Now, at last, through an agency all unknown to Antiquity, knowledge

of every kind has become general and permanent. It can no longer be

confined to a select circle. It cannot be crushed by tyranny, or lost

by neglect. It is immortal as the soul from which it proceeds. This

alone renders all relapse into barbarism impossible, while it affords

an unquestionable distinction between ancient and modern times. The

Press, watchful with more than the hundred eyes of Argus, strong

with more than the hundred arms of Briareus, not only guards all the

conquests of civilization, but leads the way to future triumphs.

Through its untiring energies, the meditation of the closet, or the

utterance of the human voice, which else would die away within the

precincts of a narrow room, is prolonged to the most distant nations

and times, with winged words circling the globe. We admire the genius

of Demosthenes, Sophocles, Plato, and Phidias; but the printing-press

is a higher gift to man than the eloquence, the drama, the philosophy,

and the art of Greece.

There is yet another country which presents a problem for the student

of Progress. In vivid phrase Sir James Mackintosh pictures the "ancient

and _immovable_ civilization of China."[262] But in these words he

spoke rather from impressions than from actual knowledge. By the side

of the impulsive movement of modern Europe, the people of this ancient

empire may appear stationary; but it can hardly be doubted that they

have advanced, though according to a scale unlike our own. It is

difficult to assign satisfactory reasons for the seeming inertness of

their national life. Perhaps I shall not err, if I refer it to peculiar

constitutional characteristics,--to inherent difficulties of their

language as an instrument of knowledge,--to national vanity on an

exaggerated scale, making them look down upon others,--to an insulation

excluding all others,--and also to the habit of unhesitating deference

to Antiquity, and of "backward-looking thoughts," cultivated by the

Chinese from the distant days of Confucius. They do not know the Law of

Human Progress.

[262] Discourse on the Study of the Law of Nature and Nations, p.

34.

In receiving this law, two conditions of Humanity are recognized:

first, its unity or solidarity; and, secondly, its indefinite duration

upon earth. And now of these in their order.

1. It is true, doubtless, that there are various races of men; but

there is but one great Human Family, in which Caucasian, Ethiopian,

Chinese, and Indian are all brothers, children of _one_ Father, and

heirs to _one_ happiness. Though variously endowed, they are all

tending in the same direction; nor can the light obtained by one be

withheld from any. The ether discovery in Boston will soothe pain

hereafter in Africa and in Asia, in Abyssinia and in China. So are we

all knit together, that words of wisdom and truth, which first sway the

hearts of the American people, may help to elevate benighted tribes of

the most distant regions. The vexed question of modern science, whether

these races proceeded originally from one stock, does not interfere

with the sublime revelation of Christianity, the Brotherhood of Man. In

the light of science and of religion, Humanity is an organism, complex,

but still one,--throbbing with one life, animated by one soul, every

part sympathizing with every other part, and the whole advancing in one

indefinite career of Progress.

2. And what is the measure of this career? It is common to speak of the

long life already passed by man on earth; but how brief and trivial

is this, compared with the countless ages before him! According to

received chronology, six thousand years have not yet elapsed since his

creation. But the science of Geology, that unimpeached interpreter of

the Past, now demonstrates (and here the geology of New York furnishes

important evidence), that, anterior to the commencement of human

history, this globe had endured for ages upon ages, baffling human

calculation and imagination. Without losing ourselves in the stupendous

speculations with regard to different geological epochs, before the

earth assumed its present figure, and when it was occupied only by

races of animals now extinct, it may not be without interest to glance

at the age of the epoch in which we live. This, happily, we are able to

do.

From the flow of rivers we have a gigantic measure of geological time.

It is supposed that the Falls of Niagara were once at Queenstown, and

that they have gradually worn their way back in the living rock, for

a distance of seven miles, to the place where they now pour their

thunders. An ingenious English geologist, a high authority in his

science, Sir Charles Lyell, assuming that this retreat might have

been at the rate of one foot a year, shows that the cataract must

have poured over that rock for a period of at least 36,960 years. And

the same authority teaches us that the alluvion at the mouth of the

Mississippi, the delta formed by the deposits of that mighty river

(here let it be remarked that alluvions and sand-banks are the most

recent geological formations on the surface of the earth, being nearest

to our own age), could not have been accumulated within a shorter

period than 100,500 years.[263] Even this term, so vast to our small

imagination, is only one of a series composing the present epoch;

and the epoch itself is but a unit in a still grander series. These

measurements, adopted in this branch of knowledge, can be little more

than vague approximations; but they teach, from the lips of Science, as

perhaps nothing else can, the infinite ages through which this globe

has already travelled, and the infinite ages which seem to be its

future destiny.

