Chapter VI: Letter III: Slavery (1)

Dear Sir: A considerable portion of your letter is taken up with a discussion of the rebel Vice-President Stephen's declaration touching slavery.

In his speech at Savannah, Mr. Stephens, speaking of the new Government which the rebels had set up, says: 'Its foundations are laid, its corner stone rests upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and moral condition.'

One would think this was clear enough, and that it was doing no injustice to its substantial purport to say that Mr. Stephens here makes slavery the corner stone of his new Government. You say, however, that this is 'an egregious misapprehension,' that '_he has made no such declaration_.' 'Let us learn' (you go on) 'what he actually did say. His language is this: 'The foundations of our new Government are laid, its corner stone rests upon'--what? slavery? no--'upon the _great truth_ that _the negro is not equal to the white man_, that slavery,' which he then defines to be 'subordination to the superior race, is his natural and moral condition.''

This is nice! How admirably your _italic_ emphasis upon the first clause, your intercalated comments, and the slight way of bringing in the second clause, serves to bring out the full, undivided force of the whole sentence! What a charming union of acuteness and moral nobleness it exhibits! Equally admirable for the same qualities is your distinction between basing a government upon _slavery_ and basing it upon a _great truth_ about slavery. Mr. Stephens has said that the corner stone of his new Government rests upon the _great truth_ that slavery is the natural and moral condition of the negro. He has not, therefore, said that it rests on _slavery_! And so you think yourself justified, do you, in your emphatic assertion that 'he has made no such declaration'? You stand impregnable and triumphant--on the words! You stick to what is 'nominated in the bond'--the very Shylock of criticism!

But not satisfied with this, you strengthen the case by argument: Mr. Stephens did not say so, or mean so, because he would have been very foolish if he had--so must every one be that thinks he did. Mr. Stephens's 'language' (you say) 'could not be applied to slavery; it would be a strange misapplication of terms to call slavery a physical, philosophical, and moral truth.' But irresistible as your logic is, did you really suppose that the 'plain men' who (according to your motto) in troubled times like these 'read pamphlets,' were any of them so stupid as to think that your wonderful distinction amounts to anything? Did you suppose any man of decent intelligence would fail to see that it makes no practical difference--since slavery, as an institution, was to be the inevitable consequence of the _great truth_ about it--and that therefore Mr. Stephens's declaration amounts substantially to saying that slavery was to be the corner stone of his new Government; and so your assertion, that 'he has made no such declaration,' is a paltry verbal quibble, unworthy of a sensible and fair-minded man.

So of your way of proving that the rebel Government have adopted no such corner stone. It is like yourself, and unparalleled but by yourself. First, you allege that even if Mr. Stephens had said so, his individual assertion is no law for the Government; next, that 'there is not one word in the Constitution of the Confederacy that gives color to any such idea as slavery being the corner stone of their Government; on the contrary, section ix, article i, _clearly repudiates it_.' You did not quote the article you refer to. Your 'plain men,' when they come to see it, will perhaps have an opinion on the question why you did not. The article is as follows: '_The importation of African negroes from any foreign country other than the slaveholding States of the United States, in hereby forbidden, and Congress is required to pass such laws as shall effectually prevent the same._'

Now did you really think that this article 'clearly repudiates' the idea of the rebels intending to have slavery for one of their fundamental institutions, or did you presume on the ignorance or stupidity of those you have undertaken to instruct in political knowledge? The article itself contains no such repudiation, nor is there anything to warrant your inference that such was its purport, and everybody that knows anything about it, knows that it is a gross misrepresentation of its real object to say so.

The rebel Constitution was framed by delegates from the seven Lower Slave States. It was adopted February 8, 1861. Neither Tennessee nor Virginia nor any of the Border States had then joined the rebel Confederacy. Most of these States were opposed to the reopening of the African slave trade from principle and sentiment. The material interests of Virginia were strongly opposed to it. The staple product of Virginia was slaves. She lived only by breeding negroes for the market of the slave-consuming States of the Lower South. To reopen the African slave trade would destroy the profits of her great staple. The price of negroes would go down from _one thousand_ dollars to _two hundred_. It was well known, however, that there had been for several years a clamor in the Lower States for the repeal of the law of the Union prohibiting the African slave trade, that the determination to have the trade reopened '_in the Union or out of the Union_' had been publicly proclaimed in South Carolina, and that the matter of demanding it from the Congress of the Union had been before the Legislature of that State, on the recommendation of the Governor, three or four years before the breaking out of the rebellion.

