SELF-CULTURE. 
 
 AN ADDRESS INTRODUCTORY TO THE 
 FRANKLIN LECTURES, 
 
 DELIVERED AT BOSTON, SEPTEMBER, 
 
 * 
 
 1838. 
 
 BY WILLIAM E. CHANNING. 
 it 
 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 BUTTON AND WENTWORTH, PRINTERS . 
 1838. 
 
 
 * * 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year Eighteen Hundred and Thirty-Eight, 
 
 BY DAVID KIMBALL, 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts. 
 
 
 * 
 
AT a meeting of the Executive Committee of the " Franklin Lectures," holden 
 November 8th, 1838, the following resolutions were unanimously adopted : 
 
 Voted, That the thanks of this Committee be presented to the Rev. WILLIAM 
 E. CHANNING, for the interesting and valuable Lecture delivered by him, intro- 
 ductory to the Seventh Course of Franklin Lectures. 
 
 Voted, That Dr. Walter Channing, Hon. Jonathan Phillips, and Enoch Hobart, 
 Esq., be a Committee to communicate the foregoing resolution, and request a copy 
 for the press. 
 
 DAVID KIMBALL, Secretary. 
 
 To Dr. WALTER CHANNING, Hon. JONATHAN PHILLIPS, and ENOCH HO- 
 BART, Esq. 
 
 Gentlemen : 
 
 I thank you for communicating to me the vote of the Executive Committee of 
 the Franklin Lectures, and 1 place at your disposal the lecture which they have 
 requested for publication. 
 
 Very truly, your friend, 
 
 WM. E. CHANNING. 
 
 MS69797 
 
THIS address was intended to make two lectures; but the 
 author was led to abridge it and deliver it as one, partly by the 
 apprehension, that some passages were too abstract for a pop- 
 ular address, partly to secure the advantages of presenting the 
 whole subject at once and in close connection, and for other 
 reasons which need not be named. Most of the passages, 
 which were omitted, are now published. The author respect- 
 fully submits the discourse to those, for whom it was partic- 
 ularly intended, and to the public, in the hope, that it will at 
 least bring a great subject before the minds of some, who may 
 not as yet have given to it the attention it deserves. 
 
ADDRESS. 
 
 MY RESPECTED FRIENDS I 
 
 By the invitation of the committee of arrange- 
 ments for the Franklin lectures, I now appear be- 
 fore you to offer some remarks introductory to this 
 course. My principal inducement for so doing is 
 my deep interest in those of my fellow citizens, 
 for whom these lectures are principally designed. 
 I understood that they were to be attended chiefly 
 by those, who are occupied by manual labor ; 
 and, hearing this, I did not feel myself at liberty 
 to decline the service, to which I had been in- 
 vited. I wished by compliance to express my 
 sympathy with this large portion of my race. I 
 wished to express iny sense of obligation to those, 
 from whose industry and skill I derive almost all the 
 
6 
 
 comforts of life. I wished still more to express 
 my joy in the efforts they are making for their own 
 improvement, and my firm faith in their success. 
 These motives will give a particular character and 
 bearing to some of my remarks. I shall speak 
 occasionally as among those who live by the labor 
 of their hands. But I shall not speak as one sep- 
 arated from them. I belong rightfully to the great 
 fraternity of working men. Happily in this com- 
 munity we all are bred and born to work ; and 
 this honorable mark, set on us all, should bind 
 together the various portions of the community. 
 
 I have expressed my strong interest in the mass 
 of the people ; and this is founded not on their 
 usefulness to the community so much as on what 
 they are in themselves. Their condition is indeed 
 obscure ; but their importance is not on this ac- 
 count, a whit the less. The multitude of men 
 cannot from the nature of the case be distin- 
 guished ; for the very idea of distinction is, that a 
 man stands out from the multitude. They make 
 little noise and draw little notice in their narrow 
 spheres of action ; but still they have their full 
 proportion of personal worth and even of great- 
 ness. Indeed every man, in every condition, is 
 great. It is only our own diseased sight which 
 makes him little. A man is great as a man, be he 
 where or what he may. The grandeur of his na- 
 ture turns to insignificance all outward distinctions. 
 His powers of intellect, of conscience, of love, of 
 
7 
 
 knowing God, of perceiving the beautiful, of act- 
 ing on his own mind, on outward nature, and on 
 his fellow creatures, these are glorious preroga- 
 tives. Through the vulgar error of undervaluing 
 what is common, we are apt indeed to pass these 
 by as of little worth. But as in the outward cre- 
 ation, so in the soul, the common is the most pre- 
 cious. Science and art may invent splendid modes 
 of illuminating the apartments of the opulent ; but 
 these are all poor and worthless, compared with the 
 common light which the sun sends into all our 
 windows, which he pours freely, impartially over 
 hill and valley, which kindles daily the eastern 
 and western sky ; and so the common lights of 
 reason, and conscience, and love are of more worth 
 and dignity than the rare endowments which give 
 celebrity to a few. Let us not disparage that na- 
 ture which is common to all men ; for no thought 
 can measure its grandeur. It is the image of 
 God, the image even of his infinity, for no lim- 
 its can be set to its unfolding. He who pos- 
 sesses the divine powers of the soul is a great 
 being, be his place what it may. You may clothe 
 him with rags, may immerse him in a dungeon, 
 may chain him to slavish tasks. But he is still 
 great. You may shut him out of your houses ; but 
 God opens to him heavenly mansions. He makes 
 no show indeed in the streets of a splendid city ; 
 but a clear thought, a pure affection, a resolute 
 act of a virtuous will have a dignity of quite 
 
8 
 
 another kind and far higher than accumulations of 
 brick and granite and plaster and stucco, however 
 cunningly put together, or though stretching far 
 beyond our sight. Nor is this all. If we pass 
 over this grandeur of our common nature, and turn 
 our thoughts to that comparative greatness, which 
 draws chief attention, and which consists in the 
 decided superiority of the individual to the gene- 
 ral standard of power and character, we shall find 
 this as free and frequent a growth among the ob- 
 scure and unnoticed as in more conspicuous walks 
 of life. The truly great are to be found every 
 where, nor is it easy to say, in what condition they 
 spring up most plentifully. Real greatness has 
 nothing to do with a man's sphere. It does not 
 lie in the magnitude of his outward agency, in the 
 extent of the effects which he produces. The 
 greatest men may do comparatively little abroad. 
 Perhaps the greatest in our city at this moment 
 are buried in obscurity. Grandeur of character 
 lies wholly in force of soul, that is, in the force of 
 thought, moral principle and love, and this may 
 be found in the humblest condition of life. A man 
 brought up to an obscure trade, and hemmed in 
 by the wants of a growing family, may, in his nar- 
 row sphere, perceive more clearly, discriminate 
 more keenly, weigh evidence more wisely, seize 
 on the right means more decisively, and have 
 more presence of mind in difficulty, than another 
 who has accumulated vast stores of knowledge by 
 
laborious study ; and he has more of intellectual 
 greatness. Many a man, who has gone but a few 
 miles from home, understands human nature bet- 
 ter, detects motives and weighs character more 
 sagaciously, than another, who has travelled over 
 the known world, and made a name by his reports 
 of different countries. It is force of thought 
 which measures intellectual, and so it is force of 
 principle which measures moral greatness, that 
 highest of human endowments, that brightest man- 
 ifestation of the Divinity. The greatest man is he 
 who chooses the Right with invincible resolution, 
 who resists the sorest temptations from within and 
 without, who bears the heaviest burdens cheer- 
 fully, who is calmest in storms and most fearless 
 under menace and frowns, whose reliance on 
 truth, on virtue, on God is most unfaltering ; and 
 is this a greatness, which is apt to make a show, 
 or which is most likely to abound in conspicuous 
 station ? The solemn conflicts of reason with 
 passion ; the victories of moral and religious prin- 
 ciple over urgent and almost irresistible solicita- 
 tions to self-indulgence ; the hardest sacrifices of 
 duty, those of deep-seated affection and of the 
 heart's fondest hopes ; the consolations, hopes, 
 joys, and peace of disappointed, persecuted, 
 scorned, deserted virtue ; these are of course un- 
 seen ; so that the true greatness of human life is 
 almost wholly out of sight. Perhaps in our pres- 
 ence, the most heroic deed on earth is done in 
 2 
 
10 
 
 some silent spirit, the loftiest - purpose cherished, 
 the most generous sacrifice made, and we do not 
 suspect it. I believe this greatness to be most 
 common among the multitude, whose names are 
 never heard. Among common people will be 
 found more of hardship borne manfully, more of 
 unvarnished truth, more of religious trust, more 
 of that generosity which gives what the giver 
 needs himself, and more of a wise estimate of life 
 and death, than among the more prosperous. And 
 even in regard to influence over other beings, 
 which is thought the peculiar prerogative of dis- 
 tinguished station, I believe, that the difference 
 between the conspicuous and the obscure does not 
 amount to much. Influence is to be measured, not 
 by the extent of fHtppojc it covers, but by its kind. 
 A man may spread his mind, his feelings and 
 opinions through a great extent ; but if his mind 
 be a low one, he manifests no greatness. A 
 wretched artist may fill a city with daubs, and 
 by a false showy style achieve a reputation ; but 
 the man of genius, who leaves behind him one 
 grand picture, in which immortal beauty is em- 
 bodied, and which is silently to spread a true 
 taste in his art, exerts an incomparably higher in- 
 fluence. Now the noblest influence on earth is 
 that exerted on character; and he, who puts forth 
 this, does a great work, no matter how narrow or 
 obscure his sphere. The father and mother of an 
 unnoticed family who, in their seclusion, awaken 
 
11 
 
 the mind of one child to the idea and love of per- 
 fect goodness, who awaken in him a strength of 
 will to repel all temptation, and who send him out 
 prepared to profit by the conflicts of life, surpass 
 in influence a Napoleon breaking the world to his 
 sway. And not only is their work higher in kind ; 
 who knows, but that they are doing a greater 
 work even as to extent or surface than the con- 
 queror ? Who knows, but that the being, whom 
 they inspire with holy and disinterested princi- 
 ples, may communicate himself to others ; and 
 that by a spreading agency, of which they were 
 the silent origin, improvements may spread through 
 a nation, through the world ? In these remarks 
 you will see why I feel and express a deep inter- 
 est in the obscure, in the mass of men. The dis- 
 tinctions of society vanish before the light of 
 these truths. I attach myself to the multitude, 
 not because they are voters and have political 
 power ; but because they are men, and have within 
 their reach the most glorious prizes of humanity. 
 In this country the mass of the people are dis- 
 tinguished by possessing means of improvement, of 
 self-culture, possessed no where else. To incite 
 them to the use of these, is to render them the 
 best service they can receive. Accordingly I have 
 chosen for the subject of this lecture, Self-culture, 
 or the care which every man owes to himself, to the 
 unfolding and perfecting of his nature. I consider 
 this topic as particularly appropriate to the intro- 
 
12 
 
 duct ion of a course of lectures, in consequence of a 
 common disposition to regard these and other like 
 means of instruction, as able of themselves to carry 
 forward the hearer. Lectures have their use. 
 They stir up many, who, but for such outward ap- 
 peals, might have slumbered to the end of life. 
 But let it be remembered, that little is to be gain- 
 ed simply by coming to this place once a week, 
 and giving up the mind for an hour to be wrought 
 upon by a teacher. Unless we are roused to act 
 upon ourselves, unless we engage in the work of 
 self-improvement, unless we purpose strenuously 
 to form and elevate our own minds, unless what 
 we hear is made a part of ourselves by conscien- 
 tious reflection, very little permanent good is re- 
 ceived. 
 
 Self-culture, I am aware, is a topic too exten- 
 sive for a single discourse, and I shall be able to 
 present but a few views which seem to me most 
 important. My aim will be, to give first the Idea 
 of self-culture, next its Means, and then to con- 
 sider some objections to the leading views which I 
 am now to lay before you. 
 
 Before entering on the discussion, let me offer 
 one remark. Self-culture is something possible. 
 It is not a dream. It has foundations in our nature. 
 Without this conviction, the speaker will but 
 declaim, and the hearer listen without profit. 
 There are two powers of the human soul which 
 make self-culture possible, the self-searching and 
 
13 
 
 the self-forming power. We have first the faculty 
 of turning the mind on itself; of recalling its past, 
 and watching its present operations ; of learning its 
 various capacities and susceptibilities, what it can do 
 and bear, what it can enjoy and suffer ; and of thus 
 learning in general what our nature is, and what it 
 was made for. It is worthy of observation, that 
 we are able to discern not only what we already 
 are, but what we may become, to see in ourselves 
 germs and promises of a growth to which no bounds 
 can be set, to dart beyond what we have actually 
 gained to the idea of Perfection as the end of our 
 being. It is by this self-comprehending power 
 that we are distinguished from the brutes, which 
 give no signs of looking into themselves. Without 
 this there would be no self-culture, for we should 
 not know the work to be done; and one reason 
 why self-culture is so little proposed is, that so few 
 penetrate into their own nature. To most men, 
 their own spirits are shadowy, unreal, compared 
 with what is outward. When they happen to cast 
 a glance inward, they see there only a dark, vague 
 chaos. They distinguish perhaps some violent 
 passion, which has driven them to injurious ex- 
 cess ; but their highest powers hardly attract a 
 thought ; and thus multitudes live and die as truly 
 strangers to themselves, as to countries, of which 
 they have heard the name, but which human foot 
 has never trodden. 
 