[263] Lyell's Principles of Geology (7th ed.), Vol. I. p. 216.

Lyell's Travels in North America, Ch. 2. Horner's Anniversary

Address, for 1847, before the London Geological Society, pp. 23-27.

D'Archiac, Histoire des Progrès de la Géologie, Tom. I. p. 358.

Thus we stand now between two infinities,--the infinity of the Past,

and the infinity of the Future; and the infinity of the Future is equal

to the infinity of the Past. In comparison with these untold spaces

before and after, what, indeed, are the six thousand years of human

history? In the contemplation of Man, what littleness! what grandeur!

how diminutive in the creation! how brief his recorded history! and yet

how vast in hopes! how majestic and transcendent in the Future!

If there be any analogy between his life on earth and that of the

frailest plant or shell-fish, as now seen in the light of science,

he must still be in his earliest and most helpless infancy. In vain

speak of Antiquity in his history; for all his present records are as

a day, an hour, a moment, in the unimaginable immensity of duration

which seems to await the globe and its inhabitants. In the sight of

our distant descendants, successive eras of the brief span which we

call History will melt into one; and as to present vision stars far

asunder seem near together, so Nimrod and Sesostris, Alexander and

Cæsar, Tamerlane and Napoleon, will seem to be contemporaries. Nor

is it any exaggeration to suppose that in the unborn ages, illumined

by a truth now, alas! too dimly perceived, the class of warriors and

conquerors, of which these are signal types, will become extinct,--like

the gigantic land reptiles and monster crocodileans belonging to a

departed period of zoölogical history.

* * * * *

Admitting the Unity of Mankind, and an Indefinite Future on earth, it

becomes easy to anticipate triumphs which else were impossible. Few

will question that Man, as an individual, is capable of indefinite

improvement, so long as he lives. This capacity is inborn. None so

poor as not to possess it. Even the idiot, so abject in condition,

is found at last to be within the sphere of education. Circumstances

alone are required to call this capacity into action; and in proportion

as knowledge, virtue, and religion prevail in a community will that

sacred atmosphere be diffused under whose genial influence the most

forlorn may grow into forms of unimagined strength and beauty. This

capacity for indefinite improvement, which belongs to the individual,

must belong also to society; for society does not die, and through the

improvement of its individuals has the assurance of its own advance. It

is immortal on earth, and will gather constantly new and richer fruits

from the teeming generations, as they stretch through unknown time. To

Chinese vision the period of the present may seem barren, but it is

sure to yield its contribution to the indefinite accumulations which

are the token of an indefinite Progress.

Tables speak sometimes as words cannot. From statistics of life, as

recorded by Science, we learn the capacity for progress in the Human

Family; the testimony is authentic, as it is interesting. A little

more than two centuries have passed since Descartes predicted that

improvement in human health which these figures exhibit. Could this

seer of Science revisit the scene of his comprehensive labors and

divine aspirations, he might well be astonished to learn how, in

the lapse of so short a period in the life of Humanity, his glowing

anticipations have been fulfilled. From the following tables[264] we

learn that even the conqueror Death has been slowly driven back, and

his inevitable triumph postponed.

[264] Supplied to me by the late Professor H.D. Rogers, from the

notes of his Lectures.

_Table showing the Diminution of Mortality in different Countries._

Deaths in England, in 1690, 1 in 33, in 1848, 1 in 47.

" France, in 1776, 1 in 25½, in 1848, 1 in 42.

" Germany, in 1788, 1 in 32, in 1848, 1 in 40.

" Sweden, in 1760, 1 in 34, in 1848, 1 in 41.

" Roman States, in 1767, 1 in 21½, in 1829, 1 in 28.

_Diminution of Mortality in Cities._

Deaths in London, in 1690, 1 in 24, in 1844, 1 in 44.

" Paris, in 1650, 1 in 25, in 1829, 1 in 32.

" Berlin, in 1755, 1 in 28, in 1827, 1 in 34.

" Vienna, in 1750, 1 in 20, in 1829, 1 in 25.

