Cannibals all! or, Slaves without masters. Fitzhugh George
have this effect, than undigested food on the stomach of a dyspeptic can add to his physical stature. We thought once this thing was original with us, but find that Say pursued this plan in writing his Political Economy. He first read all the books he could get hold of on this subject, and then took time to forget them, before he began to write.
We will not trouble the reader further, for the present, with our egotisms or our arguments, but refer him to the whole of Carlyle's "Latter Day Pamphlets," to prove that "the world is too little governed," and, therefore, is going to wreck. We say, to the whole of those pamphlets, for that is their one, great leading idea. We also add an extract from the speech of Ulysses, in the play of Troilus and Cressida, that beautifully illustrates and enforces our thought. We give the extract because it is a play that few read, it being, on the whole, far inferior to Shakspeare's other plays, and by few considered as wholly, if at all, his work:
"The heavens themselves, the planets and this centre,
Observe degree, priority, and place,
Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,
Office and custom, in all line of order:
And, therefore, is the glorious planet, Sol,
In nobler eminence enthron'd and spher'd
Amidst the other; whose med'cinable eye
Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil,
And posts, like the commandment of a king,
Sans check, to good and bad: But, when the planets,
In evil mixture, to disorder wander,
What plagues, and what portents? what mutiny?
What raging of the sea? shaking of earth?
Commotion in the winds? frights, changes, horrors,
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate,
The unity and married calm of states
Quite from their fixture? O, when degree is shak'd,
Which is the ladder of all high designs,
The enterprise is sick! How could communities,
Degrees in schools, and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows! each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy: The bounded waters
Should lift their bosom's higher than the shores,
And make a sop of all this solid globe:
Strength should be lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead:
Force should be right; or, rather, right and wrong.
(Between whose endless jar justice resides,)
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
We promised to write no more in this chapter; but, like Parthos, when "we have an idea," we want to give others the benefit of it. We agree with Mr. Jefferson, that all men have natural and inalienable rights. To violate or disregard such rights, is to oppose the designs and plans of Providence, and cannot "come to good." The order and subordination observable in the physical, animal and human world, show that some are formed for higher, others for lower stations – the few to command, the many to obey. We conclude that about nineteen out of every twenty individuals have "a natural and inalienable right" to be taken care of and protected; to have guardians, trustees, husbands, or masters; in other words, they have a natural and inalienable right to be slaves. The one in twenty are as clearly born or educated, or some way fitted for command and liberty. Not to make them rulers or masters, is as great a violation of natural right, as not to make slaves of the mass. A very little individuality is useful and necessary to society, – much of it begets discord, chaos and anarchy.
Note. – Since writing this chapter, we have received our copy of Mr. Adams's work. We congratulate ourselves on our success in "learning to forget." Here is the passage to which we refer:
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