{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_9596/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_9596","id":"gutenberg_9596","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9596","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Politics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Sociology","United States -- Politics and government"],"text":"This eBook was produced by David Widger\n\n\n\n\n\n                           REFORM AND POLITICS\n\n                                    BY\n\n                         JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER\n\n\nCONTENTS:\n\n     UTOPIAN SCHEMES AND POLITICAL THEORISTS\n     PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS\n     LORD ASHLEY AND THE THIEVES\n     WOMAN SUFFRAGE\n     ITALIAN UNITY\n     INDIAN CIVILIZATION\n     READING FOR THE BLIND\n     THE INDIAN QUESTION\n     THE REPUBLICAN PARTY\n     OUR DUMB RELATIONS\n     INTERNATIONAL ARBITRATION\n     SUFFRAGE FOR WOMEN\n\n\n\n\n                           REFORM AND POLITICS\n\n                 UTOPIAN SCHEMES AND POLITICAL THEORISTS.\n\nTHERE is a large class of men, not in Europe alone, but in this country\nalso, whose constitutional conservatism inclines them to regard any\norganic change in the government of a state or the social condition of\nits people with suspicion and distrust.  They admit, perhaps, the evils\nof the old state of things; but they hold them to be inevitable, the\nalloy necessarily mingled with all which pertains to fallible humanity.\nThemselves generally enjoying whatever of good belongs to the political\nor social system in which their lot is cast, they are disposed to look\nwith philosophic indifference upon the evil which only afflicts their\nneighbors.  They wonder why people are not contented with their\nallotments; they see no reason for change; they ask for quiet and peace\nin their day; being quite well satisfied with that social condition which\nan old poet has quaintly described:--\n\n               \"The citizens like pounded pikes;\n               The lesser feed the great;\n               The rich for food seek stomachs,\n               And the poor for stomachs meat.\"\n\nThis class of our fellow-citizens have an especial dislike of theorists,\nreformers, uneasy spirits, speculators upon the possibilities of the\nworld's future, constitution builders, and believers in progress.  They\nare satisfied; the world at least goes well enough with them; they sit as\ncomfortable in it as Lafontaine's rat in the cheese; and why should those\nwho would turn it upside down come hither also?  Why not let well enough\nalone?  Why tinker creeds, constitutions, and laws, and disturb the good\nold-fashioned order of things in church and state?  The idea of making\nthe world better and happier is to them an absurdity.  He who entertains\nit is a dreamer and a visionary, destitute of common sense and practical\nwisdom.  His project, whatever it may be, is at once pronounced to be\nimpracticable folly, or, as they are pleased to term it, _Utopian._\n\nThe romance of Sir Thomas More, which has long afforded to the\nconservatives of church and state a term of contempt applicable to all\nreformatory schemes and innovations, is one of a series of fabulous\nwritings, in which the authors, living in evil times and unable to\nactualize their plans for the well-being of society, have resorted to\nfiction as a safe means of conveying forbidden truths to the popular\nmind.  Plato's \"Timaeus,\" the first of the series, was written after the\ndeath of Socrates and the enslavement of the author's country.  In this\nare described the institutions of the Island of Atlantis,--the writer's\nideal of a perfect commonwealth.  Xenophon, in his \"Cyropaedia,\" has also\ndepicted an imaginary political society by overlaying with fiction\nhistorical traditions.  At a later period we have the \"New Atlantis\" of\nLord Bacon, and that dream of the \"City of the Sun\" with which Campanella\nsolaced himself in his long imprisonment.\n\nThe \"Utopia\" of More is perhaps the best of its class.  It is the work of\na profound thinker, the suggestive speculations and theories of one who\ncould\n\n               \"Forerun his age and race, and let\n               His feet millenniums hence be set\n               In midst of knowledge dreamed not yet.\"\n\nMuch of what he wrote as fiction is now fact, a part of the frame-work of\nEuropean governments, and the political truths of his imaginary state are\nnow practically recognized in our own democratic system.  As might be\nexpected, in view of the times in which the author wrote, and the\nexceedingly limited amount of materials which he found ready to his hands\nfor the construction of his social and political edifice, there is a want\nof proportion and symmetry in the structure.  Many of his theories are no\ndoubt impracticable and unsound.  But, as a whole, the work is an\nadmirable one, striding in advance of the author's age, and prefiguring a\ngovernment of religious toleration and political freedom.  The following\nextract from it was doubtless regarded in his day as something worse than\nfolly or the dream of a visionary enthusiast:--\n\n\"He judged it wrong to lay down anything rashly, and seemed to doubt\nwhether these different forms of religion might not all come from God,\nwho might inspire men in a different manner, and be pleased with the\nvariety.  He therefore thought it to be indecent and foolish for any man\nto threaten and terrify another, to make him believe what did not strike\nhim as true.\"\n\nPassing by the \"Telemachus\" of Fenelon, we come to the political romance\nof Harrington, written in the time of Cromwell.  \"Oceana\" is the name by\nwhich the author represents England; and the republican plan of\ngovernment which he describes with much minuteness is such as he would\nhave recommended for adoption in case a free commonwealth had been\nestablished.  It deals somewhat severely with Cromwell's usurpation; yet\nthe author did not hesitate to dedicate it to that remarkable man, who,\nafter carefully reading it, gave it back to his daughter, Lady Claypole,\nwith the remark, full of characteristic bluntness, that \"the gentleman\nneed not think to cheat him of his power and authority; for what he had\nwon with the sword he would never suffer himself to be scribbled out of.\"\n\nNotwithstanding the liberality and freedom of his speculations upon\ngovernment and religion in his Utopia, it must be confessed that Sir\nThomas More, in after life, fell into the very practices of intolerance\nand bigotry which he condemned.  When in the possession of the great seal\nunder that scandal of kingship, Henry VIII., he gave his countenance to\nthe persecution of heretics.  Bishop Burnet says of him, that he caused a\ngentleman of the Temple to be whipped and put to the rack in his\npresence, in order to compel him to discover those who favored heretical\nopinions.  In his Utopia he assailed the profession of the law with\nmerciless satire; yet the satirist himself finally sat upon the\nchancellor's woolsack; and, as has been well remarked by Horace Smith,\n\"if, from this elevated seat, he ever cast his eyes back upon his past\nlife, he must have smiled at the fond conceit which could imagine a\npermanent Utopia, when he himself, certainly more learned, honest, and\nconscientious than the mass of men has ever been, could in the course of\none short life fall into such glaring and frightful rebellion against his\nown doctrines.\"\n\nHarrington, on the other hand, as became the friend of Milton and Marvel,\nheld fast, through good and evil report, his republican faith.  He\npublished his work after the Restoration, and defended it boldly and ably\nfrom the numerous attacks made upon it.  Regarded as too dangerous an\nenthusiast to be left at liberty, he was imprisoned at the instance of\nLord Chancellor Hyde, first in the Tower, and afterwards on the Island of\nSt.  Nicholas, where disease and imprudent remedies brought on a partial\nderangement, from which he never recovered.\n\nBernardin St. Pierre, whose pathetic tale of \"Paul and Virginia\" has\nfound admirers in every language of the civilized world, in a fragment,\nentitled \"Arcadia,\" attempted to depict an ideal republic, without\npriest, noble, or slave, where all are so religious that each man is the\npontiff of his family, where each man is prepared to defend his country,\nand where all are in such a state of equality that there are no such\npersons as servants.  The plan of it was suggested by his friend Rousseau\nduring their pleasant walking excursions about the environs of Paris, in\nwhich the two enthusiastic philosophers, baffled by the evil passions and\nintractable materials of human nature as manifested in existing society,\ncomforted themselves by appealing from the actual to the possible, from\nthe real to the imaginary.  