Under these circumstances the rebel Constitution was framed. And however important to the slave-buying interest of its framers and of the people they assumed to represent, the opening of the African slave trade may have been felt to be, it was felt to be far more important at that crisis to secure the accession of Virginia and the Border States to the rebel cause by prohibiting it. Hence the adoption of the article you refer to without quoting, and of the next very significant article, which you neither quote nor refer to: '_Congress shall also have power to prohibit the importation of slaves from any State not a member of this Confederacy._' The first of these articles, prohibiting the African slave trade, is a guarantee to the interests of the slave breeders if they join the Confederacy; and the second a threat, that if they do not join it, they may have no benefit from the prohibition in the first. Yet knowing all this, or bound to know it, you represent the prohibition of the African slave trade in the rebel Constitution as a 'clear repudiation' of the idea of slavery being intended to be a fundamental institution under their Government! Shame on you! It is a thousand miles away from having any such meaning or purpose; and I confess I am utterly unable to conceive how any man of decent intelligence could in good faith make the representation you do. _Suppressio veri, allegatio falsi._

Besides, what object could you have? You vindicate the doctrine, 'the great truth,' by which (according to you, as according to Mr. Stephens) slavery as an institution is justified. You approve of slavery, or, as Mr. Stephens euphistically terms it, the 'subordination of the negro to the superior race.' You know that slavery _is_ a fundamental institution in the rebel scheme. Why then take pains to produce a contrary impression, by resorting to such futile distinctions, such wretched quibbles, and such absurd logic? It seems to me nothing but a mania for verbal distinctions and sophistical special pleas can explain such a gratuitous self-sacrifice.

Or is it, possibly, that you thought you could persuade your 'plain men who read pamphlets,' that in virtue of the sweet euphuism, 'subordination to the superior race,' negro slavery at the South was in some way to be divinely transformed, and, though called slavery, was not in fact to be slavery after the old former fashion? '_Subordination to the superior race_'! It certainly merits the praise of Mr. Justice _Shallow_: 'It is well said, in faith, sir; and it is well said indeed, too; ... and it is good, yea, indeed is it: good phrases are surely, and ever were, very commendable. Very good; a good phrase!'

But _you_ knew it was to be the _same sort of subordination_ that has always prevailed at the South. What is that? It is a subordination that is legally determined as follows: 'Slaves shall be deemed, held, taken, reputed, and adjudged in law to be '_chattels personal_ in the hands of their owners and possessors, and their executors, administrators, and assigns, to all intents, constructions, and purposes whatever.' (South Carolina Laws, 2 Brevard's Digest, 229.) 'A slave is one who is in the full power of a master to whom he belongs. The master may sell him, dispose of his person, his industry, and his labor. He can do nothing, possess nothing, nor acquire anything but what must belong to his master.' (Louisiana Civil Code, art. 35.) 'The slave is entirely subject to the will of his master.' (Idem, art. 173.)

This is the legal condition of the slave--the same in all the slaveholding States. The laws and decisions resting upon this principle of chattelhood and absolute ownership and dominion are too numerous to cite. They may be summed up in the words of Judge Crenshaw (1 Stewart's Ala. Rep., 320): '_the slave has no civil rights_.' It is matter of settled law, that he can make no contract; cannot form a legal marriage; cannot constitute a family--husbands and wives, parents and children, being liable (except in Louisiana) to be sold apart; cannot protect his wife's or daughter's chastity against the master's will; has no right of self-defence, but may be lawfully killed for resisting or striking his master or (in some States) any white man; has no appeal from his master; can bring no action; cannot testify in courts; has no right to education, but teaching him to read and write is penally prohibited.

The laws do not pretend to recognize and protect him as a person, except against murder and excessive cruelty; and these laws are nullified if the master take care to kill or torture him apart from the presence of white witnesses; and even if there be legal witnesses, the murderer or torturer can seldom be brought to punishment. 'A cruel and unreasonable battery' on a slave by the master or hirer is _not indictable_. This is Judge Ruffin's decision. (2 Devereux's N.C. Rep., 265). This decision is celebrated for the language in which it is announced, and the grounds on which it is rested.

'_The power of the master_,' says the Judge, '_must be absolute to render the submission, of the slave perfect_. I most freely confess my sense of the harshness of this proposition. I feel it as deeply as any man can. And as a principle of moral right, every person in his retirement must repudiate it. But in the actual condition of things it must be so. There is no remedy. This discipline belongs to the state of slavery. They cannot be disunited without abrogating at once the rights of the master, and absolving the slave from his subjection. It constitutes the curse of slavery to both the bond and the free portion of our population. But it is _inherent in the relation_ of master and slave. That there may be particular instances of cruelty and deliberate barbarity where, in conscience, the law might properly interfere, is most probable. The difficulty is to determine where _a court_ may properly begin. Merely in the abstract, it may well be asked which power of the master accords with right. The answer will probably sweep away all of them. But we cannot look at the matter in this light. The truth is we are forbidden to enter on a train of general reasoning on the subject. _We cannot allow the right of the master to be brought into discussion in the courts of justice. The slave, to remain a slave, must be made sensible that there is no appeal from his master, that his power is, in no instance, usurped, but is conferred by the laws of man, at least, if not by the laws of God._'

Such is slavery under the slave code. Men are sometimes better and sometimes worse than their laws. We need not wonder that volumes might be filled with recitals of cruelties and atrocities of torture, ending, in many cases, only with the death of the victim. Nor need we wonder at the more loathsome moral abominations so prevalent in Southern society, which degrade the whites even more than the blacks--of children begotten by masters upon the persons of their slave women--begotten in lust and sold for gain; of beautiful quadroons and octoroons sought and bought for the base pleasure of their owners; of families, where the lawful wives and daughters of the master are served by slaves that are their own uncles, brothers, or sisters, born of slave women, yielding to the master's lustful will. _Amalgamation is a Southern, not a Northern taste and practice._ The most abominable case that has recently come to light, is that of the young slave mother, at New Orleans, of whose children her own father (a rich rebel) was the father! All these things are inevitably incident to a state of slavery, and there is no law against them.

