b'HN 64 \nN65 \n\n\n\n\n\xe2\x96\xa04* \n\n\n\nTHE \n\n\n\nNEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\n\n\n\nNEW YORK: \nE. P. DUTTON AND COMPANY, \n\n713 Broadway. \n1874. \n\n\n\nT \n\n\n\n:\xc2\xbb\'\xe2\x80\xa2\'\' \n\n\n\nTHE \n\n\n\nNEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\n\n\nlr. \n\n\n\nH \n\n\n\n\nU \n\n\n\n\nNEW YORK: \nE. P. DUTTON AND COMPANY, \n\n713 Broadway. \n1874. \n\n\n\n^ \n\n\n\n. t \\ \n\n\n\n*A \n\n\n\nEntered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1874, by \n\nE. P. DuTTON AND COMPANY, \n\nIn the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. \n\n\n\nRIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE \\ \nPRINTED BY H. 0. HOUGHTON AND COMPANY. \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\n\n\ni. \n\nThe civil system of the United States is vitiated by \nthe trust that confides high civil function to the needy, \nby the political ignorance of the working class and by in- \nordinate liberty. The object of this pamphlet is to sub- \nmit to the political philosopher a scheme of civil reform \ncorrective of these defects. It consists of three measures : \n1st. The limitation of high civil function to rich gradu- \nates of universities ; 2d. A political education of the \nworking class, sufficient to exclude subversive ideas and \nto qualify the class, at least rudely, for the exercise of \nthe franchise ; and 3d. Such an increase of civil power \nas will serve without needless encroachment on individ- \nual liberty, to exclude unsafe liberty. The first and third \nof these measures are so repugnant to democratic suscep- \ntibility, that it would be absurd to propose them to the \npeople at large, or even to the mere statesman, before \nthe political philosopher has passed upon them. His ap- \nproval is likely to beget a propaganda which may sooner \nor later enlist a majority of the citizens in their favor. \nThen, and only then, will they be fit for the attention \nand action of the statesman. In so far as civil progress \nis the result of human design, it proceeds from three \n\n\n\n4 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nkinds of agencies, viz., that which designs, that which \npropagates, and that which realizes the design. \n\nIt is important to distinguish these three agencies, es- \npecially the second and third, \xe2\x80\x94 1st, in order to exclude \nthe violence incident to premature urgency as regards the \nrealization of schemes of political reform ; 2d, to exclude \nthe prejudice which such urgency tends to excite against \nsound schemes. The discrimination unfolds a rule of po- \nlitical art which, if followed, must relieve society of great \nviolence and disorder. It is that the State should ignore \nschemes of radical political reform until it is probable \nthat they command the assent of a majority. The corn- \nlaw league was, as propaganda, the proper precursor of \nthe ministerial and legislative action that brought about \nthe repeal of the corn-laws. If the temperance society \nin the United States had not precipitated legislation be- \nfore it had secured a majority, it is probable that success \nwould, by this time, have crowned its labors. The dis- \ncrimination separates the work of the political philos- \nopher from that of the mere statesman. In so far as the \nlatter has to do with schemes of radical reform, he has \nto do with only those for which society is ripe ; to put \nothers, however sound relatively to a future condition of \nsociety, as though they immediately concerned the states- \nman, is to put them in a connection in which they seem \naltogether absurd. The indiscriminate contempt into \nwhich they fall, tends to retard progress by dishonoring \nand discouraging political philosophy, and by postponing \nthe realization of the discredited schemes. \n\nOf the three measures of civil reform now proposed, \nnot one is ripe, and only one is nearly ripe for the states- \nman. The project of the political education of the \nworking class is backed by such cogent reasons, and the \nschool systems of the United States, England, and Ger- \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 5 \n\nmany affords such obvious facility for at least an experi- \nment in respect of it, that, to be fit for the attention of \nthe statesman, it needs only to become familiar to the \npublic mind. As to the first measure, the limitation of \nhigh civil function to rich graduates of universities, it has \nto vanquish a powerful and obstinate prejudice before it \ncan pretend to be an object of attention to the statesman. \nThe third measure will not have to encounter so formid- \nable an enemy as the second, but we cannot hope for it a \nveni, vidi, vici campaign. \n\n\n\nII. \n\nOur civil system proceeds upon the assumption that \nthe bulk of men are endowed with the moral temper of \nCincinnatus, and may be counted on to descend, at the \nsummons of duty, from irresponsible power into poverty. \nThose who control the revenues of a state enjoy a power \nthat is, to a certain extent, irresponsible, as affording \nthem the opportunity of enriching themselves without \nany greater penalty than what is involved in impotent \nsuspicion. The assumption contradicts common experi- \nence which, in giving proverbial currency to the verse, \n" an honest man \'s the noblest work of God," agrees with \nthe poet, that an honest man is one of the rarest works \nof God. What capitalist of the United States would \ntrust his private as he trusts the public property to the \nirresponsible control of needy politicians ? As bankers \nand traders, capitalists confine credit to those who have \nsomething to lose. As testators they do not indifferently \nappoint rich and poor to be their trustees, but regularly \nprefer the rich. How many of them would go bail to the \nextent of half their property for the average high civil \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nfunctionary ? Our moral axioms seem to vary according \nas our minds are, or are not, whetted by reference to our \nprivate\' interests, having one theory of the moral nature \nof man when these are concerned, and an opposite one \nwhen only the public interest is in question. " By their \nfruits ye shall know them." The assumption that arms \nneedy men with the power of the state, explains itself in \nsuch fruits as the " lobby," the system of plunder exem- \nplified by the operations of the Tammany Ring, the com- \nmon opinion that purity in office is exceptional, the de- \ngeneration of the organ of public opinion manifested by \npublic tolerance of the milder forms of official spoliation, \nand which has left only life enough for sporadic reaction \nagainst acute assaults ; and, finally, so great a success of \nthe outside fraud cooperative with official fraud, that it \ntends to glorify sharpness and bring contempt upon the \nways of honesty. \n\nIt is not a difference as to honesty that makes the rich \nmore trustworthy as regards high civil function. Under- \nstanding the word honesty to signify impregnable aversion \nto violation of right that has respect to value \xe2\x80\x94 neither \nrich nor poor are honest. Honesty, if it exist at all, is \nan extremely rare endowment. What is called common \nhonesty is neither a degree, nor a species of honesty. \nHonesty has no degrees. Aut Coesar, aid nihil. A man \nwhose respect for the property of others is good against \nordinary but not extraordinary temptation, is not an \nhonest man ; he has his price. Whatever he may have \nof pregnable reluctance to violate right of property, is not \na degree of honesty. It is indeed a lower degree of the \naversion of which the highest or impregnable degree is \nwhat is signified by the name honesty, but it is not a \ndegree of honesty. Under the name common honesty, \nwe confound with honesty several mental affections, such \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PKOGKESS. 7 \n\nas the pregnable reluctance involved in a genuine respect \nfor property, the prudence that finds the way of honesty \nexpedient, the piety that moves to conform to honesty \nfor God\'s sake. When we dissipate this confusion it is \nobvious that honesty, and indeed its genus virtue, which \nis also differentiated by the attribute, impregnability, are \nextremely rare, and we are obliged to assent to the sinis- \nter truth that, as a rule, every man has his price. Not \nalways a money price, \xe2\x80\x94 often a price in power, rank, \nbeauty, exemption from threatened disgrace. Take, as \nan example of the confusion that mistakes semblances of \nvirtue for virtue, the fact that, quite recently, the British \npatrician practiced bribery at elections. The vice was \nnot infamous and therefore not repugnant to his moral \nsense. He would shrink from the infamous vice of tak- \ning a bribe, but the equally base one of bribing, because \nnot yet infamous, was no impediment in the view of his \nmoral sense. Clearly, in so far as he is averse to infa- \nmous vice, he is averse not to the vice, but to the infamy. \nIt is because aversion to infamy tends to be stronger in the \nrich, and especially in those who have inherited wealth \n(not because the rich are honest), that the former are, \nand the latter are not, trustworthy as regards irresponsible \npower. The importance of honor in comparison of gain, \nis greatly less in the view of the poor than in that of the \nrich. \n\nIs it not time for society to emerge from the confusion \nthat betrays it with mere shows of virtue, and to reform \nits institutions according to the axiom that the bulk of \nmen are incapable of virtue ? Nature is not generous to \nman as regards the organic conditions of virtue. Even \nDr. Newman admits that she sometimes fashions her hu- \nman products so as to foist upon the race the religious \nand moral idiot, \xe2\x80\x94 the swine, according to Christ, that \n\n\n\n8 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nturn and rend if you offer pearls. It may be that she \nsometimes endows an individual with the conditions of an \ninvincible magnanimity ; but the bulk of her human