" Rome, in 1770, 1 in 21, in 1828, 1 in 31.

" Geneva, in 1560, 1 in 18, in 1821, 1 in 40.

Glancing at the cradle of nations and races risen to grandeur, and

observing the wretchedness by which they were originally surrounded,

we learn that no lot is removed from the influence of this law. The

Feejee Islander, the Bushman, the Hottentot, the Congo negro, is not

too low for its care. No term of imagined "finality" can arrest it.

The polished Briton, whose civilization we now admire, traces his

long-descended lineage from one of those painted barbarians whose

degradation still lives in the pages of Julius Cæsar. Slowly, and by

degrees, he has reached the height where he now stands; but this is no

"finality." The improvement of the Past is the earnest of yet further

improvement in the long ages of the Future. And who can doubt, that,

in the lapse of time, as the Christian Law is gradually fulfilled, the

elevation of the Briton will be shared by all his fellow-men?

The tokens of improvement may appear at a special period, in a limited

circle only, among the people, favored of God, enjoying peculiar

benefits of commerce and Christianity; but the happy influence cannot

be narrowed to any time, place, or people. Every victory over evil

redounds to the benefit of all. Every discovery, every humane thought,

every truth, when declared, is a conquest of which the whole Human

Family are partakers, extending by so much their dominion, while it

lessens by so much the sphere of future struggle and trial. Thus, while

Nature is always the same, the power of Man is ever increasing. Each

day gives him some new advantage. The mountains have not diminished in

size; but Man has overcome the barriers they interpose. The winds and

waves are not less capricious now than when they first beat upon the

ancient Silurian rocks; but the steamboat,

"Against the wind, against the tide,

Now steadies on with upright keel."

The distance between two points on the surface of the globe is the

same to-day as when the continents were upheaved from their ocean-bed;

but the art of man triumphs over such separation, and distant people

commune together. Much remains to be done; but the Creator did not

speak in vain, when he blessed his earliest children, and bade them

"multiply, and replenish the earth, and _subdue it_."

There will be triumphs nobler than any over inanimate Nature. Man

himself will be subdued,--subdued to abhorrence of vice, injustice,

violence,--subdued to the sweet charities of life,--subdued to all the

requirements of duty,--subdued, according to the Law of Human Progress,

to the recognition of that Gospel Law of Human Brotherhood, by the side

of which the first is only as the scaffolding upon the sacred temple.

To labor for this end was man sent forth into the world,--not in the

listlessness of idle perfections, but endowed with infinite capacities,

inspired by infinite desires, and commanded to strive perpetually after

excellence, amidst the encouragements of hope, the promises of final

success, and the inexpressible delights from its pursuit. Thus does the

Law of Human Progress

"assert eternal Providence,

And justify the ways of God to men,"

by showing Evil no longer a gloomy mystery, binding the world in

everlasting thrall, but an accident, under benign Power destined to be

surely subdued, as the Human Family press on to the promised goal of

happiness.

* * * * *

While recognizing Humanity as progressive, it is important to consider

a condition or limitation which may justly temper the ardors of the

reformer. Nothing is accomplished except by time and exertion. Nature

abhors violence and suddenness. Nature does everything slowly and by

degrees. It takes time for the seed to grow into "the bright consummate

flower." It is many years before the slender shoot grows into the tree.

It is slowly that we pass from infancy and imbecility to manhood and

strength. Arrived at this stage, we are still subject to the same

condition of Nature. A new temperature or a sudden stroke of light may

shock us. Our frames are not made for extremes; so that death may come,

according to the poet's conceit, "in aromatic pain."

Gradual change is a necessary condition of the Law of Progress. It is

only, according to the poetical phrase of Tacitus, _per intervalla

ac spiramenta temporum_, "by intervals and breathings of time," that

we can hope to make a sure advance. Men grow and are trained in

knowledge and virtue; but they cannot be compelled into this path. This

consideration teaches candor and charity towards all who do not yet

see the truth as we do. It admonishes us also, while keeping the eye

steadfast on the good we seek, to moderate our expectations, and be

content when the day of triumph is postponed, for it cannot be always.

This essential condition of the Law of Progress serves to reconcile

movement with stability, and to preserve order even in change; as in

Nature all projectile forces are checked and regulated by the law of

inertia, and the centrifugal motion of the planets is restrained by the

attraction of gravitation. In this principle of moderation, honestly

pursued, from proper motives, and promising the "well-ripened fruits

of wise delay," we find a just Conservatism, which, though not always

satisfying our judgment, can never fail to secure our respect.

