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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Untitled Article
the puff-word of every pretender . But truth is , nevertheless , a * holy&nd &s untouched as ever , and as discoverable to tl ^^ lOUfb Of the truth-seeker . Facts are the impressions of the fooUteUi of truth , white th * inferences to be deduced from facts form the light of her track , along which the eager intelligence of human f&fuf is tracing- its way . Every science smiles with serene confidence on many facts * and looks forward with well-grounded expectation for more .
Does moral science lack these guiding aids ? If any being want sufficient or suitable nourishment , physically or morally , does not annihilation of his powers ensue , and does not a similar effect follow if he be surfeited ? It is one fact , then , that all excess i $ evil . With that knowledge , why do we doom any to privation , or any to profusion ? Are any beings on this earth , or any class of beings , independent existences ? On the contrary , are not all
so inextricably linked and involved , that injury or distortion to one , effects , immediately or remotely , all others ? It is another fact > then , that individuality is an evil . With the knowledge of this , why are separate , exclusive * and consequently opposing interests so sedulously cultivated ? Because our moral optics need to be couched ; because , shut within the narrow pale of family , sect , class , or party , we deny , or are indifferent to , the existence
of the same elements beyond our own immediate sphere . But the tide of circumstances is ever circulating , and contact and concu&aion are incident , often inevitable , to all who float upon its surface . Woe , then , to the porcelain pots when urged against those of iron ; in vain shall they bemoan their constitutional fragility !
It may possibly be urged , that if magnanimity , like the mammoth , be departed from the earth , it is because the affairs of the world no longer afford opportunities for its exercise ; and that , in the moral as in the material market , when a demand ceases the supply falls . Upon a superficial view of the subject , some ground for this
observation may appear . The alpine difficulties of the ruder ages do not strike the eye on the level surface of more civilized times , and , with the Alps , the Hannibals seem to have vanished also . But if mountains have been levelled , pits have beeii dug ; and there is as much , if not more , heroism necessary to endufe being sunk to the depths of the one , as is essential to aunnpuiit the acclivities of the other . Upon a nearer examination it Will
be seen that the notion that magnanimity is of necessity at a discount , could only arise from the want of a due recognition of the principles of magnanimity . A short time since , a fearful accident occurred by the breaking of machinery which was raising some people to the mouth of a mine : they were all precipitated to the bottom , wjth the expept ^ n o f youth and an old man ; these caught by a rope which pung down into the mine . The first person to whom auocour cwnc was
Untitled Article
Powtr and tk * People . 401
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 1, 1835, page 491, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2647/page/55/
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