prod- \nucts are moulded so as to warrant the doctrine of total \ndepravity. In vain religion and philosophy evolve a sys- \ntem of morals the practice of which, if universal or even \ngeneral, would make a heaven on earth. A barren and, \nfor the most part, a languid approval, is all that the men- \ntal constitution of the bulk of mankind affords to virtue. \nThe legend of the Spartan fox implies that Lycurgus \nmade no account of honesty as a ground of civil trust, \nbat counted, instead, on the vigilance of the state, the \ncitizen\'s fear of the state, and the sharp-witted prudence \nthat prefers to comply with law rather than risk penalty. \nHe Avas not of the mind of the sentimentalists, who are \nfor making men honest by making believe that they are \nhonest. He did not believe that a state could be safeby \nfounded on a sham. The sham that men are capable of \nwithstanding extraordinary temptation, is the occasion of \nabuse that extends far beyond the sphere of civil func- \ntion ; especially as a pretext for a liberty of intercourse \nof the sexes, which experience is continually proving to \nbe dangerous. Public opinion should retrench that lib- \nerty, should hold transgression of the narrowed limits to \nbe indecent, and profess, and keep always before society, \nthe reason of its caution. Man should continually tell \nhimself that he is not to be largely trusted, that there are \nforces in him which are hostile to society, and that society \nand the better part of himself need to be continually on \nthe alert against these public enemies. As science dimin- \nishes the fear of God, public prudence should make the \nstate and public opinion more formidable, and by means \nof them, without imposing on humanity a strain it will \nnot bear, establish manners that tend to exclude oppor- \n\n\n\n/ \n\n\n\n\\ \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 9 \n\ntunity of vice. It should rid us of the " benevolism " \nthat is rotting the nineteenth century ; and, substituting \nsurgery for justice, as reason of severity, cut out the \nrotten parts of society with unlimited charity and an un- \nsparing hand. It should secure, as regards laws and cus- \ntoms, a limited dominion to conservatism, proportionately \nsubordinating the spirit of innovation, and reducing the \nrate of social change so that society shall, at the end of \nhalf a century, bear a recognizable likeness to what it \nwas at the beginning. It should insist that the individual \nput up with ills that cannot be relieved without radical \ninjury to society ; for example, unhappy marriage. Mo- \nnogamy, which is the pillar of the highest civilization, it \nshould protect with stern care, even to the degree of for- \nbidding public discussion of the principle. In this in- \nterest it should be iron-handed against erotic godliness \nand the Bohemianism of genius. \n\nOur political system attracts into public life the sharp- \nwitted of the needy class, and, dividing them into oppo- \nsite factions, proposes to them office as a spoil and makes \nit an occasion of incessant strife. Those who are in office \nare keenly alive to the fact that they are to enjoy but a \nbrief tenure, and have the strongest incentive to make \nthe most of their time. What should common sense ex- \npect from human nature under such circumstances ? The \nneedy politician must live by politics. The allowed \npecuniary reward of a few years\' tenure of office, is not \nprovision for a life-time. To live honestly by politics \nis simply impossible. No poor man capable of high civil \nfunction is weak enough to abandon a professional or \nbusiness career for the temporary service of the state \nwithout seeing his way to a compensation. To leave a \nprofession or business for, say four years, is to abandon it. \nOne cannot renew his relation to it at the point at which \n\n\n\n10 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nhe left off. To return is to begin at the beginning, \xe2\x80\x94 to \nbegin life anew, and with the stigma of instability. Is \nit not a blunder to expect honest legislation and honest \nadministration on such conditions ? \n\nThe blunder has the excuse of inadvertency. It is one \nthing to overlook the fact that the conditions exclude fair \ndealing, and quite another to judge, with full advertence, \nthat they afford it. We exact no sureties of the poor \nman whom we make President of the United States, \nSecretary of the Treasury, or Postmaster-General, but we \nexact sureties of the same man if we appoint him col- \nlector of a port or of internal revenue, or simple post- \nmaster. If we make him collector of an important port \nwe subject him to the supervision of a naval officer. The \ninconsistency explains that, in so far as the American \nmind is responsible for the admission of the needy to \nhigh office, it is chargeable only with inadvertency, as hav- \ning failed to modify, in order to exclude them, the civil \nmodel given to it by England. According to that model, \nthe dignity of high civil function suffers no sign of dis- \ntrust of the functionary. Prescription supposed the high \ncivil functionary to be patrician, and patrician honor was \naccounted a sufficient guaranty. On the other hand, \nsureties were required of plebeian officials. It did not \noccur to the framers of our Constitution that, in throwing \nopen high office to all classes, the country was foregoing \nthe important guaranty of wealth and culture. The \noversight is also partially excused by the habit of the \ntime, according to which the poor and uncultivated, as \na rule, made no pretensions to high office, and it was \nextremely improbable that any considerable number of \nthem could emerge from the obscurity of private life. \n\nWealth, then, is a sine qua non of fitness for high civil \nfunction. But wealth without early culture is not a suf- \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 11 \n\nficient guaranty. Men who have acquired wealth by \nsharp practice would not scruple to make a predatory use \nof power that could be safely abused. On the contrary, \nit would seem to them weakness to spare the opportunity. \nHonor has not the value in their eyes that it has in the \nview of those who have acquired wealth by fair dealing, \nor of those who have never known poverty and have \nnever been engaged in sordid pursuit. Now it is not \npossible to distinguish, by any general mark, the rich who \nhave honestly acquired wealth from those who have ac- \nquired it by sharp practice, and thereby exclude the latter \nfrom high office. But an obvious mark enables the selec- \ntion of a species of the rich that almost shuts out the \npredatory. This mark is the credential of a university \ndegree. Sequestration from sordid pursuit and the hav- \ning the mind mainly conversant about science, letters, \nreligion, and morals, tends to beget a finer sense of honor \na larger knowlege of moral maxims, a profounder appre- \nciation of the importance of morality, and a repugnance \nto infamous vice impregnable to ordinary temptation. \nThis culture is certified by the University degree. \nCoupled with a satisfactory sign of wealth, such as the \npayment of a certain amount of taxes, it affords ample \nsecurity that the class which it characterizes all but \nexcludes the sharper. Accordingly, high civil function \nshould be, for the most part, limited to rich graduates \nof universities. Exception should be made as regards \njudicial and high military office, seeing that the ante- \ncedents by which men are prepared for these offices do \nnot generally involve or confer wealth ; but the function- \naries so excepted should be enriched by large life-long \nsalaries, as England enriches her judges and law lords. \n\nUnderstanding the name patrician to signify a citizen \nwhose recent progenitors have for at least two generations \n\n\n\n12 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nenjoyed hereditary wealth, \xe2\x80\x94 a patrician order balanced \nby a politically educated plebs, affords the best material \nfor the organ of high civil function. The English gentry \nhas been in this relation to the English plebs since the \nabolition of close boroughs, except that the working-class \nis not politically educated. The majority of the mem- \nbers of the House of Commons are patricians ; and, for \na good part of the century, English legislation has been \nas democratic as that of the United States, excelling it \nin not being tainted by a suspicion of " lobby " influence. \nInduction is decisive against the patrician as master, but \nof the patrician as servant (civil servant of the people), \nif it venture on such brief experience to pronounce at all, \nit must be in his favor. The superior aptitude of the \nrich graduate of the university is enhanced to the fullest \ndegree by the peculiar moral influences that educate the \npatrician. They sequester him not only from sordid oc- \ncupation, but also from those who have undergone its \nlowering influences. In so far as good morals depend on \ngood manners, they are indebted to lineage. The spirit, \nhabit, or instinct of adaptation to others according to re- \npect, kindness, simplicity, and modesty, \xe2\x80\x94 that sign of \nsocial puberty, the result of ages of attrition that have \nworn away the angularity and roughness of minds, and \nsubstituted such. roundness and smoothness that personal \nplay and interaction in the movement of life are the \neasiest possible, \xe2\x80\x94 proceeds from and is incapable of sub- \nsisting without the patrician. If it be admitted that \ngood manners tend to enhance good morals, it must also \nbe admitted that, other things being the same, a parlia- \nment of patricians is more likely to serve its constituents \nloyally than a parliament of plebeians. The advan- \ntage of the wealthy patrician to the state is not con- \nfined to his excellence as high civil functionary. His \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 13 \n\nexemption from the temptations that peculiarly beset \npoverty and the pursuit of wealth, together with his \nsocial ascendency, make