In swordsman," says Mr. Jay,* "the practised marksman, is ever more ready to engage in personal combats, than the man who is unaccustomed to the use of deadly weapons. those portions of our country where it is supposed essential to personal safety to go armed with pistols and bowie-knives, mortal affrays are so frequent as to excite but little attention, and to secure, with rare exceptions, impunity to the murderer; whereas, at the North and East, where we are unprovided with such facilities for taking life, comparatively few murders of the kind are perpetrated. We might, indeed, safely submit the decision of the principle we are discussing to the calculations of pecuniary interest. Let two men, equal in age and health, apply for an insurance on their lives; one known to be ever armed to defend his honor and his life against every assailant; and the other, a meek, unresisting Quaker. Can we doubt for a moment which of these men would be deemed by the Insurance Company most likely to reach a good old age?" The second of these grounds is a part of the unalterable nature of man, which was recognised in early ages, though unhappily it has been rarely made the basis of intercourse among nations. It is an expansion of the old Horatian adage, Si vis me flere, primam flendum est tibi; if you wish me to weep, you must yourself first weep. So are we all knit together the feelings in our own bosom awaken corresponding feelings in the bosom of others; as harp answers to harp in its softest vibrations; as deep responds to deep in the might of its passions. What within us is good invites the good in our brother; generosity begets generosity; love wins love; Peace secures Peace; while all within us that is bad challenges the bad in our brother; distrust engenders distrust; hate provokes hate; War arouses War. Life is full of illustrations of this beautiful law. Even the miserable maniac, in whose mind the common rules of conduct are overthrown, confesses its overruling power, and the vacant stare of madness may be illumined by a word of love. The wild beasts * Address before the American Peace Society, p. 23, 24. confess it; and what is the interesting story of Orpheus, whose music drew, in listening rapture, the lions and panthers of the forest, but an expression of this prevailing law ?* Literature abounds in illustrations of this principle. Looking back to the early dawn of the world, one of the most touching scenes which we behold, illumined by that Auroral light, is the peaceful visit of the aged Priam to the tent of Achilles to intreat the body of his son. The fierce combat has ended in the death of Hector, whose unhonored corse the bloody Greek has already trailed behind his chariot. The venerable father, after twelve days of grief, is moved to efforts to regain the remains of the Hector he had so dearly loved. He leaves his lofty cedarn chamber, and with a single aged attendant, unarmed, repairs to the Grecian camp, by the side of the distant sounding sea. Entering alone, he finds Achilles within his tent; in the company of two of his chiefs. He grasps his knees, and kisses those terrible homicidal hands, which had taken the life of his son. The heart of the inflexible, the angry, the inflamed Achilles, is touched by the sight which he beholds, and responds to the feelings of Priam. He takes the suppliant by the hand, seats him by his side, consoles his grief, refreshes his weary body, and concedes to the prayers of a weak, unarmed, old man, what all Troy in arms could not win. In * There is a striking illustration of this law in the incident recorded by Homer in the Odyssey, (XIV, 30, 31,) where Ulysses, on reaching his loved Ithaca, is beset by dogs, who are described as wild beasts in ferocity, and who barking rushed towards him; but he, with craft, (that is the word of Homer) seats himself upon the earth, and lets his staff fall from his hands; thus in unarmed repose finding protection. A similar incident is noticed by Mr. Mure in his entertaining travels in Greece; and also by Mr. Borrow in his Bible in Spain. Pliny remarks that all dogs may be appeased in the same way. Impetus eorum, et sævitia mitigantur ab homine considente humi. Nat. Hist. Lib. VIII. cap. 40. This scene fills a large part of a book of the Iliad. (XXIV.) It is instructive to all, who would know what commends itself most truly to the heart of man, what is most truly grand, to observe that the passages of Homer which receive the most unquestioned admiration are--not the bloody combats even of the bravest chiefs, even of the Gods themselves-but those two passages in which he has painted the gentle, unwarlike, affections of our nature; the parting of Hector and Andromache, and the supplication of Priam. this scene the poet, with unconscious power, has presented a picture of the omnipotence of that law of our nature, making all mankind of kin, in obedience to which no word of kindness, no act of confidence, falls idly to the earth. Among the legendary passages of Roman history, perhaps none makes a deeper impression, than that scene, after the Roman youth had been consumed at Allia, and the invading Gauls under Brennus had entered the city, where we behold the venerable Senators of the Republic, too old to flee, and careless of surviving the Roman name, seated each on his curule chair, in a temple, unarmed, looking, as Livy says, more august than mortal, and with the majesty of the Gods. The Gauls gaze on them as upon sacred images, and the hand of slaughter, which had raged through the streets of Rome, is stayed by the sight of an assembly of unarmed old men. At length a Gaul approaches and gently strokes with his hand the silver beard of a Senator, who, indignant at the license, smites the barbarian with his ivory staff; which was the signal for general vengeance. Think you, that a band of savages could have slain these Senators, if the appeal to force had not first been made by one of their own number!