Such is slavery--such is the institution you advocate as divinely ordered, under the soft phrase, '_subordination to the superior race_'! And this is the way you speak of those whom you term radical Abolitionists: 'Look at the dark conclave of conspirators, freedom-shriekers, Bible-spurners, fierce, implacable, headstrong, denunciatory, Constitution and Union haters, noisy, factious, breathing forth threatenings and slaughter against all who venture a difference of opinion from them, murderous, passionate advocates of imprisonments and hangings, blood-thirsty,--and if there be any other epithet in the vocabulary of wickedness, do they not every one fitly designate some phase of radical Abolitionism?'

I cannot help fancying that it will occur to some that by substituting _slavery-shriekers_ and _Bible-perverters_ in this sentence, it might at least equally well describe Northern pro-slavery zealots. At any rate, your language is the very extravagance of coarse pro-slavery fanaticism. I have never been of mind with those you term radical Abolitionists; but it seems to me that of the two fanaticisms, the anti-slavery fanaticism is the most respectable in principle, less selfish, and more generous in impulse. I have all my life been disposed to leave the South in undisturbed possession of its constitutional pound of slavery flesh. But when the slaveholders showed an inveterate determination not to be content with that, but to _nationalize_ slavery, to carry it everywhere, and to make it the great element of political control throughout the nation, I felt no constitutional obligation to submit. And when the conspirators, foiled in their designs, rushed into open rebellion, I made up my mind that slavery had best be destroyed--for only when it is, will the conditions of true unity between the South and the North begin to exist--then only will the prosperity and peace of the nation be established on a permanent basis. This is now the opinion of a great many of the best and wisest men at the South. I believe that slavery will be destroyed in the progress and sequel of this war--to the ultimate incalculable advantage of the South.

One word more: You have seen fit to quote Burke and Milton, for the sake of a fling at the _clergy_ who venture to discuss the questions of the day. I do not know how far some of your associates will be disposed to thank you. Perhaps their being on your side gives them a capacity not possessed by the others, and exempts them from the application of your rebuke. I have an impression that the culture and habits of thinking of the members of the clerical profession do not particularly unfit them for taking just and sound views on the questions that agitate the public mind, and that their position--cutting them off from all offices and emoluments that are the objects of ambition to party politicians--gives them some special advantages for doing so. For myself, having all my life been devoted to study and thought on the great principles of social and moral order, I feel myself as well qualified, at least, to offer an opinion, as though I had been devoted to the mechanical application of the principles of physical science.

C. S. HENRY.

BUCKLE, DRAPER, AND THE LAW OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT.

_FIRST PAPER._

So parallel are the lines of thought in Mr. Buckle's 'History of Civilization' and Professor Draper's 'Intellectual Development of Europe,' while they continue within the same limits in discussing the law of individual and social progress; and so exactly does the latter work resume the consideration of this law at the point where the English writer abandoned its further analysis, to commence to apply that which he had made to the history of various nations, that one might almost suppose the two authors had undertaken the task conjointly, and divided the work between them.

It was the purpose of Mr. Buckle, in his introduction, to ascertain the sources of social, and, incidentally, of individual development--the fundamental causes of human progression; and subsequently to verify the principles established, by tracing, in general outlines, the rise and advance of leading nations under their impulse. The basis upon which he started in his examination was this: 'That when we perform an action, we perform it in consequence of some motive or motives; that those motives are the results of some antecedents; and that, therefore, if we were acquainted with the whole of the antecedents, and with all the laws of their movements, we could with unerring certainty predict the whole of their immediate results.'

From this proposition the historian concludes 'that the actions of men, being determined solely by their antecedents, must, under precisely the same circumstances, always issue in precisely the same results. And as all antecedents are either in the mind or out of it, we clearly see that all the variations in the results--in other words, all the changes of which history is full, all the vicissitudes of the human race, their progress or their decay, their happiness or their misery--must be the fruit of a double action; an action of external phenomena upon the mind, and another action of the mind upon the phenomena.'

Mr. Buckle gives it as the result of his investigations concerning the relative influence of these two agencies: That external or physical laws have been most powerful in the earlier ages of the world, and among the most ignorant nations; that in proportion as knowledge increases, the power of this class of agencies diminishes, and that of mental laws becomes more predominant; that these latter are therefore the great motor forces of civilization, consisting of two parts, the moral and the intellectual, of which the latter are vastly superior as instruments of social advancement, stationary in their effects; finally, as the formal statement of the laws of human development, he says:

'1st. That the progress of mankind depends on the success with
which the laws of phenomena are investigated, and on the extent to
which a knowledge of those laws is diffused. 2d. That before such
investigation can begin, a spirit of scepticism must arise, which,
at first aiding the investigation, is afterward aided by it. 3d.
That the discoveries thus made increase the influence of
intellectual truths, and diminish, relatively, not absolutely, the
influence of moral truths; moral truths being more stationary than
intellectual truths, and receiving fewer additions. 4th. That the
great enemy of this movement, and therefore the great enemy of
civilization, is the protective spirit--the notion that society
cannot prosper, unless the affairs of life are watched over and
protected at nearly every turn by the state and the church; the
state teaching men what they are to do, and the church teaching
them what they are to believe.'