him an intolerant and formidable \ncensor of dishonesty and its attendant vices. He makes \npublic opinion too hot for knavery. Where he is the \nsupreme part of the organ of public opinion, the wealthy \nare not free, as in the United States, to proceed openly \nwith impunity as public enemies, \xe2\x80\x94 to apply without dis- \nguise against society the social apparatus ; for example, \nto make the national distress evinced in an irredeemable \ncurrency an instrument of open plunder ; to seize upon \nthe management of railroads, and, in the view of all the \nworld, by devices that baffle law, to rob the stockhold- \ners ; to work the gold-room and the stock exchange so as \nto let loose a panic. Infamy in such a society paralyzes \nthe declared public enemy, whatever his wealth. No \ndecent member of society will work for him. Opinion \nfrustrates the scoundrel who has sagacity enough to baffle \nthe state. The wholesome bearing of the patrician on \npublic opinion does not suppose in him the moral im- \npregnability signified by the name honesty, but only that \nthe accidental moral form into which he is moulded by \nhis circumstances, and of which opposite circumstances \nmight deprive him, involves a. strong repugnance to cer- \ntain violations of right which are, for the most part, \nmore leniently regarded by the plebeian. The patrician \noriginates, propagates, and maintains an ideal and work- \ning standard of the state more conformable to dignity \nthan what could obtain without him. The state which \nhe conducts has majesty. It is incapable of dealing with \nthe citizen in the spirit of a huckster, such as is exempli- \nfied by the mean blunder, of imposing on its lower offi- \ncials that they are to be turned adrift with every change \nof administration ; nor does it threaten its creditors by \n\n\n\n14 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nentertaining projects of repudiation ; nor does it man- \nifest a brutal disregard of private interests by suddenly \nupsetting through precipitate legislation an order of \nthings on which industry has counted ; nor does it pre- \nfer pecuniary claims against other nations in excess of \nwhat justice sanctions, nor pocket what it publicly allows \nto be the difference. Public opinion that emanates from \nthe patrician abhors and excludes such abuses. It re- \nquires the spirit of the state to be, within certain limits, \nand especially in its dealings with its citizens, large, \nrespectful, and humane. \n\nChristianity attests, and stigmatizes under the name of \nMammon, the demoralizing influence of the pursuit of \nwealth. It enjoins upon its missionaries to exclude " care \nfor the morrow," and leave to their heavenly Father the \nbusiness of providing for their physical wants. It was to \nexempt the priesthood from this influence that the Roman \nCatholic Church imposed celibacy. What celibacy does \nfor that priesthood in the way of sequestration from \nMammon, is done for a secular order, the patrician, by \nthe law of entail. Not that the order is wholly exempted \nfrom provident occupation (an exemption that is neither \npossible nor needful as regards any class or individual), \nbut that it is disengaged from the species of provident \noccupation that makes the gain of one man depend upon \nthe loss of another. The productive part of industry \ndoes not put men in obvious antagonism and rouse in \nthem competitive fierceness. It is exchange that occa- \nsions industrial enmity, and evolves the demoralizing \ninfluence to which Christ applied the name Mammon. \nThe business of the farmer, manufacturer, and mechanic, \nin so far as it excludes exchange, is not unfavorable to \nreligion and morality. Competition is the infernal ele- \nment of industry, and it is confined to exchange. It ha- \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 15 \n\nbituates the heart to apprehend the world as an enemy, life \nas a warfare, benevolence as a weakness, inhumanity as \nmoral power. 1 So long as society cannot relieve itself of \nthis malignant influence of competition, so long the se- \nquestration of a secular, enlightened, and influential order \nfrom competitive industry, will be an invaluable anti- \ndote. \n\nTo propose to the people of the United States the in- \nstitution of a gentry, would be as reasonable as to propose \nto an escaped lunatic a compromise with his keeper. \nTherefore, although convinced that the patrician is a \nsine qua non of the highest form of democracy, the writer, \nin looking forward to a probable next phase of civil prog- \nress, does not pretend, as regards the United States, to \nlook beyond a point at which the people will recognize \nthe indispensableness of wealth and high culture to the \ncivil functionary. But better things may be expected of \nGreat Britain. She has the happiness to possess a gentry \nthat is still intrenched in the affection, respect, and trust \nof the majority of the plebs. This gentry is proving that \nit is the best possible servant of democracy ; and the late \nconservative reaction seems to show that the people are \nnot disinclined to accept the evidence. Aversion to so- \ncial inferiority is pusillanimous when it would rather \nput up with a worse condition of society than adopt a \nbetter, that imposes a social superior. This is not an \nEnglish infirmity. Therefore, in spite of the acceleration \nof the democratic movement in England during the pres- \n\n1 It rarely happens that a theory totally void of reasonableness obtains with \nany considerable part of mankind. What is common to the theories of commu- \nnism and socialism together with that of liberty, fraternity, equality, may be \nfound to involve a sound objection to the order of things that substitute competi- \ntive fierceness for the fraternal spirit. If it were possible for the state (and it \nis by no means obvious that it is impossible) to become the sole merchant and \nretailer of the society, the spirit of competition would be almost extinguished \xe2\x80\x94 \nthe reicrn of Mammon ended. \n\n\n\n16 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nent century, one may reasonably venture to opine that \nthe next phase of civil progress in England will hinge on \nthe surpassing aptitude of a gentry for high civil function. \nA renewal of power of entail together with the limitation \nof high civil function to the rich and cultivated, would \nprobably suffice to constitute the patrician the helmsman \nof the state. A politically educated working-class taught \nto appreciate the elevating influence of lineage would \nprobably, for the most part, prefer him as candidate for \nthe House of Commons to the novus homo ; and the House \nbeing mainly patrician, a discrimination in his favor \nwould prefer him for administrative office. The plebeian \nminority in high office would be obliged to adopt the \nspirit of the patrician majority, which would thus be alto- \ngether dominant. \n\nThe patrician element swayed the revolution that be- \ngot the United States, and it swayed the conduct of the \nConfederation down to the last war with England, when \nit was overwhelmed by the plebs throughout the North, \nEast, and West. It held dominion in the South to the \nend of the civil war, and by leaguing itself with the dem- \nocratic party of the other sections of the Union, it man- \naged to bear strongly, though no longer dominantly, on \nthe conduct of the Confederation. Venality was not slow \nto proclaim the advent of the plebs ; politics became a \ntrade, the state a spoil. Now for the first time was enun- \nciated as a political dictum, " to the victor belongs the \nspoils," a dictum symptomatic of the decay that was to \nengender the Tammany Ring. A conception of the state \nlike that which evolved the spoil policy of Van Buren, \nMarcy, and Jackson, begins to make itself heard in Eng- \nland. One hears of the employments of the state being \nthrown open to all classes, not meaning that all classes \nshould be parts of the organ of sovereignty, but that the \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 17 \n\npecuniary benefits of civil employment should be thrown \nopen to all. What should we say of a merchant who \nshould undertake business with a view to the employ- \nment of clerks, or modify his business merely to adapt it \nto a lower level of clerical fitness ? Just such a lack of \nwit and dignity would be evinced by a state that should \nbusy itself about interests which in comparison of its \nproper objects are so trivial. The fitness of the civil \nfunctionary is a matter of importance to the state, not \nthe class from which he is derived, not whether he be a \nSmith or a Howard, not whether private ambition or pri- \nvate concern about the loaves and fishes be impartially \nsatisfied. A state that has eyes for such trivialities is as \nblind to the grand objects that should occupy it, as the fly \non St. Paul\'s to the architectural sublime. \n\nThe limitation of high civil function to rich graduates \nof universities is not possible in the new States of the \nUnion, these being destitute of a rich and learned class. \nThe objection put by the fact applies not against the ex- \npediency of the limitation, but against the conversion of \nterritories into States before they have developed such a \nclass. The sign of puberty of a territory should be the \nhaving a population of at least two millions, and such or \nsuch a number of citizens who are graduates of universi- \nties and pay an amount of taxes indicative of wealth. \n\n\n\nIII. \n\nThe political ignorance of the mass of the people sub- \njects it to the erroneous assumption, that inequality as to \nwealth can be conventionally excluded without a greater \ninjury to society than what the inequality involves. So \nlong as the working-class is without political cohesion and \n2 \n\n\n\n18 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nOrganization, the error is impotent ; but, in proportion \nas the progress of science and art favor the tendency of \nthe class to political solidarity, it threatens civilization. \nIt is