{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_3118/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_3118","id":"gutenberg_3118","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3118","summary":null,"tags":["Category: American Literature","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Politics","Essays"],"text":"Produced by David Widger\n\n\n\n\n\n\"EQUALITY\"\n\nBy Charles Dudley Warner\n\nIn accordance with the advice of Diogenes of Apollonia in the beginning\nof his treatise on Natural Philosophy--\"It appears to me to be well for\nevery one who commences any sort of philosophical treatise to lay down\nsome undeniable principle to start with\"--we offer this:\n\n        All men are created unequal.\n\nIt would be a most interesting study to trace the growth in the world of\nthe doctrine of \"equality.\" That is not the purpose of this essay, any\nfurther than is necessary for definition. We use the term in its popular\nsense, in the meaning, somewhat vague, it is true, which it has had since\nthe middle of the eighteenth century. In the popular apprehension it is\napt to be confounded with uniformity; and this not without reason, since\nin many applications of the theory the tendency is to produce likeness or\nuniformity. Nature, with equal laws, tends always to diversity; and\ndoubtless the just notion of equality in human affairs consists with\nunlikeness. Our purpose is to note some of the tendencies of the dogma as\nit is at present understood by a considerable portion of mankind.\n\nWe regard the formulated doctrine as modern. It would be too much to say\nthat some notion of the \"equality of men\" did not underlie the\nsocialistic and communistic ideas which prevailed from time to time in\nthe ancient world, and broke out with volcanic violence in the Grecian\nand Roman communities. But those popular movements seem to us rather\nblind struggles against physical evils, and to be distinguished from\nthose more intelligent actions based upon the theory which began to stir\nEurope prior to the Reformation.\n\nIt is sufficient for our purpose to take the well-defined theory of\nmodern times. Whether the ideal republic of Plato was merely a convenient\nform for philosophical speculation, or whether, as the greatest authority\non political economy in Germany, Dr. William Roscher, thinks, it \"was no\nmere fancy\"; whether Plato's notion of the identity of man and the State\nis compatible with the theory of equality, or whether it is, as many\ncommunists say, indispensable to it, we need not here discuss. It is true\nthat in his Republic almost all the social theories which have been\ndeduced from the modern proclamation of equality are elaborated. There\nwas to be a community of property, and also a community of wives and\nchildren. The equality of the sexes was insisted on to the extent of\nliving in common, identical education and pursuits, equal share in all\nlabors, in occupations, and in government. Between the sexes there was\nallowed only one ultimate difference. The Greeks, as Professor Jowett\nsays, had noble conceptions of womanhood; but Plato's ideal for the sexes\nhad no counterpart in their actual life, nor could they have understood\nthe sort of equality upon which he insisted. The same is true of the\nRomans throughout their history.\n\nMore than any other Oriental peoples the Egyptians of the Ancient Empire\nentertained the idea of the equality of the sexes; but the equality of\nman was not conceived by them. Still less did any notion of it exist in\nthe Jewish state. It was the fashion with the socialists of 1793, as it\nhas been with the international assemblages at Geneva in our own day, to\ntrace the genesis of their notions back to the first Christian age. The\nfar-reaching influence of the new gospel in the liberation of the human\nmind and in promoting just and divinely-ordered relations among men is\nadmitted; its origination of the social and political dogma we are\nconsidering is denied. We do not find that Christ himself anywhere\nexpressed it or acted on it. He associated with the lowly, the vile, the\noutcast; he taught that all men, irrespective of rank or possessions, are\nsinners, and in equal need of help. But he attempted no change in the\nconditions of society. The \"communism\" of the early Christians was the\ntemporary relation of a persecuted and isolated sect, drawn together by\ncommon necessities and dangers, and by the new enthusiasm of\nself-surrender. [\"The community of goods of the first Christians at\nJerusalem, so frequently cited and extolled, was only a community of use,\nnot of ownership (Acts iv. 32), and throughout a voluntary act of love,\nnot a duty (v. 4); least of all, a right which the poorer might assert.\nSpite of all this, that community of goods produced a chronic state of\npoverty in the church of Jerusalem.\" (Principles of Political Economy. By\nWilliam Roscher. Note to Section LXXXI. English translation. New York:\nHenry Holt & Co. 1878.)]--Paul announced the universal brotherhood of\nman, but he as clearly recognized the subordination of society, in the\nduties of ruler and subject, master and slave, and in all the domestic\nrelations; and although his gospel may be interpreted to contain the\nelements of revolution, it is not probable that he undertook to\ninculcate, by the proclamation of \"universal brotherhood,\" anything more\nthan the duty of universal sympathy between all peoples and classes as\nsociety then existed.\n\nIf Christianity has been and is the force in promoting and shaping\ncivilization that we regard it, we may be sure that it is not as a\npolitical agent, or an annuller of the inequalities of life, that we are\nto expect aid from it. Its office, or rather one of its chief offices on\nearth, is to diffuse through the world, regardless of condition or\npossessions or talent or opportunity, sympathy and a recognition of the\nvalue of manhood underlying every lot and every diversity--a value not\nmeasured by earthly accidents, but by heavenly standards. This we\nunderstand to be \"Christian equality.\" Of course it consists with\ninequalities of condition, with subordination, discipline, obedience; to\nobey and serve is as honorable as to command and to be served.