But there is another Conservatism,--and its treatment belongs to this

occasion,--of a different character, which performs no good office,

and cannot secure respect. Child of indifference, of ignorance, of

prejudice, of selfishness, it seeks to maintain things precisely as

they are, deprecates every change, and, disregarding the _transitory_

condition of all that is human, blindly prays for the _perpetuity_ of

existing institutions. Such an influence is productive of disorder

rather than order, and is destructive rather than justly conservative.

Contrary to the Law of Progress, it plants itself upon ancient ways,

and vainly exalts all that was done by our ancestors, as beyond

addition and above amendment. It is well illustrated in the early

verses,--

All that is newe, and ever do crye,

The old is better, awaye with the newe,

Because it is false and the old is true";

and again, in the conversation between two eminent English

ecclesiastics. "Brother of Winchester," said Cranmer to Lord Chancellor

Gardyner, "you like not anything new, unless you be yourself the

author thereof." "Your Grace wrongeth me," replied the inveterate

Conservative. "I have never been author yet of any one new thing; for

which I thank my God."[265] Such a Conservatism is the bigotry of

science, of literature, of jurisprudence, of religion, of politics. An

example will exhibit its character.

[265] Campbell's Lives of the Lord Chancellors, Vol. II. ch. 40, p.

51.

When Sir Samuel Romilly proposed to abolish the punishment of death

for stealing a pocket-handkerchief, the Commons of England consulted

certain officials of the law, who assured the House that such an

innovation would endanger the whole criminal law of the realm. And when

afterwards this illustrious reformer and model lawyer (for, of all men

in the history of the English law, Romilly is most truly the model

lawyer) proposed to abolish the obscene punishment for high treason,

requiring the offender to be drawn and quartered, and his bowels to

be thrown into his face, while his body yet palpitates with life,

the Attorney-General of the day, in opposing this humane amendment,

asked, "Are the safeguards, the ancient landmarks, the bulwarks of

the Constitution, to be thus hastily removed?" Which gave occasion

for the appropriate exclamation in reply, "What! to throw the bowels

of an offender into his face, one of the safeguards of the British

Constitution! I ought to confess that until this night I was wholly

ignorant of this bulwark!"[266] An irrational enormity, with a fit

parallel only in our own country, where Slavery is called a "divine

institution," and important to the stability of our Constitution!

[266] Essays of Basil Montagu, p. 69.

"_Esto perpetua!_" was the dying conservative ejaculation of Paul

Sarpi, the Venetian friar, over the constitution of his atrocious

republic; and this same phrase is invoked by Sir William Blackstone for

the British Constitution, enfolding so many inequalities and so many

abuses. It were well--and here all must agree--to exclaim of Truth, of

Justice, of Peace, of Freedom, _May it be perpetual!_ But is it not

irrational to make this claim for any institutions of human device, and

therefore finite? How can they provide for the Infinite Future? The

Finite cannot measure the Infinite. Nothing from Man's hands--nor laws,

nor constitutions--can be perpetual. It is God alone who builds for

eternity. His laws are everlasting.

Out of this pernicious prejudice have proceeded that persecution

and neglect which are the too frequent lot of the world's pioneers.

Among the ancient Greeks, the wisdom which first assigned the natural

cause of thunder and storm was condemned by conservative savages as

impiety to the gods. In the eighth century, an ignorant conservative

Pope persecuted a priest who declared that the world was round. At

a later day, to the everlasting scandal of mankind, the book of

Copernicus, unfolding the true system of the universe, was branded by

a conservative Papal bull as heretical and false, and Galileo, after

announcing the annual and diurnal motions of the earth, was sentenced

to the dungeons of the conservative Inquisition. This was in Italy;

but in England--and here we come nearer home--Harvey was accustomed

to say, that, after the publication of his book on the circulation of

the blood,--one of the epochs of modern discovery,--"he fell mightily

in his practice, and it was believed by the vulgar that he was

crack-brained, and all the physicians were against his opinion."[267]

According to him, nobody older than forty, at the time of his

discovery, received it as true. The age of forty was the dividing

line of life,--a Mason and Dixon's line,--determining the capacity to

receive that discovery. This little story may admonish all who have

passed that conservative line to be careful how they are inhospitable

to any new truth.