 But self-culture is possible, not only because we 
 
14 
 
 can enter into and search ourselves. We have a 
 still nobler power, that of acting on, determining 
 and forming ourselves. This is a fearful as well 
 as glorious endowment, for it is the ground of hu- 
 man responsibility. We have the power not only of 
 tracing our powers, but of guiding and impelling 
 them, not only of watching our passions, but of con- 
 trolling them, not only of seeing our faculties grow, 
 but of applying to them means and influences to aid 
 their growth. We can stay or change the current 
 of thought. We can concentrate the intellect on 
 objects which we wish to comprehend. We can 
 fix our eyes on perfection and make almost every 
 thing speed us towards it. This is indeed a noble 
 prerogative of our nature. Possessing this, it mat- 
 ters little what or where we are now, for we can 
 conquer a better lot, and even be happier for start- 
 ing from the lowest point. Of all the discoveries 
 which men need to make, the most important at 
 the present moment, is that of the self- forming 
 power treasured up in themselves. They little 
 suspect its extent, as little as the savage appre- 
 hends the energy which the mind is created to ex- 
 ert on the material world. It transcends in im- 
 portance all our power over outward nature. 
 There is more of divinity in it, than in the force 
 which impels the outward universe ; and yet how 
 little we comprehend it ! How it slumbers in most 
 men unsuspected, unused ! This makes self-cul- 
 ture possible, and binds it on us as a solemn duty. 
 
15 
 
 I. I am first to unfold the idea of self-culture ; and 
 this, in its most general form, may easily be seized. 
 To cultivate any thing, be it a plant, an animal, a 
 mind, is to make grow. Growth, expansion is 
 the end. Nothing admits culture, but that which 
 has a principle of life, capable of being expanded. 
 He, therefore, who does what he can to unfold all 
 his powers and capacities, especially his nobler 
 ones, so as to become a well proportioned, vigor- 
 ous, excellent, happy being, practises self-culture. 
 
 This culture of course has various branches cor- 
 responding to the different capacities of human 
 nature ; but though various, they are intimately 
 united and make progress together. The soul 
 which our philosophy divides into various capaci- 
 ties, is still one essence, one life ; and it exerts at 
 the same moment, and blends in the same act its 
 various energies of thought, feeling and volition. 
 Accordingly in a wise self-culture all the princi- 
 ples of our nature grow at once by joint harmo- 
 nious action, just as all parts of the plant are 
 unfolded together. When therefore you hear of 
 different branches of self-improvement, you will 
 not think of them as distinct processes going on 
 independently on each other, and requiring each 
 its own separate means. Still a distinct consider- 
 ation of these is needed to a full comprehension 
 of the subject, and these I shall proceed to unfold. 
 
 First, self-culture is Moral, a branch of singular 
 importance. When a man looks into himself he 
 
16 
 
 discovers two distant orders or kinds of principles, 
 which it behoves him especially to comprehend. 
 He discovers desires, appetites, passions which 
 terminate in himself, which crave and seek his own 
 interest, gratification, distinction ; and he discovers 
 another principle, an antagonist to these, which is 
 Impartial, Disinterested, Universal, enjoining on 
 him a regard to the rights and happiness of other 
 beings, and laying on him obligations which must 
 be discharged, cost what they may, or however 
 they may clash with his particular pleasure or gain. 
 No man, however narrowed to his own interest, 
 however hardened by selfishness, can deny, that 
 there springs up within him a great idea in oppo- 
 sition to interest, the idea of Duty, that an inward 
 voice calls him more or less distinctly to revere 
 and exercise Impartial Justice, and Universal 
 Good-will. This disinterested principle in hu- 
 man nature we call sometimes reason, sometimes 
 conscience, sometimes the moral sense or faculty. 
 But, be its name what it may, it is a real principle 
 in each of us, and it is the supreme power within 
 us, to be cultivated above all others, for on its cul- 
 ture the right development of all others depends. 
 The passions indeed may be stronger than the 
 conscience, may lift up a louder voice ; but their 
 clamour differs wholly from the tone of command 
 in which the conscience speaks. They are not 
 clothed with its authority, its binding power. In 
 their very triumphs they are rebuked by the moral 
 
17 
 
 principle, and often cower before its still deep 
 menacing voice. No part of self-knowledge is 
 more important than to discern clearly these two 
 great principles, the self-seeking and the disinter- 
 ested ; and the most important part of self-culture 
 is to depress the former, and to exalt the latter, or 
 to enthrone the sense of duty within us. There are 
 no limits to the growth of this moral force in man, 
 if he will cherish it faithfully. There have been 
 men, whom no power in the universe could turn 
 from the Right, to whom death in its most dread- 
 ful forms has been less dreaded, than transgres- 
 sion of the inward law of universal justice and love. 
 
 In the next place, self-culture is Religious. 
 When we look into ourselves we discover powers, 
 which link us with this outward, visible, finite, 
 ever changing world. We have sight and other 
 senses to discern, and limbs and various faculties 
 to secure and appropriate the material creation. 
 And we have too a power, which cannot stop at 
 what we see and handle, at what exists within the 
 bounds of space and time, which seeks for the 
 Infinite, Uncreated cause, which cannot rest till it 
 ascend to the Eternal, All-comprehending Mind. 
 This we call the religious principle, and its gran- 
 deur cannot be exaggerated by human language ; 
 for it marks out a being destined for higher com- 
 munion than with the visible universe. To devel- 
 ope this, is eminently to educate ourselves. The 
 3 
 
18 
 
 true idea of God, unfolded clearly and livingly 
 within us, and moving us to adore and obey him, 
 and to aspire after likeness to him, is the noblest 
 growth in human, and I may add, in celestial na- 
 tures. The religious principle, and the moral, are 
 intimately connected, and grow together. The 
 former is indeed the perfection and highest mani- 
 festation of the latter. They are both disinterest- 
 ed. It is the essence of true religion to recognize 
 and adore in God the attributes of Impartial Justice 
 and Universal Love, and to hear him commanding 
 us in the conscience to become what we adore. 
 
 Again. Self-culture is Intellectual. We cannot 
 look into ourselves without discovering the intel- 
 lectual principle, the power which thinks, reasons, 
 and judges, the power of seeking and acquiring 
 truth. This indeed we are in no danger of over- 
 looking. The intellect being the great instrument 
 by which men compass their wishes, it draws more 
 attention than any of our other powers. When we 
 speak to men of improving themselves, the first 
 thought which occurs to them is, that they must cul- 
 tivate their understanding, and get knowledge and 
 skill. By education, men mean almost exclusively 
 intellectual training. For this, schools and colleges 
 are instituted, and to this the moral and religious 
 discipline of the young is sacrificed. Now I 
 reverence, as much as any man, the intellect ; 
 but let us never exalt it above the moral prin- 
 
19 
 
 ciple. With this it is most intimately connect- 
 ed. In this its culture is founded, and to ex- 
 alt this is its highest aim. Whoever desires that 
 his intellect may grow up to soundness, to healthy 
 vigour, must begin with moral discipline. Reading 
 and study are not enough to perfect the power of 
 thought. One thing above all is needful, and that 
 is, the Disinterestedness which is the very soul of 
 virtue. To gain truth, which is the great object 
 of the understanding, I must seek it disinterest- 
 edly. Here is the first and grand condition of 
 intellectual progress. I must choose to receive 
 the truth, no matter how it bears on myself. I 
 must follow it, no matter where it leads, what in- 
 terests it opposes, to what persecution or loss it 
 lays me open, from what party it severs me, or to 
 what party it allies. Without this fairness of mind, 
 which is only another phrase for disinterested love 
 of truth, great native powers of understanding are 
 perverted and lead astray ; genius runs wild ; 
 "the light within us becomes darkness/' The 
 subtlest reasoners, for want of this, cheat them- 
 selves as well as others, and become entangled in 
 the web of their own sophistry. It is a fact well 
 known in the history of science and philosophy, 
 that men, gifted by nature with singular intelli- 
 gence, have broached the grossest errors, and even 
 sought to undermine the grand primitive truths on 
 which human virtue, dignity and hope depend. 
 And on the other hand, I have known instances of 
 
20 
 
 men of naturally moderate powers of mind, who 
 by a disinterested love of truth and their fellow 
 creatures, have gradually risen to no small force 
 and enlargement of thought. Some of the most 
 useful teachers in the pulpit and in schools, have 
 owed their power of enlightening others, not so 
 much to any natural superiority, as to the sim- 
 plicity, impartiality and disinterestedness of their 
 minds, to their readiness to live and die for the 
 truth. A man, who rises above himself, looks 
 from an eminence on nature and providence, on 
 society and life. Thought expands as by a natural 
 elasticity, when the pressure of selfishness is 
 removed. The moral and religious principles of 
 the soul, generously cultivated, fertilize the intel- 
 lect. Duty, faithfully performed, opens the mind 
 to Truth, both being of one family, alike immuta- 
 ble, universal and everlasting. 
 
 I have enlarged on this subject, because the 
 connexion between moral and intellectual culture 
 is often overlooked, and because the former is often 
 sacrificed to the latter. The exaltation of talent, 
 as it is called, above virtue and religion, is the 
 curse of the age. Education is now chiefly a 
 stimulus to learning, and thus men acquire power 
 without the principles which alone make it a good. 
 Talent is worshipped ; but, if divorced from rec- 
 titude, it will prove more of a demon than a God. 
 
 Intellectual culture consists, not chiefly, as many 
 are apt to think, in accumulating information, 
 

 21 
 
 though this is important, but in building up a force 
 of thought which may be turned at will on any 
 subjects, on which we are called to pass judgment. 
 This force is manifested in the concentration of the 
 attention, in accurate penetrating observation, in re- 
 ducing complex subjects to their elements, in diving 
 beneath the effect to the cause, in detecting the more 
 subtle differences and resemblances of things, in 
 reading the future in the present, and especially in 
 rising from particular facts to general laws or uni- 
 versal truths. This last exertion of the intellect, its 
 rising to broad views and great principles, con- 
 stitutes what is called the philosophical mind, and 
 is especially worthy of culture. What it means 
 your own observation must have taught you. You 
 must have taken note of two classes of men, the 
 one always employed on details, on particular 
 facts, and the other using these facts as foundations 
 of higher, wider truths. The latter are philoso- 
 phers. For example, men had for ages seen pieces 
 of wood, stones, metals falling to the ground. 
 Newton seized on these particular facts, and rose 
 to the idea, that all matter tends, or is attracted, 
 towards all matter, and then defined the law ac- 
 cording to which this attraction or force acts at dif- 
 ferent distances, thus giving us a grand princi- 
 ple, which, we have reason to think, extends to and 
 controls the whole outward creation. One man 
 reads a history, and can tell you all its events, 
 and there stops. Another combines these events, 
 
22 
 
 brings them under one view and learns the great 
 causes which are at work on this or another nation, 
 and what are its great tendencies, whether to free- 
 dom or despotism, to one or another form of civil- 
 ization. So one man talks continually about the 
 particular actions of this or another neighbour ; 
 whilst another looks beyond the acts to the inward 
 principle from which they spring, and gathers from 
 them larger views of human nature. In a word, 
 one man sees all things apart and in fragments, 
 whilst another strives to discover the harmony, 
 connection, unity of all. One of the great evils 
 of society is, that men, occupied perpetually with 
 petty details, want general truths, want broad and 
 fixed principles. Hence many, not wicked, are 
 unstable, habitually inconsistent, as if they were 
 overgrown children rather than men. To build 
 up that strength of mind, which apprehends 
 and cleaves to great universal truths, is the 
 highest intellectual self-culture ; and here I wish 
 you to observe how entirely this culture agrees 
 with that of the moral and the religious principles 
 of our nature, of which I have previously spoken. 
 In each of these, the improvement of the soul con- 
 sists in raising it above what is narrow, particular, 
 individual, selfish, to the universal and unconfined. 
 To improve a man, is to liberalize, enlarge him in 
 thought, feeling and purpose. Narrowness of in- 
 tellect and heart, this is the degradation from 
 which all culture aims to rescue the human being. 
 