\n\nIf the religion of Christ should ever be acclimated on earth, the result\nwould not be the removal of hardships and suffering, or of the necessity\nof self-sacrifice; but the bitterness and discontent at unequal\nconditions would measurably disappear. At the bar of Christianity the\npoor man is the equal of the rich, and the learned of the unlearned,\nsince intellectual acquisition is no guarantee of moral worth. The\ncontent that Christianity would bring to our perturbed society would come\nfrom the practical recognition of the truth that all conditions may be\nequally honorable. The assertion of the dignity of man and of labor is,\nwe imagine, the sum and substance of the equality and communism of the\nNew Testament. But we are to remember that this is not merely a \"gospel\nfor the poor.\"\n\nWhatever the theories of the ancient world were, the development of\ndemocratic ideas is sufficiently marked in the fifteenth century, and\neven in the fourteenth, to rob the eighteenth of the credit of\noriginating the doctrine of equality. To mention only one of the early\nwriters,--[For copious references to authorities on the spread of\ncommunistic and socialistic ideas and libertine community of goods and\nwomen in four periods of the world's history--namely, at the time of the\ndecline of Greece, in the degeneration of the Roman republic, among the\nmoderns in the age of the Reformation, and again in our own day--see\nRoscher's Political Economy, notes to Section LXXIX., et seq.]\n--Marsilio, a physician of Padua, in 1324, said that the laws ought to be\nmade by all the citizens; and he based this sovereignty of the people\nupon the greater likelihood of laws being better obeyed, and also being\ngood laws, when they were made by the whole body of the persons affected.\n\nIn 1750 and 1753, J. J. Rousseau published his two discourses on\nquestions proposed by the Academy of Dijon: \"Has the Restoration of\nSciences Contributed to Purify or to Corrupt Manners?\" and \"What is the\nOrigin of Inequality among Men, and is it Authorized by Natural Law?\"\nThese questions show the direction and the advance of thinking on social\ntopics in the middle of the eighteenth century. Rousseau's Contrat-Social\nand the novel Emile were published in 1761.\n\nBut almost three-quarters of a century before, in 1690, John Locke\npublished his two treatises on government. Rousseau was familiar with\nthem. Mr. John Morley, in his admirable study of Rousseau, [Rousseau. By\nJohn Morley. London: Chapman & Hall. 1873--I have used it freely in the\nglance at this period.]--fully discusses the latter's obligation to\nLocke; and the exposition leaves Rousseau little credit for originality,\nbut considerable for illogical misconception. He was, in fact, the most\nillogical of great men, and the most inconsistent even of geniuses. The\nContrat-Social is a reaction in many things from the discourses, and\nEmile is almost an entire reaction, especially in the theory of\neducation, from both.\n\nHis central doctrine of popular sovereignty was taken from Locke. The\nEnglish philosopher said, in his second treatise, \"To understand\npolitical power aright and derive it from its original, we must consider\nwhat state all men are naturally in; and that is a state of perfect\nfreedom to order their actions and dispose of their persons and\npossessions as they think fit, within the bounds of the law of nature,\nwithout asking leave or depending upon the will of any other man--a state\nalso of equality, wherein all the power and jurisdiction is reciprocal,\nno one having more than another; there being nothing more evident than\nthat creatures of the same species and rank, promiscuously born to all\nthe advantages of nature and the use of the same faculties, should also\nbe equal one amongst another, without subordination or subjection, unless\nthe Lord and Master of them all should by any manifest declaration of His\nwill set one above another, and confer on him by an evident and clear\nappointment an undoubted right to dominion and sovereignty.\" But a state\nof liberty is not a state of license. We cannot exceed our own rights\nwithout assailing the rights of others. There is no such subordination as\nauthorizes us to destroy one another. As every one is bound to preserve\nhimself, so he is bound to preserve the rest of mankind, and except to do\njustice upon an offender we may not impair the life, liberty, health, or\ngoods of another. Here Locke deduces the power that one man may have over\nanother; community could not exist if transgressors were not punished.\nEvery wrongdoer places himself in \"a state of war.\" Here is the\ndifference between the state of nature and the state of war, which men,\nsays Locke, have confounded--alluding probably to Hobbes's notion of the\nlawlessness of human society in the original condition.\n\nThe portion of Locke's treatise which was not accepted by the French\ntheorists was that relating to property. Property in lands or goods is\ndue wholly and only to the labor man has put into it. By labor he has\nremoved it from the common state in which nature has placed it, and\nannexed something to it that excludes the common rights of other men.\n\nRousseau borrowed from Hobbes as well as from Locke in his conception of\npopular sovereignty; but this was not his only lack of originality. His\ndiscourse on primitive society, his unscientific and unhistoric notions\nabout the original condition of man, were those common in the middle of\nthe eighteenth century. All the thinkers and philosophers and fine ladies\nand gentlemen assumed a certain state of nature, and built upon it, out\nof words and phrases, an airy and easy reconstruction of society, without\na thought of investigating the past, or inquiring into the development of\nmankind. Every one talked of \"the state of nature\" as if he knew all\nabout it. \"The conditions of primitive man,\" says Mr. Morley, \"were\ndiscussed by very incompetent ladies and gentlemen at convivial\nsupper-parties, and settled with complete assurance.\" That was the age\nwhen solitary Frenchmen plunged into the wilderness of North America,\nconfidently expecting to recover the golden age under the shelter of a\nwigwam and in the society of a squaw.