ls, of our attitude toward
those who are more developed than we are, and toward those who
are about equally developed; but my address to-day will be mainly
occupied with our duty toward those who are or seem to be
wholly undeveloped. The fundamental principle of Ethics is that
every human being possesses indefeasible worth. It is comparatively
easy to apply the principle of anticipating our neighbor's latent
talents to the highly gifted, to the great authors, scientists,
statesmen, artists, and even to the moderately gifted, for
their worth is, in part, already manifested in their lives. But it is not
so easy to apply or justify the principle in the case of the obscure
masses, whose lives are uneventful, unilluminated by talent, charm,
or conspicuous service, and who, as individuals at least, it might
appear, could well be spared without impairing the progress of the
human race. And yet this doctrine of the worth of all is the
cornerstone of our democracy. Upon it rests the principle of the
equal rights of even the humblest before the law, the equal right of
all to participate in the government. It is also the cornerstone of all
private morality; for unless we accept it, we cannot take the
spiritual attitude toward those who are undeveloped.

The doctrine, then, that every man possesses indefeasible worth is
the basis of public morality, and at the same time the moral
principle by which our private relations to our fellow-men are
regulated. What does it mean to ascribe indefeasible worth to
every man? It means, for instance, that human beings may not be
hunted and killed in sport as hunters kill birds or other game; that
human beings may not be devoured for food as they have been by
cannibals or sometimes by men in starvation camps when hard
pressed by hunger; that human beings may not be forced to work
without pay, or in any way treated as mere tools or instruments for
the satisfaction of the desires of others. This, and more to the same
purpose, is implied in the ascription of indefeasible worth to every
man. Moreover, on the same principle, it follows that it is morally
wrong to deprive another of the property which he needs for his
livelihood or for the expression of his personality, and to blast the
reputation of another--thereby destroying what may be called his
social existence. And it also follows that a society is morally most
imperfect, the conditions of which are such that many lives are
indirectly sacrific