* Following this sentiment in the literature of modern times we find its pervading presence. I will not dwell on the examples which arise to the mind.† I will allude only to that *This story is recounted by Livy, Lib. V. Cap. 4, 2; also by Plutarch in his life of Camillus. It is properly repudiated by Niebuhr as a legend; but it is none the less important, as an illustration of that law, which is considered in the The heart of man confesses that the Roman Senator provoked death for himself and associates. text. + Guizot preserves an instance of the effect which was produced by an unarmed man before a violent multitude, employing the word instead of a sword. (Guizot, Historie de la Civilization, Tom. II. p. 36.) Who can forget that finest scene in that noble historical romance, the Promessi Sposi, where Fra Cristofero, in an age of violence, after slaying a comrade in a broil, in unarmed penitence, seeks the presence of the family and retainers of his victim, and awakens by his dignified gentleness, the admiration of those who were mad with the desire of vengeance? A popular romance, which has just left the press, and is now read in both hemispheres, Le Juif Errant, by Eugene Sue, has an interesting picture, at the close of the second volume, of the superiority of Christian courage over the hired and trained violence of soldiers. scene in Swedish poetry, where Frithiof, in deadly combat with Atlé, when the falchion of the latter broke, said, throwing away his own weapon;— Swordless foeman's life Ne'er dyed this gallant blade. The two champions now closed in mutual clutch; they hugged like bears, says the Poet; 'Tis o'er; for Frithiof's matchless strength Has felled his ponderous size; And 'neath that knee, at giant length, Supine the Viking lies. "But fails my sword, thou Berserk swart !" The voice rang far and wide, "Its point should pierce thy inmost heart, Its hilt should drink the tide." "Be free to lift the weaponed hand," Undaunted Atlé spoke, Hence, fearless, quest thy distant brand! Thus I abide the stroke." Frithiof regains his sword, intent to close the dread debate, while his adversary awaits the stroke; but his heart responds to the the generous courage of his foe; he cannot injure one, who has shown such confidence in him ;— This quelled his ire, this checked his arm, I cannot leave these illustrations without alluding particularly to the history of the treatment of the insane, which is full of deep instruction, showing how strong in nature must be the principle, which leads us to respond to the conduct and feelings of others. When Pinel first proposed to remove the heavy chains from the raving maniacs of the hospitals of Paris, he was regarded as one who saw visions, or dreamed dreams. His wishes were gratified at last; and the change was immediate; the wrinkled front of evil passions was smoothed into the serene countenance of Peace. The old treatment by force, is now universally abandoned; the law *Tegner's Frithiof's Saga, Canto XI, translated by Strong; Longfellow's Poets and Poetry of Europe, p. 161. of love has taken its place; and all these unfortunates mingle together, unvexed by those restraints, which implied suspicion, and, therefore aroused opposition. The warring propensities, which once filled with confusion and strife, the hospitals for the insane, while they were controlled by force, are a dark but feeble type of the present relations of nations, on whose hands are the heavy chains of military preparations, assimilating the world to one great Mad-House; while the peace and good will which now abound in these retreats, are the happy emblems of what awaits the world when it shall have the wisdom to recognise the supremacy of the higher sentiments of our nature; of gentleness, of confidence, of love; making their future might Magnetic o'er the fixed untrembling heart. I might also dwell on the recent experience, so full of delightful wisdom, in the treatment of the distant, degraded convicts of New South Wales,* showing the importance of confidence and kindness on the part of their overseers, in awakening a corresponding sentiment even in these outcasts, from whose souls virtue seems, at first view, to be wholly blotted out. Thus, from all quarters, from the far-off Past, from the far-away Pacific, from the verse of the poet, from the legend of history, from the cell of the mad-house, from the assembly of transported criminals, from the experience of daily life, from the universal heart of man ascends the spontaneous tribute to the prevailing power of that law, according to which the human heart responds to the feelings by which it is addressed, whether of confidence or distrust, of love or hate. It will be urged that these instances are exceptions to the general laws by which mankind are governed. It is not so. They are the unanswerable evidence of the real nature of They reveal the Divinity of Humanity, out of which all goodness, all happiness, all true greatness can alone proceed. They disclose susceptibilities which are general, which man. * The reader is referred to the several publications of Captain Macchonichie, whose labors of beneficence entitle him to more than a vulgar military laurel. |