ural right, but to be
settled by convention, as the good and safety of society may require. If
society should disfranchise individuals convicted of infamous crimes,
would this be an invasion of natural right? Yet this would not be
justified on the score of their moral guilt, but that the good of
society required or would be promoted by it. We admit the existence of a
moral law, binding on societies as on individuals. Society must act in
good faith. No man, or body of men, has a right to inflict pain or
privation on others, unless with a view, after full and impartial
deliberation, to prevent a greater evil. If this deliberation be had,
and the decision made in good faith, there can be no imputation of moral
guilt. Has any politician contended that the very existence of
governments in which there are orders privileged by law, constitutes a
violation of morality; that their continuance is a crime, which men are
bound to put an end to, without any consideration of the good or evil to
result from the change? Yet this is the natural inference from the dogma
of the natural equality of men as applied to our institution of
slavery--an equality not to be invaded without injustice and wrong, and
requiring to be restored instantly, unqualifiedly, and without reference
to consequences.

This is sufficiently common-place, but we are sometimes driven to
common-place. It is no less a false and shallow, than a presumptuous
philosophy, which theorizes on the affairs of men as a problem to be
solved by some unerring rule of human reason, without reference to the
designs of a superior intelligence, so far as he has been placed to
indicate them, in their creation and destiny. Man is born to subjection.
Not only during infancy is he dependent, and under the control of
others; at all ages, it is the very bias of his nature, that the strong
and the wise should control the weak and the ignorant. So it has been
since the days of Nimrod. The existence of some form of slavery in all
ages and countries, is proof enough of this. He is born to subjection as
he is born in sin and ignorance. To make any considerable progress in
knowledge, the continued efforts of successive generations, and the
diligent training and unwearied exertions of the individual, are
requisite. To make progress in moral virtue, not less time and effort,
aided by superior help, are necessary; and it is only by the matured
exercise of his knowledge and his virtue, that he can at