Under the chestnut-trees of the Bois de\nBoulogne, through long summer days, the two friends, sick of the noisy\nworld about them, yet yearning to become its benefactors,--gladly\nescaping from it, yet busy with schemes for its regeneration and\nhappiness,--at once misanthropes and philanthropists,--amused and solaced\nthemselves by imagining a perfect and simple state of society, in which\nthe lessons of emulation and selfish ambition were never to be taught;\nwhere, on the contrary, the young were to obey their parents, and to\nprefer father, mother, brother, sister, wife, and friend to themselves.\nThey drew beautiful pictures of a country blessed with peace, indus try,\nand love, covered with no disgusting monuments of violence and pride and\nluxury, without columns, triumphal arches, hospitals, prisons, or\ngibbets; but presenting to view bridges over torrents, wells on the arid\nplain, groves of fruit-trees, and houses of shelter for the traveller in\ndesert places, attesting everywhere the sentiment of humanity.  Religion\nwas to speak to all hearts in the eternal language of Nature.  Death was\nno longer to be feared; perspectives of holy consolation were to open\nthrough the cypress shadows of the tomb; to live or to die was to be\nequally an object of desire.\n\nThe plan of the \"Arcadia\" of St. Pierre is simply this: A learned young\nEgyptian, educated at Thebes by the priests of Osiris, desirous of\nbenefiting humanity, undertakes a voyage to Gaul for the purpose of\ncarrying thither the arts and religion of Egypt.  He is shipwrecked on\nhis return in the Gulf of Messina, and lands upon the coast, where he is\nentertained by an Arcadian, to whom he relates his adventures, and from\nwhom he receives in turn an account of the simple happiness and peace of\nArcadia, the virtues and felicity of whose inhabitants are beautifully\nexemplified in the lives and conversation of the shepherd and his\ndaughter.  This pleasant little prose poem closes somewhat abruptly.\nAlthough inferior in artistic skill to \"Paul and Virginia\" or the \"Indian\nCottage\", there is not a little to admire in the simple beauty of its\npastoral descriptions.  The closing paragraph reminds one of Bunyan's\nupper chamber, where the weary pilgrim's windows opened to the sunrising\nand the singing of birds:--\n\n\"Tyrteus conducted his guests to an adjoining chamber.  It had a window\nshut by a curtain of rushes, through the crevices of which the islands of\nthe Alpheus might be seen in the light of the moon.  There were in this\nchamber two excellent beds, with coverlets of warm and light wool.\n\n\"Now, as soon as Amasis was left alone with Cephas, he spoke with joy of\nthe delight and tranquillity of the valley, of the goodness of the\nshepherd, and the grace of his young daughter, to whom he had seen none\nworthy to be compared, and of the pleasure which he promised himself the\nnext day, at the festival on Mount Lyceum, of beholding a whole people as\nhappy as this sequestered family.  Converse so delightful might have\ncharmed away the night without the aid of sleep, had they not been\ninvited to repose by the mild light of the moon shining through the\nwindow, the murmuring wind in the leaves of the poplars, and the distant\nnoise of the Achelous, which falls roaring from the summit of Mount\nLyceum.\"\n\nThe young patrician wits of Athens doubtless laughed over Plato's ideal\nrepublic.  Campanella's \"City of the Sun\" was looked upon, no doubt, as\nthe distempered vision of a crazy state prisoner.  Bacon's college, in\nhis \"New Atlantis,\" moved the risibles of fat-witted Oxford.  More's\n\"Utopia,\" as we know, gave to our language a new word, expressive of the\nvagaries and dreams of fanatics and lunatics.  The merciless wits,\nclerical and profane, of the court of Charles II.  regarded Harrington's\nromance as a perfect godsend to their vocation of ridicule.  The gay\ndames and carpet knights of Versailles made themselves merry with the\nprose pastoral of St.  Pierre; and the poor old enthusiast went down to\nhis grave without finding an auditory for his lectures upon natural\nsociety.\n\nThe world had its laugh over these romances.  When unable to refute their\ntheories, it could sneer at the authors, and answer them to the\nsatisfaction of the generation in which they lived, at least by a general\ncharge of lunacy.  Some of their notions were no doubt as absurd as those\nof the astronomer in \"Rasselas\", who tells Imlac that he has for five\nyears possessed the regulation of the weather, and has got the secret of\nmaking to the different nations an equal and impartial dividend of rain\nand sunshine.  But truth, even when ushered into the world through the\nmedium of a dull romance and in connection with a vast progeny of errors,\nhowever ridiculed and despised at first, never fails in the end of\nfinding a lodging-place in the popular mind.  The speculations of the\npolitical theorists whom we have noticed have not all proved to be of\n\n                                \"such stuff\n          As dreams are made of, and their little life\n          Rounded with sleep.\"\n\nThey have entered into and become parts of the social and political\nfabrics of Europe and America.  The prophecies of imagination have been\nfulfilled; the dreams of romance have become familiar realities.\n\nWhat is the moral suggested by this record?  Is it not that we should\nlook with charity and tolerance upon the schemes and speculations of the\npolitical and social theorists of our day; that, if unprepared to venture\nupon new experiments and radical changes, we should at least consider\nthat what was folly to our ancestors is our wisdom, and that another\ngeneration may successfully put in practice the very theories which now\nseem to us absurd and impossible?  Many of the evils of society have been\nmeasurably removed or ameliorated; yet now, as in the days of the\nApostle, \"the creation groaneth and travaileth in pain;\" and although\nquackery and empiricism abound, is it not possible that a proper\napplication of some of the remedies proposed might ameliorate the general\nsuffering?  Rejecting, as we must, whatever is inconsistent with or\nhostile to the doctrines of Christianity, on which alone rests our hope\nfor humanity, it becomes us to look kindly upon all attempts to apply\nthose doctrines to the details of human life, to the social, political,\nand industrial relations of the race.  If it is not permitted us to\nbelieve all things, we can at least hope them.  Despair is infidelity and\ndeath.  Temporally and spiritually, the declaration of inspiration holds\ngood, \"We are saved by hope.\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                 PECULIAR INSTITUTIONS OF MASSACHUSETTS.\n\n                                 [1851.]\n\nBERNARDIN ST. PIERRE, in his Wishes of a Solitary, asks for his country\nneither wealth, nor military glory, nor magnificent palaces and\nmonuments, nor splendor of court nobility, nor clerical pomp.  \"Rather,\"\nhe says, \"O France, may no beggar tread thy plains, no sick or suffering\nman ask in vain for relief; in all thy hamlets may every young woman find\na lover and every lover a true wife; may the young be trained arightly\nand guarded from evil; may the old close their days in the tranquil hope\nof those who love God and their fellow-men.\"\n\nWe are reminded of the amiable wish of the French essayist--a wish even\nyet very far from realization, we fear, in the empire of Napoleon III.--\nby the perusal of two documents recently submitted to the legislature of\nthe State of Massachusetts.  They indicate, in our view, the real glory\nof a state, and foreshadow the coming of that time when Milton's\ndefinition of a true commonwealth shall be no longer a prophecy, but the\ndescription of an existing fact,--\"a huge Christian personage, a mighty\ngrowth and stature of an honest man, moved by the purpose of a love of\nGod and of mankind.\"\n\nSome years ago, the Legislature of Massachusetts, at the suggestion of\nseveral benevolent gentlemen whose attention had been turned to the\nsubject, appointed a commission to inquire into the condition of the\nidiots of the Commonwealth, to ascertain their numbers, and whether\nanything could be done in their behalf.\n\nThe commissioners were Dr. Samuel G. Howe, so well and honorably known\nfor his long and arduous labors in behalf of the blind, Judge Byington,\nand Dr. Gilman Kimball.  The burden of the labor fell upon the chairman,\nwho entered upon it with the enthusiasm, perseverance, and practical\nadaptation of means to ends which have made him so efficient in his\nvaried schemes of benevolence.  On the 26th of the second month, 1848, a\nfull report of the results of this labor was made to the Governor,\naccompanied by statistical tables and minute details.  One hundred towns\nhad been visited by the chairman or his reliable agent, in which five\nhundred and seventy-five persons in a state of idiocy were discovered.