tion of
conscientious men is a corporation _with_ a conscience.
Law never made men a whit more just; and, by means of their
respect for it, even the well-disposed are daily made the
agents on injustice. A common and natural result of an
undue respect for the law is, that you may see a file of
soldiers, colonel, captain, corporal, privates,
powder-monkeys, and all, marching in admirable order over
hill and dale to the wars, against their wills, ay, against
their common sense and consciences, which makes it very
steep marching indeed, and produces a palpitation of the heart.
They have no doubt that it is a damnable business in
which they are concerned; they are all peaceably inclined.
Now, what are they? Men at all? or small movable forts and
magazines, at the service of some unscrupulous man in power?
Visit the Navy Yard, and behold a marine, such a man as an
American government can make, or such as it can make a man
with its black arts--a mere shadow and reminiscence of
humanity, a man laid out alive and standing, and already,
as one may say, buried under arms with funeral accompaniment,
though it may be,

"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero was buried."

The mass of men serve the state thus, not as men mainly,
but as machines, with their bodies. They are the standing army,
and the militia, jailers, constables, posse comitatus, etc.
In most cases there is no free exercise whatever of the
judgement or of the moral sense; but they put themselves
on a level with wood and earth and stones; and wooden men
can perhaps be manufactured that will serve the purpose as well.
Such command no more respect than men of straw or a lump of dirt.
They have the same sort of worth only as horses and dogs.
Yet such as these even are commonly esteemed good citizens.
Others--as most legislators, politicians, lawyers, ministers,
and office-holders--serve the state chiefly with their heads;
and, as they rarely make any moral distinctions, they are as
likely to serve the devil, without _intending_ it, as God.
A very few--as heroes, patriots, martyrs, reformers in the
great sense, and _men_--serve the state with their consciences
also, and so necessarily resist it for the most part; and
they are commonly treated as enemies by it. A wise man will
only be useful as a man, and will not submit to be "