now, all over the civilized world, either eruptive or \nsmouldering under the form of communism. \n\nThe end of authority being to prepare people to dis- \npense with it without injury to themselves or their neigh- \nbors, civil authority should have S3 prepared the plebs ; \nbut, on the contrary, it has suffered its ward to acquire \nthe thews and sinews of a man with the mind of an in- \nfant ; and communism and the violence of trades-unions \nare the breaking away of the monster from the old con- \ntrol. It has already, in constitutional states, usurped an \nindependence which it can only abuse. Where it is king, \nthe demagogue is mayor of the palace. To compel us to \ngive it the mind of a man we are menaced with anarchy. \nThe second Empire applied against communism all the \npower of the state, but the evil so thrived under repres- \nsion that in 1871, it was able to strive for empire behind \nthe walls of Paris. Argument has proved as unavailing \nagainst it as civil force. In 1848, a society in France, \nnamed Association pour la Defense du Travail Nationale, \nundertook to argue down the evil, and to this end en- \ndeavored to popularize the able argument of M. Thiers, \nentitled " De la Propriete" The argument is conclusive \nfor those who are able to master it, but is inaccessible to \nthe working-class. The success of the strike principle \nshows that the class most disposed to communism has \nachieved a higher organic form, and correspondingly \ngreater strength. It has wrested thirteen millions ster- \nling per annum from the employing class of Great Brit- \nain. The principle is so well grounded in reason and \nequit} r as to have elicited the sanction of two congresses of \npolitical philosophers, \xe2\x80\x94 one in Germany and one in Aus- \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 19 \n\ntria. The latter expecting a political advent of the work- \ning class, has declared that it should be prepared for \npower by a political education. The tendency which, in \nmodern times, is manifested by communism, showed itself \nin ancient Rome, under the form of agrarianism. It has \nits roots in human nature, and its action is, in all prob- \nability, older than history. History is not without evi- \ndence that, in prehistoric time the tendency subverted \nand engendered civil systems ; for example, those of \nancient Germany and of Sparta. That of Germany ex- \ncluded individual property in land. The land was annu- \nally divided amongst tribes by whom it was allotted, for \nthe year, to individuals, no tribe being allowed to remain \non the same land two years successively. One of the \nreasons of this remarkable law assigned by the Germans \nto Caesar, was the importance of excluding the discontent \nwith which great inequality as to wealth tends to provoke \nthe common people. Now the reason presupposes an \nexperience by which it was evolved, \xe2\x80\x94 an experience of a \ncivil system under which individual property generated \ngreat inequality as to wealth, and a consequent discontent \nthat disrupted the state and substituted a new civil form. \nThe civil system of Sparta, like that of ancient Germany, \nevinced an aversion to great inequality as to wealth. \nThis aversion presupposed a system of the state under \nwhich an unrestricted operation of the principle of indi- \nvidual property excited an insurrectionary and victorious \ndiscontent. It is true that neither ancient Germany nor \nSparta proceeded upon the scheme of communism ; but \nthey compromised with the principle of human nature \nthat is the matrix of agrarianism, communism, and gener- \nally of the poor man\'s aversion to the rich. \n\nCommunism has not made notable progress in Great \nBritain or the United States. In those countries the \n\n\n\n20 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nstrike movement gives more cause for anxiety. Perhaps \nthe success of the strike movement, as one distemper ex- \ncludes another, postpones that of communism, which may \nbreak oat as virulently as in France or Spain, whenever \na prolonged distress of the working-class makes room for \nit. But the organic power which trades-unions impart \nto the working-class, if uncontrolled by political knowl- \nedge, is fraught with danger. It tends, and ever with \nmore force in proportion to the success of its exactions, on \nthe one hand, to diminish the growth of capital, including \nthe wages-fund, and, on the other, to stimulate that of \nthe class dependent on wages. It tends to diminish the \ngrowth of capital by diminishing profit, and to stimulate \nthe increase of the working-class by the temporary in- \ncrease of wages. Higher wages, more marriages, more \nchildren ; and, beside the increase from the stimulation \nof the principle of population, the class would be aug- \nmented by accessions from the lower stratum of the em- \nploying class ; for the diminution of profit would cause a \nfall of small capitalists into the working-class. Then, \nthe increase of the wages-fund is mainly derived from \nprofit. What is contributed from wages by the laborer, is, \nin comparison of what profit contributes, insignificant. It \nis notorious that the advance of wages elicited by strikes \nhas not considerably augmented the savings of British \nlaborers. To save an excess of wages over the expense of \na thrifty laborer\'s subsistence, demands an effort of self- \ndenial greatly exceeding what is exerted by a capitalist to \nsave the excess of his profit over the expense of living of \nthrifty men of equal fortune. The effort exacted of the \nlaborer is one of which but few of any class are capable. \nCapital remaining the same, and the number of laborers \nincreasing, wages must ultimately fall. If the exactions \nof trades-unions should go the length of making cost 1 \n\n1 T\' o vrcrd cost signifies either : First, what the capitalist parts with as a \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 21 \n\nequal to product, or, still worse, of exceeding it, the evil \nwould of course be aggravated, and would cumulate and \nbreak all the sooner. In the latter case, capital must stead- \nily decrease and laborers augment till starvation, or disease \nbegotten of poverty, or an exodus should restore a toler- \nable proportion between wages and those who live by \nthem. A knowledge of political economy \xe2\x80\x94 such an \noutline knowledge, for example, as Mrs. Fawcett\'s " Polit- \nical Economy for Beginners" is intended to impart, \xe2\x80\x94 \ndiffused amongst the working-class or a part of it, would \nexpose to the class the danger towards which it is being \ndriven by inordinate exaction. It includes knowledge \nthat the greater part of profit returns to laborers in the \nwages-fund, that the parsimony of the capitalist saves for \nthem what they had ever failed to save for themselves, \nand that it is an indirect benefit, like the rise of the \nprice of food in the beginning of a scarce year, which by \nseasonably pinching the stomachs of the poor, saves them, \nat the end of the year, from starvation. It would show \nthem the need of a thrift sufficient to save what they ex- \ntort from the capitalist, and the need of austere precau- \ntion against their arch-enemy the Malthusian principle. \nThe strike movement, as was to be expected, has at last \nbegotten a counter movement, \xe2\x80\x94 a league of capitalists ; 1 \nand now we are to see society separate into two opposed \narmies that have to settle by treaty or by violence the \nfuture relations of capital and labor. Is this event, so \nprofoundly affecting the organization of society, an evolu- \n\nconclition of production (regarding distribution for brevity\'s sake as a part of \nproduction) ; or second, what is consumed as a condition of production. I here \nuse the word in the former sense. It would be convenient to treat cost as a \ngenus, viz., what is parted with as a condition of production, and assign to it as \nspecies, under the names relative and absolute cost, the two kinds which it now \nequivocally signifies. \n\n1 Such a league was formed in England a few months since, when the text \nwas written, but of late nothing has been heard of it. \n\n\n\n22 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\ntion or a degeneration ? We may be witnessing the \nbirth throes of a new organ consisting of a combination \nof a guild of capitalists and a guild of laborers, whereby \nthe relation of labor and capital may, hereafter, be regu- \nlarly conventionally and quietly adjusted or we may be wit- \nnessing the beginning of a war that is to subvert civiliza- \ntion. The political enlightenment of the working-class \ncannot but make for the better result. The more the class \nknows of the laws of wealth, the less it will be disposed \nto suicidal exaction. If it can be made to see that, \nwithin certain limits, capitalists and laborers have a com- \nmon interest ; that profit tends to become an addition to \nwages, that the main reason of the employer\'s parsimony, \nviz., increase of command over labor, is a reason for add- \ning his savings to the wages-fund, and that, therefore, \nhis parsimony benefits laborers no less than if its saving \nwere a saving from wages, the knowledge must tend to \nhumble the pretensions of the class and dispose it to \naccommodation. \n\nThe error on which the suicidal exaction of trades- \nunions proceeds, cannot be exposed without a knowledge \nof political economy ; but it is otherwise with that of \ncommunism. The following brief and plain argument \nsuffices to expose this fallacy to a mind provided with no \nmore knowledge than the knowledge of human nature \nwhich common experience imparts to adults of ordinary \ncapacity. \n\nTo exclude private property would be to deprive in- \ndustry and parsimony of their main motive, to retrench \nliberty so as to degrade the individual into the condition \nof a slave of societ}^, and to arm tyranny with the greatest \npossible power. Work without an adequate motive is re- \npugnant. The dependence of one\'s subsistence and that \nof his family on a given amount of