\nThese were examined carefully in respect to their physical as well as\nmental condition, no inquiry being omitted which was calculated to throw\nlight upon the remote or immediate causes of this mournful imperfection\nin the creation of God.  The proximate causes Dr. Howe mentions are to be\nfound in the state of the bodily organization, deranged and\ndisproportioned by some violation of natural law on the part of the\nparents or remoter ancestors of the sufferers.  Out of 420 cases of\nidiocy, he had obtained information respecting the condition of the\nprogenitors of 359; and in all but four of these eases he found that one\nor the other, or both, of their immediate progenitors had in some way\ndeparted widely from the condition of health; they were scrofulous, or\npredisposed to affections of the brain, and insanity, or had intermarried\nwith blood-relations, or had been intemperate, or guilty of sensual\nexcesses.\n\nOf the 575 cases, 420 were those of idiocy from birth, and 155 of idiocy\nafterwards.  Of the born idiots, 187 were under twenty-five years of age,\nand all but 13 seemed capable of improvement.  Of those above twenty-five\nyears of age, 73 appeared incapable of improvement in their mental\ncondition, being helpless as children at seven years of age; 43 out of\nthe 420 seemed as helpless as children at two years of age; 33 were in\nthe condition of mere infants; and 220 were supported at the public\ncharge in almshouses.  A large proportion of them were found to be given\nover to filthy and loathsome habits, gluttony, and lust, and constantly\nsinking lower towards the condition of absolute brutishness.\n\nThose in private houses were found, if possible, in a still more\ndeplorable state.  Their parents were generally poor, feeble in mind and\nbody, and often of very intemperate habits.  Many of them seemed scarcely\nable to take care of themselves, and totally unfit for the training of\nordinary children.  It was the blind leading the blind, imbecility\nteaching imbecility.  Some instances of the experiments of parental\nignorance upon idiotic offspring, which fell under the observation of Dr.\nHowe, are related in his report Idiotic children were found with their\nheads covered over with cold poultices of oak-bark, which the foolish\nparents supposed would tan the brain and harden it as the tanner does his\nox-hides, and so make it capable of retaining impressions and remembering\nlessons.  In other cases, finding that the child could not be made to\ncomprehend anything, the sagacious heads of the household, on the\nsupposition that its brain was too hard, tortured it with hot poultices\nof bread and milk to soften it.  Others plastered over their children's\nheads with tar.  Some administered strong doses of mercury, to \"solder up\nthe openings\" in the head and make it tight and strong.  Others\nencouraged the savage gluttony of their children, stimulating their\nunnatural and bestial appetites, on the ground that \"the poor creatures\nhad nothing else to enjoy but their food, and they should have enough of\nthat!\"\n\nIn consequence of this report, the legislature, in the spring of 1848,\nmade an annual appropriation of twenty-five hundred dollars, for three\nyears, for the purpose of training and teaching ten idiot children, to be\nselected by the Governor and Council.  The trustees of the Asylum for the\nBlind, under the charge of Dr. Howe, made arrangements for receiving\nthese pupils.  The school was opened in the autumn of 1848; and its first\nannual report, addressed to the Governor and printed by order of the\nSenate, is now before us.\n\nOf the ten pupils, it appears that not one had the usual command of\nmuscular motion,--the languid body obeyed not the service of the imbecile\nwill.  Some could walk and use their limbs and hands in simple motions;\nothers could make only make slight use of their muscles; and two were\nwithout any power of locomotion.\n\nOne of these last, a boy six years of age, who had been stupefied on the\nday of his birth by the application of hot rum to his head, could\nscarcely see or notice objects, and was almost destitute of the sense of\ntouch.  He could neither stand nor sit upright, nor even creep, but would\nlie on the floor in whatever position he was placed.  He could not feed\nhimself nor chew solid food, and had no more sense of decency than an\ninfant.  His intellect was a blank; he had no knowledge, no desires, no\naffections.  A more hopeless object for experiment could scarcely have\nbeen selected.\n\nA year of patient endeavor has nevertheless wrought a wonderful change in\nthe condition of this miserable being.  Cold bathing, rubbing of the\nlimbs, exercise of the muscles, exposure to the air, and other appliances\nhave enabled him to stand upright, to sit at table and feed himself, and\nchew his food, and to walk about with slight assistance.  His habits are\nno longer those of a brute; he observes decency; his eye is brighter; his\ncheeks glow with health; his countenance, is more expressive of thought.\nHe has learned many words and constructs simple sentences; his affections\nbegin to develop; and there is every prospect that he will be so far\nrenovated as to be able to provide for himself in manhood.\n\nIn the case of another boy, aged twelve years, the improvement has been\nequally remarkable.  The gentleman who first called attention to him, in\na recent note to Dr. Howe, published in the report, thus speaks of his\npresent condition: \"When I remember his former wild and almost frantic\ndemeanor when approached by any one, and the apparent impossibility of\ncommunicating with him, and now see him standing in his class, playing\nwith his fellows, and willingly and familiarly approaching me, examining\nwhat I gave him,--and when I see him already selecting articles named by\nhis teacher, and even correctly pronouncing words printed on cards,--\nimprovement does not convey the idea presented to my mind; it is\ncreation; it is making him anew.\"\n\nAll the pupils have more or less advanced.  Their health and habits have\nimproved; and there is no reason to doubt that the experiment, at the\nclose of its three years, will be found to have been quite as successful\nas its most sanguine projectors could have anticipated.  Dr. Howe has\nbeen ably seconded by an accomplished teacher, James B. Richards, who has\ndevoted his whole time to the pupils.  Of the nature and magnitude of\ntheir task, an idea may be formed only by considering the utter\nlistlessness of idiocy, the incapability of the poor pupil to fix his\nattention upon anything, and his general want of susceptibility to\nimpressions.  All his senses are dulled and perverted.  Touch, hearing,\nsight, smell, are all more or less defective.  His gluttony is\nunaccompanied with the gratification of taste,--the most savory viands\nand the offal which he shares with the pigs equally satisfy him.  His\nmental state is still worse than his physical.  Thought is painful and\nirksome to him.\n\nHis teacher can only engage his attention by strenuous efforts, loud,\nearnest tones, gesticulations and signs, and a constant presentation of\nsome visible object of bright color and striking form.  The eye wanders,\nand the spark of consciousness and intelligence which has been fanned\ninto momentary brightness darkens at the slightest relaxation of the\nteacher's exertions.  The names of objects presented to him must\nsometimes be repeated hundreds of times before he can learn them.  Yet\nthe patience and enthusiasm of the teacher are rewarded by a progress,\nslow and unequal, but still marked and manifest.  Step by step, often\ncompelled to turn back and go over the inch of ground he had gained, the\nidiot is still creeping forward; and by almost imperceptible degrees his\nsick, cramped, and prisoned spirit casts off the burden of its body of\ndeath, breath as from the Almighty--is breathed into him, and he becomes\na living soul.\n\nAfter the senses of the idiot are trained to take note\nof their appropriate objects, the various perceptive faculties are next\nto be exercised.  The greatest possible number of facts are to be\ngathered up through the medium of these faculties into the storehouse of\nmemory, from whence eventually the higher faculties of mind may draw the\nmaterial of general ideas.  It has been found difficult, if not\nimpossible, to teach the idiot to read by the letters first, as in the\nordinary method; but while the varied powers of the three letters, h, a,\nt, could not be understood by him, he could be made to comprehend the\ncomplex sign of the word hat, made by uniting the three.\n\nThe moral nature of the idiot needs training and development as well as\nhis physical and mental.  All that can be said of him is, that he has the\nlatent capacity for moral development and culture.  