LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNI. GIFT OF MRS. MARTHA E. HALLIDIE. GfcM ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION AND OTHER ESSAYS ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION AND OTHER ESSAYS BY ISAAC TAYLOR LONDON BELL AND DALDY FLEET STREET 1860 CONTENTS. ESSAY I. ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. In Two Parts Page ESSAY II. MIND IN FORM 134 ESSAY III. MODERN ADVANCEMENTS AND LAY INVENTORS 191 ESSAY IV. LAY THEOLOGTANS ...... 234 ESSAY V. IPIDEMIC WHIMS 254. ESSAY VI. [EADS IN GROUPS 289 ESSAY VII. 'HE ORNAMENTATION OF NATURE . . . 314 Supplementary Notes . . . . . -337 HE ESSAYS conflicting this volume have not before appeared in print, with the exception of portions of the FOURTH ESSAY " Lay Theologians," which had place in the " Eclectic Review " fome years ago. The fubftance of the FIFTH ESSAY " Epidemic Whims" was delivered as a Lec- ture in the AfTembly Room of the Free -Trade Hall, Manchefter, in 1856. ESSAYS, ETC. Ultimate Civilization. PART I. i. I VILIZ ATION is a term of the body focial ; not of the man individual. Within the circle of a community in even the moft advanced ftate of civi- lization, very many of its members may, and in- deed muft, remain in a condition of inferiority, as well in refpecl: of knowledge, intelligence, refine- ment, as of the enjoyment of the goods of material existence. The phrafe, Ultimate Civilization, has no fuch meaning as this that the advancement of the individual man has reached a limit forbidding the hope of further progrefs ; but this only, that the feveral orders and conftituents of the Social Mafs have come, at length, into a ftate of ftable equili- brium, or of undifturbed, and unreftri&ed, and productive interaction. 2 ESS ATS, ETC. Civilization involves an idea of the focial fyftem which allows us to think of it analogically as if it were a living organization ; it fuppofes, there- fore, an equable diftribution of the vital force ; but then it excludes the fuppofition of an identity of functions among its conftituents ; nor does it ad- mit either an equality of pofition, or an unquiet tendency toward a greater fimplification of ftruc- ture. On the contrary, as the higheft poflible civilization demands a multiplicity of elements, and, therefore, alfo, a great complexity of ftruc- ture, and a correfponding intricacy of movements, it will demand the tranquil interaction of all thefe parts, or members. Few elements, and a fimple ftructure, and a near approximation of orders, may indeed confift with the well-being and the intelli- gence of individuals ; but it will not admit an ad- vance in the civilization of the mafs, beyond the fecond, or the third, ftage upward, from the rudeft barbarifm. Within a community that is in a condition of advanced and progreflive civilization, there will be an indefinite, or, an unlimited progrefs in a uniform direction ; but there will be no change of direction ; or there will be the minimum of change. There will be the greater}, {lability ; but no ftagnation. There will be a conftant interaction of the parts, and a normal commotion among them ; but no dif- location of orders ; no interchange of functions ; no invafions of office. Within fuch a focial fyftem ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 3 the individual man enjoys his maximum of perfonal liberty, and he has unreftricted room of develop- ment ; but the functions and the orders have little, if any room of relative development. A focial fyftem that is in a high condition of civilization will be inexorably confervative in whatever be- longs to the abftract ; and it is free, in the fulleft fenfe, as to whatever is concrete. Ultimate Civilization by the very import of the phrafe implies the fact of an anterior, or a more ancient Civilization ; or a lefs perfect, and an earlier condition, out of which the later, and the more perfect, has flowly arifen. Hiftory gives us no inftance of an extemporaneous civilization ; there can be none that has been newly manufac- tured none that has been planned and devifed, and put in courfe of experiment by the men of yef- terday ; none that comes frefh and bright from the fire, and the hammer, and the anvil. A high civilization muft be the product of ages, and the habitude of centuries \ it muft have been fo abraded in the pafTage of a multitude of years as that the ribs of the mould, wherein it was caft, were long ago rubbed off from its furface, and are now quite worn away. The civilization of a people muft have come to it, like its language, from a re- mote and almoft forgotten age ; or fay like its alluvial foil the depofit of uncounted eras. Inafmuch as Civilization is a term of the focial body, and finds its analogies in the animal organi- 4 ESS4TS, ETC. zation, an advanced civilization implies health throughout the body ; nor can it ever confift, either with a chronic difeafed condition of any part, or with unconfcioufnefs of fuch difeafe, in the fen- forium of the body. A perfect fenfitivenefs in the fenforium is the caution of Nature againft the in- fidious advances of difeafe, in the extremities. Analogies are helps, they are not proofs, they are not arguments ; and yet they are very fervice- able helps when a true and a fubftantiaiy^ze fpecified ; to the advancements, intellectual or moral, of the individual man ; for thefe take their rife in the illi- mitable treafure-houfe of Nature; they fpring from birth-gifts, of which, perhaps, no complete fample may hitherto have actually been given to the world. But as to any poflible advancements of the Social Mafs^ thefe will always take their limit from that which is the mean level of mind within it ; or, the average quantity of Mind in the Body Social. Individual minds may lift this mean level a degree or two, and may fuftain it for a while ; but the ftatic power of the community, after a little, takes its fteady effect upon the fcale. We may, therefore, fpeak of Ultimate Civiliza- tion, as a final condition of perfect health, in the focial body ; or, of diffufed and tranquil functional life throughout ; and yet we plant no hypothetic barrier acrofs the path of the individual man, as ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 