work, determines an \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 23 \n\nadequate motive relatively, to that work. Not so a mere \nduty to perform the work. If the duty can be shirked \nwithout other manifest penalty than uneasiness of con- \nscience, it is certain to be generally shirked. Servants of \ninattentive masters who, ignorant of the ordinary stand- \nard of servants\' work, easily put up with less than is due \nto them, tend, as a rule, to a minimum of work. In pro- \nportion as employers are exacting, the standard of work is \nhigher. The farmers of the northern part of the United \nStates do most of the work on their respective farms, and \nrequire of their servants a day\'s work equal to that of the \nmaster. The standard of farm work in that part of the \nUnited States, is the highest in the world. In the South- \nern States, on the contrary, where, when slavery existed, \nthe master did not work, the standard was extremely low. \nThe tendency of the laborer to leave undone that which \nhe can leave undone with impunity, is the rock that wrecks \nso many farming enterprises of men who are ignorant \nwhat a farm servant owes in the way of work, or who \nhave not energy to exact it. Communism, as guaranty- \ning subsistence and excluding the exacting master, would \nexclude an adequate motive for the quantity of work \nneedful to civilization. On the other hand, the guaranty \nof subsistence extinguishes the motive of parsimony. \nAccordingly in a communistic society the minimum of \nproduction and the maximum of waste would be the rule. \nEach man\'s tendency in this direction would make him, \nas part of the organ of public opinion, lenient to the ten- \ndency in others. Society would sink into poverty, and \nfrom its inability to support a learned class, into ignor- \nance. If not saved by an enlightened despot, it must fall \ninto barbarism, and finally into savagery. What havoc \na scarce year would make in such a society ! The de- \npendence of the citizen upon the state for his daily food, \n\n\n\n24 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nwould put liberty at the mercy of the chief magistrate. \nHolding the citizen by the stomach, a temptation, irre- \nsistible to most men, would constantly solicit the magis- \ntrate to perpetuate his rule by applying the greatest \npower for tyranny ever possessed by man. A partial \ndistribution in favor of the strong would sufficiently in- \ntrench him against the bulk of the society. \n\nIf it be possible to impart a knowledge of political \neconomy, including the anti-communistic argument, to a \nmajority of the males of civilized society, it is possible to \nparalyze communism and to make trades-unions a useful \nsocial organ. Under a compulsory sj^stem of education, \nincluding in its curriculum an outline of political economy, \nthe employing class, and even the upper stratum of the \nworking-class, would, at their own cost, impart the req- \nuisite knowledge to their male youth. To impart it to \nso many of the remaining male youth as, added to those \nindependently educated, would ultimately constitute a \nmajority of the males of the society, the state or the so- \nciety might have to bear the burden not only of main- \ntaining the requisite schools but also of contributing to \nthe support of the scholars. Between the twelfth and \nthirteenth year a mind of ordinary capacity prepared by \nthe usual primary instruction, would be fit to receive and \nmaster an outline of political economy. Three years \nwould suffice for the antecedent instruction. Accordingly, \nfour years of eleemosynary support and education of the \ncomplement of male youth needful to make up the de- \nsiderated majority, would be the cost to society of smoth- \nering under a crust of knowledge the Titanic errors \nthat threaten to explode it. To develop the desired ma- \njority, it might be necessary for the United States to feed \nat the public expense for four years, perhaps a third of \nthe male youth of the working-class. There is the length \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 25 \n\nand breadth of the difficulty. Does it so flagrantly ex- \nceed the resources of such countries as the United States, \nGreat Britain, Germany, Austria, France, that it is not \nworth while to attempt to succor civilization by means of \nit? Private bounty could not be more honorably em- \nployed than in helping the state to educate the poor ; \nand if all that it now wastes in corrupting society, in be- \ngetting and maintaining a lazzaroni, were applied to that \nend, it would probably suffice to maintain at least a moiety \nof the pupils dependent on eleemosynary help. But if it \nwere found impossible to maintain at school for four years, \nincluding the thirteenth, a majority of the male youth, \nsociety might select and politically educate a sufficient \nnumber of the youth destined to be its future workmen \nto serve as a propaganda of sound political doctrine to \nthe class and as a bulwark against false ideas ; and, by \nmeans of these, it might secure to conservatism and order \nenough of the working-class to constitute, with employers, \nan overwhelming\' majority. To encourage parents to \ncooperate with the state as to the political education of \ntheir children, privilege and immunity should attach to \nknowledge of political economy. The franchise should \nbe limited to men possessing this knowledge, and these \nshould be exempt from military service, except when an \nextraordinary levy had exhausted the ignorant class. To \ndiscourage abuse of the public bounty, citizens independ- \nently educated and in enjoyment of the franchise, should \nbe preferred for state employments and be exempt from \nmilitary service so long as the army could be recruited \nfrom the class indebted to eleemosynary help. \n\nIt maybe objected that in the thirteenth year the mind \nis not ripe for the reception of political economy. This \nobjection must yield to the consideration that the science \nis susceptible of a doctrinal form in which it is relieved of \n\n\n\n26 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nabstract dryness and difficulty, and which unfolds its \nprinciples by means of a series of amusing transactions \nbetween juvenile students, some taking the role of laborer, \nothers that of capitalist, and the transactions being coun- \nterfeits of the real proceedings of both orders. All manner \nof goods would be produced and exchanged. The trans- \nactions would constitute a model of the order of produc- \ntion and distribution, being to these what the orrery is to \nthe planetary system. The young student would see the \npart of the goods that go to the capitalist as profits, return \ninto the wages-fund, and it would be obvious to him that \nthe saving of the capitalists is as much for the benefit of \nlaborers as though it were a saving from wages. The \ntheory of rent, the theory of money 7 , the theory- of credit, \nwould be made manifest to him by transactions to which \nhe would be an interested and amused party. This em- \npirico-doctrinal method is also applicable for the ex- \nposure of the laws that make society, except as to its \nrudest or embryonic form, dependent on civil institutions, \nand for illustrating the advantages and disadvantages of \nthe various possible forms of the state. \n\nThe limitation of the franchise to men qualified for its \nexercise by political knowledge, will appear to many to \nbe a violation of right. This objection is nullified by a \ncorrect idea of the nature and genesis of right and duty, \nan idea which the writer presumes will be new to the \nreader. Right is the differentia of the meum and tuum. \nIt supposes that something morally belongs to its subject, \nas land, mone} r , liberty, inviolability of life. Right sup- \nposes duty ; for example, if a right have respect to land, \nif it be the moral element of ownership of land, the right \nsupposes the possibility of some one being both able and \nsubject to temptation to use the land in a way contrary \nto the mind of the owner, and that in case the tempta- \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 27 \n\ntion obtains, a recusant volition is due to the owner. If \na thing be owned by one and in possession of another, the \nright of the owner supposes a duty in the possessor to \nrestore the thing when required. Right to liberty sup- \nposes a corresponding duty to respect the liberty. \n\nThe ideas of right and duty are begotten by the bear- \ning of custom on the mind. Customary measures of lib- \nerty and immunity so affect the mind that an encroach- \nment upon them is apprehended as culpable. The mind \nis at first morally sensitive only to encroachments on the \nmeum ; later it is alive to encroachments of others on the \ntuum. ; in a third phase of development, it apprehends \nwith self-reproach the encroachment of its subject on \nthe tuum. When the association of ideas, or, as it is \nbetter named by Sir William Hamilton, redintegration, \nestablishes the connection of the moral imperative with \nhuman welfare, the mind habitually annexes ideas of \nduty to ideas of voluntary actions of a nature to promote \ngeneral happiness. When the idea of God kindles the \nreligious spirit, the moral imperative is given as Divine \ncommand. \n\nThat customary measures of liberty and immunity be- \nget the ideas of right and duty, is proved by the fact \nthat the idea of a right to a larger measure of liberty and \nimmunity than what he enjoys, never originates in the \nmind of a born slave. The idea of risjht to unaccustomed \nliberty seems to be unattainable even by free men in ad- \nvance of a late phase of civilization. On the other hand, \nslaves apprehend as violation any encroachment upon \ntheir customary liberty and immunity. Moreover cus- \ntom is the recognized ground of what is termed prescrip- \ntive right. \n\nA right supposes power in the subject of the correl- \native duty to obey the duty. One has no right to life \n\n\n\n28 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nagainst the tiger he encounters in the