Uninstructed and left\nto himself, he has no ideas of regulated appetites and propensities, of\ndecency and delicacy of affection and social relations.  The germs of\nthese ideas, which constitute the glory and beauty of humanity,\nundoubtedly exist in him; but there can be no growth without patient and\npersevering culture.  Where this is afforded, to use the language of the\nreport, \"the idiot may learn what love is, though he may not know the\nword which expresses it; he may feel kindly affections while unable to\nunderstand the simplest virtuous principle; and he may begin to live\nacceptably to God before he has learned the name by which men call him.\"\n\nIn the facts and statistics presented in the report, light is shed upon\nsome of the dark pages of God's providence, and it is seen that the\nsuffering and shame of idiocy are the result of sin, of a violation of\nthe merciful laws of God and of the harmonies of His benign order.  The\npenalties which are ordained for the violators of natural laws are\ninexorable and certain.  For the transgressor of the laws of life there\nis, as in the case of Esau, \"no place for repentance, though he seek it\nearnestly and with tears.\"  The curse cleaves to him and his children.\nIn this view, how important becomes the subject of the hereditary\ntransmission of moral and physical disease and debility! and how\nnecessary it is that there should be a clearer understanding of, and a\nwilling obedience, at any cost, to the eternal law which makes the parent\nthe blessing or the curse of the child, giving strength and beauty, and\nthe capacity to know and do the will of God, or bequeathing\nloathsomeness, deformity, and animal appetite, incapable of the\nrestraints of the moral faculties!  Even if the labors of Dr. Howe and\nhis benevolent associates do not materially lessen the amount of present\nactual evil and suffering in this respect, they will not be put forth in\nvain if they have the effect of calling public attention to the great\nlaws of our being, the violation of which has made this goodly earth a\nvast lazarhouse of pain and sorrow.\n\nThe late annual message of the Governor of Massachusetts invites our\nattention to a kindred institution of charity.  The chief magistrate\ncongratulates the legislature, in language creditable to his mind and\nheart, on the opening of the Reform School for Juvenile Criminals,\nestablished by an act of a previous legislature.  The act provides that,\nwhen any boy under sixteen years of age shall be convicted of crime\npunishable by imprisonment other than such an offence as is punished by\nimprisonment for life, he may be, at the discretion of the court or\njustice, sent to the State Reform School, or sentenced to such\nimprisonment as the law now provides for his offence.  The school is\nplaced under the care of trustees, who may either refuse to receive a boy\nthus sent there, or, after he has been received, for reasons set forth in\nthe act, may order him to be committed to prison under the previous penal\nlaw of the state.  They are also authorized to apprentice the boys, at\ntheir discretion, to inhabitants of the Commonwealth.  And whenever any\nboy shall be discharged, either as reformed or as having reached the age\nof twenty-one years, his discharge is a full release from his sentence.\n\nIt is made the duty of the trustees to cause the boys to be instructed in\npiety and morality, and in branches of useful knowledge, in some regular\ncourse of labor, mechanical, agricultural, or horticultural, and such\nother trades and arts as may be best adapted to secure the amendment,\nreformation, and future benefit of the boys.  The class of offenders for\nwhom this act provides are generally the offspring of parents depraved by\ncrime or suffering from poverty and want,--the victims often of\ncircumstances of evil which almost constitute a necessity,--issuing from\nhomes polluted and miserable, from the sight and hearing of loathsome\nimpurities and hideous discords, to avenge upon society the ignorance,\nand destitution, and neglect with which it is too often justly\nchargeable.  In 1846 three hundred of these youthful violators of law\nwere sentenced to jails and other places of punishment in Massachusetts,\nwhere they incurred the fearful liability of being still more thoroughly\ncorrupted by contact with older criminals, familiar with atrocity, and\nrolling their loathsome vices \"as a sweet morsel under the tongue.\"  In\nview of this state of things the Reform School has been established,\ntwenty-two thousand dollars having been contributed to the state for that\npurpose by an unknown benefactor of his race.  The school is located in\nWestboro', on a fine farm of two hundred acres.  The buildings are in the\nform of a square, with a court in the centre, three stories in front,\nwith wings.  They are constructed with a degree of architectural taste,\nand their site is happily chosen,--a gentle eminence, overlooking one of\nthe loveliest of the small lakes which form a pleasing feature in New\nEngland scenery.  From this place the atmosphere and associations of the\nprison are excluded.  The discipline is strict, as a matter of course;\nbut it is that of a well-regulated home or school-room,--order, neatness,\nand harmony within doors; and without, the beautiful 'sights and sounds\nand healthful influences of Nature.  One would almost suppose that the\npoetical dream of Coleridge, in his tragedy of Remorse, had found its\nrealization in the Westboro' School, and that, weary of the hopelessness\nand cruelty of the old penal system, our legislators had embodied in\ntheir statutes the idea of the poet:--\n\n\"With other ministrations thou, O Nature,\nHealest thy wandering and distempered child\nThou pourest on him thy soft influences,\nThy sunny hues, fair forms, and breathing sweets,\nThy melodies of woods, and winds, and waters,\nTill he relent, and can no more endure\nTo be a jarring and a dissonant thing\nAmidst this general dance and minstrelsy.\"\n\nThus it is that the Christian idea of reformation, rather than revenge,\nis slowly but surely incorporating itself in our statute books.  We have\nonly to look back but a single century to be able to appreciate the\nimmense gain for humanity in the treatment of criminals which has been\nsecured in that space of time.  Then the use of torture was common\nthroughout Europe.  Inability to comprehend and believe certain religious\ndogmas was a crime to be expiated by death, or confiscation of estate, or\nlingering imprisonment.  Petty offences against property furnished\nsubjects for the hangman.  The stocks and the whipping-post stood by the\nside of the meeting-house.  Tongues were bored with redhot irons and ears\nshorn off.  The jails were loathsome dungeons, swarming with vermin,\nunventilated, unwarmed.  A century and a half ago the populace of\nMassachusetts were convulsed with grim merriment at the writhings of a\nmiserable woman scourged at the cart-tail or strangling in the ducking-\nstool; crowds hastened to enjoy the spectacle of an old man enduring the\nunutterable torment of the 'peine forte et dare,'--pressed slowly to\ndeath under planks,--for refusing to plead to an indictment for\nwitchcraft.  What a change from all this to the opening of the State\nReform School, to the humane regulations of prisons and penitentiaries,\nto keen-eyed benevolence watching over the administration of justice,\nwhich, in securing society from lawless aggression, is not suffered to\noverlook the true interest and reformation of the criminal, nor to forget\nthat the magistrate, in the words of the Apostle, is to be indeed \"the\nminister of God to man for good!\"\n\n\n\n\n                       LORD ASHLEY AND THE THIEVES.\n\n\"THEY that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick,\" was\nthe significant answer of our Lord to the self-righteous Pharisees who\ntook offence at his companions,--the poor, the degraded, the weak, and\nthe sinful.  \"Go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy, and\nnot sacrifice; for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to\nrepentance.\"\n\nThe great lesson of duty inculcated by this answer of the Divine Teacher\nhas been too long overlooked by individuals and communities professedly\ngoverned by His maxims.  The phylacteries of our modern Pharisees are as\nbroad as those of the old Jewish saints.  The respectable Christian\ndetests his vicious and ill-conditioned neighbors as heartily as the\nIsraelite did the publicans and sinners of his day.  He folds his robe of\nself-righteousness closely about him, and denounces as little better than\nsinful weakness all commiseration for the guilty; and all attempts to\nrestore and reclaim the erring violators of human law otherwise than by\npains and penalties as wicked collusion with crime, dangerous to the\nstability and safety of society, and offensive in the sight of God.  