9 if we might know the utmoft that may be poflible to him ; this we can never know. We note the boundary line of fociety, forward ; but we abftain from bandaging nature, in the man. There may be thofe, and there are fuch always, who will be dreaming about fome future unde- finable advancements of man in fociety. Harm- lefs dreams are thefe ; for the moft part they are the paftime of vague undifciplined intelle&s. An- ticipations which involve, or which demand, what is altogether hypothetic in human nature, and of which, in its elements, hiftory has nothing to fay, thefe things are juft now beyond our range of vifion. As we admit nothing fabulous in the paft, fo we build upon nothing fabulous in the future. Of every improvement, and advancement, which we difcern upon the horizon, a germ or a rudiment, if not more, is now under the hand, or it is quite in near profpecl:. II. WHATEVER may feem proper to our fubjedl: in this EiTay is advanced on the fuppofition that we have before us a file, or better to put it, an infu- lated community, a ONE PEOPLE ONE in all thofe fenfes that may bring it within the range of our analogy our illuftrative type Animal Organi- zation. We need not fuppofe that an infular peo- io ESSATS, ETC. pie is a&ually cut off from the fellowfhip of na- tions ; but we have now to do with it only in refpecl: to thofe interior functions, which, though they may be open to influences, or perturbations, from without, are thus interfered with in an inci- dental, or remote manner only. As to cofmopolitan civilization, the fubjecl: is not merely indefinitely vaft, but it involves the prefence, and the operation, of fome wholly dif- ferent principles. It is a great theme, and a theme of another order, in a logical fenfe. This caution, therefore, given, we return to our enclofed field. Within an infular community civilization is pro- moted, and facilitated, and is ftimulated, and, there- fore, it may be actually advanced by various means which fhould be called incidental ; and fome of them are quite fortuitous. But concerning fuch means it muft not be forgotten that each of them more or lefs fo, may claim to be confidered, either as a means a caufe of advancing civiliza- tion, or as the confequence of its advancing con- dition. In moft inftances that which we fhould think of as a caufe, viewed on one fide, looks more like a confequence viewed on fome other fide. A caufe it is if we are thinking of the accidents, or of the individual efforts that have attached to it at the moment of its rife : a confequence, an effect:, if we inquire concerning thofe needs of the time which it came forward to fupply. A caufe, feen at the moment of funrife : a confequence, looked at ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. n at earlieft break of day. So it was with the art of printing. The firft to be mentioned of thefe means, or thefe ftimulative caufes of civilization, are thofe happy difcoveries, and thofe furprifmg inventions and improvements in the Arts, which we have already named for the purpofe of excepting againft them, as things in which it does not confift, and in the prefence of which the condition of a peo- ple, at large, may be fuch as that we muft affign them a low place on the fcale of national well- being. Not only inventions, or great difcoveries in the Arts, but even the introduction of fome new, and hitherto unthought of material available in the Arts may vaftly facilitate the progrefs of an already advancing civilization ; and fo alfo may fome inconfiderable change in the domeftic, or the trading ufages of a people ; and which attract little attention, as they work themfelves filently into the routine of its daily life. Inftances of this order might be named in hundreds. The reader will here, perhaps, be thinking of vaft matters fuch as railway travelling fleam navigation the electric telegraph ; but we might be content to name inftances of a far humbler order, and may affirm that our now-prefent civilization ought not to difdain to own its obligations to improvements of a kind which philofophic writers would, per- haps, think quite beneath their notice. For in- ftance, what a burlefque upon " philofophic gene- 12 ESS ATS, ETC. ralifation" would it be to mention fuch things among the ftimulants of civilization, as the intro- duction and univerfal ufeof lucifer matches ! never- thelefs, the feptuagenarian ftudent, who remem- bers well his winter morning's conflict with flint, and fteel, and tinder-box, and brimftone-match, will own that he has won a fifteen minutes for his books, through fix months of the year, by aid of the lucifer match an infallible candle-lighter in three feconds ! Incalculable is the gain that has accrued in modern times in facilitating the free ex- preffion of thought by writing in fuch things as thefe : the adoption of a curfive hand-writing, in place of the fquare, or the uncial letter and along with this, the ufe of a limpid chemical dye, as ink, in the place of a body-ink ; and along with thefe, the coming in of cheap fcribbling paper. It has been by fuch means as thefe, not only that com- mercial and domeftic communication by writing has been fo vaftly extended ; but (which is of more importance) that the private utterance of thought, by the pen, has come to be fo much lefs formal, lefs periodic, and fo much more fpontaneous, and genuine, and full, and that it has gone fo far into detail ; and thus, that the vaft difference between ftiff literary antiquity, and our daily felves, in what- ever relates to the recording of our minds, has had its origin, and has come to be fo great as it is. In proportion as writing is aflimilated to the freedom of converfation, it fheds the common light of in- ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 13 tellectual life abroad ; and fends it far beyond pri- vileged circles. Small things, and things of the lefs noticeable order, are thofe that, in fact, have wrought the moft important changes in modern times. So it has been in Legiflative action. The popular no- tion of govermental agency, through the means of the enactment of laws, is of this fort that, by thefe organic evolutions a nation may be fet for- ward at great ftrides : and fuch, in fome