In all these points the recent work of Professor Draper coincides with that of the lamented English writer. The main object of the former is, however, to discuss a question more basic than those undertaken by the author of 'Civilization in England,' the consideration of which was by him formally declined: namely, the question of a predetermined order of development lying back of all physical and mental phenomena. The opening sentences of the American book will sufficiently indicate the purpose of its pages:

'I intend, in this work, to consider in what manner the advancement
of Europe in civilization has taken place, to ascertain how far its
progress has been fortuitous, and how far determined by primordial
law.

'Does the procession of nations in time, like the erratic phantasm
of a dream, go forward without reason or order? Or, is there a
predetermined, a solemn march, in which all must join, ever moving,
ever resistlessly advancing, encountering and enduring an
inevitable succession of events?

'In a philosophical examination of the intellectual and political
history of nations, an answer to these questions is to be found.
* * * Man is the archetype of society. Individual development is the
model of social progress.'

It will be sufficient for our present purpose to indicate the line of Dr. Draper's argument, in seeking for a solution to the problem of progress, and to sum up the conclusions to which he is ultimately led by his investigations.

In the intellectual infancy of a savage state, man regards all passing events as depending on the arbitrary volition of a superior but invisible power. The tendency is necessarily to superstition. After reason, aided by experience, has led him forth from these delusions as respects surrounding things, he still clings to his original ideas as respects objects far removed, believing the stars to be inhabited by mysterious powers, or to be such themselves. Gradually he emerges from star worship as he did from fetichism, still venerating and perhaps exalting into immortal gods the genii whom he once supposed to inhabit the stars, long after he has ascertained that the latter are without any perceptible influence on him.

He is exchanging, by ascending degrees, his primitive doctrine of arbitrary volition for the doctrine of law. As the fall of a stone, the flowing of a river, and the ordinary operations of nature familiar to him have been traced to physical causes, to like causes are at last traced the revolutions of the stars. In events and scenes continually increasing in greatness and grandeur, he is detecting the dominion of law. This perception is extended, until at last it embraces all natural events, until they are seen to be the consequences of physical conditions, and therefore the results of law.

'But if we admit that this is the case, from the mote that floats
in the sunbeam to multiple stars revolving round each other, are we
willing to carry our principles to their consequences, and
recognize a like operation of law among living as among lifeless
things, in the organic as well as the inorganic world? What
testimony does physiology offer on this point?'

Physiology, in its progress, has passed through the same stages as physics. Living beings were once considered to be beyond the power of external influences, the various physiological functions being carried forward by a feigned immaterial principle, called the vital agent. But when it was discovered that the heart is constructed upon the recognized rules of hydraulics; the eye upon the most refined principles of optics; that the ear was furnished with the means of dealing with the three characteristics of sound--its tympanum for intensity, its cochlea for pitch, and its semicircular canals for quality; and that the air, brought into the great air passages, calling into play atmospheric pressure, was conveyed upon physical principles into the ultimate cells of the lungs, and thence to the blood; when these and very many other like facts were brought into prominence by modern research, it became necessary to admit that animated beings do not constitute the exception once supposed, and that organic operations are the result of physical agencies.

'If thus, in the recesses of the individual economy, these natural
agents bear sway, must they not operate in the social economy too?

'Has the great, shadeless desert nothing to do with the habits of
the nomade tribes who pitch their tents upon it--the fertile plain
no connection with flocks and pastoral life--the mountain
fastnesses with the courage that has so often defended them--the
sea with habits of adventure? Indeed, do not all our expectations
of the stability of social institutions rest upon our belief in the
stability of surrounding physical conditions? From the time of
Bodin, who nearly three hundred years ago published his work 'De
Republica,' these principles have been well recognized: that the
laws of nature cannot be subordinated to the will of man, and that
government must be adapted to climate. It was these things which
led to the conclusion that force is best resorted to for northern
nations, reason for the middle, and superstition for the southern.'

The importance of physical agents and physical laws in the social as well as in the individual economy, is variously illustrated by Professor Draper, who points out the essential part they play in several departments of nature. To the merely mechanical inclination of the earth's axis of rotation toward the plane of her orbit of revolution around the sun, we owe the changing seasons and the method of life which is dependent on these. The alteration of that physical arrangement would involve a corresponding alteration in the whole life of the globe. So, again, the possibility of existence upon the earth, in any way, depends upon conditions altogether of a material kind. It is necessary that our planet should be at a definite mean distance from the source of light and heat, the sun; and that the form of her orbit should be almost a circle, since it is only within a narrow range of temperature, secured by these conditions, that life can be maintained.