And\nyet nothing is more certain than that, just in proportion as the example\nof our Lord has been followed in respect to the outcast and criminal, the\neffect has been to reform and elevate,--to snatch as brands from the\nburning souls not yet wholly given over to the service of evil.  The\nwonderful influence for good exerted over the most degraded and reckless\ncriminals of London by the excellent and self-denying Elizabeth Fry, the\nhappy results of the establishment of houses of refuge, and reformation,\nand Magdalen asylums, all illustrate the wisdom of Him who went about\ndoing good, in pointing out the morally diseased as the appropriate\nsubjects of the benevolent labors of His disciples.  No one is to be\ndespaired of.  We have no warrant to pass by any of our fellow-creatures\nas beyond the reach of God's grace and mercy; for, beneath the most\nrepulsive and hateful outward manifestation, there is always a\nconsciousness of the beauty of goodness and purity, and of the\nloathsomeness of sin,--one chamber of the heart as yet not wholly\nprofaned, whence at times arises the prayer of a burdened and miserable\nspirit for deliverance.  Deep down under the squalid exterior,\nunparticipative in the hideous merriment and recklessness of the\ncriminal, there is another self,--a chained and suffering inner man,--\ncrying out, in the intervals of intoxication and brutal excesses, like\nJonah from the bosom of hell.  To this lingering consciousness the\nsympathy and kindness of benevolent and humane spirits seldom appeal in\nvain; for, whatever may be outward appearances, it remains true that the\nway of the transgressor is hard, and that sin and suffering are\ninseparable.  Crime is seldom loved or persevered in for its own sake;\nbut, when once the evil path is entered upon, a return is in reality\nextremely difficult to the unhappy wanderer, and often seems as well nigh\nimpossible.  The laws of social life rise up like insurmountable barriers\nbetween him and escape.  As he turns towards the society whose rights he\nhas outraged, its frown settles upon him; the penalties of the laws he\nhas violated await him; and he falls back despairing, and suffers the\nfetters of the evil habit to whose power he has yielded himself to be\nfastened closer and heavier upon him.  O for some good angel, in the form\nof a brother-man and touched with a feeling of his sins and infirmities,\nto reassure his better nature and to point out a way of escape from its\nbody of death!\n\nWe have been led into these remarks by an account, given in the London\nWeekly Chronicle, of a most remarkable interview between the professional\nthieves of London and Lord Ashley,--a gentleman whose best patent of\nnobility is to be found in his generous and untiring devotion to the\ninterests of his fellow-men.  It appears that a philanthropic gentleman\nin London had been applied to by two young thieves, who had relinquished\ntheir evil practices and were obtaining a precarious but honest\nlivelihood by picking up bones and rags in the streets, their loss of\ncharacter closing against them all other employments.  He had just been\nreading an address of Lord Ashley's in favor of colonial emigration, and\nhe was led to ask one of the young men how he would like to emigrate.\n\n\"I should jump at the chance!\" was the reply. Not long after the\ngentleman was sent for to visit one of those obscure and ruinous courts\nof the great metropolis where crime and poverty lie down together,--\nlocalities which Dickens has pictured with such painful distinctness.\nHere, to his surprise, he met a number of thieves and outlaws, who\ndeclared themselves extremely anxious to know whether any hope could be\nheld out to them of obtaining an honest living, however humble, in the\ncolonies, as their only reason for continuing in their criminal course\nwas the impossibility of extricating themselves.  He gave them such\nadvice and encouragement as he was able, and invited them to assemble\nagain, with such of their companions as they could persuade to do so, at\nthe room of the Irish Free School, for the purpose of meeting Lord\nAshley.  On the 27th of the seventh month last the meeting took place.\nAt the hour appointed, Lord Ashley and five or six other benevolent\ngentlemen, interested in emigration as a means of relief and reformation\nto the criminal poor, entered the room, which was already well-nigh\nfilled.  Two hundred and seven professed thieves were present.  \"Several\nof the most experienced thieves were stationed at the door to prevent the\nadmission of any but thieves.  Some four or five individuals, who were\nnot at first known, were subjected to examination, and only allowed to\nremain on stating that they were, and being recognized as, members of the\ndishonest fraternity; and before the proceedings of the evening commenced\nthe question was very carefully put, and repeated several times, whether\nany one was in the room of whom others entertained doubts as to who he\nwas.  The object of this care was, as so many of them were in danger of\n'getting into trouble,' or, in other words, of being taken up for their\ncrimes, to ascertain if any who might betray them were present; and\nanother intention of this scrutiny was, to give those assembled, who\nnaturally would feel considerable fear, a fuller confidence in opening\ntheir minds.\"\n\nWhat a novel conference between the extremes of modern society!  All that\nis beautiful in refinement and education, moral symmetry and Christian\ngrace, contrasting with the squalor, the ignorance, the lifelong\ndepravity of men living \"without God in the world,\"--the pariahs of\ncivilization,--the moral lepers, at the sight of whom decency covers its\nface, and cries out, \"Unclean!\"  After a prayer had been offered, Lord\nAshley spoke at considerable length, making a profound impression on his\nstrange auditory as they listened to his plans of emigration, which\noffered them an opportunity to escape from their miserable condition and\nenter upon a respectable course of life.  The hard heart melted and the\ncold and cruel eye moistened.  With one accord the wretched felons\nresponded to the language of Christian love and good-will, and declared\ntheir readiness to follow the advice of their true friend.  They looked\nup to him as to an angel of mercy, and felt the malignant spirits which\nhad so long tormented them disarmed of all power of evil in the presence\nof simple goodness.  He stood in that felon audience like Spenser's Una\namidst the satyrs; unassailable and secure in the \"unresistible might of\nmeekness,\" and panoplied in that \"noble grace which dashed brute violence\nwith sudden adoration and mute awe.\"\n\nTwenty years ago, when Elizabeth Fry ventured to visit those \"spirits in\nprison,\"--the female tenants of Newgate,--her temerity was regarded with\nastonishment, and her hope of effecting a reformation in the miserable\nobjects of her sympathy was held to be wholly visionary.  Her personal\nsafety and the blessed fruits of her labors, nevertheless, confirmed the\nlanguage of her Divine Master to His disciples when He sent them forth as\nlambs among wolves: \"Behold, I give unto you power over all the power of\nthe enemy.\"  The still more unpromising experiment of Lord Ashley, thus\nfar, has been equally successful; and we hail it as the introduction of a\nnew and more humane method of dealing with the victims of sin and\nignorance, and the temptations growing out of the inequalities and vices\nof civilization.\n\n\n\n\n\n                             WOMAN SUFFRAGE.\n\n                    Letter to the Newport Convention.\n\n                 AMESBURY, MASS., 12th, 8th Month, 1869.\n\nI HAVE received thy letter inviting me to attend the Convention in behalf\nof Woman's Suffrage, at Newport, R.  I., on the 25th inst.  I do not see\nhow it is possible for me to accept the invitation; and, were I to do so,\nthe state of my health would prevent me from taking such a part in the\nmeeting as would relieve me from the responsibility of seeming to\nsanction anything in its action which might conflict with my own views of\nduty or policy.  Yet I should do myself great injustice if I did not\nembrace this occasion to express my general sympathy with the movement.\nI have seen no good reason why mothers, wives, and daughters should not\nhave the same right of person, property, and citizenship which fathers,\nhusbands, and brothers have.\n\nThe sacred memory of mother and sister; the wisdom and dignity of women\nof my own religious communion who have been accustomed to something like\nequality in rights as well as duties; my experience as a co-worker with\nnoble and self-sacrificing women, as graceful and helpful in their\nhousehold duties as firm and courageous in their public advocacy of\nunpopular truth; the steady friendships which have inspired and\nstrengthened me, and the reverence and respect which I feel for human\nnature, irrespective of sex, compel me to look with something more than\nacquiescence on the efforts you are making.  