rare inftances, has been the confequence of Acts of Parliament, and of ftatutes, and of the orders and decrees of autocratic ftates. When fuch enact- ments are good, and when they affimilate well with the people's condition, they are, in truth, the laft refults of flow focial advancements ; they are never its caufes. The legiflative formality is the utterance, in technical ftyle, of the everywhere out-fpoken fenfe of the community. But gover- mental regulations, and thofe changes of a lower order that come within the admitted powers of the feparate departments of a ftate, have often done more in ftimulating or in facilitating the focial improvement of a people, than has been effected by thofe arduous labours of fenates, which did not reach their iflue until a revolution, or the overthrow of public order, had become imminent. It might feem as if a tafte for paradoxes had led us aftray, if we were to put any fuch quef- tion as this Has Britifh civilization been moft , ETC. effectively promoted by Reform in Parliament by Catholic Emancipation by Abolition of the Com Laws, on the one hand ; or, on the other hand, by the Penny Poftage by the equalization of charges as to diftance thus effecting the anni- hilation of diftance^ as to bufinefs and the domeftic life, and by the practice of charging poftage by weight ? Small things comparatively, or fmall in the efteem of political agitators ; yet are they often of immeafurable importance in their bearing upon the moral and the intellectual progrefs of the people. And thus it is in the animal body : it is a notable thing to fet, or to refet a limb ; but it is doing more for life and health to reftore action throughout congefted microfcopic veflels over the entire furface of the body. It is good to endow colleges, and to found chairs and to ftipendiate profeflbrs ; but it may be a greater good to lower the duty upon paper, and upon tea, and upon bricks and timber. It is a good to annul obfolete ftatutes, reftridtive of the liberty of worfhip long enjoyed by all, fpite of ftatutes : it was a greater good to abolifh entirely and for ever the window tax. An enlightened government a government well underftanding its beneficial function will pafs, or will favour the patting of acts that have been demanded, in louder and louder tones, thefe ten years paft or more. But, without being afked to do it, it will do fuch things as might be likened ULTIMATE CI7ILIZ4TION. 15 to the better packing of the ballaft of a {hip the doing which allows the (hip to right herfelf. Conftitutional evolutions legislative reforms, may well be put out of our view, as if they might be pre-concerted, or brought about upon fhowing of reafons. They will come when they muft come and whether it be for good or for evil. Meantime the regulative and noifelefs a&s of an Executive muft fpring from the intelligence of individual men. Statefmen, as a clafs, will oppofe innovations of every kind ; but there comes in one official perfon in a thoufand who will bring them about, and rifk his political exiftence in doing it. What we are here concerned with are thofe matters that come within the admitted range of the meditative and fpeculative intelligence of edu- cated men : fuch things as obtrude themfelves upon notice in a community which, like that of Eng- land, is actually in a ftate of hopeful and rapid de- velopment, and of even-paced progrefs. A higher Civilization, thought of, and defired, and aimed at, and alfo in near profpecl:, is before us ; nor is our profpecl: intercepted by any defpotifm ftanding acrofs the road. Neither from above, nor from beneath is the Britifh people, juft now, threatened with defpotic interdictions. 16 ESSATS, ETC. in. A NATIONAL condition of hopeful progrefs toward a fettled, or permanent civilization (permanent, if, to human affairs at all, fuch an epithet may ever be applied) demands fuch things as we have already briefly indicated, and which mould now be fet in view with more fpeciality ; as thus : we muft find under our hand, in the focial body, the greateft number^ and the greateft variety of conftituents or of feparate and independent Elements. No cuftomary phrafe prefents itfelf, which, in the fulnefs of its meaning, may well ferve to re- prefent that independence, and that feparate force of the feveral conftituents of a focial mafs which we muft defire to find in it. For if we mould fay that fuch elements are antagonlftic, a ftate of unreft or of open rivalry is implied, which, if we may revert to our analogy, would induce not health, but difeafe, in the body, and which muft iflue in its diflblution. If we fpoke of feparate elements as heterogeneous^ then this word feems to forbid the hope of a tranquil and healthful inter- action among them : an organization binding together heterogeneous ingredients, will be fpend- ing its forces upon itjelf^ rather than combining them for the purpofes of the common life ; and yet it is certain that a thorough homogeneoufnefs in the materials of a community will confift only with the loweft order of focial exiftence. Little ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 17 can be expected from a focial mafs that might beft be refembled to the mollufcs Jelly only : or if jelly and fhell, then the analogy finds its antitype in the oriental condition defpot and flaves the holder and the holden ! Separate elements, tending more to conferve their feparate exiftence, than to lofe and merge it fuch mould we choofe as affording the moft aufpicious conditions, or as the charafteriftics of a community affumed to be in a hopeful ftate for advance in civilization. What then are the ingre- dients of our Englim focial mafs : Englijh^ here ftands for Britijh, and it embraces whatever be- longs to the one People centred in the one Go- vernment ? The firft, or the moft rudimental of thefe in- gredients, are its Aboriginal Diverfities of Race. The Englim population, when, with the records of its hiftory before us, we look round upon it as anobje&of phyfiological fcience, offers to the eye the ftill-diftinguifhable traces of the three or four Races^ that have become intimately commingled, by innumerable croffings, taking effecl: through many generations, and which yet, by virtue of