\n\nThe state of nature of Rousseau was a state in which inequality did not\nexist, and with a fervid rhetoric he tried to persuade his readers that\nit was the happier state. He recognized inequality, it is true, as a word\nof two different meanings: first, physical inequality, difference of age,\nstrength, health, and of intelligence and character; second, moral and\npolitical inequality, difference of privileges which some enjoy to the\ndetriment of others-such as riches, honor, power. The first difference is\nestablished by nature, the second by man. So long, however, as the state\nof nature endures, no disadvantages flow from the natural inequalities.\n\nIn Rousseau's account of the means by which equality was lost, the\nincoming of the ideas of property is prominent. From property arose civil\nsociety. With property came in inequality. His exposition of inequality\nis confused, and it is not possible always to tell whether he means\ninequality of possessions or of political rights. His contemporary,\nMorelly, who published the Basileade in 1753, was troubled by no such\nambiguity. He accepts the doctrine that men are formed by laws, but holds\nthat they are by nature good, and that laws, by establishing a division\nof the products of nature, broke up the sociability of men, and that all\npolitical and moral evils are the result of private property. Political\ninequality is an accident of inequality of possessions, and the\nrenovation of the latter lies in the abolition of the former.\n\nThe opening sentence of the Contrat-Social is, \"Man is born free, and\neverywhere he is a slave,\" a statement which it is difficult to reconcile\nwith the fact that every human being is born helpless, dependent, and\ninto conditions of subjection, conditions that we have no reason to\nsuppose were ever absent from the race. But Rousseau never said, \"All men\nare born equal.\" He recognized, as we have seen, natural inequality. What\nhe held was that the artificial differences springing from the social\nunion were disproportionate to the capacities springing from the original\nconstitution; and that society, as now organized, tends to make the gulf\nwider between those who have privileges and those who have none.\n\nThe well-known theory upon which Rousseau's superstructure rests is that\nsociety is the result of a compact, a partnership between men. They have\nnot made an agreement to submit their individual sovereignty to some\nsuperior power, but they have made a covenant of brotherhood. It is a\ncontract of association. Men were, and ought to be, equal cooperators,\nnot only in politics, but in industries and all the affairs of life. All\nthe citizens are participants in the sovereign authority. Their\nsovereignty is inalienable; power may be transmitted, but not will; if\nthe people promise to obey, it dissolves itself by the very act--if there\nis a master, there is no longer a people. Sovereignty is also\nindivisible; it cannot be split up into legislative, judiciary, and\nexecutive power.\n\nSociety being the result of a compact made by men, it followed that the\npartners could at any time remake it, their sovereignty being\ninalienable. And this the French socialists, misled by a priori notions,\nattempted to do, on the theory of the Contrat-Social, as if they had a\ntabula rasa, without regarding the existing constituents of society, or\ntraditions, or historical growths.\n\nEquality, as a phrase, having done duty as a dissolvent, was pressed into\nservice as a constructor. As this is not so much an essay on the nature\nof equality is an attempt to indicate some of the modern tendencies to\ncarry out what is illusory in the dogma, perhaps enough has been said of\nthis period. Mr. Morley very well remarks that the doctrine of equality\nas a demand for a fair chance in the world is unanswerable; but that it\nis false when it puts him who uses his chance well on the same level with\nhim who uses it ill. There is no doubt that when Condorcet said, \"Not\nonly equality of right, but equality of fact, is the goal of the social\nart,\" he uttered the sentiments of the socialists of the Revolution.\n\nThe next authoritative announcement of equality, to which it is necessary\nto refer, is in the American Declaration of Independence, in these words:\n\"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal;\nthat they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights;\nthat among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to\nsecure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their\njust power from the consent of the governed.\" And the Declaration goes\non, in temperate and guarded language, to assert the right of a people to\nchange their form of government when it becomes destructive of the ends\nnamed.\n\nAlthough the genesis of these sentiments seems to be French rather than\nEnglish, and equality is not defined, and critics have differed as to\nwhether the equality clause is independent or qualified by what follows,\nit is not necessary to suppose that Thomas Jefferson meant anything\ninconsistent with the admitted facts of nature and of history. It is\nimportant to bear in mind that the statesmen of our Revolution were\ninaugurating a political and not a social revolution, and that the\ngravamen of their protest was against the authority of a distant crown.\nNevertheless, these dogmas, independent of the circumstances in which\nthey were uttered, have exercised and do exercise a very powerful\ninfluence upon the thinking of mankind on social and political topics,\nand are being applied without limitations, and without recognition of the\nfact that if they are true, in the sense meant by their originators, they\nare not the whole truth. It is to be noticed that rights are mentioned,\nbut not duties, and that if political rights only are meant, political\nduties are not inculcated as of equal moment. It is not announced that\npolitical power is a function to be discharged for the good of the whole\nbody, and not a mere right to be enjoyed for the advantage of the\npossessor; and it is to be noted also that this idea did not enter into\nthe conception of Rousseau.