I frankly confess that I am\nnot able to forsee all the consequences of the great social and political\nchange proposed, but of this I am, at least, sure, it is always safe to\ndo right, and the truest expediency is simple justice.  I can understand,\nwithout sharing, the misgivings of those who fear that, when the vote\ndrops from woman's hand into the ballot-box, the beauty and sentiment,\nthe bloom and sweetness, of womankind will go with it.  But in this\nmatter it seems to me that we can trust Nature.  Stronger than statutes\nor conventions, she will be conservative of all that the true man loves\nand honors in woman.  Here and there may be found an equivocal, unsexed\nChevalier D'Eon, but the eternal order and fitness of things will remain.\nI have no fear that man will be less manly or woman less womanly when\nthey meet on terms of equality before the law.\n\nOn the other hand, I do not see that the exercise of the ballot by woman\nwill prove a remedy for all the evils of which she justly complains.  It\nis her right as truly as mine, and when she asks for it, it is something\nless than manhood to withhold it.  But, unsupported by a more practical\neducation, higher aims, and a deeper sense of the responsibilities of\nlife and duty, it is not likely to prove a blessing in her hands any more\nthan in man's.\n\nWith great respect and hearty sympathy, I am very truly thy friend.\n\n\n\n\n\n                              ITALIAN UNITY\n\n                   AMESBURY, MASS., 1st Mo., 4th, 1871.\n\n     Read at the great meeting in New York, January, 1871, in celebration\n     of the freedom of Rome and complete unity of Italy.\n\nIT would give me more than ordinary satisfaction to attend the meeting on\nthe 12th instant for the celebration of Italian Unity, the emancipation\nof Rome, and its occupation as the permanent capital of the nation.\n\nFor many years I have watched with deep interest and sympathy the popular\nmovement on the Italian peninsula, and especially every effort for the\ndeliverance of Rome from a despotism counting its age by centuries.  I\nlooked at these struggles of the people with little reference to their\necclesiastical or sectarian bearings.  Had I been a Catholic instead of a\nProtestant, I should have hailed every symptom of Roman deliverance from\nPapal rule, occupying, as I have, the standpoint of a republican radical,\ndesirous that all men, of all creeds, should enjoy the civil liberty\nwhich I prized so highly for myself.\n\nI lost all confidence in the French republic of 1849, when it forfeited\nits own right to exist by crushing out the newly formed Roman republic\nunder Mazzini and Garibaldi.  From that hour it was doomed, and the\nexpiation of its monstrous crime is still going on.  My sympathies are\nwith Jules Favre and Leon Gambetta in their efforts to establish and\nsustain a republic in France, but I confess that the investment of Paris\nby King William seems to me the logical sequence of the bombardment of\nRome by Oudinot.  And is it not a significant fact that the terrible\nchassepot, which made its first bloody experiment upon the halfarmed\nItalian patriots without the walls of Rome, has failed in the hands of\nFrench republicans against the inferior needle-gun of Prussia?  It was\nsaid of a fierce actor in the old French Revolution that he demoralized\nthe guillotine.  The massacre at Mentana demoralized the chassepot.\n\nIt is a matter of congratulation that the redemption of Rome has been\neffected so easily and bloodlessly.  The despotism of a thousand years\nfell at a touch in noiseless rottenness.  The people of Rome, fifty to\none, cast their ballots of condemnation like so many shovelfuls of earth\nupon its grave.  Outside of Rome there seems to be a very general\nacquiescence in its downfall.  No Peter the Hermit preaches a crusade in\nits behalf.  No one of the great Catholic powers of Europe lifts a finger\nfor it.  Whatever may be the feelings of Isabella of Spain and the\nfugitive son of King Bomba, they are in no condition to come to its\nrescue.  It is reserved for American ecclesiastics, loud-mouthed in\nprofessions of democracy, to make solemn protest against what they call\nan \"outrage,\" which gives the people of Rome the right of choosing their\nown government, and denies the divine right of kings in the person of Pio\nNono.\n\nThe withdrawal of the temporal power of the Pope will prove a blessing to\nthe Catholic Church, as well as to the world.  Many of its most learned\nand devout priests and laymen have long seen the necessity of such a\nchange, which takes from it a reproach and scandal that could no longer\nbe excused or tolerated.  A century hence it will have as few apologists\nas the Inquisition or the massacre of St. Bartholomew.\n\nIn this hour of congratulation let us not forget those whose suffering\nand self-sacrifice, in the inscrutable wisdom of Providence, prepared the\nway for the triumph which we celebrate.  As we call the long, illustrious\nroll of Italian patriotism--the young, the brave, and beautiful; the\ngray-haired, saintly confessors; the scholars, poets, artists, who, shut\nout from human sympathy, gave their lives for God and country in the\nslow, dumb agony of prison martyrdom--let us hope that they also rejoice\nwith us, and, inaudible to earthly ears, unite in our thanksgiving:\n\"Alleluia!  for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth!  He hath avenged the\nblood of his servants!\"\n\nIn the belief that the unity of Italy and the overthrow of Papal rule\nwill strengthen the cause of liberty throughout the civilized' world, I\nam very truly thy friend.\n\n\n\n\n\n                           INDIAN CIVILIZATION.\n\nTHE present condition and future prospects of the remnants of the\naboriginal inhabitants of this continent can scarcely be a matter of\nindifference to any class of the people of the United States.  Apart from\nall considerations of justice and duty, a purely selfish regard to our\nown well-being would compel attention to the subject.  The irreversible\nlaws of God's moral government, and the well-attested maxims of political\nand social economy, leave us in no doubt that the suffering, neglect, and\nwrong of one part of the community must affect all others.  A common\nresponsibility rests upon each and all to relieve suffering, enlighten\nignorance, and redress wrong, and the penalty of neglect in this respect\nno nation has ever escaped.\n\nIt is only within a comparatively recent period that the term Indian\nCivilization could be appropriately used in this country.  Very little\nreal progress bad been made in this direction, up to the time when\nCommissioner Lang in 1844 visited the tribes now most advanced.  So\nlittle had been done, that public opinion had acquiesced in the\nassumption that the Indians were not susceptible of civilization and\nprogress.  The few experiments had not been calculated to assure a\nsuperficial observer.\n\nThe unsupported efforts of Elliot in New England were counteracted by the\nimprisonment, and in some instances the massacre of his \"praying\nIndians,\" by white men under the exasperation of war with hostile tribes.\nThe salutary influence of the Moravians and Friends in Pennsylvania was\ngreatly weakened by the dreadful massacre of the unarmed and blameless\nconverts of Gnadenhutten.  But since the first visit of Commissioner\nLang, thirty-three years ago, the progress of education, civilization,\nand conversion to Christianity, has been of a most encouraging nature,\nand if Indian civilization was ever a doubtful problem, it has been\npractically solved.\n\nThe nomadic habits and warlike propensities of the native tribes are\nindeed formidable but not insuperable difficulties in the way of their\nelevation.  The wildest of them may compare not unfavorably with those\nNorthern barbarian hordes that swooped down upon Christian Europe, and\nwho were so soon the docile pupils and proselytes of the peoples they had\nconquered.  The Arapahoes and Camanches of our day are no further removed\nfrom the sweetness and light of Christian culture than were the\nScandinavian Sea Kings of the middle centuries, whose gods were patrons\nof rapine and cruelty, their heaven a vast, cloud-built ale-house, where\nghostly warriors drank from the skulls of their victims, and whose hell\nwas a frozen horror of desolation and darkness, to be avoided only by\ndiligence in robbery and courage in murder.  The descendants of these\nhuman butchers are now among the best exponents of the humanizing\ninfluence of the gospel of Christ.  The report of the Superintendent of\nthe remnants of the once fierce and warlike Six Nations, now peaceable\nand prosperous in Canada, shows that the Indian is not inferior to the\nNorse ancestors of the Danes and Norwegians of our day in capability of\nimprovement.