an infcrutable law, conferve their phyfiognomical and phyfical chara&eriftics. But now, as related to our immediate fubjecl:, this fact is to be noted, that, although thefe diverfities have no doubt greatly contributed to make the Englim people what it is, in nerve, and bone, and mufcle, and animal energy, c 1 8 ESS ATS, ETC. and in moral tone, and in intellectual elafticity, they have at length and through a period of feven hundred years ceafed to be thought of, or to be recognized and have ceafed to interact, one upon the other, with any appreciable antagonifm, or mutual revulfion, or contrariety, and therefore we muft put them quite out of our reckoning, and dif- allow their claim to be mentioned among the in- gredients of our focial exiftence. At the rail of the chancel the " happy pair " kneel, fide by fide, quite unconfcious of the fact which the phyfiog- nomift is fure of that the one is Saxon, or Dane, the other Norman. Wonderful is that perfiftence of Race-types which are not loft among the inter- mixtures of a thoufand years ! Thefe race ele- ments, how much foever they may have made the Englifh Engtijb) are not, as fuck, to be now numbered among the active elements of Englifh civilization. Something different from this muft be faid in relation to National diverfities ; for thefe, while they include differences of race, have received an imprefs of long-continued political antagonifm, and are ftill vividly recognizable as counteractive elements within the Britifh focial mafs. England, Scotland, Ireland, are ftill three, as well as one ; and they are ftill three, more than they are one. Nor is the time near at hand, probably, when thefe nationalities mail have quite melted them- felves down into a homogeneous mafs. ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 19 At a point which we fhould look for fomewhere at a mid-diftance between antagonifm, in the fenfe of declared hoftility, and of a tame and fervile affentation fomewhere between machinations and the hatching of confpiracies, and an obfequious fubferviency at a point not very eafily found, or defined, we muft defire to fee national differences or avulfions perpetuated ; fo far as that we may continue to derive from them all the advantage which they yield in ftimulating, and pufhing for- ward, and, it may be, provoking the civilization of the entire people. It muft feem a nice matter to lay the finger upon this mid-point. Juft on one fide of it muft ftand thofe national prejudices thofe unreafoning and unreafonable diflikes, or inftinc- tive avulfions which hedge a people about, as re- lated to its neareft neighbours. On the other fide there will be many namelefs differences of tafte, and modes of behaviour, and many habitudes of fpeech, which are not indeed enough to keep worthy people apart, but which yet are enough to acl: as a drag upon the abfolute freedom and full enjoyment of focial and domeftic intercourfe. It is thus that England, Scotland, Ireland ftand related, each toward the other two ; the people are not enemies, far from it : they are not dan- gerous rivals : they are not employed in plotting each other's overthrow : they are not brooding over intended invafions or maffacres. Neverthe- lefs the three nations do maintain their decifive 20 ESS4TS, ETC. chara&eriftics ; and whoever it is, in the feat of power, that holds them in hand, feels each fepa- rately pulling its own way : he feels the near horfe, the middle horfe, and the off horfe, and he knows that each muft be looked to at every turn of the road ; and that the bit in the mouth of each muft be adjufted in relation to the temper of the creature, as over hot, or as fluggim. National differences affume a new afpect when, as is almoft always the fa6t, they receive an inten- fity from religious differences. Religious antago- nifms, confidered as powerful ftimulants of na- tional civilization and fuch indeed they are demand a diftin<5t and a thoughtful confideration. Everybody among ourfelves has at length come to underftand, or at leaft paflively to afTent to, this fimple and moft momentous truth that re- ligious differences, when inflamed by intolerance, become active caufes of focial confufion tending toward national difmtegration : this has been fig- nally exemplified in the paft hiftory of Spain, and of France. It is a truth not fo generally under- ftood among ourfelves or it is not fo cordially admitted that the abfolutely unreftriclied develop- ment, and the fixed confervation of religious dif- ferences, is a principal, and indeed an indifpenfable condition of Social Advancement, and of the pro- grefs of a people toward a ftate of equipoife, with- out ftagnation. Religious differences, well defined, firmly main- ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 21 tained, and freely developed, and in fuch a condi- tion that they are not merely elements^ but are energies within the focial mafs, when duly attem- pered, ftand, if not foremoft, yet quite prominent^ among the forces that are carrying us forward toward a higher civilization. This due tempera- ment, or this balancing of thefe energies implies fuch things as thefe : firft, there muft be, on the fide of abatement, or, let us fay, offafety the pre- valent fecular good fenfe of the mafs of the people there muft be a homely right feeling abroad, which is always ready to acl: as a rebuke and as a check upon religious violences, upon extrava- gancies, upon abfurdities, of all fpecies ; and which exprefTes itfelf (too rudely perhaps fometimes) through that harm-toned wind-inftrument the Newfpaper. But on the fide of abatement we need alfo, what is far better, and which is every way approvable, namely a genuine catholicity of feeling a properly Chriftian mood, pervading the religious community, and favoured always by the few better-minded leaders of each party, and which, at this time, is much promoted by thofe evangelical combinations that call forth large fympathies, phi- lanthropies, melting companions, ftrong enough to overflow all embankments. But there muft alfo be prefent a confervative, and, fo far, a mutually repulfive energy ; and it muft be in operation beneath the furface of the feveral communions ; for if there be not this 22 