man will not reverence these? And yet, behold, the man is not
sane but insane, who considers these alone as venerable. Oceans of
horse-hair, continents of parchment, and learned-serjeant eloquence,
were it continued till the learned tongue wore itself small in the
indefatigable learned mouth, cannot make unjust just. The grand
question still remains, Was the judgment just? If unjust, it will not
and cannot get harbour for itself, or continue to have footing in this
Universe, which was made by other than One Unjust. Enforce it by never
such statuting, three readings, royal assents; blow it to the four
winds with all manner of quilted trumpeters and pursuivants, in the
rear of them never so many gibbets and hangmen, it will not stand, it
cannot stand. From all souls of men, from all ends of Nature, from the
Throne of God above, there are voices bidding it: Away, away! Does it
take no warning; does it stand, strong in its three readings, in its
gibbets and artillery-parks? The more woe is to it, the frightfuler
woe. It will continue standing for its day, for its year, for its
century, doing evil all the while; but it has One enemy who is
Almighty: dissolution, explosion, and the everlasting Laws of Nature
incessantly advance towards it; and the deeper its rooting, more
obstinate its continuing, the deeper also and huger will its ruin and
overturn be.

In this God's-world, with its wild-whirling eddies and mad
foam-oceans, where men and nations perish as if without law, and
judgment for an unjust thing is sternly delayed, dost thou think that
there is therefore no justice? It is what the fool hath said in his
heart. It is what the wise, in all times, were wise because they
denied, and knew forever not to be. I tell thee again, there is
nothing else but justice. One strong thing I find here below: the just
thing, the true thing. My friend, if thou hadst all the artillery of
Woolwich trundling at thy back in support of an unjust thing; and
infinite bonfires visibly waiting ahead of thee, to blaze centuries
long for thy victory on behalf of it,--I would advise thee to call
halt, to fling down thy baton, and say, "In God's name, No!" Thy
'success'? Poor devil, what will thy success amount to? If the thing
is unjust, thou hast not succeeded; no, not though bonfires
blazed from North to South, and bells rang, and editors wrote
leading-articles, and the just thing lay trampled out of sight, to all
mortal eyes an abolished and ann