\n\nIt is scarcely necessary to say, what is universally conceded, that the\nwars waged by the Indians against the whites have, in nearly every\ninstance, been provoked by violations of solemn treaties and systematic\ndisregard of their rights of person, property, and life.  The letter of\nBishop Whipple, of Minnesota, to the New York Tribune of second month,\n1877, calls attention to the emphatic language of Generals Sherman,\nHarney, Terry, and Augur, written after a full and searching\ninvestigation of the subject: \"That the Indian goes to war is not\nastonishing: he is often compelled to do so: wrongs are borne by him in\nsilence, which never fail to drive civilized men to deeds of violence.\nThe best possible way to avoid war is to do no injustice.\"\n\nIt is not difficult to understand the feelings of the unfortunate pioneer\nsettlers on the extreme borders of civilization, upon whom the blind\nvengeance of the wronged and hunted Indians falls oftener than upon the\nreal wrong-doers.  They point to terrible and revolting cruelties as\nproof that nothing short of the absolute extermination of the race can\nprevent their repetition.  But a moment's consideration compels us to\nadmit that atrocious cruelty is not peculiar to the red man.  \"All wars\nare cruel,\" said General Sherman, and for eighteen centuries Christendom\nhas been a great battle-field.  What Indian raid has been more dreadful\nthan the sack of Magdeburg, the massacre of Glencoe, the nameless\natrocities of the Duke of Alva in the Netherlands, the murders of St.\nBartholomew's day, the unspeakable agonies of the South of France under\nthe demoniac rule of revolution!  All history, black with crime and red\nwith blood, is but an awful commentary upon \"man's inhumanity to man,\"\nand it teaches us that there is nothing exceptional in the Indian's\nferocity and vindictiveness, and that the alleged reasons for his\nextermination would, at one time or another, have applied with equal\nforce to the whole family of man.\n\nA late lecture of my friend, Stanley Pumphrey, comprises more of valuable\ninformation and pertinent suggestions on the Indian question than I have\nfound in any equal space; and I am glad of the opportunity to add to it\nmy hearty endorsement, and to express the conviction that its general\ncirculation could not fail to awaken a deeper and more kindly interest in\nthe condition of the red man, and greatly aid in leading the public mind\nto a fuller appreciation of the responsibility which rests upon us as a\npeople to rectify, as far as possible, past abuses, and in our future\nrelations to the native owners of the soil to \"deal justly and love\nmercy.\"\n\n\n\n\n\nREADING FOR THE BLIND.\n\n[1880.]\n\nTo Mary C.  Moore, teacher in the Perkins Asylum.\n\nDEAR FRIEND,--It gives me great pleasure to know that the pupils in thy\nclass at the Institution for the Blind have the opportunity afforded them\nto read through the sense of touch some of my writings, and thus hold\nwhat I hope will prove a pleasant communion with me.  Very glad I shall\nbe if the pen-pictures of nature, and homely country firesides, which I\nhave tried to make, are understood and appreciated by those who cannot\ndiscern them by natural vision.  I shall count it a great privilege to\nsee for them, or rather to let them see through my eyes.  It is the mind\nafter all that really sees, shapes, and colors all things.  What visions\nof beauty and sublimity passed before the inward and spiritual sight of\nblind Milton and Beethoven!\n\nI have an esteemed friend, Morrison Hendy, of Kentucky, who is deaf and\nblind; yet under these circumstances he has cultivated his mind to a high\ndegree, and has written poems of great beauty, and vivid descriptions of\nscenes which have been witnessed only by the \"light within.\"\n\nI thank thee for thy letter, and beg of thee to assure the students that\nI am deeply interested in their welfare and progress, and that my prayer\nis that their inward and spiritual eyes may become so clear that they can\nwell dispense with the outward and material ones.\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE INDIAN QUESTION.\n\nRead at the meeting in Boston, May, 1883, for the consideration of the\ncondition of the Indians in the United States.\n\nAMESBURY, 4th mo., 1883.\n\nI REGRET that I cannot be present at the meeting called in reference to\nthe pressing question of the day, the present condition and future\nprospects of the Indian race in the United States.  The old policy,\nhowever well intended, of the government is no longer available.  The\nwestward setting tide of immigration is everywhere sweeping over the\nlines of the reservations.  There would seem to be no power in the\ngovernment to prevent the practical abrogation of its solemn treaties and\nthe crowding out of the Indians from their guaranteed hunting grounds.\nOutbreaks of Indian ferocity and revenge, incited by wrong and robbery on\nthe part of the whites, will increasingly be made the pretext of\nindiscriminate massacres.  The entire question will soon resolve itself\ninto the single alternative of education and civilization or\nextermination.\n\nThe school experiments at Hampton, Carlisle, and Forest Grove in Oregon\nhave proved, if such proof were ever needed, that the roving Indian can\nbe enlightened and civilized, taught to work and take interest and\ndelight in the product of his industry, and settle down on his farm or in\nhis workshop, as an American citizen, protected by and subject to the\nlaws of the republic.  What is needed is that not only these schools\nshould be more liberally supported, but that new ones should be opened\nwithout delay.  The matter does not admit of procrastination.  The work\nof education and civilization must be done.  The money needed must be\ncontributed with no sparing hand.  The laudable example set by the\nFriends and the American Missionary Association should be followed by\nother sects and philanthropic societies.  Christianity, patriotism, and\nenlightened self interest have a common stake in the matter.  Great and\ndifficult as the work may be the country is strong enough, rich enough,\nwise enough, and, I believe, humane and Christian enough to do it.\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE REPUBLICAN PARTY.\n\nRead at a meeting of the Essex Club, in Boston,\nNovember, 1885.\n\nAMESBURY, 11th Mo., 10, 1885.\n\nI AM sorry that I cannot accept thy invitation to attend the meeting of\nthe Essex Club on the 14th inst.  I should be glad to meet my old\nRepublican friends and congratulate them on the results of the election\nin Massachusetts, and especially in our good old county of Essex.\n\nSome of our friends and neighbors, who have been with us heretofore, last\nyear saw fit to vote with the opposite party.  I would be the last to\ndeny their perfect right to do so, or to impeach their motives, but I\nthink they were mistaken in expecting that party to reform the abuses and\nevils which they complained of.  President Cleveland has proved himself\nbetter than his party, and has done and said some good things which I\ngive him full credit for, but the instincts of his party are against him,\nand must eventually prove too strong for him, and, instead of his\ncarrying the party, it will be likely to carry him.  It has already\ncompelled him to put his hands in his pockets for electioneering\npurposes, and travel all the way from Washington to Buffalo to give his\nvote for a spoilsman and anti-civil service machine politician.  I would\nnot like to call it a case of \"offensive partisanship,\" but it looks a\ngood deal like it.\n\nAs a Republican from the outset, I am proud of the noble record of the\nparty, but I should rejoice to see its beneficent work taken up by the\nDemocratic party and so faithfully carried on as to make our organization\nno longer necessary.  But, as far as we can see, the Republican party has\nstill its mission and its future.  When labor shall everywhere have its\njust reward, and the gains of it are made secure to the earners; when\neducation shall be universal, and, North and South, all men shall have\nthe free and full enjoyment of civil rights and privileges, irrespective\nof color or former condition; when every vice which debases the community\nshall be discouraged and prohibited, and every virtue which elevates it\nfostered and strengthened; when merit and fitness shall be the conditions\nof office; and when sectional distrust and prejudice shall give place to\nwell-merited confidence in the loyalty and patriotism of all, then will\nthe work of the Republican party, as a party, be ended, and all political\nrivalries be merged in the one great party of the people, with no other\naim than the common welfare, and no other watchwords than peace, liberty,\nand union.  