ESSATS, ETC. repulfive confervatifm, or if religious indifferentifm fhould prevail on all fides, and if what are conven- tionally flyled " minor differences " fhould come to be regarded as matters of no importance, if truth, even in fmall things, fhould fall into dif- efteem, then, as is evident, the energy of thefe feveral elements has pafTed away ; religious pro- feffion, as related to modifications of belief, and to modes of government and worfhip, has become flaccid ; and thenceforward religious differences, having ceafed to acT: as impulfes^ are left to reft upon the furface of fociety as fo many dead en- cumbrances : they are the debris of the old red fandftone, and of the granite of a remote era of religious earneftnefs. In abatement of the mortification one may have felt in liftening to the vivacity and the eagernefs of certain religious perfuafions, pleading for them- felves upon very nugatory argumentative grounds confiderations of this order may take effecl:. We may remember that, apart from this perti- nacity of a narrow-going logic, the needful vitality of thefe elements would be gone. Convince the zealous upholder of certain forms and modes that he u difquiets himfelf in vain," and in doing fo you unnerve him ; expand his views, and you induce upon him a faintnefs, and he becomes, if more of a philofopher, yet lefs of an efficient force within the great mechanifm of our focial exiftence. It is unavoidable in treating fubjects of this ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 23 kind, fuch as they appear when feen from the fecular point of view, that we fhould fpeak of what is ordinarily regarded from quite another point of view, in a ftyle which may alarm or of- fend fome Chriftian people. Yet the nervous apprehenfion of doing fo the over caution, and the timidity, leading toward evafivenefs^ which thence would take its rife, brings with it a danger of a more ferious kind even the rifk of gene- rating, in other minds, a fufpicion as to Chrif- tianity itfelf. An even-paced courage, founded upon knowledge, muft always be fafe. Antagoniftic elements of one kind often over- lap, or dove-tail into, antagoniftic elements of another kind. It is thus that, within the Britifh commonwealth, the nationalities intermix with the religious differences more or lefs fo. So it is with Scotland and its puritanifm, fpread over Eng- land in its nonconformity ; and with Ireland, and its romanifm, fp^read over England in its noble fa- milies and its gentry, ftill adhering to the faith of 1500. There is another interlacing which needs to be mentioned, although it has ceafed to be of much importance : this is that of the religious elements with the permanent partition of the Bri- tifh people into the three eftates of the ariftocracy, the mercantile or monied body, and the induftrial whether manufacturing, rural, or municipal plough-driving, or fhopkeeping. It is upon the broad bafis of this triform antagonifm that Britifh 24 ESS ATS, ETC. energy, and its world-wide developments, take their ftart. Should one of thefe principal elements of living power ever fall from its place, or forget itfelf fhould it become effete, or fliould it fuc- cumb to its oppofite, England will be England no more : it will not, as now it is, be prefent on all ihores ; it will not, as now it is, be in command on all oceans : thenceforward it muft be looked for nowhere, but on the pages of tranfatlantic hif- torians ; for it will have loft even its own literary exiftence, along with its fupremacy in arts and arms. Everyone underftands that the threefold confti- tution of the Britifh commonwealth finds now no exprefiion of itfelf in the obfolete conftitutional formula the king, the lords, and the commons, of our earlier hiftory. More real, and widely un- like each other are thofe conditions under which ariftocratic life, mercantile life, trading life, induf- trial life, rear and train the individual man, from his very babyhood to his ripe years. It can never be otherwife than that the average man or, as we call him, the reprefentative man of each of thefe orders, mall differ from his brethren of either of the other claffes mail differ, not only in a marked manner, but in a manner the chara&eriftics of which are quite indelible. The inftances muft be rare in the extreme, if indeed any one fuch in- ftance could be adduced, in which thefe charac- teriftics have been wholly effaced, either by fignal ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 25 revolutions of fortune, or by the force of mind, in the individual man. The permanence of thefe fixed diftin&ions af- fords therefore a ground of calculation as to the onward movements of the Social Mafs. So long as thefe orders are maintained, each clafs will be working its deftined effecl: upon the other clafles, in the way of an emulative and a ftimulative ele- ment. The others would not continue to be what they^are, or what they may be feverally, if any one of them were removed, or were to become unim- portant. Under the now harmonious balancings of the feveral orders, this reciprocity, this invigo- rative interaction, is felt, and is recognized on all hands. The Induftrial Clafs, efpecially, has fo been brought into correfpondence with the Ariftocratic, as that there has been communicated to both, in different modes, a fort of galvanic impulfe, which is greatly beneficial to both, and not lefs fo to the loftier, than to the lower of the two. There have indeed been times of peril when fome real caufes of difquiet, and fome that were imaginary, have afforded to the crafty demagogue an occafion, which he has eagerly improved, for inflaming the induftrial Mind. There have been moments when the equipoife of the fyftem has been nearly overthrown, and when its utter ruin has come to be imminent. But the gloomy day paffed over, and the morrow of England was fine. Let it be affirmed, if it may with truth be 26 ESS ATS, ETC. affirmed, that a high civilization is attainable, as well (or better) apart from Monarchy and Arifto- cracy, as with their prefence and help. The in- ftance of any fuch focial marvel, or of a Social Syftem, thus fruftrate has yet to be produced from the book of Hiftory. Meantime it ftiould be fhown, in fupport of