@ of thousands, hereafter be allowed to sit and vote on the trial of his client! We are unable to comprehend the difference that in England, where privilege and chartered monopoly has been carried to the highest přích, no member of parliament would dare vote or act in his representative capacity, in any case where his personal interest was to be affected by such vote, or where he had been connected with the case as council. jurora. In a case of life and death, who ever heard or read of an interested judge or juror being allowed to sit and determine the cause! Who is prepared to tolerate such gross enormity? Who in principle, in the cases; and we understand could look on and see a trial of life and death conducted by a judge or jury who had received large sums to save the life of the criminal? Or who could bear or tolerate a system which would permit his feed council, who had received a large Bum to save his life, to act as judge or as a juror on the trial?ock of smiliw simono unit sophi If a community of freemen could not tolerate such enormity, how do they look patiently on and hear the feed council," the director, the stockholder, or agent of a bank or other incorporation, argue, debate, contend and vote in a legislative body, on the trial and 'arraignment of such corporation, where the issue is life or death to such artificial person? Can any person, connected in interest with such, whether as judge, juror, or representative, Be fit to sit or vote on the trial? ng98tze di REVI Can a lawyer, with a fee of only an hundred dollars, be incompetent by reason thereof, to sit on the trial of his client; and a bank council who has received his thousands, and expects his tens Surely, we have need of as mueir purity in the legislative bodies of our republican institutions. We, in Philadelphia, the seat of the old mammoth, have a deep interest in this question. We, who have been slain with the jaw bone of an ass, wielded by a little bank representative, who frets his hour on the congressional stage. This inquiry should be made, and at once; and as congress, the real focus of Bank politicians, is How in session, it should be commenced there All that is required is an open expression of public sentiment in a tangible shape, and we feel confident that there are independent Senators and Representatives, at Washington, who will probe this sore of the body politic to the battem. AN EXPOSURE OF THE ERRORS AND EVILS OF THE PRESENT Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, is hewn down, and cast into the fire."-Christ's Sermon on the Mount. In proportion as a nation advances in knowl- duce, but how will it harmonize with existing ar edge, in the same proportion it ought to advance rangements? Will it interfere with any of our in happiness. Knowledge is only useful so far as it venerable institutions? Is it in accordance with tends to this end; and that knowledge which the wisdom of our ancestors? Is there any pre has not this tendency, is no knowledge at all, but cedent for it? And in this way they decide as mere trash and nonsense. to its adoption or rejection. Now can anything Man has been boasting for ages about his no- be more ridiculous? Can anything be more ab ble endowments, his vast intelligence, his won- surd and irrational? If the measure will promote drous inventions and discoveries, while all the our happiness, what do we care about existing time he has been sinking deeper and deeper in arrangements? What need we care? If it will wretchedness and vice. What use are his noble lessen the amount of vice, and crime, and misery endowments, if they tend not to increase his happi- amongst us, what do we care whether it interness? What use are his vast intelligence, and feres with "our venerable institutions" or not? his wondrous inventions and discoveries, if they Yet these men are called the "collective wisdom tend not to lessen the amount of his misery? With of the nation!" And I suppose this is a sample all his endowments he is the most wretched ani- of it. Such wisdom may be worthy the parties mal in existence. What other animal undergoes who are blessed with it, but very different is the half the amount of suffering that he does? Toil- wisdom of rational beings. If we are to be guiding incessantly day after day, and year after year, ed and governed by the "wisdom" of our ances and with all his toil can scarcely obtain the ne- tors, why call us progressive beings? And if cessaries of life. At other times, when denied we are progressive beings, why fasten us down the privilege of toiling, he wanders about the to their ignorant and irrational arrangements, country in beggary and in want, enduring all and especially when we see such vice and misethe sufferings that hunger and utter destitution ry springing out of them? must occasion. And while this is the case, he The only object of our existence is happiness, talks and boasts of his wisdom and intelligence! and if existing arrangements confer not happiness Just as if beggary and starvation were an evi why then, put an end to them and make better dence of them. If wise and intelligent, why not arrangements. This is what reason and rationhappy? If superior to other animals, why endure ality would suggest. The more "venerable” (as more misery than other animals? If possessed of they call it) any thing is, the more reason there nobler endowments, why so vicious and wicked? is for its alteration. Man is progressive; he ac But the real fact is, man has been in a sort of quires fresh knowledge daily; and the arrange dream from the period of his existence up to the ments made to day may be greatly improved to present time. He has been labouring under the