\n\nThe dogma that \"government derives its just power from the consent of the\ngoverned\" is entirely consonant with the book theories of the eighteenth\ncentury, and needs to be confronted, and practically is confronted, with\nthe equally good dogma that \"governments derive their just power from\nconformity with the principles of justice.\" We are not to imagine, for\ninstance, that the framers of the Declaration really contemplated the\nexclusion from political organization of all higher law than that in the\n\"consent of the governed,\" or the application of the theory, let us say,\nto a colony composed for the most part of outcasts, murderers, thieves,\nand prostitutes, or to such states as today exist in the Orient. The\nDeclaration was framed for a highly intelligent and virtuous society.\n\nMany writers, and some of them English, have expressed curiosity, if not\nwonder, at the different fortunes which attended the doctrine of equality\nin America and in France. The explanation is on the surface, and need not\nbe sought in the fact of a difference of social and political level in\nthe two countries at the start, nor even in the further fact that the\ncolonies were already accustomed to self-government.\n\nThe simple truth is that the dogmas of the Declaration were not put into\nthe fundamental law. The Constitution is the most practical state\ndocument ever made. It announces no dogmas, proclaims no theories. It\naccepted society as it was, with its habits and traditions; raising no\nabstract questions whether men are born free or equal, or how society\nought to be organized. It is simply a working compact, made by \"the\npeople,\" to promote union, establish justice, and secure the blessings of\nliberty; and the equality is in the assumption of the right of \"the\npeople of the United States\" to do this. And yet, in a recent number of\nBlackwood's Magazine, a writer makes the amusing statement, \"I have never\nmet an American who could deny that, while firmly maintaining that the\ntheory was sound which, in the beautiful language of the Constitution,\nproclaims that all men were born equal, he was,\" etc.\n\nAn enlightening commentary on the meaning of the Declaration, in the\nminds of the American statesmen of the period, is furnished by the\nopinions which some of them expressed upon the French Revolution while it\nwas in progress. Gouverneur Morris, minister to France in 1789, was a\nconservative republican; Thomas Jefferson was a radical democrat. Both of\nthem had a warm sympathy with the French \"people\" in the Revolution; both\nhoped for a republic; both recognized, we may reasonably infer, the\nsufficient cause of the Revolution in the long-continued corruption of\ncourt and nobility, and the intolerable sufferings of the lower orders;\nand both, we have equal reason to believe, thought that a fair\naccommodation, short of a dissolution of society, was defeated by the\nimbecility of the king and the treachery and malignity of a considerable\nportion of the nobility. The Revolution was not caused by theories,\nhowever much it may have been excited or guided by them. But both Morris\nand Jefferson saw the futility of the application of the abstract dogma\nof equality and the theories of the Social Contract to the reconstruction\nof government and the reorganization of society in France.\n\nIf the aristocracy were malignant--though numbers of them were far from\nbeing so--there was also a malignant prejudice aroused against them, and\nM. Taine is not far wrong when he says of this prejudice, \"Its hard, dry\nkernel consists of the abstract idea of equality.\"--[The French\nRevolution. By H. A. Taine. Vol. i., bk. ii., chap. ii., sec. iii.\nTranslation. New York: Henry Holt & Co.]--Taine's French Revolution is\ncynical, and, with all its accumulation of material, omits some facts\nnecessary to a philosophical history; but a passage following that quoted\nis worth reproducing in this connection: \"The treatment of the nobles of\nthe Assembly is the same as the treatment of the Protestants by Louis\nXIV. . . . One hundred thousand Frenchmen driven out at the end of the\nseventeenth century, and one hundred thousand driven out at the end of\nthe eighteenth! Mark how an intolerant democracy completes the work of an\nintolerant monarchy! The moral aristocracy was mowed down in the name of\nuniformity; the social aristocracy is mowed down in the name of equality.\nFor the second time an abstract principle, and with the same effect,\nburies its blade in the heart of a living society.\"\n\nNotwithstanding the world-wide advertisement of the French experiment, it\nhas taken almost a century for the dogma of equality, at least outside of\nFrance, to filter down from the speculative thinkers into a general\npopular acceptance, as an active principle to be used in the shaping of\naffairs, and to become more potent in the popular mind than tradition or\nhabit. The attempt is made to apply it to society with a brutal logic;\nand we might despair as to the result, if we did not know that the world\nis not ruled by logic. Nothing is so fascinating in the hands of the\nhalf-informed as a neat dogma; it seems the perfect key to all\ndifficulties. The formula is applied in contempt and ignorance of the\npast, as if building up were as easy as pulling down, and as if society\nwere a machine to be moved by mechanical appliances, and not a living\norganism composed of distinct and sensitive beings. Along with the spread\nof a belief in the uniformity of natural law has unfortunately gone a\nsuggestion of parallelism of the moral law to it, and a notion that if we\ncan discover the right formula, human society and government can be\norganized with a mathematical justice to all the parts. By many the dogma\nof equality is held to be that formula, and relief from the greater evils\nof the social state is expected from its logical extension.\n\nLet us now consider some of the present movements and tendencies that are\nrelated, more or less, to this belief:\n\nI. Absolute equality is seen to depend upon absolute supremacy of the\nstate. Professor Henry Fawcett says, \"Excessive dependence on the state\nis the most prominent characteristic of modern socialism.