[267] Aubrey's Letters and Lives, Vol. II. p. 383.

This same undue tenacity to existing things and repugnance to what is

new threw impediments in the way of successive improvements by which

travel and intercourse among men are promoted. Surely stage-coaches,

when first introduced into England, must have been welcome, though

novel, as contributing to the comfort of men. But this was not the

case universally. An early writer calls for their suppression,

breaking forth against them in this wise. "These coaches," he says,

"are one of the greatest mischiefs that hath happened of late years

to the kingdom,--mischievous to the public, destructive to trade, and

prejudicial to lands. First, by destroying the breed of good horses,

the strength of the nation, and making men careless of attaining to

good horsemanship, a thing so useful and commendable in a gentleman:

for, hereby they become weary and listless, when they ride a few miles,

and unwilling to get on horseback, not able to endure frost, snow, or

rain, or to lodge in the fields; and what reason, save only their using

themselves so tenderly, and their riding in these stage-coaches, can

be given for this their inability? Secondly, by hindering the breed

of watermen, who are the nursery for seamen, and they the bulwark of

the kingdom: for, if these coaches were down, watermen, as formerly,

would have work, and be encouraged to take apprentices, whereby their

number would every year greatly increase. Thirdly, by lessening of his

Majesty's revenues: for now four or five travel in a coach together,

without any servants, and it is they that occasion the consumption

of beer and ale on the roads; and all inn-keepers do declare that

they sell not half the drink nor pay the king half the excise they

did before these coaches set up."[268] Such was the conservative

bill of indictment against stage-coaches. The history of canals, of

steamboats, and, lastly, of railways, shows similar prejudices. Even

Mr. Jefferson (and I cannot mention him as an immoderate conservative),

when told that the State of New York had explored the route of a

canal from the Hudson to Lake Erie, and found it practicable,--that

same canal which now, like a thread of silver, winds its way through

your imperial State,--replied, that "it was a very fine project, and

might be executed a century hence." This is only a little better than

the observation of the Greenwich pensioners, who, on first seeing

the steamboat upon the waters of the Thames, as they looked out from

their palatial home, said, "We do not like the steamboat, it is so

contrary to Nature." In our own country, Fitch brought forward the

idea of a steamboat amidst ill-disguised sneers; and at a later day,

Fulton, while building his first experiment at New York, was viewed

with indifference or contempt, as a visionary; and when, at last, he

accomplished the long distance to Albany, distrust of the Future still

prevailed, and it was doubted if the voyage could be accomplished

again, or, if successful again, it was still doubted if the invention

could be of permanent value. Thus did this evil spirit perplex noble

aims! And in England, as late as 1825, railways were pronounced

"altogether delusions and impositions," and the conservative "Quarterly

Review," alluding to the opinion of certain engineers that the railway

engine could go eighteen or twenty miles an hour, says: "These gross

exaggerations may delude for a time, but must end in the mortification

of those concerned.... We should as soon expect the people of Woolwich

to suffer themselves to be fired off upon one of Congreve's ricochet

rockets, as trust themselves to the mercy of such a machine, going at

such a rate."[269]

[268] The Grand Concern of England, 1673: Harleian Miscellany, Vol.

VIII. pp. 539, 540.

[269] Quarterly Review, Vol. XXXI. pp. 361, 362. Illustrations of

this spirit might be indefinitely extended. One, made familiar

to the world by Macaulay's History, since this Address was

delivered, has too much point to be omitted. As late as the close

of the reign of Charles the Second, the streets of London, with a

population of half a million, were not lighted at night, and, as

a natural consequence, became the frequent scene of assassination

and outrage, perpetrated under the shelter of darkness. At last, in

1685, it was proposed to place a light, on moonless nights, before

every tenth door. This projected improvement was enthusiastically

applauded and furiously attacked. "The cause of darkness," says

Macaulay, "was not left undefended. There were fools in that age

who opposed the introduction of what was called the new light, as

strenuously as fools in our age have opposed the introduction of

vaccination and railroads, as strenuously as the fools of an age

anterior to the dawn of history doubtless opposed the introduction

of the plough and of alphabetical writing."--_History of England_,

Vol. I. ch. 3.