a theory thus unauthenti- cated, that a clearly-defined element intrinfically effective, as toward other elements an element the more, would, if it were removed, or if it were rendered ineffective, leave the mafs by fo much the more enriched, and by fo much the better fitted for attaining an advanced civilization. To fhow a probability on this fide, in favour of a mere hypothefis, would not be eafy. But does not every community contain a nu- merous clafs which has not been named in the above account of the ftated conftituents of the Social Syftem ? Affu redly it does. A clafs hete- rogeneous and helplefs, inorganic and unfervice- able, conftituted of the uncounted multitude that has filtered down from out of the Induftrial Clafs, firjl and next, in a fmaller proportion, from the trading clafs, and to fome extent from the mer- cantile, and even, it may be, from the ariftocratic clafTes. The exiftence of this inorganic multitude this undefined, undefinable, unintended, and neverthe- lefs this conftant body, muft be diftin&ly recog- nized in a community that would think itfelf to be ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 27 in a hopeful ftate, and that believes itfelf to be pro- greflive toward a higher civilization. And not merely muft this multitude be recognized ; but it muft be held conftantly in view ; it muft be in- cefTantly thought of; and in fuch ways it muft be cared for as may be approvable firft, on the grounds of an enlightened Chriftian benevolence ; andfecondfy, on the grounds of political fcience ; or rather, on grounds whereupon the two fpecies of influence may be found to coincide, and to har- monize. A recognition of this mixed multitude the camp-followers of focial order conftituted as it is of thofe who bring with them their humanity, and its urgent wants, and its miferies, and thefe miferies mixed up confufedly with its individual wrongfulnefs this recognition will lead on to ano- ther branch of our fubjecl: when we mail have to mention thofe prevalent beliefs, or thofe diffufed habits of feeling thofe undefined moral principles, apart from which, or in their abfence, a commu- nity muft not be allowed to fpeak hopefully con- cerning itfelf. IV. IT would be an idle occupation in truth it would be a mockery to fpeculate, or to hold difcourfe concerning the advancing civilization of a Com- munity within which there exifts, in a legalized 28 ESS ATS, ETC. and authenticated form, any ufage that has been inherited from barbarifm, and that is a chara&e- riftic, and a caufe, and a confequence, of a low ftage of focial life a ftage not far raifed above the favage condition. So long as barbarifm, in any one of its cuftomary manifeftations, is recognized by a State and by a people, with approval fo long as fuch a ufage is not merely tolerated, but is pleaded for, and is boafted of fo long muft we continue to leave them out of our account, when we are confidering the means and the conditions of national progrefs. The exiftence, in the bofom of a denfe popula- tion, of a large indigent clafs, enduring the extreme miferies of want, and liable to the worfe wretched- nefs of moral ruin, is believed (whether on fuffi- cient grounds or not) to be everywhere an inevi- table evil. Purely evil it is held to be ; and as fuch it is undefired, it is unintended, it is difal- lowed, it is difapproved. None among us come forward to argue for it as a good, or to fpeak of it as evil, in appearance only. This mifery of a clafs is the fubjecl: of earned inquiries inquiries re- newed with zeft at fhort intervals. Every one afks What is the remedy ? What is it that can be done to remove, or to exclude entirely, or to mitigate this wretchednefs, phyfical and moral ? So far, then, there is a conftant preflure, tending toward the diminution, or the abfolute abolition of what all fo much deplore. ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 29 How great foever may be the extent of the in- digent clafs, or how deep foever the miferies that are endured within its dark borders, it does not prohibit national progrefs fo long as it is in this manner as above faid recognized, and deplored, and is fubjecled to remedial action whether wifely ordered, or otherwife. The cafe is wholly different when the fpe&acle of national life prefents to view the terrible paradox of fome barbaric ufage or inftitution, which is re- cognized as a goody and is vaunted of as a glory and is upheld with arrogant determination to con- ferve it to the laft. Thefe relics of barbarifm may be enumerated thus *Polygamy, Infanticide, Legalized Profti- tution, Capricious Divorce, Sanguinary and Im- moral Games, Inflidtion of Torture, Wars of Ra- pacity, Cafte, and Slavery. In fight of communities tolerating any one of thefe Plagues, philanthropy fickens. If the recognition and the authentication of any barbaric ufage bars the advance of a people, and poftpones the confideration of its future good, fo may the exiftence, within it, of a large indigent clafs, If it be not thought of if it is not cared for ; or if it be thought of, and cared for, only here and there, by a martyr-like philanthropift. The mafles juft above the miferable loweft, and from thefe to * " Effays, etc." p. 345. 30 ESS ATS, ETC. thofe next above, even to the uppermoft, muft have become formally cognizant of this wretch ednefs near them ; as well as incidentally informed con- cerning it. Each clafs, and each in its own manner, muft have given ear willingly to thofe who have dived into the abyfs, and have come up to make their report concerning its woes. There muft pervade the feveral fuperincumbent orders, a fen- fitivenefs, a difquietude, a reftlefs defire to find and to apply practicable remedies ; and there muft be a willingnefs to render fubftantial aid in whatever mode has been found to be the moft approvable. If this be the mind and feeling of the feveral eftates of the commonwealth, as toward the helplefs and miferable, then its own progrefs may well be re- garded as hopeful. Certainly not if it be otherwife. The remedial means that may have been recom- mended, and reforted to, at the firft impulfe of this humane difquietude, were perhaps fuch as muft be difallowed, for they were ill-judged and