23 
 
 Again. Self-culture is Social, or one of its 
 great offices is to unfold and purify the affections, 
 which spring up instinctively in the human breast, 
 which bind together husband and wife, parent and 
 child, brother and sister ; which bind a man to 
 friends and neighbors, to his country, and to the 
 suffering who fall under his eye, wherever they be- 
 long. The culture of these is an important part 
 of our work, and it consists in converting them 
 from instincts into principles, from natural into 
 spiritual attachments, in giving them a rational, 
 moral, and holy character. For example, our 
 affection for our children is at first instinctive ; 
 and if it continue such, it rises little above the 
 brute's attachment to its young. But when a pa- 
 rent infuses into his natural love for his offspring 
 moral and religious principle, when he comes to 
 regard his child as an intelligent, spiritual, im- 
 mortal being, and honors him as such, and desires 
 first of all to make him disinterested, noble, a 
 worthy child of God and the friend of his race, 
 then the instinct rises into a generous and holy 
 sentiment. It resembles God's paternal love for 
 his spiritual family. A like purity and dignity we 
 must aim to give to all our affections. 
 
 Again. Self-culture is Practical, or it proposes 
 as one of its chief ends to fit us for action, to 
 make us efficient in whatever we undertake, to 
 train us to firmness of purpose and to fruitfulness 
 
24 
 
 of resource in common life, and especially in 
 emergencies, in times of difficulty, danger and 
 trial. But passing over this and other topics for 
 which I have no time, I shall confine myself to 
 two branches of self-culture which have been 
 almost wholly overlooked in the education of the 
 people, and which ought not to be so slighted. 
 
 In looking at our nature, we discover, among 
 its admirable endowments, the sense or percep- 
 tion of Beauty. We see the germ of this in 
 every human being, and there is no power 
 which admits greater cultivation ; and why should 
 it not be cherished in all ? It deserves remark, 
 that the provision for this principle is infinite in 
 the universe. There is but a very minute por- 
 tion of the creation which we can turn into food 
 and clothes, or gratification for the body ; but the 
 whole creation may be used to minister to the 
 sense of beauty. Beauty is an all-pervading pres- 
 ence. It unfolds in the numberless flowers of the 
 spring. It waves in the branches of the trees and 
 the green blades of grass. It haunts the depths 
 of the earth and sea, and gleams out in the hues 
 of the shell and the precious stone. And not 
 only these minute objects, but the ocean, the 
 mountains, the clouds, the heavens, the stars, the 
 rising and setting sun, all overflow with beauty. 
 The universe is its temple ; and those men who 
 are alive to it cannot lift their eyes without feeling 
 themselves encompassed with it on every side. 
 
25 
 
 Now this beauty is so precious, the enjoyments it 
 gives are so refined and pure, so congenial with 
 our tenderest and noble feelings, and so akin to 
 worship, that it is painful to think of the multi- 
 tude of men as living in the midst of it, and living 
 almost as blind to it, as if, instead of this fair 
 earth and glorious sky, they were tenants of a 
 dungeon. An infinite joy is lost to the world by 
 the want of culture of this spiritual endowment. 
 Suppose that I were to visit a cottage, and to 
 see its walls lined with the choicest pictures 
 of Raphael, and every spare nook filled with 
 statues of the most exquisite workmanship, and 
 that I were to learn, that neither man, woman 
 nor child ever cast an eye at these miracles of art, 
 how should I feel their privation ; how should I 
 want to open their eyes, and to help them to com- 
 prehend and feel the loveliness and grandeur 
 which in vain courted their notice. But every 
 husbandman is living in sight of the works of a 
 diviner artist ; and how much would his existence 
 be elevated, could he see the glory which shines 
 forth in their forms, hues, proportions and moral 
 expression ! I have spoken only of the beauty of 
 nature, but how much of this mysterious charm is 
 found in the elegant arts, and especially in litera- 
 ture ? The best books have most beauty. The 
 greatest truths are wronged if not linked with 
 beauty, and they win their way most surely and 
 deeply into the soul when arrayed in this their 
 4 
 
26 
 
 natural and fit attire. Now no man receives the 
 true culture of a man, in whom the sensibility to 
 the beautiful is not cherished ; and I know of no 
 condition in life from which it should be excluded. 
 Of all luxuries this is the cheapest and most at 
 hand ; and it seems to me to be most important to 
 those conditions, where coarse labor tends to :ive 
 a grossness to the mind. From the diffusion of 
 the sense of beauty in ancient Greece, and of the 
 taste for music in modern Germany, we learn that 
 the people at large, may partake of refined grat- 
 ifications which have hitherto been thought to be 
 necessarily restricted to a few. 
 
 What beauty is, is a question which the most 
 penetrating minds have not satisfactorily answered ; 
 nor, were I able, is this the place for discussing it. 
 But one thing I would say; the beauty of the out- 
 ward creation is intimately related to the lovely, 
 grand, interesting attributes of the soul. It is 
 the emblem or expression of these. Matter be- 
 comes beautiful to us, when it seems to lose its 
 material aspect, its inertness, finiteness and gross- 
 ness, and by the ethereal lightness of its forms and 
 motions seems to approach spirit ; when it images 
 to us pure and gentle affections ; when it spreads 
 out into a vastness which is a shadow of the Infi- 
 nite ; or when hi more awfiil shapes and move- 
 ments it speaks of the Omnipotent. Thus out- 
 ward beauty is akin to something deeper and 
 unseen, is the reflection of spiritual attributes ; 
 
27 
 
 and of consequence the way to see and feel it 
 more and more keenly is to cultivate those moral, 
 religious, intellectual and social principles of 
 which I have already spoken, and which are the 
 glory of the spiritual nature ; and I name this, 
 that you may see, what I am anxious to show, the 
 harmony which subsists among all branches of hu- 
 man culture, or how each forwards and is aided by 
 all. 
 
 There is another power, which each man should 
 cultivate according to his ability, but which is 
 very much neglected in the mass of the people, 
 and that is the power of Utterance. A man was 
 not made to shut up his mind in itself; but to give 
 it voice and to exchange it for other minds. 
 Speech is one of our grand distinctions from the 
 brute. Our power over others lies not so much 
 in the amount of thought within us, as in the 
 power of bringing it out. A man of more than 
 ordinary intellectual vigor, may, for want of ex- 
 pression, be a cypher, without significance, in 
 society. And not only does a man influence 
 others, but he greatly aids his own intellect, by 
 giving distinct and forcible utterance to his 
 thoughts. We understand ourselves better, our 
 conceptions grow clearer, by the very effort to 
 make them clear to another. Our social rank too 
 depends a good deal on our power of utterance. 
 The principal distinction between what are called 
 gentlemen and the vulgar lies in this, that the lat- 
 
28 
 
 ter are awkward in manners, and are essentially 
 wanting in propriety, clearness, grace, and force 
 of utterance. A man who cannot open his lips 
 without breaking a rule of grammar, without 
 showing in his dialect or brogue or uncouth tones 
 his want of cultivation, or without darkening his 
 meaning by a confused, unskilful mode of commu- 
 nication, cannot take the place to which perhaps 
 his native good sense entitles him. To have in- 
 tercourse with respectable people, we must speak 
 their language. On this account, I am glad that 
 grammar and a correct pronunciation are taught in 
 the common schools of this city. These are not 
 trifles ; nor are they superfluous to any class of 
 people. They give a man access to social advan- 
 tages, on which his improvement very much de- 
 pends. The power of utterance should be in- 
 cluded by all in their plans of self-culture. 
 
 I have now given a few views of the culture, 
 the improvement, which every man should pro- 
 pose to himself. I have all along gone on the 
 principle, that a man has within him capacities of 
 growth, which deserve and will reward intense, 
 unrelaxing toil. I do not look on a human being 
 as a machine, made to be kept in action by a for- 
 eign force, to accomplish an unvarying succession 
 of motions, to do a fixed amount of work, and then 
 to fall to pieces at death, but as a being of free spir- 
 itual powers ; and I place little value on any cul- 
 
29 
 
 ture, but that which aims to bring out these and to 
 give them perpetual impulse and expansion. I 
 am aware, that this view is far from being univer- 
 sal. The common notion has been, that the mass 
 of the people need no other culture than is neces- 
 sary to fit them for their various trades ; and 
 though this error is passing away, it is far from 
 being exploded. But the ground of a man's cul- 
 ture lies in his nature, not in his calling. His 
 powers are to be unfolded on account of their 
 inherent dignity, not their outward direction. He 
 is to be educated, because he is a man, not 
 because he is to make shoes, nails, or pins. A 
 trade is plainly not the great end of his being, for 
 his mind cannot be shut up in it ; his force of 
 thought cannot be exhausted on it. He has facul- 
 ties to which it gives no action, and deep wants it 
 cannot answer. Poems, and systems of theology 
 and philosophy, which have made some noise in 
 the world, have been wrought at the work-bench 
 and amidst the toils of the field. How often, 
 when the arms are mechanically plying a trade, 
 does the mind, lost in reverie or day dreams, 
 escape to the ends of the earth ! How often does 
 the pious heart of woman mingle the greatest of 
 all thoughts, that of God, with household drudgery! 
 Undoubtedly a man is to perfect himself in his 
 trade, for by it he is to earn his bread and to 
 serve the community. But bread or subsistence 
 is not his highest good ; for if it were, his lot 
 
30 
 
 would be harder than that of the inferior animals, 
 for whom nature spreads a table and weaves a 
 wardrobe, without a care of their own. Nor was he 
 made chiefly to minister to the wants of the com- 
 munity. A rational moral being cannot without 
 infinite wrong be converted into a mere instru- 
 ment of others' gratification. He is necessarily 
 an end, not a means. A mind, in which are sown 
 the seeds of wisdom, disinterestedness, firmness of 
 purpose, and piety, is worth more than all the out- 
 ward material interests of a world. It exists for 
 itself, for its own perfection, and must not be en- 
 slaved to its own or others' animal wants. You 
 tell me, that a liberal culture is needed for men 
 who are to fill high stations, but not for such as 
 are doomed to vulgar labor. I answer, that Man 
 is a greater name than President or King. Truth 
 and goodness are equally precious, in whatever 
 sphere they are found. Besides, men of all con- 
 ditions sustain equally the relations, which give 
 birth to the highest virtues and demand the high- 
 est powers. The laborer is not a mere laborer. 
 He has close, tender, responsible connections with 
 God and his fellow creatures. He is a son, hus- 
 band, father, friend and Christian. He belongs to 
 a home, a country, a church, a race ; and is such 
 a man to be cultivated only for a trade ? Was he 
 not sent into the world for a great work. To 
 educate a child perfectly requires profounder 
 thought, greater wisdom, than to govern a state ; 
 
31 
 
 and for this plain reason, that the interests and 
 wants of the latter are more superficial, coarser, 
 and more obvious, than the spiritual capacities, 
 the growth of thought and feeling, and the subtle 
 laws of the mind, which must all be studied and 
 comprehended, before the work of education can 
 be thoroughly performed ; and yet to all condi- 
 tions this greatest work on earth is equally com- 
 mitted by God. What plainer proof do we need 
 that a higher culture, than has yet been dreamt 
 of, is needed by our whole race. 
 
 II. I now proceed to enquire into the Means 
 by which the self-culture, just described, may be 
 promoted ; and here I know not where to begin. 
 The subject is so extensive, as well as important, 
 that I feel myself unable to do any justice to it, 
 especially in the limits to which I am confined. 
 I beg you to consider me as presenting but hints, 
 and such as have offered themselves with very 
 little research to my own mind. 
 
 And, first, the great means of self-culture, that 
 which includes all the rest, is to fasten on this 
 culture as our Great End, to determine deliber- 
 ately and solemnly, that we will make the most 
 and the best of the powers which God has given 
 us. Without this resolute purpose, the best means 
 are worth little, and with it the poorest become 
 mighty. You may see thousands, with every 
 opportunity of improvement which wealth can 
 
32 
 
 gather, with teachers, libraries, and apparatus, 
 bringing nothing to pass, and others, with few 
 helps, doing wonders ; and simply because the 
 latter are in earnest, and the former not. A man 
 in earnest finds means, or, if he cannot find, 
 creates them. A vigorous purpose makes much 
 out of little, breathes power into weak instru- 
 ments, disarms difficulties, and even turns them 
 into assistances. Every condition has means of 
 progress, if we have spirit enough to use them. 
 Some volumes have recently been published, giv- 
 ing examples or histories of "knowledge acquired 
 under difficulties;" and it is most animating to see 
 in these what a resolute man can do for himself. 
 A great idea, like this of Self-culture, if seized on 
 clearly and vigorously, burns like a living coal in 
 the soul. He who deliberately adopts a great end, 
 has, by this act, half accomplished it, has scaled 
 the chief barrier to success. 
 