It is through natural agents also that the means of regulation are secured in the present economy of the globe. Through heat, the distribution and arrangement of the vegetable tribes are accomplished; through their mutual relations with the atmospheric air, plants and animals are interbalanced, and neither permitted to obtain a superiority. The condensation of carbon from the air and its inclusion in the strata constitute the chief epoch in the organic life of the earth giving a possibility for the appearance of the hot-blooded and more intellectual animal tribes. That event was due to the influence of the rays of the sun.

Passing from inorganic to organic forms, our author remarks that their permanence is altogether dependent 'on the invariability of the material conditions under which they live. Any variation therein, no matter how insignificant it might be, would be forthwith followed by a corresponding variation in the form.' At this point we are brought to the far-famed 'development theory,' which, since the publication of the 'Vestiges of Creation,' has been the scientific battle field of the naturalists of the world. Professor Draper is, of course, a firm adherent of this theory. He continues:

'The present invariability of the world of organization is the
direct consequence of the physical equilibrium, and so it will
continue as long as the mean temperature, the annual supply of
light, the composition of the air, the distribution of water,
oceanic and atmospheric currents, and other such agencies, remain
unaltered; but if any one of these, or of a hundred other incidents
that might be mentioned, should suffer modification, in an instant
the fanciful doctrine of the immutability of species would be
brought to its true value. The organic world appears to be in
repose, because natural influences have reached an equilibrium. A
marble may remain forever motionless upon a level table; but let
the surface be a little inclined, and the marble will quickly run
off. What should we say of him who, contemplating it in its state
of rest, asserted that it was impossible for it ever to move?

'When, therefore, we notice such orderly successions, we must not
at once assign them to a direct intervention, the issue of wise
predeterminations of a voluntary agent; we must first satisfy
ourselves how far they are dependent upon mundane or material
conditions, occurring in a definite and necessary series, ever
bearing in mind the important principle that an orderly sequence of
inorganic events necessarily involves an orderly and corresponding
progression of organic life.

'To this doctrine of the control of physical agencies over organic
forms I acknowledge no exceptions, not even in the case of man. The
varied aspects he presents in different countries are the necessary
consequences of those influences.'

Whether we advocate the doctrine of the origination of the human race from a single pair, or from different races at different centres, we are, in Dr. Draper's judgment, alike driven to the conclusion of the transitory nature of typical forms, to their transmutations and extinctions. In the former case, we can only account for diverse races, having different shades of complexion, different varieties of skull, etc., by the admission of the paramount control of physical agents, such as climate and other purely material circumstances; in the latter, we can only account for the varieties visible among the different races themselves on similar grounds.

Variations in the aspect of man are best seen when an examination is made of nations arranged in a northerly and southerly direction, the differences of climate being much greater in this direction than from east to west. These variations do not affect complexion, development of the brain, and, therefore, intellectual power, only. But differences of manners and customs, that is, differences in the modes of civilization, must coexist with diversities of climate. An ethnical element is therefore necessarily of a dependent nature; its durability arises from its perfect correspondence with the conditions by which it is surrounded. Whatever can affect that correspondence will touch its life.

With such considerations the author passes from individuals to groups of men or nations:

'There is a progress for races of men as well marked as the
progress of one man. There are thoughts and actions appertaining to
specific periods in the one case as in the other. Without
difficulty we affirm of a given act that it appertains to a given
period. We recognize the noisy sports of boyhood, the business
application of maturity, the feeble garrulity of old age. We
express our surprise when we witness actions unsuitable to the
epoch of life. As it is in this respect in the individual, so it is
in the nation. The march of individual existence shadows forth the
march of race existence, being, indeed, its representative on a
little scale. Groups of men, or nations, are distributed by the
same accidents, or complete the same cycle as the individual. Some
scarcely pass beyond infancy; some are destroyed on a sudden; some
die of mere old age. In this confusion of events, it might seem
altogether hopeless to disentangle the law which is guiding them
all, and demonstrate it clearly. Of such groups each may exhibit,
at the same moment, an advance to a different stage, just as we see
in the same family the young, the middle aged, and the old. * * *
In each nation, moreover, the contemporaneously different classes,
the educated and illiterate, the idle and industrious, the rich and
poor, the intelligent and superstitious, represent different
contemporaneous stages of advancement. One may have made a great
progress, another scarcely have advanced at all. How shall we
ascertain the real state of the case? Which of these classes shall
we regard as the truest and most perfect type?'

In order to deal with this problem, and to demonstrate the general nature of a movement having such diverse components, we must, continues Professor Draper, select, from a family or a nation, or a family of many nations, such members or classes or states as most closely represent respectively its type or have advanced most completely in their career. In a state the leading or intellectual class is always the true representative. It has passed gradually through the lower stages, and has made the greatest advance.