It is related that the Arve, a river of Switzerland, swollen by floods,

sometimes drives the waters of the Rhone back into the Lake of Geneva;

and the force is sometimes so great as to make the mill-wheels revolve

in a contrary direction. There are too many in the world who by their

efforts would cause the stream to flow back upon the fountain, and even

make the mill-wheels revolve in a contrary direction.

Unhappily, this same bigotry,--conservatism, if you will,--which has

blindly opposed improvement in physical comforts, sets its face more

passionately still against those movements whose direct object is the

elevation of the race. In all times and places it has persecuted the

prophets and stoned the gifted messengers of truth. Of its professors

Milton pictures the boldest type in Satan, who, knowing well the

sins and offences of mortals, would keep them ever in their present

condition, holding them fast in degradation, binding them in perpetual

slavery, nor indulging in any aspiration, except of long dominion over

a captive race, whose sorrows and hopes cannot touch his impenetrable

soul. From a sketch by another hand we learn something of his activity.

With honest plainness, characteristic of himself and his age, the

early English prelate, Latimer, says, in one of his sermons, "The Devil

is the most diligentest bishop and preacher in all England."[270] It

may be said with equal truth,--and none can question it,--that he is

the busiest and most offensive Conservative.

[270] Of the Plough: Sermons, Vol. I. p. 65.

Time forbids my dwelling longer on the ample illustrations of this

influence: nor need I. One world-renowned example shall suffice. The

early efforts in England for the overthrow of the slave-trade were

encountered by an enmity black as the bad passions of the crime itself.

In Liverpool the excited slave-traders threatened to throw Clarkson

into the dock. But gradually the heart of the nation was touched,

until at last the people of England demanded the abolition of this

Heaven-defying traffic.

Thus ever has Truth moved on,--though opposed and reviled, still mighty

and triumphant. Rejected by the rich and powerful, by the favorites of

fortune and of place, she finds shelter with those who often have no

shelter for themselves. It is such as these that most freely welcome

moral truth, with its new commandments. Not the dwellers in the glare

of the world, but the humble and lowly, most clearly perceive this

truth,--as watchers placed in the depths of a well observe the stars

which are obscured to those who live in the effulgence of noon. Free

from egotism and prejudice, whether of self-interest or of class,

without cares and temptations, whether of wealth or power, dwelling

in the mediocrity or obscurity of common life, they discern the new

signal, and surrender unreservedly to its guidance. The Saviour knew

this. He did not call upon Priest or Levite or Pharisee to follow him,

but upon the humble fishermen by the Sea of Galilee.

Let us, then, be of good cheer. From the great Law of Progress we

derive at once our duties and our encouragements. Humanity has

ever advanced, urged by instincts and necessities implanted by

God,--thwarted sometimes by obstacles, causing it for a time, a moment

only in the immensity of ages, to deviate from its true line, or

seem to retreat, but still ever onward. At last we know the law of

this movement; we fasten our eyes upon that star, unobserved in the

earlier ages, which lights the way to the Future, opening into vistas

of infinite variety and extension. Amidst the disappointments which

attend individual exertions, amidst the universal agitations which

now surround us, let us recognize this law, let us follow this star,

confident that whatever is just, whatever is humane, whatever is good,

whatever is true, according to an immutable ordinance of Providence, in

the sure light of the Future, must prevail. With this faith, we place

our hands, as those of little children, in the great hand of God. He

will guide and sustain us--through pains and perils it may be--in the

path of Progress.

In such a faith there are motives to beneficent activity which will

endure to the last syllable of life. Let the young embrace this law;

it shall be to them an ever-living spring. Let the old cherish this

law; it shall be to them a staff for support. It will give to all,

young and old, a new appreciation of their existence, a new sentiment

of their force, a new revelation of their destiny. It will be as

another covenant, witnessed by the bow in the heavens, not only that

no honest, earnest effort for the welfare of man can be in vain, but

that it shall send a quickening influence through uncounted ages, and

contribute to the coming of that Future of Intelligence, Freedom, Peace

we would now secure for ourselves, but cannot. Though not ourselves

partakers of these brighter days, ours may be the pleasure at least of

foreseeing them, of enjoying them in happy vision, or the satisfaction,

sweeter still, of hastening by some moments the too distant epoch.