\" \"These\nproposals to prohibit inheritance, to abolish private property, and to\nmake the state the owner of all the capital and the administrator of the\nentire industry of the country are put forward as representing socialism\nin its ultimate and highest development.\"--[\"Socialism in Germany and the\nUnited States,\" Fortnightly Review, November, 1878.]\n\nSociety and government should be recast till they conform to the theory,\nor, let us say, to its exaggerations. Men can unmake what they have made.\nThere is no higher authority anywhere than the will of the majority, no\nmatter what the majority is in intellect and morals. Fifty-one ignorant\nmen have a natural right to legislate for the one hundred, as against\nforty-nine intelligent men.\n\nAll men being equal, one man is as fit to legislate and execute as\nanother. A recently elected Congressman from Maine vehemently repudiated\nin a public address, as a slander, the accusation that he was educated.\nThe theory was that, uneducated, he was the proper representative of the\naverage ignorance of his district, and that ignorance ought to be\nrepresented in the legislature in kind. The ignorant know better what\nthey want than the educated know for them. \"Their education [that of\ncollege men] destroys natural perception and judgment; so that cultivated\npeople are one-sided, and their judgment is often inferior to that of the\nworking people.\" \"Cultured people have made up their minds, and are hard\nto move.\" \"No lawyer should be elected to a place in any legislative\nbody.\"--[Opinions of working-men, reported in \"The Nationals, their\nOrigin and their Aims,\" The Atlantic Monthly, November, 1878.]\n\nExperience is of no account, neither is history, nor tradition, nor the\naccumulated wisdom of ages. On all questions of political economy,\nfinance, morals, the ignorant man stands on a par with the best informed\nas a legislator. We might cite any number of the results of these\nillusions. A member of a recent House of Representatives declared that we\n\"can repair the losses of the war by the issue of a sufficient amount of\npaper money.\" An intelligent mechanic of our acquaintance, a leader among\nthe Nationals, urging the theory of his party, that banks should be\ndestroyed, and that the government should issue to the people as much\n\"paper money\" as they need, denied the right of banks or of any\nindividuals to charge interest on money. Yet he would take rent for the\nhouse he owns.\n\nLaws must be the direct expression of the will of the majority, and be\naltered solely on its will. It would be well, therefore, to have a\ncontinuous election, so that, any day, the electors can change their\nrepresentative for a new man. \"If my caprice be the source of law, then\nmy enjoyment may be the source of the division of the nation's\nresources.\"--[Stahl's Rechtsphilosophie, quoted by Roscher.]\n\nProperty is the creator of inequality, and this factor in our artificial\nstate can be eliminated only by absorption. It is the duty of the\ngovernment to provide for all the people, and the sovereign people will\nsee to it that it does. The election franchise is a natural right--a\nman's weapon to protect himself. It may be asked, If it is just this, and\nnot a sacred trust accorded to be exercised for the benefit of society,\nwhy may not a man sell it, if it is for his interest to do so?\n\nWhat is there illogical in these positions from the premise given?\n\"Communism,\" says Roscher, [Political Economy, bk. i., ch. v., 78.]--\"is\nthe logically not inconsistent exaggeration of the principle of equality.\nMen who hear themselves designated as the sovereign people, and their\nwelfare as the supreme law of the state, are more apt than others to feel\nmore keenly the distance which separates their own misery from the\nsuperabundance of others. And, indeed, to what an extent our physical\nwants are determined by our intellectual mold!\"\n\nThe tendency of the exaggeration of man's will as the foundation of\ngovernment is distinctly materialistic; it is a self-sufficiency that\nshuts out God and the higher law.--[\"And, indeed, if the will of man is\nall-powerful, if states are to be distinguished from one another only by\ntheir boundaries, if everything may be changed like the scenery in a play\nby a flourish of the magic wand of a system, if man may arbitrarily make\nthe right, if nations can be put through evolutions like regiments of\ntroops, what a field would the world present for attempts at the\nrealizations of the wildest dreams, and what a temptation would be\noffered to take possession, by main force, of the government of human\naffairs, to destroy the rights of property and the rights of capital, to\ngratify ardent longings without trouble, and to provide the much-coveted\nmeans of enjoyment! The Titans have tried to scale the heavens, and have\nfallen into the most degrading materialism. Purely speculative dogmatism\nsinks into materialism.\" (M. Wolowski's Essay on the Historical Method,\nprefixed to his translation of Roscher's Political Economy.)]--We need to\nremember that the Creator of man, and not man himself, formed society and\ninstituted government; that God is always behind human society and\nsustains it; that marriage and the family and all social relations are\ndivinely established; that man's duty, coinciding with his right, is, by\nthe light of history, by experience, by observation of men, and by the\naid of revelation, to find out and make operative, as well as he can, the\ndivine law in human affairs. And it may be added that the sovereignty of\nthe people, as a divine trust, may be as logically deduced from the\ndivine institution of government as the old divine right of kings.\nGovernment, by whatever name it is called, is a matter of experience and\nexpediency. If we submit to the will of the majority, it is because it is\nmore convenient to do so; and if the republic or the democracy vindicate\nitself, it is because it works best, on the whole, for a particular\npeople. But it needs no prophet to say that it will not work long if God\nis shut out from it, and man, in a full-blown socialism, is considered\nthe ultimate authority.