 One thing is essential to the strong purpose of 
 self-culture now insisted on, namely, faith in the 
 practicableness of this culture. A great object, 
 to awaken resolute choice, must be seen to be 
 within our reach. The truth, that progress is the 
 very end of our being, must not be received as a 
 tradition, but comprehended and felt as a reality. 
 Our minds are apt to pine and starve, by being 
 imprisoned within what we have already attained. 
 A true faith, looking up to something better, 
 catching glimpses of a distant perfection, prophe- 
 
33 
 
 sying to ourselves improvements proportioned to 
 our conscientious labors, gives energy of purpose, 
 gives wings to the soul ; and this faith will contin- 
 ually grow, by acquainting ourselves with our own 
 nature, and with the promises of divine help and 
 immortal life which abound in revelation. 
 
 Some are discouraged from proposing to them- 
 selves improvement, by the false notion, that the 
 study of books, which their situation denies them, 
 is the all important, and only sufficient means. 
 Let such consider, that the grand volumes, of 
 which all our books are transcripts, I mean, 
 nature, revelation, the human soul, and human 
 life, are freely unfolded to every eye. The great 
 sources of wisdom are experience and observation ; 
 and these are denied to none. To open and fix 
 our eyes upon what passes without and within us, 
 is the most fruitful study. Books are chiefly use- 
 ful, as they help us to interpret what we see and 
 experience. When they absorb men, as they 
 sometimes do, and turn them from observation of 
 nature and life, they generate a learned folly, for 
 which the plain sense of the laborer could not be 
 exchanged but at great loss. It deserves attention 
 that the greatest men have been formed without 
 the studies, which at present are thought by many 
 most needful to improvement. Homer, Plato, 
 Demosthenes, never heard the name of chemistry, 
 and knew less of the solar system, than a boy in 
 our common schools. Not that these sciences are 
 5 
 
34 
 
 unimportant ; but the lesson is, that human im- 
 provement never wants the means, where the pur- 
 pose of it is Jeep and earnest in the soul. 
 
 The purpose of self-culture, this is the life and 
 strength of all the methods we use for our own 
 elevation. I reiterate this principle on account of 
 its great importance ; and I would add a remark 
 to prevent its misapprehension. When I speak of 
 the purpose of self-culture, I mean, that it should 
 be sincere. In other words, we must make self- 
 culture really and truly our end, or choose it for its 
 own sake, and not merely as a means or instrument 
 of something else. And here I touch a common and 
 very pernicious error. Not a few persons desire 
 to improve themselves only to get property and to 
 rise in the world ; but such do not properly choose 
 improvement, but something outward and foreign 
 to themselves ; and so low an impulse can produce 
 only a stinted, partial, uncertain growth. A man, 
 as I have said, is to cultivate himself because he is 
 a man. He is to start with the conviction, that 
 there is something greater within him than in the 
 whole material creation, than in all the worlds 
 which press on the eye and ear; and that inward 
 improvements have a worth and dignity in them- 
 selves, quite distinct from the power they give over 
 outward things. Undoubtedly a man is to labor 
 to better his condition, but first to better himself. 
 If he knows no higher use of his mind than to 
 invent and drudge for his body, his case is desper- 
 ate as far as culture is concerned. 
 
35 
 
 In these remarks, I do not mean to recommend 
 to the laborer indifference to his outward lot. I 
 hold it important, that every man in every class 
 should possess the means of comfort, of health, of 
 neatness in food and apparel, and of occasional 
 retirement and leisure. These are good in them- 
 selves, to be sought for their own sakes, and still 
 more, they are important means of the self-culture 
 for which I am pleading. A clean, comfortable 
 dwelling, with wholesome meals, is no small aid 
 to intellectual and moral progress. A man living 
 in a damp cellar or a garret open to rain and snow, 
 breathing the foul air of a filthy room, and striving 
 without success to appease hunger on scanty or 
 unsavoury food, is in danger of abandoning himself 
 to a desperate, selfish recklessness. Improve then 
 your lot. Multiply comforts, and still more get 
 wealth if you can by honorable means, and if it 
 do not cost too much. A true cultivation of the 
 mind is fitted to forward you in your worldly 
 concerns, and you ought to use it for this end. 
 Only, beware, lest this end master you; lest your 
 motives sink as your condition improves ; lest you 
 fall victims to the miserable passion of vying with 
 those around you in show, luxury and expense. 
 Cherish a true respect for yourselves. Feel that 
 your nature is worth more than every thing which 
 is foreign to you. He who has not caught a 
 glimpse of his own rational and spiritual being, of 
 something within himself superior to the world 
 
36 
 
 and allied to the divinity, wants the true spring of 
 that purpose of self-culture, on which I have in- 
 sisted as the first of all the means of improvement. 
 
 I proceed to another important means of Self- 
 culture, and this is the control of the animal appe- 
 tites. To raise the moral and intellectual nature, 
 we must put down the animal. Sensuality is the 
 abyss in which very many souls are plunged and 
 lost. Among the most prosperous classes, what a 
 vast amount of intellectual life is drowned in lux- 
 urious excesses. It is one great curse of wealth, 
 that it is used to pamper the senses ; and among 
 the poorer classes, though luxury is wanting, yet 
 a gross feeding often prevails, under which the 
 spirit is whelmed. It is a sad sight to walk through 
 our streets, and to see how many countenances 
 bear marks of a lethargy and a brutal coarseness, 
 induced by unrestrained indulgence. Whoever 
 would cultivate the soul, must restrain the appe- 
 tites. I am not an advocate for the doctrine, that 
 animal food was not meant for man ; but that this 
 is used among us to excess, that as a people w r e 
 should gain much in cheerfulness, activity, and 
 buoyancy of mind, by less gross and stimulating 
 food, I am strongly inclined to believe. Above 
 all, let me urge on those, who would bring out and 
 elevate their higher nature, to abstain from the 
 use of spirituous liquors. This bad habit is dis- 
 tinguished from all others by the ravages it makes 
 
37 
 
 on the reason, the intellect ; and this effect is 
 produced to a mournful extent, even when drunk- 
 enness is escaped. Not a few men, called tempe- 
 rate, and who have thought themselves such, have 
 learned, on abstaining from the use of ardent 
 spirits, that for years their minds had been cloud- 
 ed, impaired by moderate drinking, without their 
 suspecting the injury. Multitudes in this city are 
 bereft of half their intellectual energy, by a degree 
 of indulgence which passes for innocent. Of all 
 the foes of the working class, this is the deadliest. 
 Nothing has done more to keep down this class, 
 to destroy their self-respect, to rob them of their 
 just influence in the community, to render profit- 
 less the means of improvement within their reach, 
 than the use of ardent spirits as a drink. They 
 are called on to withstand this practice, as they 
 regard their honor, and would take their just place 
 in society. They are under solemn obligations to 
 give their sanction to every effort for its suppres- 
 sion. They ought to regard as their worst ene- 
 mies, (though unintentionally such,) as the enemies 
 of their rights, dignity, and influence, the men 
 who desire to flood city and country with distilled 
 poison. I lately visited a flourishing village, and 
 on expressing to one of the respected inhabitants 
 the pleasure I felt in witnessing so many signs 
 of progress, he replied, that one of the causes 
 of the prosperity I witnessed, was the disuse 
 of ardent spirits by the people. And this refor- 
 
38 
 
 mation we may be assured wrought something 
 higher than outward prosperity. In almost every 
 family so improved, we cannot doubt that the ca- 
 pacities of the parent for intellectual and moral 
 improvement were enlarged, and the means of ed- 
 ucation made more effectual to the child. I call 
 on working men to take hold of the cause of tem- 
 perance as peculiarly their cause. These remarks 
 are the more needed, in consequence of the efforts 
 made far and wide, to annul at the present moment 
 a recent law for the suppression of the sale of 
 ardent spirits in such quantities as favor intemper- 
 ance. I know, that there are intelligent and good 
 men, who believe, that, in enacting this law, gov- 
 ernment transcended its limits, left its true path, 
 and established a precedent for legislative inter- 
 ference with all our pursuits and pleasures. No 
 one here looks more jealously on government than 
 myself. But I maintain, that this is a case which 
 stands by itself, which can be confounded with no 
 other, and on which government from its very na- 
 ture and end is peculiarly bound to act. Let it 
 never be forgotten, that the great end of govern- 
 ment, its highest function, is, not to make roads, 
 grant charters, originate improvements, but to 
 prevent or repress Crimes against individual rights 
 and social order. For this end it ordains a penal 
 code, erects prisons, and inflicts fearful punish- 
 ments. Now if it be true, that a vast proportion 
 of the crimes, which government is instituted to 
 
39 
 
 prevent and repress, have their origin in the 
 use of ardent spirits ; if our poor-houses, work- 
 houses, jails and penitentiaries are tenanted in a 
 great degree by those, whose first and chief im- 
 pulse to crime came from the distillery and dram- 
 shop ; if murder and theft, the most fearful out- 
 rages on property and life, are most frequently 
 the issues and consummation of intemperance, is 
 not government bound to restrain by legislation 
 the vending of the stimulus to these terrible social 
 wrongs ? Is government never to act as a parent, 
 never to remove the causes or occasion of wrong 
 doing ? Has it but one instrument for repressing 
 crime, namely, public, infamous, punishment, an 
 evil only inferior to crime ? Is government a 
 usurper, does it wander beyond its sphere, by im- 
 posing restraints on an article, which does no 
 imaginable good, which can plead no benefit con- 
 ferred on body or mind, which unfits the citizen 
 for the discharge of his duty to his country, and 
 which, above all, stirs up men to the perpetration 
 of most of the crimes, from which it is the highest 
 and most solemn office of government to protect 
 society 1 
 
 I come now to another important measure of 
 self-culture, and this is, intercourse with superior 
 minds. I have insisted on our own activity as es- 
 sential to our progress ; but we were not made to 
 live or advance alone. Society is as needful to us 
 
40 
 
 as air or food. A child doomed to utter loneli- 
 ness, growing up without sight or sound of human 
 beings, would not put forth equal power with 
 many brutes ; and a man, never brought/into con- 
 tact with minds superior to his own, will probably 
 run one and the same dull round of thought and 
 action to the end of life. 
 
 It is chiefly through books that we enjoy inter- 
 course with superior minds, and these invaluable 
 means of communication are in the reach of all. 
 In the best books, great men talk to us, give us their 
 most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into 
 ours. God be thanked for books. They are the 
 voices of the distant and the dead, and make us 
 heirs of the spiritual life of past ages. Books are 
 the true levellers. They give to all, who will 
 faithfully use them, the society, the spiritual pres- 
 ence of the best and greatest of our race. No 
 matter how poor I am. No matter though the 
 prosperous of my own time will not enter my ob- 
 scure dwelling. If the Sacred Writers will enter 
 and take up their abode under my roof, if Milton 
 will cross my threshold to sing to me of Paradise, 
 and Shakspeare to open to me the worlds of imag- 
 ination and the workings of the human heart, 
 and Franklin to enrich me with his practical wis- 
 dom, I shall not pine for want of intellectual 
 companionship, and I may become a cultivated 
 man though excluded from what is called the 
 best society in the place where I live. 
 
41 
 
 To make this means of culture effectual, a man 
 must select good books, such as have been written 
 by right minded and strong minded men, real 
 thinkers, who instead of diluting by repetition 
 what others say, have something to say for them- 
 selves, and write to give relief to full earnest 
 souls ; and these works must not be skimmed over 
 for amusement, but read with fixed attention and 
 a reverential love of truth. In selecting books, 
 we may be aided much by those who have studied 
 more than ourselves. But, after all, it is best to 
 be determined in this particular a good deal by 
 our own tastes. The best books for a man are not 
 always those which the wise recommend, but oftener 
 those which meet the peculiar wants, the natural 
 thirst of his mind, and therefore awaken interest 
 and rivet thought. And here it may be well to 
 observe, not only in regard to books but in other re- 
 spects, that self-culture must vary with the individ- 
 ual. All means do not equally suit us all. A man 
 must unfold himself freely, and should respect the 
 peculiar gifts or biasses by which nature has dis- 
 tinguished him from others. Self-culture does not 
 demand the sacrifice of individuality. It does not 
 regularly apply an established machinery, for the 
 sake of torturing every man into one rigid shape, 
 called perfection. As the human countenance, 
 with the same features in us all, is diversified 
 without end in the race, and is never the same in 
 any two individuals, so the human soul, with the 
 6 
 
42 
 
 same grand powers and laws, expands into an infi- 
 nite variety of forms, and would be wofully stinted 
 by modes of culture requiring all men to learn 
 the same lesson or to bend to the same rules. 
 
 I know how hard it is to some men, especially to 
 those who spend much time in manual labor, to fix 
 attention on books. Let them strive to overcome the 
 difficulty, by choosing subjects of deep interest, or 
 by reading in company with those whom they love. 
 Nothing can supply the place of books. They 
 are cheering or soothing companions in solitude, 
 illness, affliction. The wealth of both continents 
 would not compensate for the good they impart. 
 Let every man, if possible, gather some good 
 books under his roof, and obtain access for him- 
 self and family to some social library. Almost 
 any luxury should be sacrificed to this. 
 