ineffective ; or they may even be of a kind that is likely to aggravate, more than to alleviate, the evils in view. All this may be ; and fuch unap- proved movements are a probable confequence of the unlooked-for difclofure of thofe appalling facts which benevolent zeal has difclofed. Sudden re- velations of extreme mifery give rife to temporizing expedients for its relief. Such things may be ; and worfe woes may fpring up to aftound thofe who had expected to bring home a golden harveft. Yet ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 31 notwithftanding a feries of difappointments, good muft enfue in the end, fo long as the national fen- fitivenefs, in regard to the lot of helplefs thoufands, is maintained in its due vivacity. What then does this Senfitivenefs this hu- mane confcioufnefs imply ? And what are the re- medial courfes to which it will give rife ? And in what modes will any fuch means actually take effecl: ? Queftions a reply to which will beft be given, informally, and in fuch manner as to interweave the various matters that are therein involved. Writers of a certain clafs in the department of political economy demand an unconditional af- fent to axioms concerning the phyfical and the moral well-being of a people, which axioms they affirm to be demonftrably true, and which more- over are of a kind that comes within the province of arithmetic to make intelligible ; and fo it would be, if only human nature and horfe nature might properly be treated of in the fame modes of ex- preffion, and might be fubje&ed to the fame for- mulae. We underftand human nature otherwife. There can be no queftion thus far, that whatever per centage of the population it is which is found, at any time, to belong to the indigent cafte, and whatever may be the depth of its wretchednefs, and the meafure of its deftitution, thefe things are produces of caufes that are calculable to a great extent. The ratio of increafe in the population the caufes which are regulative of wages the 32 ESS4TS, ETC. revolutions and viciffitudes of man u fa 61 u res the turn of foreign trade and commerce, and the ba- lancings of the energies of neighbouring nations, are intelligible caufes of the increafe, or of the decreafe of deftitution in the loweft clafs, as they are of comfort, or of diftrefs in the induftrial and trading clafs. Influences like .thefe, and many there are that have equal claims to be confidered, concur to render the reafonings of Political Eco- nomy infinitely complicated, and, to a great ex- tent, precarious and difappointing. A refult ap- proximately true is the beft that ought to be looked for, as likely to reward the labours of thofe who, difdaining to fee in human nature anything which figures will not fymbolize, or which tables will not bring under the eye, are driven in upon the fallacies of a hypothetic philofophy. The actual number of the indigent in a com- munity, and the quality of the mifery that is en- dured by them, are determined, as much by influ- ences that are undefmable, as they are by caufes that may be fpecified, and meafured, and numbered. The condition of thofe who float, or who are driven, hither and thither, outfide of the pale of Induftrial Order, ftands related to the ftate of feeling and opinion, and to the domeftic habits, and the modes of life that prevail in the clafs proximate to thefe outcafts : that is to fay, the clafs from which, chiefly, though not folely, thefe outcafts drop off, one by one, into the abyfs. ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 33 A procefs of difmtegration is always going on upon the lower furface of the loweft induftrial clafs, which augments the inorganic mafs beneath ; but at what rate it (hall make thefe augments depends greatly upon the habits and the feeling which pervade that penultimate clafs. The feeling and habits of this clafs are the con- fequence of what is prevalent in the clafs next above this, and which we might defignate as the antepenultimate. And thus fhould we afcend, in fearch of the effective opinion of the community, from rank to rank, and we fhall find it to be the moft effective in the middle zone of focial con- fcioufnefs the region of thoughtful and enter- prifing fyrnpathy. We fhall find effective fym- pathies on that level where education, and a fenfe of refponfibility, and the wider range of thought that attaches to the difcharge of public functions, are at the beft. It will be on that level that we muft find if anywhere a feeling concerning THE DUES OF HUMANITY which will operate, with more or lefs force, as a regulative caufe, determining the actual conditions of human life, down to its loweft ranges. What thefe condi- tions are will, in fome degree, depend upon the feeling of the community as to what they ought to be. What then fhould the Dues of Humanity in- clude ? Certainly we intend by this phrafe no fuch things as are cuftomarily claimed for " every D 34 ESS ATS, ETC. citizen," by political theorifts, or fuch as are noifed by felf-feeking demagogues. Let political rights be pleaded for, where rights can, to fome good purpofe, be argued, and afcertained in fenates, and in newfpapers. Such rights as thefe can be claimed in behalf only of about a twenty per cent, of the wretched namely, the adult males among them the able-bodied, and thofe who, for the moft part, if they were to receive their dues, muft accept them in the fhape of chaftifement for vaga- bondifm. Thofe Dues of Humanity which we have to claim are to be claimed in behalf of the helplefs woman, and of her lucklefs infants, and of the maimed, and of the fick, and of the imbecile, and of the aged ; a great multitude it is, and fuch it will be, wherever millions of people are denfely congregated. Thefe then are our clients ; but what is it that we are intending to claim for them ? Is it Parochial Relief? This is accorded al- ready; and it actually meets a fmall portion of the multitude, and to thefe it affords the Jiatuteable minimum of fupply for the animal neceffities of human nature. Is what we claim that which may be afforded within eleemofynary eftablimments ? This fource alfo does its part, through the filtra- tion of trufteeftiips, and of official favouritifm. Is it the miniftrations