\n\nII. Equality of education. In our American system there is, not only\ntheoretically but practically, an equality of opportunity in the public\nschools, which are free to all children, and rise by gradations from the\nprimaries to the high-schools, in which the curriculum in most respects\nequals, and in variety exceeds, that of many third-class \"colleges.\" In\nthese schools nearly the whole round of learning, in languages, science,\nand art, is touched. The system has seemed to be the best that could be\ndevised for a free society, where all take part in the government, and\nwhere so much depends upon the intelligence of the electors. Certain\nobjections, however, have been made to it. As this essay is intended only\nto be tentative, we shall state some of them, without indulging in\nlengthy comments.\n\n( 1. ) The first charge is superficiality--a necessary consequence of\nattempting too much--and a want of adequate preparation for special\npursuits in life.\n\n( 2. ) A uniformity in mediocrity is alleged from the use of the same\ntext-books and methods in all schools, for all grades and capacities.\nThis is one of the most common criticisms on our social state by a\ncertain class of writers in England, who take an unflagging interest in\nour development. One answer to it is this: There is more reason to expect\nvariety of development and character in a generally educated than in an\nignorant community; there is no such uniformity as the dull level of\nignorance.\n\n( 3. ) It is said that secular education--and the general schools open to\nall in a community of mixed religions must be secular--is training the\nrising generation to be materialists and socialists.\n\n( 4. ) Perhaps a better-founded charge is that a system of equal\neducation, with its superficiality, creates discontent with the condition\nin which a majority of men must be--that of labor--a distaste for trades\nand for hand-work, an idea that what is called intellectual labor (let us\nsay, casting up accounts in a shop, or writing trashy stories for a\nsensational newspaper) is more honorable than physical labor; and\nencourages the false notion that \"the elevation of the working classes\"\nimplies the removal of men and women from those classes.\n\nWe should hesitate to draw adverse conclusions in regard to a system yet\nso young that its results cannot be fairly estimated. Only after two or\nthree generations can its effects upon the character of a great people be\nmeasured: Observations differ, and testimony is difficult to obtain. We\nthink it safe to say that those states are most prosperous which have the\nbest free schools. But if the philosopher inquires as to the general\neffect upon the national character in respect to the objections named, he\nmust wait for a reply.\n\nIII. The pursuit of the chimera of social equality, from the belief that\nit should logically follow political equality; resulting in extravagance,\nmisapplication of natural capacities, a notion that physical labor is\ndishonorable, or that the state should compel all to labor alike, and in\nefforts to remove inequalities of condition by legislation.\n\nIV. The equality of the sexes. The stir in the middle of the eighteenth\ncentury gave a great impetus to the emancipation of woman; though,\ncuriously enough, Rousseau, in unfolding his plan of education for\nSophie, in Emile, inculcates an almost Oriental subjection of woman--her\neducation simply that she may please man. The true enfranchisement of\nwoman--that is, the recognition (by herself as well as by man) of her\nreal place in the economy of the world, in the full development of her\ncapacities--is the greatest gain to civilization since the Christian era.\nThe movement has its excesses, and the gain has not been without loss.\n\"When we turn to modern literature,\" writes Mr. Money, \"from the pages in\nwhich Fenelon speaks of the education of girls, who does not feel that\nthe world has lost a sacred accent--that some ineffable essence has\npassed out from our hearts?\"\n\nHow far the expectation has been realized that women, in fiction, for\ninstance, would be more accurately described, better understood, and\nappear as nobler and lovelier beings when women wrote the novels, this is\nnot the place to inquire. The movement has results which are unavoidable\nin a period of transition, and probably only temporary. The education of\nwoman and the development of her powers hold the greatest promise for the\nregeneration of society. But this development, yet in its infancy, and\npursued with much crudeness and misconception of the end, is not enough.\nWoman would not only be equal with man, but would be like him; that is,\nperform in society the functions he now performs. Here, again, the notion\nof equality is pushed towards uniformity. The reformers admit structural\ndifferences in the sexes, though these, they say, are greatly exaggerated\nby subjection; but the functional differences are mainly to be\neliminated. Women ought to mingle in all the occupations of men, as if\nthe physical differences did not exist. The movement goes to obliterate,\nas far as possible, the distinction between sexes. Nature is, no doubt,\namused at this attempt. A recent writer--[\"Biology and Woman's Rights,\"\nQuarterly Journal of Science, November, 1878.]--, says: \"The 'femme\nlibre' [free woman] of the new social order may, indeed, escape the\ncharge of neglecting her family and her household by contending that it\nis not her vocation to become a wife and a mother! Why, then, we ask, is\nshe constituted a woman at all? Merely that she may become a sort of\nsecond-rate man?\"\n\nThe truth is that this movement, based always upon a misconception of\nequality, so far as it would change the duties of the sexes, is a\nretrograde.