 One of the very interesting features of our 
 times, is the multiplication of books, and their dis- 
 distribution through all conditions of society. 
 At a small expense, a man can now possess him- 
 self of the most precious treasures of English liter- 
 ature. Books, once confined to a few by their 
 costliness, are now accessible to the multitute ; 
 and in this way a change of habits is going on in 
 society, highly favorable to the culture of the 
 people. Instead of depending on casual rumor 
 and loose conversation for most of their knowledge 
 and objects of thought; instead of forming their 
 judgments in crowds, and receiving their chief 
 
43 
 
 I 
 excitement from the voice of neighbors, men are 
 
 now learning to study and reflect alone, to follow 
 out subjects continuously, to determine for them- 
 selves what shall engage their minds, and to call 
 to their aid the knowledge, original views, and 
 reasonings of men of all countries and ages ; and 
 the results must be, a deliberateness and indepen- 
 dence of judgment, and a thoroughness and extent 
 of information, unknown in former times. The 
 diffusion of these silent teachers, books, through 
 the whole community, is to work greater effects 
 than artillery, machinery, and legislation. Its 
 peaceful agency is to supersede stormy revolutions. 
 The culture, which it is to spread, whilst an 
 unspeakable good to the individual, is also to 
 become the stability of nations. 
 
 Another important means of self-culture, is to 
 free ourselves from the power of human opinion 
 and example, except as far as this is sanctioned 
 by our own deliberate judgment. We are all prone 
 to keep the level of those we live with, to repeat 
 their words, and dress our minds as well as bodies 
 after their fashion ; and hence the spiritless tame- 
 ness of our characters and lives. Our greatest 
 danger, is not from the grossly wicked around us, 
 but from the worldly, unreflecting multitude, who 
 are borne along as a stream by foreign impulse, 
 and bear us along with them. Even the influence 
 of superior minds may harm us, by bowing us to 
 
44 
 
 servile acquiescence and damping our spiritual 
 activity. The great use of intercourse with other 
 minds, is to stir up our own, to whet our appetite 
 for truth, to carry our thoughts beyond their old 
 tracks. We need connexions with great thinkers 
 to make us thinkers too. One of the chief arts 
 of self-culture, is to unite the childlike teach- 
 ableness, which gratefully welcomes light from ev- 
 ery human being who can give it, with manly resis- 
 tance of opinions however current, of influences 
 however generally revered, which do not approve 
 themselves to our deliberate judgment. You ought 
 indeed patiently and conscientiously to strengthen 
 your reason by other men's intelligence, but you 
 must not prostrate it before them. Especially if 
 there springs up within you any view of God's word 
 or universe, any sentiment or aspiration which 
 seems to you of a higher order than what you 
 meet abroad, give reverent heed to it ; enquire 
 into it earnestly, solemnly. Do not trust it blind- 
 ly, for it may be an illusion ; but it may be the 
 Divinity moving within you, a new revelation, not 
 supernatural but still most precious, of truth or 
 duty ; and if after enquiry it so appear, then let no 
 clamor, or scorn, or desertion turn you from it. 
 Be true to your own highest convictions. Intima- 
 tions from our own souls of something more per- 
 fect than others teach, if faithfully followed, give 
 us a consciousness of spiritual force and progress, 
 never experienced by the vulgar of high life or 
 
45 
 
 low life, who march, as they are drilled, to the 
 step of their times. 
 
 Some, I know, will wonder, that I should think 
 the mass of the people capable of such intimations 
 and glimpses of truth, as I have just supposed. 
 These are commonly thought to be the prerogative 
 of men of genius, who seem to be born to give 
 law to the minds of the multitude. Undoubtedly 
 nature has her nobility, and sends forth a few to 
 be eminently " lights of the world/' But it is 
 also true that a portion of the same divine fire is 
 given to all ; for the many could not receive with 
 a loving reverence the quickening influences of 
 the few, were there not essentially the same 
 spiritual life in both. The minds of the multitude 
 are not masses of passive matter, created to 
 receive impressions unresistingly from abroad. 
 They are not wholly shaped by foreign instruc- 
 tion; but have a native force, a spring of thought 
 in themselves. Even the child's mind outruns its 
 lessons, and overflows in questionings which bring 
 the wisest to a stand. Even the child starts the 
 great problems, which philosophy has labored to 
 solve for ages. But on this subject I cannot now 
 enlarge. Let me only say, that the power of orig- 
 inal thought is particularly manifested in those, 
 who thirst for progress, who are bent on unfolding 
 their whole nature. A man who wakes up to the 
 consciousness of having been created for progress 
 and perfection, looks with new eyes on himself 
 
46 
 
 and on the world in which he lives. This great 
 truth stirs the soul from its depths, breaks up old 
 associations of ideas, and establishes new ones, 
 just as a mighty agent of chemistry, brought into 
 contact with natural substances, dissolves the old 
 affinities which had bound their particles together, 
 and arranges them anew. This truth particularly 
 aids us to penetrate the mysteries of human life. 
 By revealing to us the end of our being, it helps 
 us to comprehend more and more the wonderful, 
 the infinite system, to which we belong. A man in 
 the common walks of life, who has faith in perfec- 
 tion, in the unfolding of the human spirit, as the 
 great purpose of God, possesses more the secret 
 of the universe, perceives more the harmonies 
 or mutual adaptations of the world without and 
 the world within him, is a wiser interpreter of 
 Providence, and reads nobler lessons of duty in 
 the events which pass before him, than the pro- 
 foundest philosopher who wants this grand cen- 
 tral truth. Thus illuminations, inward sugges- 
 tions, are not confined to a favored few, but visit 
 all who devote themselves to a generous self- 
 culture. 
 
 Another means of Self-culture may be found by 
 every man in his Condition or Occupation, be it 
 what it may. Had I time, I might go through all 
 conditions of life, from the most conspicuous to 
 the most obscure, and might show how each furn- 
 
47 
 
 ishes continual aids to improvement. But I will 
 take one example, and that is, of a man living by 
 manual labor. This may be made the means of 
 Self-culture. For instance, in almost all labor, a 
 man exchanges his strength for an equivalent in 
 the form of wages, purchase-money, or some 
 other product. In other words, labor is a system 
 of contracts, bargains, imposing mutual obliga- 
 tions. Now the man, who, in working, no matter 
 in what way, strives perpetually to fulfil his obli- 
 gations thoroughly, to do his whole work faith- 
 fully, to be honest not because honesty is the best 
 policy, but for the sake of justice, and that he 
 may render to every man his due, such a laborer 
 is continually building up in himself one of the 
 greatest principles of morality and religion. Ev- 
 ery blow on the anvil, on the earth, or whatever 
 material he works upon, contributes something to 
 the perfection of his nature. 
 
 Nor is this all. Labor is a school of benevo- 
 lence as well as justice. A man to support him- 
 self must serve others. He must do or produce 
 something for their comfort or gratification. This 
 is one of the beautiful ordinations of Providence, 
 that, to get a living, a man must be useful. Now 
 this usefulness ought to be an end in his labor as 
 truly as to earn his living. He ought to think of 
 the benefit of those he works for, as well as of his 
 own ; and in so doing, in desiring amidst his 
 sweat and toil to serve others as well as himself, 
 
48 
 
 he is exercising and growing in benevolence, as 
 truly as if he were distributing bounty with a 
 large hand to the poor. Such a motive hallows 
 and dignifies the commonest pursuit. It is strange, 
 that laboring men do not think more of the vast 
 usefulness of their toils, and take a benevolent 
 pleasure in them on this account. This beautiful 
 city, with its houses, furniture, markets, public 
 walks, and numberless accommodations, has grown 
 up under the hands of artizans and other laborers, 
 and ought they not to take a disinterested joy in 
 their work ? One would think, that a carpenter 
 or mason, on passing a house which he had 
 reared, would say to himself, " this work of mine 
 is giving comfort and enjoyment every day and 
 hour to a family, and will continue to be a kindly 
 shelter, a domestic gathering-place, an abode of 
 affection, for a century or more after I sleep in 
 the dust;" and ought not a generous satisfaction 
 to spring up at the thought ? It is by thus inter- 
 weaving goodness with common labors, that we 
 give it strength and make it a habit of the soul. 
 
 Again. Labor may be so performed as to be a 
 high impulse to the mind. Be a man's vocation 
 what it may, his rule should be to do its duties 
 perfectly, to do the best he can, and thus to make 
 perpetual progress in his art. In other words, 
 Perfection should be proposed ; and this I urge 
 not only for its usefulness to society, nor for the 
 sincere pleasure which a man takes in seeing a 
 
49 
 
 work well done. This is an important means of 
 Self-culture. In this way the idea of Perfection 
 takes root in the mind, and spreads far beyond the 
 man's trade. He gets a tendency towards com- 
 pleteness in whatever he undertakes. Slack, 
 slovenly performance in any department of life is 
 more apt to offend him. His standard of action 
 rises, and every thing is better done for his 
 thoroughness in his common vocation. 
 
 There is one circumstance attending all condi- 
 tions of life, which may and ought to be turned to 
 the use of self-culture. Every condition, be it 
 what it may, has hardships, hazards, pains. We 
 try to escape them ; we pine for a sheltered lot, 
 for a smooth path, for cheering friends, and un- 
 broken success. But providence ordains storms, 
 disasters, hostilities, sufferings ; and the great ques- 
 tion, whether we shall live to any purpose or not, 
 whether we shall grow strong in mind and heart, 
 or be weak and pitiable, depends on nothing so 
 much as on our use of these adverse circumstances. 
 Outward evils are designed to school our passions, 
 and to rouse our faculties and virtues into intenser 
 action. Sometimes they seem to create new pow- 
 ers. Difficulty is the element, and resistance the 
 true work of a man. Self-culture never goes on 
 so fast, as when embarrassed circumstances, the 
 opposition of men or the elements, unexpected 
 changes of the times, or other forms of suffering, 
 instead of disheartning, throw us on our inward 
 7 
 
50 
 
 resources, turn us for strength to God, clear up to 
 us the great purpose of life, and inspire calm reso- 
 lution. No greatness or goodness is worth much, 
 unless tried in these fires. Hardships are not on 
 this account to be sought for. They come fast 
 enough of themselves, and we are in more danger 
 of sinking under, than of needing them. But 
 when God sends them, they are noble means of 
 self-culture, and as such, let us meet and bear 
 them cheerfully. Thus all parts of our condition 
 may be pressed into the service of self-improve- 
 ment. 
 
 I have time to consider but one more means 
 of self-culture. We find it in our Free Gov- 
 ernment, in our Political relations and duties. 
 It is a great benefit of free institutions, that they 
 do much to awaken and keep in action a nation's 
 mind. We are told, that the education of the 
 multitude is necessary to the support of a re- 
 public; but it is equally true, that a republic is 
 a powerful means of educating the multitude. It 
 is the people's University. In a free state, solemn 
 responsibilities are imposed on every citizen; 
 great subjects are to be discussed ; great interests 
 to be decided. The individual is called to deter- 
 mine measures affecting the well-being of millions 
 and the destinies of posterity. He must consider 
 not only the internal relations of his native land, 
 but its connexion with foreign states, and judge 
 
51 
 
 of a policy which touches the whole civilized 
 world. He is called by his participation in the 
 national sovereignty, to cherish public spirit, a 
 regard to the general weal. A man who purposes 
 to discharge faithfully these obligations, is carrying 
 on a generous self-culture. The great public 
 questions, which divide opinion around him and 
 provoke earnest discussion, of necessity invigorate 
 his intellect, and accustom him to look beyond 
 himself. He grows up to a robustness, force, en- 
 largement of mind, unknown under despotic rule. 
 
 It may be said that I am describing what free 
 institutious ought to do for the character of the in- 
 dividual, not their actual effects ; and the objection, 
 I must own, is too true. Our institutions do not 
 cultivate us, as they might and should ; and the 
 chief cause of the failure is plain. It is the 
 strength of party spirit; and so blighting is its 
 influence, so fatal to self-culture, that I feel my- 
 self bound to warn every man against it, who has 
 any desire of improvement. I do not tell you it 
 will destroy your country; It wages a worse war 
 against yourselves. Truth, justice, candor, fair 
 dealing, sound judgment, self-control, and kind 
 affections are its natural and perpetual prey. 
 
 I do not say, that you must take no side in politics. 
 The parties which prevail around you differ in 
 character, principles, and spirit, though far less 
 than the exaggeration of passion affirms; and, as 
 far as conscience allows, a man should support that. 
 