We are next called to notice that individual life is maintained only by the production and destruction of organic particles, death being necessarily the condition of life; and that a similar process occurs in the existence of a nation, in which the individual represents the organic molecule, whose production, continuance, and death in the person, answers to the production, continuance, and death of a person in the state. In the same manner that individuals change through the action of physical agencies and submit to impressions, so likewise do aggregates of men constituting nations. 'A national type pursues its way physically and intellectually through changes and developments answering to those of the individual, and being represented by infancy, childhood, youth, manhood, old age, and death, respectively.'

This orderly process may, however, be disturbed by emigration, by blood admixture, or by other exterior or interior occurrences, which would involve a corresponding change in the national characteristics and duration; perhaps result in the rapid and total disappearance of the community.

For--and this brings us to the last point of analogy which Professor Draper gives between individual and national life--nations, like individuals, die. Empires are only sandhills in the hourglass of Time; they crumble spontaneously away by the process of their own growth.

'A nation, like a man, hides from itself the contemplation of its
final day. It occupies itself with expedients for prolonging its
present state. It frames laws and constitutions under the delusion
that they will last, forgetting that the condition of life is
change. Very able modern statesmen consider it to be the grand
object of their art to keep things as they are, or rather as they
were. But the human race is not at rest; and bands with which, for
a moment, it may be restrained, break all the more violently the
longer they hold. No man can stop the march of destiny. * * * The
origin, existence, and death of nations depend thus on physical
influences, which are themselves the result of immutable laws.
Nations are only transitional forms of humanity. They must undergo
obliteration as do the transitional forms offered by the animal
series. There is no more an immortality for an embryo in any one of
the manifold forms passed through in its progress of development.

'We must, therefore, no longer regard nations or groups of men as
offering a permanent picture. Human affairs must be looked upon as
in continuous movement, not wandering in an arbitrary manner here
and there, but proceeding in a perfectly definite course. Whatever
may be the present state, it is altogether transient. All systems
of civil life are therefore necessarily ephemeral. Time brings new
conditions; the manner of thought is modified; with thought,
action. Institutions of all kinds must hence participate in this
fleeting nature; and, though they may have allied themselves to
political power, and gathered therefrom the means of coercion,
their permanency is but little improved thereby; for, sooner or
later, the population on whom they have been imposed, following the
external variations, spontaneously outgrows them, and their ruin,
though it may have been delayed, is none the less certain. For the
permanency of any such system it is essentially necessary that it
should include with its own organization a law of change, and not
of change only, but change in the right direction--the direction in
which the society interested is about to pass. It is in an
oversight of this last essential condition that we find an
explanation of the failure of so many such institutions. Too
commonly do we believe that the affairs of men are determined by a
spontaneous action or free will; we keep that overpowering
influence which really controls them in the background. In
individual life we also accept a like deception, living in the
belief that everything we do is determined by the volition of
ourselves or of those around us; nor is it until the close of our
days that we discern how great is the illusion, and that we have
been swimming, playing, and struggling in a stream which, in spite
of all our voluntary motions, has silently and resistlessly borne
us to a predetermined shore.'

These lines were written before the commencement of our civil war. The following sentence, taken from the postscript to the preface, gives them, at this time, additional significance:

'When a nation has reached one of the epochs of its life, and is
preparing itself for another period of progress under new
conditions; it is well for every thoughtful man interested in its
prosperity to turn his eyes from the contentions of the present to
the accomplished facts of the past, and to seek for a solution of
existing difficulties in the record of what other people in former
times have done.'

Guided by this law of development, Professor Draper sets out on his task of investigating the course of European progress. For the purpose of facilitating this investigation, he divides the intellectual progress of the nations examined, into five periods: 1, The Age of Credulity; 2, The Age of Inquiry; 3, The Age of Faith; 4, The Age of Reason; 5, The Age of Decrepitude; corresponding with the five divisions of individual life, as previously stated, from infancy to old age. The general line of examination and its results may be stated by giving the opening paragraphs of his closing chapter:

'The object of this book is to impress upon its reader a conviction
that civilization does not proceed in an arbitrary manner, or by
chance, but that it passes through a determinate succession of
stages, and is a development according to law.

'For this purpose we considered the relations between individual
and social life, and showed that they are physiologically
inseparable from one another, and that the course of communities
bears an unmistakable resemblance to the progress of an individual,
and that man is the archetype or exemplar of society.

'We then examined the intellectual history of Greece--a nation
offering the best and most complete illustration of the life of
humanity. From the beginning of its mythology in old Indian
legends, and of its philosophy in Ionia, we saw that it passed
through phases like those of the individual to its decrepitude and
death in Alexandria.

'Then addressing ourselves to the history of Europe, we found that,
if suitably divided into groups of ages, these groups, compared
with each other in chronological succession, present a striking
resemblance to the successive phases of Greek life, and therefore
to that which Greek life resembles--that is to say, individual
life.'

Looking at the successive phases of individual life, Professor Draper finds intellectual advancement to be their chief characteristic. The anatomist discovers that the human form advances to its highest perfection through provisions in its nervous structure for intellectual improvement. In like manner the physiologist ranks the vast series of animals now inhabiting the earth in the order of their intelligence. The geologist declares that there has been an orderly improvement in intellectual power of the beings that have successively inhabited the earth.