--[\"It has been frequently observed that among declining\nnations the social differences between the two sexes are first\nobliterated, and afterwards even the intellectual differences. The more\nmasculine the women become, the more effeminate become the men. It is no\ngood symptom when there are almost as many female writers and female\nrulers as there are male. Such was the case, for instance, in the\nHellenistic kingdoms, and in the age of the Caesars. What today is called\nby many the emancipation of woman would ultimately end in the dissolution\nof the family, and, if carried out, render poor service to the majority\nof women. If man and woman were placed entirely on the same level, and if\nin the competition between the two sexes nothing but an actual\nsuperiority should decide, it is to be feared that woman would soon be\nrelegated to a condition as hard as that in which she is found among all\nbarbarous nations. It is precisely family life and higher civilization\nthat have emancipated woman. Those theorizers who, led astray by the dark\nside of higher civilization, preach a community of goods, generally\ncontemplate in their simultaneous recommendation of the emancipation of\nwoman a more or less developed form of a community of wives. The grounds\nof the two institutions are very similar.\" (Roscher's Political Economy,\np. 250.) Note also that difference in costumes of the sexes is least\napparent among lowly civilized peoples.]--One of the most striking\nfeatures in our progress from barbarism to civilization is the proper\nadjustment of the work for men and women. One test of a civilization is\nthe difference of this work. This is a question not merely of division of\nlabor, but of differentiation with regard to sex. It not only takes into\naccount structural differences and physiological disadvantages, but it\nrecognizes the finer and higher use of woman in society.\n\nThe attainable, not to say the ideal, society requires an increase rather\nthan a decrease of the differences between the sexes. The differences may\nbe due to physical organization, but the structural divergence is but a\nfaint type of deeper separation in mental and spiritual constitution.\nThat which makes the charm and power of woman, that for which she is\ncreated, is as distinctly feminine as that which makes the charm and\npower of men is masculine. Progress requires constant differentiation,\nand the line of this is the development of each sex in its special\nfunctions, each being true to the highest ideal for itself, which is not\nthat the woman should be a man, or the man a woman. The enjoyment of\nsocial life rests very largely upon the encounter and play of the subtle\npeculiarities which mark the two sexes; and society, in the limited sense\nof the word, not less than the whole structure of our civilization,\nrequires the development of these peculiarities. It is in diversity, and\nnot in an equality tending to uniformity, that we are to expect the best\nresults from the race.\n\nV. Equality of races; or rather a removal of the inequalities, social and\npolitical, arising in the contact of different races by intermarriage.\n\nPerhaps equality is hardly the word to use here, since uniformity is the\nthing aimed at; but the root of the proposal is in the dogma we are\nconsidering. The tendency of the age is to uniformity. The facilities of\ntravel and communication, the new inventions and the use of machinery in\nmanufacturing, bring men into close and uniform relations, and induce the\ndisappearance of national characteristics and of race peculiarities. Men,\nthe world over, are getting to dress alike, eat alike, and disbelieve in\nthe same things: It is the sentimental complaint of the traveler that his\nsearch for the picturesque is ever more difficult, that race distinctions\nand habits are in a way to be improved off the face of the earth, and\nthat a most uninteresting monotony is supervening. The complaint is not\nwholly sentimental, and has a deeper philosophical reason than the mere\npleasure in variety on this planet.\n\nWe find a striking illustration of the equalizing, not to say leveling,\ntendency of the age in an able paper by Canon George Rawlinson, of the\nUniversity of Oxford, contributed recently to an American periodical of a\nhigh class and conservative character.--[\"Duties of Higher towards Lower\nRaces.\" By George Rawlinson. Princeton Re-view. November, 1878. New\nYork.]--This paper proposes, as a remedy for the social and political\nevils caused by the negro element in our population, the miscegenation of\nthe white and black races, to the end that the black race may be wholly\nabsorbed in the white--an absorption of four millions by thirty-six\nmillions, which he thinks might reasonably be expected in about a\ncentury, when the lower type would disappear altogether.\n\nPerhaps the pleasure of being absorbed is not equal to the pleasure of\nabsorbing, and we cannot say how this proposal will commend itself to the\nvictims of the euthanasia. The results of miscegenation on this\ncontinent--black with red, and white with black--the results morally,\nintellectually, and physically, are not such as to make it attractive to\nthe American people.\n\nIt is not, however, upon sentimental grounds that we oppose this\nextension of the exaggerated dogma of equality. Our objection is deeper.\nRace distinctions ought to be maintained for the sake of the best\ndevelopment of the race, and for the continuance of that mutual reaction\nand play of peculiar forces between races which promise the highest\ndevelopment for the whole. It is not for nothing, we may suppose, that\ndifferentiation has gone on in the world; and we doubt that either\nbenevolence or self-interest requires this age to attempt to restore an\nassumed lost uniformity, and fuse the race traits in a tiresome\nhomogeneity.\n\nLife consists in an exchange of relations, and the more varied the\nrelations interchanged the higher the life. We want not only different\nraces, but different civilizations in different parts of the globe.\n\nA much more philosophical view of the African problem and the proper\ndestiny of the negro race than that of Canon Rawlinson is given by a\nrecent colored writer,--[\"Africa and the Africans.\" By Edmund W. Blyden.\nEraser's Magazine, August, 1878.]