of cafual and private charity ? It is thefe ; but it is much more than thefe. Whether or not the promptings and the im- ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 35 pulfes of a fenfitive philanthropy can be realized in particular inftances whether or not the wretch- ednefs which we come to the knowledge of may be alTuaged, at this moment ; or if not to-day foon, yet there remains, to demand inceflant thought, the condition of thofe who are deftitute of what we have defignated as the Dues of Hu- manity ; and thefe dues include thofe undefined, and undefinable good things of life good things, as well for the body as the foul thofe comforts, thofe decencies, thofe natural enjoyments, thofe endearments, thofe means of prefent well-being, thofe hopes and poffibilitiesof improvement, which, when the miferable are in our view, float before us, dimly feen, and which, in facl:, are a refraction from everyone's perfonal confcioufnefs of comfort, and of fufficiency, and of hopefulnefs. Tacitly, we demand, for whoever is miferable, fuch things as make the difference between their lot and our own. Every humane and fenfitive mind carries about it its individual idea, or its unexprefled conception of what is due to humanity ; not as to factitious wants ; but as to fuch as are univerfal and fubftantial. There is a condition, animal moral intellectual, which each of us holds before himfelf, as hypothe- tically fitting to human nature proper to it ; it is, in my eftimate, a minimum of good, lefs than which, if we find any in human form wanting it, the fpectacle can never be regarded without a pun- 36 ESS4TS, ETC. gent diftrefs it is a fpe&acle that is intolerable ; and yet it is not to be driven off with a felfifh fhrug ; but rather is to be thought of, until the re- medy be found and applied. The Dues of Humanity are whatever thofe things are which go to make up, in each mind, the abftracl: conception of the lot of our fellows, according to our individual fenfitivenefs, and our conftitutional power of fympathy, and the meafure of our companions everyone's " bowels of mercies." If it be fo, and if, for the recognition of the indigent and the outcaft clafs, and for the effecT:ivenefs of any remedial means, we are to look to the diffufed humane feeling of the clafles next above the loweft, then, in aiming at the pro- greflive civilization of a people, the foremoft care mould be given to whatever tends to cherifh and D to enhance the fenfitivenefs of that clafs ; and therefore it is that care mould be taken to con- trovert, or to prevent the defufion among them, of the vilifying doctrines of materialifm. There is a momentous truth, although it is vaguely exprefled, in the aphorifm Men will be, whatever you think them to be ; or, otherwife worded Human Nature rifes, and it falls, in its phyfical, and in its moral condition, in accordance with popular beliefs concerning it. Think ill of all the world, and of thofe around you, and they will not fail to juftify your eftimate of them. So it is undoubtedly within the domeftic circle : ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 37 children, fervants, are falfe, fraudful, foul, if the mifanthropic man, who is father and mafter, lets fall among them, in his outbreaks of paffion, his opinion that they are fo. On this ground it is that Chriftianity works its way in Chriftianizing a community if only it have free fcope. It does this, not by glozing the evil that is in the world ; not by extenuating, or by exaggerating the damage which human nature has fuftained ; but it does fo by raiting, in all minds, the ideal of human nature ; by enhancing, to the utmoft intenfity, the confcioufnefs of the difference between good and evil, and the after iffues of both ; by opening the gate of immortality to the moft degraded of beings ; and not the leaft by giving force tothofe emotions that are needed for furmounting the difgufts and averfions that hedge off the wretched near us. Precepts, enjoin- ing a&s of mercy, take effecl: upon confciences, and they wring alms out of grudging natures ; but a CHRISTIAN SENSITIVENESS toward moral de- gradation and toward bodily fuffering takes effect upon better upon loftier natures, and in its re- fults it immeafurably goes beyond the range of any formal commandment, or any motive of fear. The heterogeneous indigent multitude every- where wearing nearly the fame afpecl: of fqualor requires that fome diftinftions fhould be regarded as to its conftituents. There are depths, and there are ftill lower depths, of mifery mifery 38 ESSJrS, ETC. which is the fixed lot of thoufands of the people. At the very loweft level, or on the bafement of the pit, there are thofe nor is it known what pro- portion they bear to the whole, who may be de- fignated as the Aborigines of Woe-land born they were in it ; trained in it ; habituated are they to the fullen modes of a favage exiftence ; they have known no other mode ; and the confequent unconfcioufnefs of their condition is that which is the moft charafteriftic of thefe natives of the den. It is this want of the " Woe is me !" that renders their recovery fo hopelefs. As to any fragmentary elements of the religious confcioufnefs, fcarcely are any fuch fragments difcoverable in this cafte. Whatever is done for them muft be applied as by force : never will fuch miniftrations be invited; and therefore it is that a diftindl: recognition of the exiftence, and the nearnefs to us, of fuch a clafs fhould be regarded as the firft poftulate of popular civilization. Where no fuch recognition has been made, and where nothing has been attempted for the removal of favage life from the heart of great cities, no boaft can rightfully be made on behalf of a people as if they were moving in an onward courfe. Let us rather blufh for whatever feems to be great and profperous, until we have taken this work in hand ; and until we mail be doing it to purpofe. Prefenting itfelf under nearly the fame afpe&s clad in the fame difmal coftumes there are very ULTIMATE CIVILIZATION. 39 many of quite another order. Thefe are thofe who, one by one, or three or five together, banded in misfortune, have fallen out of place in the clafs to which they belong by birth and habits.