Then may the language which Milton addressed to his\ncountrymen two centuries ago be applied to the United States, \"Go on,\nhand in hand, O peoples, never to be disunited; be the praise and heroic\nsong of all posterity.  Join your invincible might to do worthy and\ngodlike deeds; and then he who seeks to break your Union, a cleaving\ncurse be his inheritance.\"\n\n\n\n\n\nOUR DUMB RELATIONS.\n\n[1886.]\n\nIT was said of St. Francis of Assisi, that he had attained, through the\nfervor of his love, the secret of that deep amity with God and His\ncreation which, in the language of inspiration, makes man to be in league\nwith the stones of the field, and the beasts of the field to be at peace\nwith him.  The world has never been without tender souls, with whom the\ngolden rule has a broader application than its letter might seem to\nwarrant.  The ancient Eastern seers recognized the rights of the brute\ncreation, and regarded the unnecessary taking of the life of the humblest\nand meanest as a sin; and in almost all the old religions of the world\nthere are legends of saints, in the depth of whose peace with God and\nnature all life was sacredly regarded as the priceless gift of heaven,\nand who were thus enabled to dwell safely amidst lions and serpents.\n\nIt is creditable to human nature and its unperverted instincts that\nstories and anecdotes of reciprocal kindness and affection between men\nand animals are always listened to with interest and approval.  How\npleasant to think of the Arab and his horse, whose friendship has been\ncelebrated in song and romance.  Of Vogelwied, the Minnesinger, and his\nbequest to the birds.  Of the English Quaker, visited, wherever he went,\nby flocks of birds, who with cries of joy alighted on his broad-brimmed\nhat and his drab coat-sleeves.  Of old Samuel Johnson, when half-blind\nand infirm, groping abroad of an evening for oysters for his cat.  Of\nWalter Scott and John Brown, of Edinburgh, and their dogs.  Of our own\nThoreau, instinctively recognized by bird and beast as a friend.  Emerson\nsays of him: \"His intimacy with animals suggested what Thomas Fuller\nrecords of Butler, the apologist, that either he had told the bees\nthings, or the bees had told him.  Snakes coiled round his legs; the\nfishes swam into his hand; he pulled the woodchuck out of his hole by his\ntail, and took foxes under his protection from the hunters.\"\n\nIn the greatest of the ancient Hindu poems--the sacred book of the\nMahabharata--there is a passage of exceptional beauty and tenderness,\nwhich records the reception of King Yudishthira at the gate of Paradise.\nA pilgrim to the heavenly city, the king had travelled over vast spaces,\nand, one by one, the loved ones, the companions of his journey, had all\nfallen and left him alone, save his faithful dog, which still followed.\nHe was met by Indra, and invited to enter the holy city.  But the king\nthinks of his friends who have fallen on the way, and declines to go in\nwithout them.  The god tells him they are all within waiting for him.\nJoyful, he is about to seek them, when he looks upon the poor dog, who,\nweary and wasted, crouches at his feet, and asks that he, too, may enter\nthe gate.  Indra refuses, and thereupon the king declares that to abandon\nhis faithful dumb friend would be as great a sin as to kill a Brahmin.\n\n     \"Away with that felicity whose price is to abandon the faithful!\n     Never, come weal or woe, will I leave my faithful dog.\n     The poor creature, in fear and distress, has trusted in my power to\n     save him;\n     Not, therefore, for life itself, will I break my plighted word.\"\n\nIn full sight of heaven he chooses to go to hell with his dog, and\nstraightway descends, as he supposes, thither.  But his virtue and\nfaithfulness change his destination to heaven, and he finds himself\nsurrounded by his old friends, and in the presence of the gods, who thus\nhonor and reward his humanity and unselfish love.\n\n\n\n\n\nINTERNATIONAL ARBITRATION.\n\nRead at the reception in Boston of the English delegation representing\nmore than two hundred members of the British Parliament who favor\ninternational arbitration.\n\nAMESBURY, 11th Mo., 9, 1887.\n\nIT is a very serious disappointment to me not to be able to be present at\nthe welcome of the American Peace Society to the delegation of more than\ntwo hundred members of the British Parliament who favor international\narbitration.  Few events have more profoundly impressed me than the\npresentation of this peaceful overture to the President of the United\nStates.  It seems to me that every true patriot who seeks the best\ninterests of his country and every believer in the gospel of Christ must\nrespond to the admirable address of Sir Lyon Playfair and that of his\ncolleagues who represented the workingmen of England.  We do not need to\nbe told that war is always cruel, barbarous, and brutal; whether used by\nprofessed Christians with ball and bayonet, or by heathen with club and\nboomerang.  We cannot be blind to its waste of life and treasure and the\ndemoralization which follows in its train; nor cease to wonder at the\nspectacle of Christian nations exhausting all their resources in\npreparing to slaughter each other, with only here and there a voice, like\nCount Tolstoi's in the Russian wilderness, crying in heedless ears that\nthe gospel of Christ is peace, not war, and love, not hatred.\n\nThe overture which comes to us from English advocates of arbitration is a\ncheering assurance that the tide of sentiment is turning in favor of\npeace among English speaking peoples.  I cannot doubt that whatever stump\norators and newspapers may say for party purposes, the heart of America\nwill respond to the generous proposal of our kinsfolk across the water.\nNo two nations could be more favorably conditioned than England and the\nUnited States for making the \"holy experiment of arbitration.\"\n\nIn our associations and kinship, our aims and interests, our common\nclaims in the great names and achievements of a common ancestry, we are\nessentially one people.  Whatever other nations may do, we at least\nshould be friends.  God grant that the noble and generous attempt shall\nnot be in vain!  May it hasten the time when the only rivalry between us\nshall be the peaceful rivalry of progress and the gracious interchange of\ngood.\n\n              \"When closer strand shall lean to strand,\n               Till meet beneath saluting flags,\n               The eagle of our mountain crags,\n               The lion of our mother land!\"\n\n\n\n\n\nSUFFRAGE FOR WOMEN.\n\nRead at the Woman's Convention at Washington.\n\nOAK KNOLL, DANVERS, MASS., Third Mo., 8, 1888.\n\nI THANK thee for thy kind letter.  It would be a great satisfaction to be\nable to be present at the fortieth anniversary of the Woman's Suffrage\nAssociation.  But, as that is not possible, I can only reiterate my\nhearty sympathy with the object of the association, and bid it take heart\nand assurance in view of all that has been accomplished.  There is no\neasy royal road to a reform of this kind, but if the progress has been\nslow there has been no step backward.  The barriers which at first seemed\nimpregnable in the shape of custom and prejudice have been undermined and\ntheir fall is certain.  A prophecy of your triumph at no distant day is\nin the air; your opponents feel it and believe it.  They know that yours\nis a gaining and theirs a losing cause.  The work still before you\ndemands on your part great patience, steady perseverance, a firm,\ndignified, and self-respecting protest against the injustice of which you\nhave so much reason to complain, and of serene confidence which is not\ndiscouraged by temporary checks, nor embittered by hostile criticism, nor\nprovoked to use any weapons of retort, which, like the boomerang, fall\nback on the heads of those who use them.  You can afford\nin your consciousness of right to be as calm and courteous as the\narchangel Michael, who, we are told in Scripture in his controversy with\nSatan himself, did not bring a railing accusation against him.  A wise\nadaptation of means to ends is no yielding of principle, but care should\nbe taken to avoid all such methods as have disgraced political and\nreligious parties of the masculine sex.  Continue to make it manifest\nthat all which is pure and lovely and of good repute in womanhood is\nentirely compatible with the exercise of the rights of citizenship, and\nthe performance of the duties which we all owe to our homes and our\ncountry.  Confident that you will do this, and with no doubt or misgiving\nas to your success, I bid you Godspeed.  I find I have written to the\nassociation rather than to thyself, but as one of the principal\noriginators and most faithful supporters, it was very natural that I\nshould identify thee with it.","title":"Reform and Politics: Part 2 from The Works of John Greenleaf Whittier, Volume VII","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":11717}