desert, nor against \na madman, because the tiger and the madman are desti- \ntute of power to obey duty. Power to obey duty sup- \nposes a sentiment of duty. Without an idea of duty in- \nvolved in a sentiment, obedience to duty would not be \npossible. Given a society consisting of only two persons, \nneither has a right but what is made by, and is constantly \ndependent on, a correlative sentiment of duty in the \nother ; for, without such a sentiment to give the idea of \ndoing or forbearing according to the right, there could be \nno volition obedient to the correlative duty ; and the idea \nof a right which no one has power to respect, is as ab- \nsurd as the idea of a right to life against the walls of a \nwell into which one has fallen. If one of a society of \nthree apprehend himself as having a certain right, and \nanother apprehend him, in a correlative sentiment of \nduty, as having such a right ; and if the two have power \nto cause the putative right to be respected, then, though \nthe third be destitute of a sentiment of duty relative to \nthe putative right, the right exists ; it is determined by \nthe efficient correlative sentiment of duty. Many mem- \nbers of society are moral idiots ; they are altogether des- \ntitute of the sentiment of duty ; but their moral idiotcy \nexcludes no right, the rights of all the members of the \nsociety being determined by the efficient moral sentiment \nof the bulk of the society. The erroneous assumption \nthat right is independent of efficient sentiment, caused \nthe collision of law and conscience in the United States, \nfrom which emerged the idea of a " higher law." The \nevil of slavery had become manifest to many humane \nand ardent minds. These coalesced into the party \nknown as abolitionists. The abolitionists apprehended \nslavery not merely as an evil, but as a violation of right ; \nand they held it to be their duty, not only to propagate \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 29 \n\ntheir abhorrence of the institution, but also to violate \nthe law of the country by inciting and helping slaves \nto escape from their masters. To this erroneous moral \nimperative, Mr. Seward gave the name of " higher law." \nIf the abolitionists had discerned the dependence of right \non an efficient sentiment of duty, they would not have \nregarded the slave as having a right to freedom and them- \nselves as under an obligation to assist him to liberty in \nviolation of law. They would have felt themselves \nbound to endeavor to propagate their moral abhorrence \nof slavery until they should excite an efficient moral sen- \ntiment in favor of liberty. The sentiment, armed with \nthe needful power, would constitute a right to liberty ; \nand then, and only then, it would be time to insist on \nabolition. The moral order is, in such cases, the way of \npeace, reformers restricting themselves to propaganclism \ntill they excite an efficient sentiment of duty, and then \npolitically and legally applying the power they have en- \ngendered. Philanthropy is a nuisance so long as it is \nirritated by the error that rights are independent of the \nmoral sentiment of society. Conscience makes it insubor- \ndinate. In advancing societies there is a progress as to \nmoral ideas which, every now and then, brings to light \nsome moral repugnancy in the form of the state or in the \nlaws ; and if, on every such occasion, philanthropy must \nneeds be insurrectionary in the name of a " higher law," \nit would domesticate anarchy. \n\nTo allow the dependence of rights on the moral senti- \nment of society, is to be disabused of the notion that \nrights are essential to the human individual and are older \nthan society, that sooiety, like a confederation of states, \nis the creature of a contract made between sovereign \nparties. Considered from the moral stand-point, the de- \npendence of the individual on society is at first unlimited. \n\n\n\n30 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nIn the rudest state of society there is no sentiment of \nduty, and there are no rights ; and, indeed, in view of \nthe fact that the human individual is the product of \nsociety, that, as infant, his dependence upon it is ex- \ntreme, and that, as adult, he owes to it the development \nof all his faculties, it is not to the honor of the human \nintellect that the idea of society as being the creature of \na contract made between sovereigns, could have mastered \nthe faith of a considerable part of mankind. \n\nSeeing that rights are the offspring of the moral senti- \nment of society, men have no right to suffrage except it \nbe conferred by that sentiment. To give an individual \nthe franchise, is to make him a part of the organ of sover- \neignty, \xe2\x80\x94 the organ that has for function the regulation \nof society. This, if the individual be politically ignorant, \nis to set him to do what he is incapable of doing, as \nthough peasants should be set to make watches. Moral \nsentiment repudiates such an absurdity, and therefore \ndetermines no right in the politically ignorant to meddle \nwith the business of the state. \n\n\n\nIV. \n\nThe state is but a means ; its end is the happiness and \ndignity of the human individual. But while it subserves \nit also retrenches the happiness and dignity of the citizen. \nIt does this by retrenching his liberty. If it exclude all \nliberty, it excludes all dignity and all that deserves the \nname of happiness. If it allow a certain excess of liberty, \nit gives room for disorder that tends to become anarchy. \nWhat then is the conterminus of civil power and safe \nliberty ? Let us look for a sign of it to the exigencies to \nwhich civil power corresponds. \n\n\n\nTHE KEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 31 \n\nThe protection of person and property against persons, \nis the characteristic function of the state. The protec- \ntion of person and property against the elements, as by \nthe construction and working of light-houses, the im- \nprovement of harbors and of internal navigation, may, \nnotwithstanding its great importance, be classed as one \nof the extraordinary functions of the state ; to which \nclass belongs also the relief of indigence, sanitary meas- \nures, colonization, the extension of commerce, the pro- \nmotion of science and art. To protect person and prop- \nerty against persons, it is necessary to apply preventive \nmeasures as well as measures of redress. Prevention is \nthe reason of an encroachment of characteristic civil \nfunction on liberty that seems to many political philoso- \nphers to be inexpedient as Avell as derogatory to the dig- \nnity of the citizen. Extraordinary civil function does \nnot, as a rule, encroach on liberty, at least not directly \nnor obviously. Accordingly our question does not impli- \ncate that of the expediency of extraordinary civil func- \ntion ; it has to do with no civil power but that which lias \nrespect to characteristic civil function and especially to \nthe preventive part of it. \n\nThe power of the state to protect person and property \nagainst persons, is in proportion to its knowledge of the \ncallings, domiciles, movements, character, etc., of all per- \nsons within its domain. If it be not all-seeing in respect \nof these, murder, treason, theft, fraud, are tempted and \nhelped by opportunity. If the society be suffered to grow \nso as to press severely against the limit of subsistence, the \nworking-class is plunged into extreme poverty consti- \ntuting a powerful incentive to violation of property and \nperson. Extreme poverty tends to suspend the moral \nimperative in respect of those whose indifference insults \nit. Why should not the despised pauper prey upon them \n\n\n\n32 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nas they prey upon animals of a different species ? Sym- \npathy is the ground, the sine qua non of moral sentiment, \nand, therefore of right and duty. But if the contempt \nof indifference be in place of sympathy, the ground of \nobligation is, in the view of the sufferer, wanting. It is \nto the weakness, not to the conscience of the pauper that \nsociety owes whatever of impunity it enjoys from the de- \nmoralizing tendency of pauperism. The governing classes \nare so familiar with the exterior of extreme poverty, they \nhave so little experience of the torment it involves, and \nits causes appear to be so hopelessly beyond human con- \ntrol, that these classes seem to themselves to be exempt \nfrom responsibility in regard to it ; and they view it as a \nhardship that human fortitude can very well endure. In \nthe view of the benevolent who know its intensity, it \nwere better that man were annihilated than that extreme \npoverty should measure the earthly life of the race. \nViewed from the middle between these extremes, the \nevil appears so great that, to the humane heart, its ex- \nclusion would be cheaply purchased by a considerable \nsacrifice of liberty. \n\nIt is only at such a cost of liberty that the state can \nacquire the knowledge necessary for the prevention of \ncrime against person and property, and for the exclusion \nof extreme poverty. Its eye should be on every citizen \nfrom his birth, and upon every foreigner that enters its \ndomain. It should know the calling and property of \nevery citizen. Every change of domicile should be known \nto it, and the occupants of every house. Travellers should \nbe an object of peculiar vigilance. Vagabondage should \nnot be tolerated. No citizen should be allowed to attain \nto man\'s estate without being qualified, or being in the \nway of being qualified, to give society a quid pro quo as \nregards his maintenance, except the maintenance be oth- \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 33 \n\nerwise guaranteed. The poor, unqualified to earn their \nbread, should be treated as a class dangerous to society. \nThe state should have power to apply them to the ac- \nquisition of some industrial art, and should have control \nof them till they repay the expense of teaching them. \n\nEnglish liberty cradled the International and built and \nlet loose the Alabama. It is a standing menace to other \nnations and to civilization at home and abroad. Never \nhad nations a better casus-belli than what the universal \naggressiveness of English liberty affords. Liberty in the \nUnited States is at this moment aiding and abetting \nCuba to throw off the Spanish yoke. The reaction \nagainst civil authority has begotten a fanatical optimism \nin respect to liberty. Human nature, forsooth, needs only \nunlimited freedom to develop civil perfection. Therefore \nwe should allow unlimited freedom of discussion and or- \nganization. A Paris and a Cartagena commune must be \nfree to organize itself in London. Nascent progress is al- \nways odious to the majorit}^ and would be stifled by the \nprejudice if it were not protected by the right of free \ndiscussion. No matter how violent the change proposed, \n\xe2\x80\x94 no matter how revolting and corrupting, nay even \nthough it be the conversion of all women into strum- \npets, \xe2\x80\x94 it is to be freely mooted and discussed, and suf- \nfered to organize itself, because it is presumable that, \nowing to the selectiveness of liberty, nothing but what is \ngood can survive free discussion. Liberty is the way, the \ntruth, and the life ! \n\nIt is more than time to suppress this superstition. In \ncommunism it has already raised a devil most difficult if \nnot impossible to lay. There is no such high-road to social \nperfection as the fanatics of liberty imagine. We have \nto grope our way in the dark, and not improbably over \nground which it would not be encouraging to see. We \n\n3 \n\n\n\n84 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nshould be tenacious of solid footing till experiment has \nassured us that we can trust our weight on new ground. \nWe should not trust wholly either in liberty or in con- \nservatism, but in so much of both as induction sanctions. \nWe should hold to our moral principles as though we \nwere morally infallible ; at least to those of them in re- \nspect of which a majority of the society are unanimous, \nand we should forbid public discussion of any scheme of \ninnovation which they condemn. In such free states as \nEngland and the United States, men are so besotted by \nexcessive liberty, that it seems to them not too dearly \npurchased at the cost of the crime, poverty, and anarchical \ntendency for which it is responsible. The prejudice would \nvanish before the light of political knowledge. A sov- \nereign people knowing the reason of the limitation of safe \nliberty, would know how to put up with self-imposed re- \nstraints, without which order and prosperity are impos- \nsible. According to experience, men easily put up with \nretrenchment of liberty, when equity, backed by power, \nrequires it. As a rule, even the rude in crowds sponta- \ntaneously forego an incommodious liberty. When cir- \ncumstances have brought home to the plebs the impor- \ntance of strong government, it has known how to submit ; \nfor example, lately in the United States, during the civil \nwar, to put up with the usurpation of illegal and dan- \ngerous power by the executive. They who most insist \non largest liberty, are they who know least of the con- \nstitution and circumstances of human nature that make \nhuman welfare dependent on strong government. Sup- \nplant the ignorance, and the intolerance will disappear \nwith it. \n\nThe aversion of the plebs to strong government is ag- \ngravated by an error that is easily dissipated, an error \nthat confounds strong government with civil authority. \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 35 \n\nThe plebs begins as infant. During its infancy civil \nauthority and power are at their maximum. According \nas the plebs is matured by civilization, it grows impatient \nof the too-much of civil restraint. A struggle ensues, \nthe plebeian striving in the name of liberty, and the \nauthority in the name of God. During the struggle the \nwar upon authority is necessarily a war upon strong gov- \nernment ; and when the plebs, as is inevitable amongst \nthe higher races, emancipates itself from tutelage, it con- \ntinues to regard strong government with a hostile eye, as \nthough it involved civil authority and were incompatible \nwith democracy. But the error has no root. A plebs \nthat is almost warranted, as in England or the United \nStates, to say of itself, Vetat, c\'est moi, has no ineradica- \nble reason of aversion to strong government. If it could \nsee its way to a strong civil system adequately guaranteed \nagainst abuse by the civil functionary, and if this system \nappeared to it to be the most expedient as regards the \nprosperity of society, there is nothing in history to war- \nrant the belief that it would not adopt the system. But \nthe addiction of the Anglo-Saxon to the principle of lais- \nsez faire, determines a better founded repugnance to the \nproposed increase of civil power. He distrusts the med- \ndling of human contrivance with civil growth, expecting \nall amelioration from the spontaneity of nature, and dis- \nposed to think that human interference with deep-seated \nsocial evil is more likely to aggravate than to improve. \nThis, combined with impatience of civil control, and ap- \nparently justified by the failure of so many political pre- \nscriptions, gives to the prejudice in favor of unsafe liberty \na stronghold which, though not impregnable, is capable \nof standing a Trojan siege. The civilized world is of \nlate in a state of neophobia. It stigmatizes eveiy novelty \nthat pretends to be a measure for the amelioration of \n\n\n\n36 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nsociety with the name of Utopia. True it has been often \nthe dupe of philanthropic invention, and is unceasingly \npestered by a swarm of vain schemes of social experi- \nment. This experience, however, should teach it not in- \ntolerance, but discrimination. Every human faculty errs, \nand the highest, Reason, misses more frequently than it \nhits the truth. Midway between such extremes as in- \ntolerance of novelty and a credulous susceptibility to \nnovelty is the zone of wisdom. Progress is ever demand- \ning of us the invention and application of new means, \nand our faculty has not been found unequal to the de- \nmand. \n\nRedundancy of population threatens to become the most \nformidable of the exigencies that demand strong govern- \nment. Until a dense population covers the habitable \nglobe, we are exempt from the necessity to find a final \nsolution of the Malthusian problem. Meantime, pressure \nagainst the limit of subsistence may be relieved by emi- \ngration. It tends to relieve itself in this way spontane- \nously, but not amply, steadily, nor in the way most \nfavorable to the society relieved. The relief is ample \nwhen it raises wages so that thrifty workmen can decently \nmaintain their families and have something to spare. It \nis favorable to the society relieved when it detaches those \nwho are most likely to succumb in the struggle for sub- \nsistence, whereas the abler and more enterprising of the \nworking-class are detached by spontaneous emigration. \nIf the state were empowered to prevent the increase of \npopulation beyond a given number by means of compul- \nsory emigration, an easy condition of the working-class \nwould be constantly or at least with little interruption, \nmaintained, and the society might be steadily disem- \nbarrassed of those who would be most likely to become a \nburden. It might select for expatriation the able-bodied \n\n\n\n\xe2\x80\xa2v \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OE CIVIL PROGRESS. 6( \n\npauper of sound mind, including all those who had been \nat any time helped by public bounty, excepting persons \nwho should purchase exemption by an amount equal to \nthe cost of transporting an emigrant. Colonial land \nmight be allotted to emigrants on condition of their set- \ntling on and cultivating the allotment, and the land \nmight be subjected to a permanent tax varying, within \ncertain limits, with the value, the tax to be applied to \ndefray the cost of emigration. Other moderate taxes \nmight be levied on the colonists, to be applied in the \nsame way. The colony, it will be said, would throw off \nthis burden when it acquired sufficient strength. The \nact would be dishonest, ungrateful, impious, and as impru- \ndent as immoral. All rights of property obtaining in \nthe colony would obtain in subordination to the end for \nwhich the colony was founded, and it would be sheer \nrobbery to despoil the mother-country of the property \nreserved by her, for carrying out that end. The moral \nreason would be inefficient if it were unarmed ; but the \nmother-country would defend her right. Besides, the \ncolony would be as much interested to have its popula- \ntion augmented as the mother-country to have its popu- \nlation diminished ; so that the tax would be applied for \nthe promotion of a common interest. Prudence, therefore, \nwould concur with duty in disposing the colony to endure \nthe tax and to preserve a filial relation to the mother- \ncountry until population should become of a certain den \nsity, which would signify the puberty of the colony, and, \ntherein, the termination of its legitimate dependence on \nthe mother-country. All colonizing countries would be \ninterested to make common cause against an insurrec- \ntionary colony that had no better reason for rebellion \nthan a sordid one. The selection for compulsory emigra- \ntion of beneficiaries of public bounty would benefit all \n\n\n\n38 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nparties concerned. It would relieve the mother-country \nof partial, total, or imminent pauperism, and the wages \nclass of severe competition, and would remove the weaker \npart of the class to a more remunerative field of employ- \nment. It would also tend to check abuse of public \nbounty, by making the beneficiary liable to compulsory \nemigration. \n\nThe great obstacle to the relief of redundancy of pop- \nulation by colonization, is that town industry, and es- \npecially that