The sciences, therefore, join with history, infers Professor Draper, in affirming that the great aim of nature is intellectual improvement; intellectual improvement in the individual, and hence, man being the archetype of society, intellectual advancement in the race.

'What, then, is the conclusion inculcated by these doctrines as
regards the social progress of great communities? It is that all
political institutions--imperceptibly or visibly, spontaneously or
purposely--should tend to the improvement and organization of
national intellect. * * *

'A great community, aiming to govern itself by intellect rather
than by coercion, is a spectacle worthy of admiration. * * * Brute
force holds communities together as an iron nail binds pieces of
wood by the compression it makes--a compression depending on the
force with which it has been hammered in. It also holds more
tenaciously if a little rusted with age. But intelligence binds
like a screw. The things it has to unite must be carefully adjusted
to its thread. It must be gently turned, not driven, and so it
retains the consenting parts firmly together. * * *

'Forms of government, therefore, are of moment, though not in the
manner commonly supposed. Their value increases in proportion as
they permit or encourage the natural tendency for development to be
satisfied.'

Intellectual freedom should be secured in free countries, adds Dr. Draper, as completely as the rights of property and personal liberty. Philosophical opinions and scientific discoveries are entitled to be judged of by their truth, not by their relation to existing interests.

'There is no literary crime greater than that of exciting a social,
and especially a theological odium against ideas that are purely
scientific, none against which the disapproval of every educated
man ought to be more strongly expressed. The republic of letters
owes it to its own dignity to tolerate no longer offences of that
kind.

'To an organization of their national intellect, and to giving it a
political control, the countries of Europe are rapidly advancing.
They are hastening to satisfy their instinctive tendency. The
special form in which they will embody their intentions must, of
course, depend to a great degree on the political forms under which
they have passed their lives, modified by that approach to
homogeneousness, which arises from increased intercommunication.'

In an all-important particular, concludes Dr. Draper, the prospect of Europe is bright. It approaches the last stage of civil life through Christianity. Universal benevolence cannot fail to yield better fruit than has been secured in the past. There is a fairer hope for nations animated by a sincere religious sentiment, who, whatever their political history may have been, have always agreed in this, that they were devout, than for a people who, like the Chinese, now passing through the last stage of civil life in the cheerlessness of Buddhism dedicate themselves to a selfish pursuit of material advantages, who have lost all belief in a future, and are living without any God.

* * * * *

The large space given to the statement of the purpose and drift of 'The Intellectual Development of Europe,' will allow only a brief consideration, in this paper, of the two great points presented by its author. These are, the question of the relative value of moral and intellectual truths in the progress of the human race; and the nature of the law of individual and social development. Both Professor Draper and Mr. Buckle affirm, and endeavor to support the affirmation with array of proof, that intellectual truths are more important and more concerned in the march of society, in the advancement of mankind, than moral ones; and both conclude that the great object of life, its final achievement, is intellectual culture and mental unfoldment in the individual and in the race. To the consideration of these points we will, therefore, direct our attention.

The social, political, religious, and scientific development of the world proceeds under the operation of two grand antagonistic principles. One is the principle of Unity. The other that principle which is the opposite of unity, which we will call Individuality. The first tends to bring about coöperation, consolidation, convergence, dependence; the second to produce separation, isolation, divergence, and independence. Unity is the principle which tends to order; Individuality to freedom. The desire of order is the animating sentiment of conservatism. The love of freedom is the vital essence of progress. Unity is the static, and Individuality the motic force of human society. Both are inherent in the nature of things, and equally important as elements of a true social organization. Unity is allied to the affections, which are synthetic in their character; Individuality, to the intellect, which is mainly analytical, critical, and disruptive in its tendency. Unity is predominant in religion, which is static in its nature; Individuality, in science, which is primarily disturbing. In the distribution of the mental faculties, Unity relates to the moral powers, and Individuality to the intellectual; the former being, as both Mr. Buckle and Professor Draper have shown, more stationary in their character than the latter.

Unity is represented in social affairs by the institutions of community which tend to bind the people into a composite whole; Individuality, by the personal independence which liberates from the conventionalities of association and creates social freedom. In the religious domain, Unity is represented by faith, which is allied to the emotional or affectional nature, and is predominantly concessive, unquestioning, and submissive; Individuality, by the spirit of inquiry and investigation, which will only believe after intellectual examination and satisfaction. In political affairs, Unity is represented by the principle of leadership, seen, in its one-sided and imperfect form, in despotic or monarchical rule; Individuality, by the democratic principle of political equality. In science, the two principles have various analogues in different departments. In rational mechanics, unity is analogous to statics, and individuality to dynamics. In astronomy, unity to the centripetal, and individuality to the centrifugal force. Unity is allied to synthetical, and individuality to analytical chemistry. It will not be necessary to specify further analogies. These two principles are everywhere present throughout the universe; and it is through the mutual play of their opposite drifts, when rightly adjusted and balanced, that harmony is secured, as in the revolutions of the planets; while disharmony is the result, wherever it exists, of an undue preponderance, either of the tendency to unity, on the one hand, or of that to disunity or individuality, on the other.

