. "mm • CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY CORNELL UNrVERSITV LIBRARY 3 1924 088 025 832 DAT£: DUE Jf^ n jQft? ' ■Ri '^m-^ > ^i Dj l ii;. r" »it>--^ -^ JZ>1 tr^r -OE&*.n as acting wrong, unless he is always ready to give an answer to him that asks of him a reason. And what is that man good for who either has no principles of his own, or having them fears to live according to their dictates ? Can he respect himself? Can he look for any respect from others? Most assuredly not. The consciousness of his inferiority before the upright and conscientious man of independence, oppresses the timeserver ; it makes him wish that he could sink into the earth. Scarcely less con- temptible is the timorous partizan of other men's notions ; who, knowing nothing of himself, adopts blindly the views of those with whom chance brings him in contact ; who with honest intentions, is made the instru- ment of the designing, and the victim of the crafty ; who, having no chart to steer by, suffers himself to be blown about by every wind of doctrine ; who spends one part of his life in endeavouring to correct the mistakes which he should have avoided in another, and dies leaving his work unfinished ; who nullifies his own influence by perpetually undoing what he has done, and who cannot be respected for the purity of his motives, because we despise him for the inconsistency of his conduct. He who cannot think is an idiot ; he who will not is a bigot ; he who dares not is a slave : and he who thinking right, acts \,'rong, is without excuse or palliation a villain. The lyceum furnishes our young men with almost their only opportunity to cultivate in themselves that acute- ness and precision of thought which give the judgment a decided temperament, while it fosters also that firmness of purpose which is the natural result of an habitual reliance on one's own conclusions, and which conduces so much to confer a tone of independence on the whole moral character. If ever there was a time when it might seem peculiarly incumbent on every man about to enter on the active duties of manhood, to qualify himself to perform those duties understandingly and efficiently, and with a high and holy aim to the welfare of his fellow-creatures, that time is surely no other than the present. If ever there was a nation upon whom devolved much of duty to be discharged for the benefit of other nations, it is our own. If ever there was a people among whom it be- 132 MEMOIRS, SPEECHES AND WRITINGS hoved every individual strenuously to exert himself for the advance- ment of the general improvement and for the safety of the common cause, it is ourselves. For those whose lot was cast in the times of uni- versal ignorance, for those who now groan beneath the heavy yoke of castes, oligarchies and hierarchies, but little can be imagined to stimu- late them to acquisition, or to action. Why should a man open his eyes, if he must behold about him nothing but degradation and misery? Why should he study the history of his race, if that history is only the record of its sufferings and its crimes ? Why should he speculate on its coming fortunes, if the prospect before him is all dark and lowering, if the future threatens but to repeat the past? But now when the world is awakening to its true interests, when a new morning has burst upon the astonished nations, hope has arisen from the grave where liter- ature, and science, and common sense, and philosophy were buried with her for so many ages. All is not lost. Experience is no longer to be but a prophet of plagues forever boding ill. Prudence shall no longer confine herself to her single lesson. Forbear ! Attempt not good, for in so doing you shall assuredly effect evil ! She has abandoned her ungen- erous doctrine ; she walks hand in hand with philanthropy : she is not afraid to proclaim in the highways and public places that better days are in store for us. Mankind begin to know their friends, and to mark their enemies ; and henceforth he who would insure their favor must take his stand among the doers of good, and not as has been the case in the infancy and childhood of the world, among the doers of magnificent evils. But a little while and the purple garb of war shall cease to be a robe of glory. Wars of conquest will be ranked with assassinations for plunder ; and the ambitious for fame will employ their talents to enroll their names among the benefactors, and not among the destroyers of their species. There is much to encourage benevolent enterprise ; much to stimulate honorable ambition. Every quarter of the globe exhibits evidence of improvement, and promise of more rapid advances. The races of men hitherto inferior, whether from constitution or from cir- cumstances, are disappearing from the face of the earth, and giving place to those possessed of higher capacities both of virtue and enjoy- ment. The Saxon family, carrying with them the love of freedom which is a part of their nature, the language of freedom which is their inalienable birthright, and those free institutions, which, through centu- ries of bloody strife, their fathers have secured and perfected, have planted their colonies wherever agriculture could find a soil to cultivate, or commerce products to barter. Under the burning line, beneath the frozen pole, among the crowded millions of Hindostan, or over the deso- late wastes of New Holland, along the sultry coasts of Guinea, up the OP EGBERT KANTOUL, JR. 133 late explored current of the Niger, in the salubrious climate of South Africa, over the vast expanse of the North American continent, you find them everywhere, and wherever you find them industry and enter- prise, intelligence and virtue, civilization and freedom are their insepa- rable companions. But the great comparative increase of the white race, and the unparalleled rapidity with which the Saxon branch of that race spreads and multiplies, are not the only symptoms of a great and lasting amelioration in the condition of the human family. The great European revolution now going on, not steadily, but with throes and spasms, cannot cease till society has assumed a form more propitious to the well-being of all its membei's. When governments shall be admin- istered in the interest of the governed, then we may hope that there will be no more convulsions, since then there will be no cause to pi-oduce them ; but till then oppression will beget resistance. The people never complain unless they sutfer, submission to light burdens being much easier than revolt against them ; but, so long as they suffer, they will, and they ought to risk even the most hazardous and costly experiments to alleviate their sufiering. The cause of the people will ultimately prevail, and this result infallibly must come, because the universal diifu- sion of intelligence is fast carrying the moral influence into that portion of society where the physical strength has always been. Let us reflect that hitherto the interests of governments, over most of Christendom, even, have been adverse to those of the people ; let us count upon the certainty of an opposite order of things, and then set limits, if we can imagine any, to the benefits which must grow oat of this fundamental change. Hitherto, great minds have arisen in rival nations, and devoted the highest or