52 
 
 which he thinks best. In one respect, however, 
 all parties agree. They all foster that pestilent 
 spirit, which I now condemn. In all of them, 
 party spirit rages. Associate men together for 
 a common cause, be it good or bad, and array 
 against them a body resolutely pledged to an 
 opposite interest, and a new passion, quite dis- 
 tinct from the original sentiment which brought 
 them together, a fierce, fiery zeal, consisting 
 chiefly of aversion to those who differ from 
 them, is roused within them into fearful ac- 
 tivity. Human nature seems incapable of a 
 stronger, more unrelenting passion. It is hard 
 enough for an individual, when contending all 
 alone for an interest or an opinion, to keep down 
 his pride, wilfulness, love of victory, anger and 
 other personal feelings. But let him join a multi- 
 tude in the same warfare, and, without singular 
 self-control, he receives into his single breast the 
 vehemence, obstinacy and vindictiveness of all. 
 The triumph of his party becomes immeasurably 
 dearer to him than the principle, true or false, 
 which was the original ground of division. The 
 conflict becomes a struggle not for principle but 
 for power, for victory ; and the desperateness, 
 the wickedness of such struggles, is the great 
 burden of history. In truth, it matters little 
 what men divide about, whether it be a foot of 
 land or precedence in a procession. Let them 
 but begin to fight for it, and self-will, ill-will, the 
 
53 
 
 rage for victory, the dread of mortification and 
 defeat, makes the trifle as weighty as a matter of 
 life and death. The Greek or Eastern empire 
 was shaken to its foundation by parties, which dif- 
 fered only about the merits of charioteers at the 
 amphitheatre. Party spirit is singularly hostile 
 to moral independence. A man, in proportion 
 as he drinks into it, sees, hears, judges by the 
 senses and understandings of his party. He 
 surrenders the freedom of a man, the right of 
 using and speaking his own mind, and echoes the 
 applauses or maledictions, with which the leaders or 
 passionate partizans see fit that the country should 
 ring. On all points parties are to be distrusted ; 
 but on no one so much as on the character of op- 
 ponents. These, if you may trust what you hear, 
 are always men without principle and truth, de- 
 voured by selfishness, and thirsting for their own 
 elevation, though on their country's ruin. When 
 I was young, I was accustomed to hear pro- 
 nounced with abhorrence, almost with execration, 
 the names of men, who are now hailed by their 
 former foes as the champions of grand principles 
 and as worthy of the highest public trusts. This 
 lesson of early experience, which later years 
 have corroborated, will never be forgotten. 
 
 Of our present political divisions I have of 
 course nothing to say. But among the current 
 topics of party, there are certain accusations and 
 recriminations, grounded on differences of social 
 
54 
 
 condition, which seem to me so unfriendly to the 
 improvement of individuals and the community, 
 that I ask the privilege of giving them a moment's 
 notice. On one side we are told, that the rich 
 are disposed to trample on the poor ; and on the 
 other, that the poor look with evil eye and hostile 
 purpose on the possessions of the rich. These 
 outcries seem to me alike devoid of truth and 
 alike demoralizing. As for the rich, who consti- 
 tute but a handful of our population, who possess 
 not one peculiar privilege, and, w^hat is more, who 
 possess comparatively little of the property of the 
 country, it is wonderful, that they should be ob- 
 jects of alarm. The vast and ever-growing property 
 of this country, where is it ? Locked up in a few 
 hands ? hoarded in a few strong boxes ? It is dif- 
 fused like the atmosphere, and almost as variable, 
 changing hands with the seasons, shifting from 
 rich to poor, not by the violence but by the indus- 
 try and skill of the latter class. The wealth of 
 the rich is as a drop in the ocean ; and it is a well 
 known fact, that those men among us, who are 
 noted for their opulence, exert hardly any politi- 
 cal power on the community. That the rich do 
 their whole duty ; that they adopt, as they should, 
 the great object of the social state, which is the 
 elevation of the people in intelligence, character, 
 and condition, cannot be pretended ; but that 
 they feel for the physical sufferings of their breth- 
 ren, that they stretch out liberal hands for the 
 
55 
 
 succor of the poor and for the support of useful 
 public institutions, cannot be denied. Among 
 them are admirable specimens of humanity. There 
 is no warrant for holding them up to suspicion as 
 the people's foes. 
 
 Nor do I regard as less calumnious the outcry 
 against the working classes, as if they were aiming 
 at the subversion of property. When we think 
 of the general condition and character of this part 
 of our population, when we recollect, that they 
 were born and have lived amidst schools and 
 churches, that they have been brought up to 
 profitable industry, that they enjoy many of the 
 accommodations of life, that most of them hold a 
 measure of property and are hoping for more, that 
 they possess unprecedented means of bettering 
 their lot, that they are bound to comfortable homes 
 by strong domestic affections, that they are able 
 to give their children an education which places 
 within their reach the prizes of the social state, 
 that they are trained to the habits, and familiar- 
 ized to the advantages of a high civilization ; 
 when we recollect these things, can we imagine 
 that they are so insanely blind to their interests, 
 so deaf to the calls of justice and religion, so 
 profligately thoughtless of the peace and safety of 
 their families, as to be prepared to make a wreck 
 of social order, for the sake of dividing among 
 themselves the spoils of the rich, which would not 
 support the community for a month. Undoubtedly 
 
56 
 
 there is insecurity in all stages of society, and so 
 there must be, until communities shall be regen- 
 erated by a higher culture, reaching and quick- 
 ening all classes of the people ; but there is not, 
 I believe, a spot on earth, where property is safer 
 than here, because, no where else is it so equally 
 and righteously diffused. In aristocracies, where 
 wealth exists in enormous masses, which have been 
 entailed for ages by a partial legislation on a favor- 
 ed few, and where the multitude, after the sleep of 
 ages, are waking up to intelligence, to self-respect, 
 and to a knowledge of their rights, property is 
 exposed to shocks which are not to be dreaded 
 among ourselves. Here indeed as elsewhere, 
 among the less prosperous members of the com- 
 munity, there are disappointed, desperate men, 
 ripe for tumult and civil strife ; but it is also 
 true, that the most striking and honorable dis- 
 tinction of this country is to be found in the 
 intelligence, character and condition of the great 
 working class. To me it seems, that the great 
 danger to property here is not from the laborer, 
 but from those who are making haste to be rich. 
 For example, in this commonwealth, no act has 
 been thought by the alarmists or the conservatives 
 so subversive of the rights of property, as a recent 
 law, authorizing a company to construct a free 
 bridge, in the immediate neighborhood of another, 
 which had been chartered by a former legislature, 
 and which had been erected in the expectation of 
 
57 
 
 an exclusive right. And with whom did this 
 alleged assault on property originate ? With lev- 
 ellers ? with needy laborers? with men bent on 
 the prostration of the rich ? No ; but with men 
 of business, who were anxious to push a more 
 lucrative trade. Again, what occurrence among 
 us has been so suited to destroy confidence, and to 
 stir up the people against the monied class, as the 
 late criminal mismanagement of some of our 
 banking institutions. And whence came this ? 
 from the rich or the poor ? From the agrarian, 
 or the man of business ? Who, let me ask, carry 
 on the work of spoliation most extensively in soci- 
 ety ? Is not more property wrested from its own - 
 ers by rash or dishonest failures, than by professed 
 highwaymen and thieves ? Have not a few unprinci- 
 pled speculators sometimes inflicted wider wrongs 
 and sufferings, than all the tenants of a state 
 prison ? Thus property is in more danger from 
 those who are aspiring after wealth, than from 
 those who live by the sweat of their brow. I do 
 not believe, however, that the institution is in 
 serious danger from either. All the advances of 
 society in industry, useful arts, commerce, knowl- 
 edge, jurisprudence, fraternal union, and practical 
 Christianity, are so many hedges round honestly 
 acquired wealth, so many barriers against revolu- 
 tionary violence and rapacity. Let us not torture 
 ourselves with idle alarms, and still more let us 
 not inflame ourselves against one another by mu- 
 
58 
 
 tual calumnies. Let not class array itself against 
 class, where all have a common interest. One 
 way of provoking men to crime is to suspect them 
 of criminal designs. We (L not secure our prop- 
 erty against the poor, by accusing them of schemes 
 of universal robbery ; nor render the rich better 
 friends of the community, by fixing on them the 
 brand of hostility to the people. Of all parties, 
 those founded on different social conditions are 
 the most pernicious ; and in no country on earth 
 are they so groundless as in our own. 
 
 Among the best people, especially among the 
 more religious, there are some, who, through dis- 
 gust with the violence and frauds of parties, with- 
 draw themselves from all political action. Such, I 
 conceive, do wrong. God has placed them in the 
 relations, and imposed on them the duties of citi- 
 zens ; and they are no more authorized to shrink 
 from these duties than from those of sons, husbands, 
 or fathers. They owe a great debt to their coun- 
 try, and must discharge it by giving support to what 
 they deem the best men and the best measures. 
 Nor let them say, that they can do nothing. Ev- 
 ery good man, if faithful to his convictions, bene- 
 fits his country. All parties are kept in check by 
 the spirit of the better portion of people, whom 
 they contain. Leaders are always compelled to 
 ask what their party will bear, and to modify their 
 measures, so as not to shock the men of principle 
 within their ranks. A good man, not tamely sub- 
 
59 
 
 servient to the body with which he acts, but judg- 
 ing it impartially, criticising it freely, bearing tes- 
 timony against its evils, and withholding his sup- 
 port from wrong, does good to those around him, 
 and is cultivating generously his own mind. 
 
 I respectfully counsel those, whom I address, to 
 take part in the politics of their country. These 
 are the true discipline of a people, and do much 
 for their education. I counsel you to labor for a 
 clear understanding of the subjects which agitate 
 the community, to make them your study, instead 
 of wasting your leisure in vague, passionate talk 
 about them. The time thrown away by the mass 
 of the people on the rumors of the day, might, if 
 better spent, give them a good acquaintance with 
 the constitution, laws, history and interests of their 
 country, and thus establish them in those great 
 principles by which particular measures are to be 
 determined. In proportion as the people thus im- 
 prove themselves, they will cease to be the tools of 
 designing politicians. Their intelligence, not their 
 passions and jealousies, will be addressed by those 
 who seek their votes. They will exert, not a nomi- 
 nal, but a real influence on the government and 
 the destinies of the country, and at the same time 
 will forward their own growth in truth and virtue. 
 
 I ought not to quit this subject of politics, con- 
 sidered as a means of self-culture, without speak- 
 ing of newspapers ; because these form the chief 
 reading of the bulk of the people. They are the 
 
60 
 
 literature of multitudes. Unhappily their impor- 
 tance is not understood ; their bearing on the in- 
 tellectual and moral cultivation of the community, 
 little thought of. A newspaper ought to be con- 
 ducted by one of our most gifted men, and its 
 income should be such as to enable him to secure 
 the contributions of men as gifted as himself. But 
 we must take newspapers as they are ; and a man, 
 anxious for self-culture, may turn them to account, 
 if he will select the best within his reach. He 
 should exclude from his house such as are venom- 
 ous or scurrilous, as he would a pestilence. He 
 should be swayed in his choice, not merely by the 
 ability with which a paper is conducted, but still 
 more by its spirit, by its justice, fairness and 
 steady adherence to great principles. Especially, 
 if he would know the truth, let him hear both 
 sides. Let him read the defence as well as the 
 attack. Let him not give his ear to one party ex- 
 clusively. We condemn ourselves, when we listen 
 to reproaches thrown on an individual and turn 
 away from his exculpation ; and is it just to read 
 continual, unsparing invective against large masses 
 of men, and refuse them the opportunity of justi- 
 fying themselves ? 
 
 A new class of daily papers has sprung up in our 
 country, sometimes called cent papers, and designed 
 for circulation among those who cannot afford cost- 
 lier publications. My interest in the working class 
 induced me sometime ago to take one of these, 
 
61 
 
 and I was gratified to find it not wanting in useful 
 matter. Two things however gave me pain. The 
 advertising columns were devoted very much to 
 patent medicines ; and when I considered that a 
 laboring man's whole fortune is his health, I could 
 not but lament, that so much was done to seduce him 
 to the use of articles, more fitted, I fear, to under- 
 mine than to restore his constitution. I was also 
 shocked by accounts of trials in the police court. 
 These were written in a style adapted to the most 
 uncultivated minds, and intended to turn into 
 matters of sport the most painful and humiliating 
 events of life. Were the newspapers of the rich 
 to attempt to extract amusement from the vices 
 and miseries of the poor, a cry would be raised 
 against them, and very justly. But is it not 
 something worse, that the poorer classes them- 
 selves should seek occasions of laughter and mer- 
 riment in the degradation, the crimes, the woes, 
 the punishments of their brethren, of those who 
 are doomed to bear like themselves the heaviest 
 burdens of life, and who have sunk under the 
 temptations of poverty ? Better go to the hospi- 
 tal, and laugh over the wounds and writhings of 
 the sick or the ravings of the insane, than amuse 
 ourselves with brutal excesses and infernal pas- 
 sions, which not only expose the criminal to the 
 crushing penalties of human laws, but incur the 
 displeasure of Heaven, and, if not repented of, 
 will be followed by the fearful retribution of the 
 life to come. 
 