which produces luxuries, is for the most part \nout of place in colonies. This obstacle testifies, not that \nthe state should not meddle with emigration, but that it \nshould look to and regulate the proportion between agri- \ncultural and town industry. Jefferson says of great \ntowns that they are great sores on the body politic. \nParis is a notorious example, and the complicity of the \nlower order of the citizens of New York with the Tam- \nmany Ring is even a better though a less conspicuous \nspecimen. But the political danger incident to great \ntowns is even less than the economical danger. Redun- \ndancy of the wages class dependent upon agricultural in- \ndustry can be relieved by emigration, but not so redun- \ndancy of the wages class dependent on town-industry. \nThe poverty and habit of colonies exclude a considerable \ndemand for the labor and skill of the latter class ; and \nthe inconsiderable demand can be more cheaply satisfied \nfrom abroad. According as the proportion of town in- \ndustry augments, irredeemable distress augments. In \ndensely populated countries the evil is accelerative. The \nlow cost and price consequent on the low wages, tend to \nextend the foreign market for town products. This en- \nables and causes an increase of the wages class, the agri- \ncultural portion remaining the same or but slightly in- \ncreasing, while the bulk of the additional number engages \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 39 \n\nin town industry. After a time the increase of the wages \nclass further reduces wages, cost, and price, and augments \nthe foreign market, increasing the excess of population \nover what domestic agriculture can maintain ; and it in- \ncreases the number unfit for emigration. Another danger \nto countries having a much greater population than what \ntheir agriculture can feed, is that they are at the mercy of \nevery interruption to commerce. The}^ are sensitive to \nall the ills that affect their foreign markets. It is true \nthat they are more powerful, better able, as having more \nmen and money, to gratify national ambition. They are \nbetter able to sway the policy of other nations, to pre- \nserve their independence, and to make the rest of the \nworld convenient to them. It may be expedient to risk \nthe danger of extraordinary town population for the sake \nof these benefits ; but surely no attention has been \nhitherto bestowed upon the question that warrants such \na conclusion. If society after due consideration, should \nconclude that it is better not to interfere with the in- \ncrease of town population, it would not, in the worst \nsense, drift into the dangerous extremity. It would \nwillingly incur the danger. If it concluded otherwise, it \nwould have no reasonable alternative but to arm the state \nwith power to arrest the inordinate growth of towns. \n\nSuch are the exigencies that call for a retrenchment of \nliberty in constitutional states. Do they expose the con- \nterminus for which we are looking ? No ; there are no \ngeneral marks significant of the limit. But there is a \nmethod instead by which each societ} 7 may practically \nthough not theoretically, ascertain and keep itself oscilla- \nting in a narrow range within which the limit lies. The \nmethod proceeds on such a complex of incommunicable \nknowledge and of instinctive aptitude as constitutes the \nskill that precedes and generates art ; such, for example, \n\n\n\n40 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nas enables the slinger to hit the mark, or a person in mo- \ntion to elude collision at the intersection of his direction \nand that of another moving body. This method gives to \nthe state a power that is not to be fully exercised except \nin extremity, with the understanding that the civil func- \ntionary is to employ no more of it than what is indispen- \nsable for the due conduct of the society. To this it will \nbe objected that the functionary would not have respect to \nthe interest of liberty, and that the indefiniteness of his \nobligation in regard of it would tempt, elicit, and protect \na regular abuse of power. Police administration, in con- \nstitutional states, disproves the objection. It is every- \nwhere applied so as to be inoffensive to the class that, as a \nrule, gives no occasion for its interference. This, no doubt, \nis owing to the peculiar sensitiveness of society to police in- \nterference ; and it is not to be inferred that civil power in \nother departments wherein it is not in contact with and re- \nstrained by a like sensitiveness, would be exercised, in the \nabsence of any equivalent restraint, with like deference to \nliberty. But it is possible to apply an equivalent restraint, \n1st, by generating and maintaining, through the political \neducation of the people, a public opinion that bears un- \ncomfortably on the citizen who manifests indifference to \nthe danger of civil encroachments ; and 2d, by the ap- \npointment of prosecuting and judicial officers for the pro- \ntection of liberty against civil functionaries. The sinecur- \nism of the demos is the arch-enemy of democracy. It likes \nthe honor, but not the trouble of " kinging." To prevent \nthis indolence, Athens decreed that every citizen must \ntake part with one faction or another. A people whose \nemotive nature does not afford a basis for such a jealous \nand active love of liberty as the proposed political educa- \ntion should aim at exciting, is either altogether incapable \nof, or not yet ripe for, a more advanced civil form ; but it \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. 41 \n\nis probable that, in view of the collapse of liberty and \ndecay of civilization heretofore caused by popular indif- \nference to encroaching civil power, the peoples of the \nUnited States, England, Germany, and France, enlight- \nened by a political education, will evolve a sufficiently \njealous, vigilant, and reactive patriotism. Stimulated \nand supported by this spirit, the civil guardians of lib- \nerty would be likely to hold in check the encroaching \ntendency of civil power, and to keep it near the desired \nconterminus. To this end, the police should be a body \nprepared by something more than the common education \nfor the nice exercise of discretion, and for this they \nshould be held responsible. \n\n\n\nV. \n\nA state of the proposed pattern is a democracy, as hav- \ning for sovereign the unanimous majority of all the adult \ncitizens intellectually competent to exercise suffrage. It \nis a limited democracy because of the disqualification of \nthe needy and of the rich who are not graduates of uni- \nversities for high civil function. It maybe either a dem- \nocratic republic, or what is badly termed a constitutional \nmonarchy ; in other words, either an elective chief -mag- \nistracy, as in the United States, or as in England, a hered- \nitary nominal chief -magistracy . The misnomer consti- \ntutional monarchy obscures the relation to democracy and \nthe excellent conveniency to liberty of hereditary fictitious \nchief-magistrac}^. The head of the state is not in any \nrespect sovereign. It is quite safe to affirm of him that \nhe can do no wrong, seeing ^that his impotence secures his \nimpeccability. His prime minister is the real chief mag- \nistrate. He himself has more than the honor but none of \n\n\n\n42 THE NEXT PHASE OF CIVIL PROGRESS. \n\nthe power of magistracy. But though not a sovereign, he \nis the symbol of the power and dignity of the state, and a \nsymbol of great utility, as absorbing and nullifying that \ndangerous excess of honor, which, when concentrated \nupon an able servant of the state tends to convert him \ninto a despot. Ambition is more securely harnessed when \nthe high officers of the state are universally and habit- \nually viewed, and habitually apprehend themselves, as \nsubjects and servants of an individual; \xe2\x80\x94 one so easily \nloses sight of such an abstract master as the state ! More- \nover, hereditary nominal chief-magistracy is more conven- \nient to liberty than elective chief-magistracy, as affording, \nin the facility of deposing a minister or a parliament, a \nreadier expression of the mind of the majority. It has \nalso the advantage of excluding the frequent agitation of \nsociety for the satisfaction of private ambition. \n\nThe prerogative that gives England its House of Lords \nis a mere accident of fictitious hereditary chief-magistracy. \nTo propose it to a democratic republic as an ameliorative \nlimit, would be but little more absurd than to propose its \nabolition in England. It is objectionable as saddling the \nbulk of society with a merely conventional superiority. \nHuman pride can easily put up with a superiority that \nis inevitable, or that atones by its utility, such as that of a \ngentry ; but reason protests against tolerance of a merely \nconventional superiority that is neither inevitable nor of \ncompensating utility. On the other hand, the prerogative \nhas worked well in England, and no one is able to foresee \nwhat damage to the state its abolition in that country \nmight cause. " Heredity " is by no means of itself a se- \nlective principle as regards the intellectual and moral \naptitudes required in a legislator, but as applied to what \nmay be termed the nutrition of the House of Lords, it \noperates selectively. It selects those who in respect of \n\n\n\nTHE NEXT PHASE OK CIVIL PROGRESS. 4\'6 \n\nopulence, instruction, and refinement, give the best guar- \nantees of good conduct, and, within the organ which it \naliments, there forms another organ, the working House \nof Lords, which consists of the able portion of the he- \nreditary peers and of the law lords, and which experience \nhas proved to be efficient. No political philosopher wor- \nthy of the name would be for incurring, in order to re- \nmove a merely sentimental grievance, the unforeseeable \nconsequences of the suppression of an institution so sanc- \ntioned by experience. \n\n\n\nDEO 30 18 \n\n\n\n.-\xe2\x80\xa2\' \n\n\n\n\n\n\nLIBRARY OF CONGRESS \n\n\n\n027 273 651 \n\n\n\n\n\n! \n\n\n\n\n\n\n'