In virtue of this analysis, looking at the question solely from the stand point of abstract science, we should affirm that moral truth, as the analogue or representative of the principle of unity, and as the converging tendency, was exactly the equal and counterpart of intellectual truth, the analogue of the diverging tendency, represented by the principle of individuality. To assert the contrary, would be equivalent to averring that dynamics were more important agencies in mechanics than statics; that the centrifugal force was more essential to the harmonious movements of the heavenly bodies than the centripetal, because the functions of statics and centripetal force are more stationary in their nature; or that the head was more important than the heart, which two parts are, in the human organism, the respective representatives of intellect and affection, the basis of moral power.

The truth, in relation to all these particulars, will appear on closer examination, if not already shown, to be this: _that the principle of Unity and the principle of Individuality must everywhere be represented in proximately equal proportions, in order to effect a just balance of conditions and to secure practical harmony_. Centralization and freedom must everywhere coexist, and be equally operative. Conservatism is as important to society as progress. Conservatism overbalancing progress, destroys society by stagnation, blotting out the individuality of the person and moulding men into machine-like uniformity; progress preponderating over conservatism, destroys the community by disrupting bands of association before new methods are sufficiently understood, and giving reins to a liberty whose untutored use can end only in anarchy and unbridled license. Conservatism and progress, the centripetal and centrifugal forces of society, each being equally balanced, will result in a harmonization of social interests that will cause community to move on its career as evenly as the planet moves in its graceful orbit. So in every other department, wherever these opposite principles are equally adjusted by allowing each full play, there results perfect consonance and peace. Order and freedom in government; unity and liberty in church; individuality and mutuality in society; these are the elements, when alike operative, of security and success in their respective domains, in individual and social life.

To secure the highest state of civilization, it is therefore essential that there should be an equal activity of the intellectual and of the moral or (as they may be more appropriately called) the religious faculties: religion being, in its broadest sense, devotion--arising from a conscientious feeling of duty or obligation--to that which appears to the individual as the highest truth; and the faculties which are active in the exercise of this devotion being the moral or religious ones. Viewed as a question of abstract science merely, the investigation might be arrested at this point, with the conclusion that intellectual and moral agencies were both indispensible to the progress of humanity, and the right relations of society, and, therefore, equally important elements of social advancement. Additional proof will be given incidentally, however, of this general truth, in the consideration of the special case of the relative value of these agencies in the past progress of the nations.

It has been said that the development of the world proceeds under the operation of the antagonistic principles of unity and individuality. Unity, as a prior idea to individuality, which latter arises from the disintegration of that which was formerly one--had, historically, a prior development. The period of its paramount sway in the first grand division of time stretches from the dawn of history up to about the twelfth century, or to the beginning of the revival of learning. The principle of individuality then began to be active, and has guided the subsequent progress of civilization. At no time, nor in any nation, however, has either one of these principles been entirely inactive. One or the other has _preponderated_, and thus given distinct characteristics to its age. It is to these preponderating drifts that reference is made in the foregoing division, as specially marking periods.

The opposite tendencies of unity and individuality, and their successive development have been somewhat vaguely apprehended by Professor Draper,--who has not, however, perceived them as _principles_,--and have furnished him with the periods into which he arbitrarily divides the progressive epochs of social growth. If we change these divisions into their proper order--an order singularly disarranged by this author--we shall have substantially the representative periods in the historical domain, of unity and individuality. The order in which these eras are placed in 'The Intellectual Development of Europe' is, 1, Age of Credulity; 2, Age of Inquiry; 3, Age of Faith; 4, Age of Reason; 5, Age of Decrepitude. It is evident, however, as partially shown by Mr. Buckle, that the age of inquiry is uniformly subsequent to the age of faith, and immediately precedes the age of reason. Comparing this distribution, moreover, with the one given by Dr. Draper of the five stages of human existence to which he makes it correspond, we find childhood given as the age of inquiry, youth of faith, and manhood of reason. The ages of inquiry and faith should, however, change places, in order to be congruous. In applying these periods to the history of Greece, the age of inquiry is made to extend from the rise of philosophy to the time of Socrates; and the age of faith to comprise the epochs of Socrates, Plato, and the Skeptics, up to about the time of Aristotle. But in any such division as Dr. Draper attempts, the age of faith should precede the rise of philosophical speculation, and the age of inquiry should include the era of ethical as well as of physical investigation. In the application to European history a similar error is made. The age of inquiry is given as the epoch of the rise of Christianity and the establishment of the papal power; then follow the thousand years of the age of faith, the age of reason beginning a little before the time of Galileo. The time given to the age of inquiry should have been included in the age of faith, while the real European age of inquiry is the era of the restoration of learning, the development of modern languages, the invention of printing, and the Reformation, an era which Dr. Draper discusses in a chapter entitled: 'APPROACH TO THE AGE OF REASON IN EUROPE. _It is preceded by the Rise of Criticism._' Certainly the epoch of the rise of criticism, of the Reformation, and of printing, is the age of inquiry, if any age is entitled to that name.