--an official in the government of\nLiberia. We are mistaken, says this excellent observer, in regarding\nAfrica as a land of a homogeneous population, and in confounding the\ntribes in a promiscuous manner. There are negroes and negroes. \"The\nnumerous tribes inhabiting the vast continent of Africa can no more be\nregarded as in every respect equal than the numerous peoples of Asia or\nEurope can be so regarded;\" and we are not to expect the civilization of\nAfrica to be under one government, but in a great variety of States,\ndeveloped according to tribal and race affinities. A still greater\nmistake is this:\n\n\"The mistake which Europeans often make in considering questions of negro\nimprovement and the future of Africa is in supposing that the negro is\nthe European in embryo, in the undeveloped stage, and that when,\nby-and-by, he shall enjoy the advantages of civilization and culture, he\nwill become like the European; in other words, that the negro is on the\nsame line of progress, in the same groove, with the European, but\ninfinitely in the rear . . . . This view proceeds upon the assumption\nthat the two races are called to the same work, and are alike in\npotentiality and ultimate development, the negro only needing the element\nof time, under certain circumstances, to become European. But to our mind\nit is not a question between the two races of inferiority or superiority.\nThere is no absolute or essential superiority on the one side, or\nabsolute or essential inferiority on the other side. It is a question of\ndifference of endowment and difference of destiny. No amount of training\nor culture will make the negro a European. On the other hand, no lack of\ntraining or deficiency of culture will make the European a negro. The two\nraces are not moving in the same groove, with an immeasurable distance\nbetween them, but on parallel lines. They will never meet in the plane of\ntheir activities so as to coincide in capacity or performance. They are\nnot identical, as some think, but unequal; they are distinct, but\nequal--an idea that is in no way incompatible with the Scripture truth\nthat God hath made of one blood all nations of men.\"\n\nThe writer goes on, in a strain that is not mere fancy, but that involves\none of the truths of inequality, to say that each race is endowed with\npeculiar talents; that the negro has aptitudes and capacities which the\nworld needs, and will lack until he is normally trained. In the grand\nsymphony of the universe, \"there are several sounds not yet brought out,\nand the feeblest of all is that hitherto produced by the negro; but he\nalone can furnish it.\"--\"When the African shall come forward with his\npeculiar gifts, they will fill a place never before occupied.\" In short,\nthe African must be civilized in the line of his capacities. \"The present\npractice of the friends of Africa is to frame laws according to their own\nnotions for the government and improvement of this people, whereas God\nhas already enacted the laws for the government of their affairs, which\nlaws should be carefully ascertained, interpreted, and applied; for until\nthey are found out and conformed to, all labor will be ineffective and\nresultless.\"\n\nWe have thus passed in review some of the tendencies of the age. We have\nonly touched the edges of a vast subject, and shall be quite satisfied if\nwe have suggested thought in the direction indicated. But in this limited\nview of our complex human problem it is time to ask if we have not pushed\nthe dogma of equality far enough. Is it not time to look the facts\nsquarely in the face, and conform to them in our efforts for social and\npolitical amelioration?\n\nInequality appears to be the divine order; it always has existed;\nundoubtedly it will continue; all our theories and 'a priori'\nspeculations will not change the nature of things. Even inequality of\ncondition is the basis of progress, the incentive to exertion.\nFortunately, if today we could make every man white, every woman as like\nman as nature permits, give to every human being the same opportunity of\neducation, and divide equally among all the accumulated wealth of the\nworld, tomorrow differences, unequal possession, and differentiation\nwould begin again. We are attempting the regeneration of society with a\nmisleading phrase; we are wasting our time with a theory that does not\nfit the facts.\n\nThere is an equality, but it is not of outward show; it is independent of\ncondition; it does not destroy property, nor ignore the difference of\nsex, nor obliterate race traits. It is the equality of men before God, of\nmen before the law; it is the equal honor of all honorable labor. No more\npernicious notion ever obtained lodgment in society than the common one\nthat to \"rise in the world\" is necessarily to change the \"condition.\" Let\nthere be content with condition; discontent with individual ignorance and\nimperfection. \"We want,\" says Emerson, \"not a farmer, but a man on a\nfarm.\" What a mischievous idea is that which has grown, even in the\nUnited States, that manual labor is discreditable! There is surely some\ndefect in the theory of equality in our society which makes domestic\nservice to be shunned as if it were a disgrace.\n\nIt must be observed, further, that the dogma of equality is not satisfied\nby the usual admission that one is in favor of an equality of rights and\nopportunities, but is against the sweeping application of the theory made\nby the socialists and communists. The obvious reply is that equal rights\nand a fair chance are not possible without equality of condition, and\nthat property and the whole artificial constitution of society\nnecessitate inequality of condition. The damage from the current\nexaggeration of equality is that the attempt to realize the dogma in\nfact--and the attempt is everywhere on foot--can lead only to mischief\nand disappointment.\n\nIt would be considered a humorous suggestion to advocate inequality as a\ntheory or as a working dogma. Let us recognize it, however, as a fact,\nand shape the efforts for the improvement of the race in accordance with\nit, encouraging it in some directions, restraining it from injustice in\nothers. Working by this recognition, we shall save the race from many\nfailures and bitter disappointments, and spare the world the spectacle of\nrepublics ending in despotism and experiments in government ending in\nanarchy.","title":"Equality","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":8218}