62 
 
 One important topic remains. That great 
 means of self-improvement, Christianity, is yet 
 untouched, and its greatness forbids me now to 
 approach it. I will only say, that if you study 
 Christianity in its original records and not in hu- 
 man creeds ; if you consider its clear revelations 
 of God, its life-giving promises of pardon and 
 spiritual strength, its correspondence to man's 
 reason, conscience and best affections, and its 
 adaptation to his wants, sorrows, anxieties and 
 fears ; if you consider the strength of its proofs, 
 the purity of its precepts, the divine greatness of 
 the character of its author, and the immortality 
 which it opens before us, you will feel yourselves 
 bound to welcome it joyfully, gratefully, as afford- 
 ing aids and incitements to self-culture, which 
 would vainly be sought in all other means. 
 
 I have thus presented a few of the means of 
 self-culture. The topics, now discussed, will I 
 hope suggest others to those who have honored 
 me with their attention, and create an interest 
 which will extend beyond the present hour. I 
 owe it however to truth to make one remark. I 
 wish to raise no unreasonable hopes. I must say 
 then, that the means, now recommended to you, 
 though they will richly reward every man of every 
 age who will faithfully use them, will yet not pro- 
 duce their full and happiest effect, except in cases 
 where early education has prepared the mind for 
 
63 
 
 future improvement. They, whose childhood has 
 been neglected, though they may make progress 
 in future life, can hardly repair the loss of their 
 first years ; and I say this, that we may all be 
 excited to save our children from this loss, that 
 we may prepare them, to the extent of our power, 
 for an effectual use of all the means of self-culture, 
 which adult age may bring with it. With these 
 views, I ask you to look with favor on the recent 
 exertions of our legislature and of private citi- 
 zens, in behalf of our public schools, the chief 
 hope of our country. The legislature has of late 
 appointed a board of education, with a secretary, 
 who is to devote his whole time to the improve- 
 ment of public schools. An individual more fitted 
 to this responsible office, than the gentleman who 
 now fills it,* cannot, I believe, be found in our com- 
 munity ; and if his labors shall be crowned with 
 success, he will earn a title to the gratitude of the 
 good people of this State, unsurpassed by that of 
 any other living citizen. Let me also recall to your 
 minds a munificent individual,! who, by a generous 
 donation, has encouraged the legislature to resolve 
 on the establishment of one or more institutions 
 called Normal Schools, the object of which is, to 
 prepare accomplished teachers of youth, a work, 
 on which the progress of education depends more 
 than on any other measure. The efficient friends 
 of education are the true benefactors of their 
 
 * Horace Mann, Esq. t Edmund Dwight, Esq. 
 
64 
 
 country, and their names deserve to be handed 
 down to that posterity, for whose highest wants 
 they are generously providing. 
 
 There is another mode of advancing education 
 in our whole country, to which I ask your particu- 
 lar attention. You are aware of the vast extent 
 and value of the public lands of the Union. By 
 annual sales of these, large amounts of money are 
 brought into the national treasury, which are ap- 
 plied to the current expenses of the Government. 
 For this application there is no need. In truth, 
 the country has received detriment from the ex- 
 cess of its revenues. Now, I ask, why shall not 
 the public lands be consecrated, (in whole or in 
 part, as the case may require,) to the education 
 of the people ? This measure would secure at 
 once what the country most needs, that is, able, 
 accomplished, quickening teachers of the whole 
 rising generation. The present poor remune- 
 ration of instructers is a dark omen, and the only 
 real obstacle which the cause of education has to 
 contend with. We need for our schools gifted 
 men and women, worthy, by their intelligence 
 and their moral power, to be entrusted with a 
 nation's youth ; and to gain these we must pay 
 them liberally, as well as afford other proofs of the 
 consideration in which we hold them. In the 
 present state of the country, when so many paths 
 of wealth and promotion are opened, superior men 
 cannot be won to an office so responsible and la- 
 
65 
 
 borious as that of teaching, without stronger in- 
 ducements than are now offered, except in some 
 of our large cities. The office of instructer ought 
 to rank and be recompensed as one of the most 
 honorable in society ; and I see not how this is 
 to be done, at least in our day, without appro- 
 priating to it the public domain. This is the peo- 
 ple's property, and the only part of their property 
 which is likely to be soon devoted to the support 
 of a high order of institutions for public educa- 
 tion. This object, interesting to all classes of 
 society, has peculiar claims on those whose means 
 of improvement are restricted by narrow circum- 
 stances. The mass of the people should devote 
 themselves to it as one man, should toil for it with 
 one soul. Mechanics, Farmers, Laborers ! Let 
 the country echo with your united cry, " The 
 Public Lands for Education/' Send to the public 
 councils men who will plead this cause with 
 power. No party triumphs, no trades-unions, no 
 associations, can so contribute to elevate you as 
 the measure now proposed. Nothing but a higher 
 education can raise you in influence and true dig- 
 nity. The resources of the public domain, wisely 
 applied for successive generations to the culture of 
 society and of the individual, would create a new 
 people, would awaken through this community in- 
 tellectual and moral energies, such as the records 
 of no country display, and as would command the 
 respect and emulation of the civilized world. In 
 9 
 
66 
 
 this grand object, the working men of all parties, 
 and in all divisions of the land, should join with 
 an enthusiasm not to be withstood. They should 
 separate it from all narrow and local strifes. They 
 should not suffer it to be mixed up with the 
 schemes of politicians. In it, they and their chil- 
 dren have an infinite stake. May they be true to 
 themselves, to posterity, to their country, to free- 
 dom, to the cause of mankind. 
 
 III. I am aware that the whole doctrine of this 
 discourse will meet opposition. There are not a 
 few who will say to me, " What you tell us sounds 
 well; but it is impracticable. Men, who dream in 
 their closets, spin beautiful theories ; but actual 
 life scatters them, as the wind snaps the cobweb. 
 You would have all men to be cultivated ; but ne- 
 cessity wills that most men shall work ; and which 
 of the two is likely to prevail. A weak sentimen- 
 tality may shrink from the truth ; still it is true, 
 that most men were made, not for self-culture, but 
 for toil." 
 
 I have put the objection into strong language, 
 that we may all look it fairly in the face. For 
 one I deny its validity. Reason as well as senti- 
 ment rises up against -it. The presumption is cer- 
 tainly very strong, that the All-wise Father, who 
 has given to every human being, reason and con- 
 science and affection, intended that these should 
 be unfolded ; and it is hard to believe, that He, 
 
67 
 
 who, by conferring this nature on all men, has 
 made all his children, has destined the great ma- 
 jority to wear out a life of drudgery and unim- 
 proving toil, for the benefit of a few. God cannot 
 have made spiritual beings to be dwarfed. In the 
 body we see no organs created to shrivel by dis- 
 use ; much less are the powers of the soul given to 
 be locked up in perpetual lethargy. 
 
 Perhaps it will be replied, that the purpose of 
 the Creator is to be gathered, not from theory, but 
 from facts ; and that it is a plain fact, that the 
 order and prosperity of society, which God must 
 be supposed to intend, require from the multitude 
 the action of their hands and not the improvement 
 of their minds. I reply, that a social order, de- 
 manding the sacrifice of the mind, is very suspi- 
 cious, that it cannot indeed be sanctioned by the 
 Creator. Were I, on visiting a strange country, 
 to see the vast majority of the people maimed, 
 crippled, and bereft of sight, and were I told that 
 social order required this mutilation, I should say, 
 Perish this order. Who would not think his un- 
 derstanding as well as best feelings insulted, by 
 hearing this spoken of as the intention of God. 
 Nor ought we to look with less aversion on a 
 social system, which can only be upheld by crip- 
 pling and blinding the Minds of the people. 
 
 But to come nearer to the point. Are labor 
 and self-culture irreconcileable to each other. In 
 the first place, we have seen that a man, in the 
 
68 
 
 midst of labor, may and ought to give himself to 
 the most important improvements, that he may 
 cultivate his sense of justice, his benevolence, and 
 the desire of perfection. Toil is the school for 
 these high principles ; and we have here a strong 
 presumption, that, in other respects, it does not 
 necessarily blight the soul. Next we have seen, 
 that the most fruitful sources of truth and wis- 
 dom are not books, precious as they are, but 
 experience and observation ; and these belong 
 to all conditions. It is another important con- 
 sideration, that almost all labor demands intel- 
 lectual activity, and is best carried on by those 
 who invigorate their minds ; so that the two inter- 
 ests, toil and self-culture, are friends to each 
 other. It is Mind, after all, which does the work 
 of the world, so that the more there is of mind, 
 the more work will be accomplished. A man, in 
 proportion as he is intelligent, makes a given force 
 accomplish a greater task, makes skill take the 
 place of muscles, and, with less labor, gives a 
 better product. Make men intelligent and they 
 become inventive. They find shorter processes. 
 Their knowledge of nature helps them to turn its 
 laws to account, to understand the substances on 
 which they work, and to seize on useful hints, 
 which experience continually furnishes. It is 
 among workmen, that some of the most useful ma- 
 chines have been contrived. Spread education, 
 and, as the history of this country shows, there 
 
69 
 
 will be no bounds to useful inventions. You think, 
 that a man without culture will do all the better 
 what you call the drudgery of life. Go then to 
 the Southern plantation. There the slave is 
 brought up to be a mere drudge. He is robbed of 
 the rights of a man, his whole spiritual nature 
 is starved, that he may work and do nothing but 
 work : and in that slovenly agriculture, in that 
 worn out soil, in the rude state of the mechanic 
 arts, you may find a comment on your doctrine, 
 that by degrading men you make them more pro- 
 ductive laborers. 
 
 But it is said, that any considerable education 
 lifts men above their work, makes them look with 
 disgust on their trades as mean and low, makes 
 drudgery intolerable. I reply, that a man becomes 
 interested in labor Just in proportion as the mind 
 works with the hands. An enlightened farmer, 
 who understands agricultural chemistry, the laws 
 of vegetation, the structure of plants, the proper- 
 ties of manures, the influences of climate, who 
 looks intelligently on his work and brings his 
 knowledge to bear on exigences, is a much more 
 cheerful as well as more dignified laborer, than 
 the peasant, whose mind is akin to the clod on 
 which he treads, and whose whole life is the same 
 dull, unthinking, unimproving toil. But this is 
 not all. Why is it, I ask, that we call manual 
 labor low, that we associate with it the idea of 
 meanness, and think that an intelligent people 
 
70 
 
 must scorn it ? The great reason is, that, in most 
 countries, so few intelligent people have been 
 engaged in it. Once let cultivated men plough 
 and dig and follow the commonest labors, and 
 ploughing, digging and trades will cease to be 
 mean. It is the man who determines the dignity 
 of the occupation, not the occupation which meas- 
 ures the dignity of the man. Physicians and 
 surgeons perform operations less cleanly than fall 
 to the lot of most mechanics. I have seen a dis- 
 tinguished chemist covered with dust like a 
 laborer. Still these men were not degraded. 
 Their intelligence gave dignity to their work, and 
 so our laborers, once educated, will give dignity 
 to their toils. Let me add, that I see little differ- 
 ence in point of dignity, between the various 
 vocations of men. When I see a clerk, spending 
 his days in adding figures perhaps merely copy- 
 ing, or a teller of a bank counting money, or a 
 merchant selling shoes and hides, I cannot see in 
 these occupations greater respectableness than in 
 making leather, shoes, or furniture. I do not see 
 in them greater intellectual activity than in sev- 
 eral trades. A man in the fields seems to have 
 more chances of improvement in his work, than a 
 man behind the counter, or a man driving the 
 quill. It is the sign of a narrow mind, to imag- 
 ine, as many seem to do, that there is a repug- 
 nance between the plain, coarse exterior of a 
 laborer and mental culture, especially the more 
 
71 
 
 refining culture. The laborer, under his dust and 
 sweat, carries the grand elements of humanity, 
 and he may put forth its highest powers. I doubt 
 not, there is as genuine enthusiasm in the contem- 
 plation of nature and in the perusal of works of 
 genius, under a homespun garb as under finery. 
 We have heard of a distinguished author, who 
 never wrote so well, as when he was full dressed 
 for company. But profound thought and poetical 
 inspiration have most generally visited men, when, 
 from narrow circumstances or negligent habits, 
 the rent coat and shaggy face have made them 
 quite unfit for polished saloons. A man may see 
 truth, and may be thrilled with beauty, in one cos- 
 tume or dwelling as well as another ; and he 
 should respect himself the more for the hardships, 
 under which his intellectual force has been devel- 
 oped. 
 