A life filled with this thought will have comforts and consolations

else unknown. In the flush of youthful ambition, or in the

self-confidence of success, we may be indifferent to the calls of

Humanity; but history, reason, and religion all speak in vain, if

any selfish works, not helping the Progress of Man, although favored

by worldly smile, can secure that happiness and content so much

coveted as the crown of life. Look at the last days of Talleyrand,

and learn the wretchedness of an old age enlightened by no memory

of generous toil, by no cheerful hope for our fellow-men. When the

weakness of years rendered him no longer able to grasp power or hold

the threads of intrigue, he surrendered himself to discouragement

and despair. By the light of a lamp trimmed in solitude he traced

these lines, the most melancholy ever written by an old man,--think

of them, politician!--"Eighty-three years of life are now passed!

filled with what anxieties! what agitations! what enmities! what

troublous complexities! _And all this with no other result than a

great weariness, physical and moral, and a profound sentiment of

discouragement with regard to the Future and of disgust for the

Past._"[271] Poor old man! Poor indeed! In loneliness, in failing

age, with death waiting at his palace-gate, what to him were the

pomps he had enjoyed? what were titles? what were offices? what the

lavish wealth in which he lived? More precious far at that moment the

consolation that he had labored for his fellow-men, and the joyous

confidence that all his cares had helped the Progress of his race!

[271] Louis Blanc, Histoire de Dix Ans, Tom. V. ch. 10.

Be it, then, our duty and our encouragement to live and to labor,

ever mindful of the Future. But let us not forget the Past. All

ages have lived and labored for us. From one has come art; from

another jurisprudence; from another the compass; from another the

printing-press; from all have descended priceless lessons of truth

and virtue. The most distant are not without a present influence on

our daily lives. The mighty stream of Progress, though fed by many

tributary waters and hidden springs, derives something of its force

from the earlier currents which leap and sparkle in distant mountain

recesses, over precipices, among rapids, and beneath the shade of the

primeval forest.

Nor should we be too impatient to witness the fulfilment of our

aspirations. The daily increasing rapidity of discovery and

improvement, and the daily multiplying efforts of beneficence,

outstripping the imaginations of the most sanguine, furnish assurance

that the advance of man will be with a constantly accelerating speed.

The extending intercourse among the nations of the earth, and all

the children of the Human Family, gives new promise of the complete

diffusion of Truth, penetrating the most distant places, chasing away

the darkness of night, and exposing the hideous forms of Slavery,

War, and Wrong, which must be hated in proportion as they are seen.

And yet, while confident of the Future, and surrounded by heralds of

certain triumph, it becomes us to moderate our anticipations, nor

imitate those children of the Crusades, who, in their long journey from

Western Europe,

"to seek

In Golgotha him dead who lives in Heaven,"

hailed each city and castle which they approached as the Jerusalem that

was to be the end of their wanderings. Though the goal is distant, and

ever advancing, the march is none the less certain. As well attempt

to make the sun stand still in his course, or restrain the sweet

influences of the Pleiades, as arrest the incessant, irresistible

movement which is the appointed destiny of man.

Cultivate, then, a just moderation. Learn to reconcile order with

change, stability with progress. This is a wise conservatism; this is

a wise reform. Rightly understanding these terms, who would not be a

conservative, who would not be a reformer?--a conservative of all that

is good, a reformer of all that is evil,--a conservative of knowledge,

a reformer of ignorance,--a conservative of truths and principles whose

seat is the bosom of God, a reformer of laws and institutions which are

but the wicked or imperfect work of man,--a conservative of that divine

order which is found only in movement, a reformer of those earthly

wrongs and abuses which spring from a violation of the great Law of

Human Progress? Blending these two in one, may we not seek to be, at

the same time, _Reforming Conservatives and Conservative Reformers_?

And, finally, let a confidence in the Progress of our race be, under

God, a constant faith. Let the sentiment of loyalty, earth-born, which

once lavished itself on King or Emperor, give place to that other

sentiment, heaven-born, of devotion to Humanity. Let loyalty to one man

be exchanged for Love to Man. And be it our privilege to extend these

sacred influences throughout the land. So may we open to our country

new fields of peaceful victory, which shall not want the sympathies and

gratulations of the good citizen or the praises of the just historian.

Go forth, then, my country, "conquering and to conquer!"--not by

brutal violence, not by force of arms, not, oh! not on dishonest fields

of blood,--but in the majesty of Peace, Justice, Freedom, by the

irresistible might of Christian Institutions!