 But it will be asked, how can the laboring 
 classes find time for self-culture. I answer, as I 
 have already intimated, that an earnest purpose 
 finds time or makes time. It seizes on spare mo- 
 ments, and turns larger fragments of leisure to 
 golden account. A man, who follows his calling 
 with industry and spirit, and uses his earnings 
 economically, wall always have some portion of 
 the day at command ; and it is astonishing, how 
 fruitful of improvement a short season becomes, 
 when eagerly seized and faithfully used. It has 
 often been observed, that they, who have most 
 
 
72 
 
 time at their disposal, profit by it least. A single 
 hour in the day, steadily given to the study of an 
 interesting subject, brings unexpected accumula- 
 tions of knowledge. The improvement made by 
 well disposed pupils, in many of our country 
 schools, which are open but three months in the 
 year, and in our Sunday schools, which are kept 
 but one or two hours in the week, show what can 
 be brought to pass by slender means. The affec- 
 tions, it is said, sometimes crowd years into mo- 
 ments, and the intellect has something of the 
 same power. Volumes have not only been read, 
 but written, in flying journeys. I have known a 
 man of vigorous intellect, who had enjoyed few 
 advantages of early education, and whose mind 
 was almost engrossed by the details of an exten- 
 sive business, but who composed a book of much 
 original thought, in steamboats and on horseback, 
 while visiting distant customers. The succession 
 of the seasons gives to many of the working class 
 opportunities for intellectual improvement. The 
 winter brings leisure to the husbandman, and win- 
 ter evenings to many laborers in the city. Above 
 all, in Christian countries, the seventh day is 
 released from toil. The seventh part of the year, 
 no small portion of existence, may be given by 
 almost every one to intellectual and moral culture. 
 Why is it that Sunday is not made a more effectual 
 means of improvement ? Undoubtedly the sev- 
 enth day is to have a religious character ; but 
 
73 
 
 religion connects itself with all the great subjects 
 of human thought, and leads to and aids the study 
 of all. God is in nature. God is in history. In- 
 struction in the works of the Creator, so as to 
 reveal his perfection in their harmony, benefi- 
 cence and grandeur ; instruction in the histories 
 of the church and the world, so as to show in all 
 events his moral government, and to bring out the 
 great moral lessons in which human life abounds ; 
 instruction in the lives of philanthropists, of saints, 
 of men eminent for piety and virtue ; all these 
 branches of teaching enter into religion, and are 
 appropriate to Sunday ; and through these, a vast 
 amount of knowledge may be given to the people. 
 Sunday ought not to remain the dull and fruitless 
 season, that it now is to multitudes. It may be 
 clothed with a new interest and a new sanctity. 
 It may give a new impulse to the nation's soul. I 
 have thus shown, that time may be found for im- 
 provement ; and the fact is, that among our most 
 improved people, a considerable part consists of 
 persons, who pass the greatest portion of every day 
 at the desk, in the counting room, or in some 
 other sphere, chained to tasks which have very 
 little tendency to expand the mind. In the pro- 
 gress of society, with the increase of machinery, 
 and with other aids which intelligence and philan- 
 thropy will multiply, we may expect that more 
 and more time will be redeemed from manual 
 labor, for intellectual and social occupations. 
 10 
 
74 
 
 But some will say, " Be it granted that the 
 working classes may find some leisure ; should 
 they not be allowed to spend it in relaxation ? Is 
 it not cruel, to summon them from toils of the 
 hand to toils of the mind ? They have earned 
 pleasure by the day's toil and ought to partake 
 it/' Yes, let them have pleasure. Far be it 
 from me to dry up the fountains, to blight the 
 spots of verdure, where they refresh themselves 
 after life's labors. But I maintain, that self-culture 
 multiplies and increases their pleasures, that it 
 creates new capacities of enjoyment, that it saves 
 their leisure from being, what it too often is, dull 
 and wearisome, that it saves them from rushing for 
 excitement to indulgences destructive to body and 
 soul. It is one of the great benefits of self-im- 
 provement, that it raises a people above the grati- 
 fications of the brute, and gives them pleasures 
 worthy of men. In consequence of the present 
 intellectual culture of our country, imperfect as it 
 is, a vast amount of enjoyment is communicated to 
 men, women and children, of all conditions, by 
 books, an enjoyment unknown to ruder times. At 
 this moment, a number of gifted writers are em- 
 ployed in multiplying entertaining works. Walter 
 Scott, a name conspicuous among the brightest of 
 his day, poured out his inexhaustible mind in fic- 
 tions, at once so sportive and thrilling, that they 
 have taken their place among the delights of all 
 civilized nations. How many millions have been 
 
75 
 
 chained to his pages! How many melancholy 
 spirits has he steeped in forgetfulness of their 
 cares and sorrows! What multitudes, wearied by 
 their day's work, have owed some bright evening 
 hours and balmier sleep to his magical creations ! 
 And not only do fictions give pleasure. In pro- 
 portion as the mind is cultivated, it takes delight 
 in history and biography, in descriptions of nature, 
 in travels, in poetry, and even graver works. Is 
 the laborer then defrauded of pleasure by im- 
 provement ? There is another class of gratifica- 
 tions to which self-culture introduces the mass of 
 the people. I refer to lectures, discussions, meet- 
 ings of associations for benevolent and literary 
 purposes, and to other like methods of passing the 
 evening, which every year is multiplying among 
 us. A popular address from an enlightened man, 
 who has the tact to reach the minds of the people, 
 is a high gratification, as well as a source of 
 knowledge. The profound silence in our public 
 halls, where these lectures are delivered to 
 crowds, shows that cultivation is no foe to enjoy- 
 ment. I have a strong hope, that by the progress 
 of intelligence, taste and morals among all por- 
 tions of society, a class of public amusements will 
 grow up among us, bearing some resemblance to 
 the theatre, but purified from the gross evils which 
 degrade our present stage, and which, I trust, will 
 seal its ruin. Dramatic performances and recita- 
 tions are means of bringing the mass of the peo- 
 
76 
 
 pie into a quicker sympathy with a writer of 
 genius, to a profounder comprehension of his 
 grand, beautiful, touching conceptions, than can 
 be effected by the reading of the closet. No 
 commentary throws such a light on a great poem 
 or any impassioned work of literature, as the 
 voice of a reader or speaker, who brings to the 
 task a deep feeling of his author and rich and 
 various powers of expression. A crowd, electri- 
 fied by a sublime thought, or softened into a human- 
 izing sorrow, under such a voice, partake a pleas- 
 ure at once exquisite and refined ; and I cannot 
 but believe, that this and other amusements, at 
 which the delicacy of woman and the purity of 
 the Christian can take no offence, are to grow up 
 under a higher social culture. Let me only add, 
 that in proportion as culture spreads among a 
 people, the cheapest and commonest of all pleas- 
 ures, conversation, increases in delight. This, 
 after all, is the great amusement of life, cheering 
 us round our hearths, often cheering our work, 
 stirring our hearts gently, acting on us like the 
 balmy air or the bright light of heaven, so silent- 
 ly and continually, that we hardly think of its in- 
 fluence. This source of happiness is too often lost 
 to men of all classes for want of knowledge, men- 
 tal activity, and refinement of feeling ; and do we 
 defraud the laborer of his pleasure, by recommend- 
 ing to him improvements which will place the daily, 
 hourly, blessings of conversation within his reach ? 
 
77 
 
 I have thus considered some of the common ob- 
 jections which start up when the culture of the 
 mass of men is insisted on, as the great end of 
 society. For myself, these objections seem wor- 
 thy little notice. The doctrine is too shocking to 
 need refutation, that the great majority of human 
 beings, endowed as they are with rational and im- 
 mortal powers, are placed on earth, simply to toil 
 for their own animal subsistence, and to minister 
 to the luxury and elevation of the few. It is 
 monstrous, it approaches impiety, to suppose that 
 God has placed insuperable barriers to the expan- 
 sion of the free illimitable soul. True, there are 
 obstructions in the way of improvement. But in 
 this country, the chief obstructions lie, not in our 
 lot, but in ourselves, not in outward hardships, 
 but in our worldly and sensual propensities ; and 
 one proof of this is, that a true self-culture is as 
 little thought of on exchange as in the workshop, 
 as little among the prosperous as among those of 
 narrower conditions. The path to perfection is 
 difficult to men in every lot ; there is no royal 
 road for rich or poor. But difficulties are meant 
 to rouse not discourage. The human spirit is to 
 grow strong by conflict. And how much has it 
 already overcome ! Under what burdens of op- 
 pression has it made its way for ages ! What 
 mountains of difficulty has it cleared ! And with 
 all this experience, shall we say, that the progress 
 of the mass of men is to be despaired of, that the 
 
 
78 
 
 chains of bodily necessity are too strong and pon- 
 derous to be broken by the mind, that servile, 
 unimproving drudgery is the unalterable condition 
 of the multitude of the human race ? 
 
 I conclude with recalling to you the happiest 
 feature of our age, and that is, the progress of the 
 mass of the people in intelligence, self-respect, 
 and all the comforts of life. What a contrast 
 does the present form with past times ! Not many 
 ages ago, the nation was the property of one man, 
 and all its interests were staked in perpetual 
 games of war, for no end but to build up his fami- 
 ly, or to bring new territories under his yoke. 
 Society was divided into two classes, the highborn 
 and the vulgar, separated from one another by a 
 great gulph, as impassable as that between the 
 saved and the lost. The people had no signifi- 
 cance as individuals, but formed a mass, a ma- 
 chine, to be wielded at pleasure by their lords. 
 In war, which was the great sport of the times, 
 those brave knights, of whose prowess we hear, 
 cased themselves and their horses in armour, so 
 as to be almost invulnerable, whilst the common 
 people on foot were left, without protection, to 
 be hewn in pieces or trampled down by their bet- 
 ters. Who, that compares the condition of Europe 
 a few ages ago, with the present state of the 
 world, but must bless God for the change. The 
 grand distinction of modern times is, the emerging 
 
79 
 
 of the people from brutal degradation, the gradual 
 recognition of their rights, the gradual diffusion 
 among them of the means of improvement and 
 happiness, the creation of a new power in the 
 state, the power of the people. And it is worthy 
 remark, that this revolution is due in a great 
 degree to religion, which, in the hands of the 
 crafty and aspiring, had bowed the multitude to 
 the dust, but which, in the fulness of time, began 
 to fulfil its mission of freedom. It was religion, 
 which, by teaching men their near relation to 
 God, awakened in them the consciousness of their 
 importance as individuals. It was the struggle for 
 religious rights, which opened men's eyes to all 
 their rights. It was resistance to religious usur- 
 pation, which led men to withstand political op- 
 pression. It was religious discussion, which roused 
 the minds of all classes to free and vigorous 
 thought. It was religion, which armed the 
 martyr and patriot in England against arbitrary 
 power, which braced the spirits of our fathers 
 against the perils of the ocean and wilderness, 
 and sent them to found here the freest and most 
 equal state on earth. 
 
 Let us thank God for what has been gained. 
 But let us not think every thing gained. Let the 
 people feel that they have only started in the race. 
 How much remains to be done ! What a vast 
 amount of ignorance, intemperance, coarseness, 
 sensuality, may still be found in our community ! 
 
80 
 
 What a vast amount of mind is palsied and lost ! 
 When we think, that every house might be cheered 
 by intelligence, disinterestedness and refinement, 
 and then remember, in how many houses the 
 higher powers and affections of human nature are 
 buried as in tombs, what a darkness gathers over 
 society. And how few of us are moved by this 
 moral desolation? How few understand, that to 
 raise the depressed, by a wise culture, to the dig- 
 nity of men, is the highest end of the social state? 
 Shame on us, that the worth of a fellow creature is 
 so little felt. 
 
 I would, that I could speak with an awakening 
 voice to the people, of their wants, their priv- 
 ileges, their responsibilities. I would say to them, 
 You cannot, without guilt and disgrace, stop where 
 you are. The past and the present call on you to 
 advance. Let what you have gained be an im- 
 pulse to something higher. Your nature is too 
 great to be crushed. You were not created what 
 you are, merely to toil, eat, drink and sleep, like 
 the inferior animals. If you will, you can rise. 
 No power in society, no hardship in your condi- 
 tion can depress you, keep you down, in knowl- 
 edge, power, virtue, influence, but by your own 
 consent. Do not be lulled to sleep by the flatter- 
 ies which you hear, as if your participation in the 
 national sovereignty made you equal to the noblest 
 of your race. You have many and great deficien- 
 cies to be remedied ; and the remedy lies, not in 
 
81 
 
 the ballot box, not in the exercise of your political 
 powers, but in the faithful education of yourselves 
 and your children. These truths you have often 
 heard and slept over. Awake ! Resolve earnest- 
 ly on Self-culture. Make yourselves worthy of 
 your free institutions, and strengthen and per- 
 petuate them by your intelligence and your virtues. 
 
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