grossest delusions. When a mere infant, or when about one remove from a state of monkeyism, he conceived certain notions, and these have guided him in all his crazy wanderings from that day to this. These notions were gross errors, as might be expected, and the consequence has been that the world now abounds with want and beggary, fraud and deception, robbery and murder, and every other species of crime and iniquity, that a perversion of human nature is capable of. How was man in those days to understand human na ture? How was he to draw conclusions on matters of which he was as ignorant as any animal in creation? How was he to form arrangements of the best kind to promote our happiness? Yet his monkey notions have been handed down to us as genuine and infallible truths. His stupid arrangements have been maintained age after age, not because they promoted our happiness, but (wisdom like) because they were "ancient and venerable"" Look even at the House of Commons in the pesent day. There we see men, whose business it is to promote the happiness and welfare of the people, acting in a manner the most ignorant and irrational. When a measure is brought forward, their first consideration 18, not how much happiness or misery it will pro morrow; and when this is the case, how ridicu lous it is to hear men talking about maintaining our "venerable institutions;" "our glorious con stitution in church and state ;" and all such blurting nonsense; but what is most singular is, that the wisest men in the nation, or at any rate those who ought to be the wisest, are the very men who are continually using these ignorant expressions. All things ought to be estimated by the good or the evil they produce, and if we see an institution producing evil, reason and rationality would order its removal. Paine says that "governments are for the accommodation of the living, and not the dead;” and so it is with all institutions and all arrangements whatever. The living alone are concerned and not the dead. What then have our ancestors to do with our wants and wishes? Why consult them as to what sort of institutions we shall have? Their institutions might suit them. selves perhaps, but is that any reason why they ought to suit us? Let us, then, rise from our slumbering delusions, and devote ourselves to the grand and only object of our existence; that of making ourselves happy. Let us discover the causes of human suffering and all human ills; let us trace them to their source, and whatever institutions may occasion them, however "ancient and venerable," let us remove them in all possible haste, and supplant them with better. Let us value institutions, not by their age, but by the amount of good or evil they produce. If we find them producing good, let us support them; but if we find them producing evil, let us remove them. Let us do these things, and then will the human race show their intelligence and wisdom. Then will they remove themselves from a state of vice, poverty, and wretchedness, to a state of virtue and happiness. Then, indeed, we may boast of our intelligence and wisdom, our inventions and discoveries. Then we shall have something worthy of exultation. But to be boasting of these while thousands of people are starving,-while thousands are driven to theft, robbery, and murder, is a species of brutal insanity that man alone is capable of. With this beginning, I shall now proceed to the object of this publication. I shall first prove that the present arrangement of society is a bad one; that it is based upon error of the grossest kind, and that, as a natural consequence, it produces all the misery, and vice, and crime, and all the other evils, that everywhere abound. I shall then explain the principles on which alone the happiness of man can be founded. I shall describe a few of the arrangements that are necessary to this end, and show their vast superiority over any of the arrangements which now exist. To prove then that the present arrangement of society is a bad one, we have only to look at its fruits. Jesus Christ says, "If a tree bring not forth good fruit, hew it down, and cast it into the fire;" and applying this principle to the present arrangement of society, let us examine its fruits. If we find that it bringeth not forth good fruit, why, according to Christ himself, we are to put an end to it; we are to hew it down and cast it into the fire. Now I would ask any man whether the present arrangement of society bringeth forth good fruit; or whether it does not, on the contrary, bring forth the very worst fruit that any state of society could possibly produce? It luckily happens, that this is a case that admits of no dispute, for it rests not on argument alone. It needs no reasoning to decide it. These fruits are before the eyes of every man; every man can see them, and what is worse in another sense, every man can feel them. These fruits are, in the first place, anger, hatred, and all kinds of uncharitableness. In the second place, beggary and starvation; groups of people wandering about the streets and roads, clad in miserable rags, without homes and without food, and hundreds die week ly through hunger and utter destitution. Our houses are scarcely ever freed from some object of want and wretchedness. Thousands of people are driven to the commission of all manner of crimes. Theft and robbery, and murder, and prostitution, and suicides, everywhere abound; our gaols are crammed with these unfortunate victims. It has even become dangerous to be out in the dark; robberies are committed in the open streets; no man is safe; although policemen and watchmen are stationed in all quarters. People are reckless of their fate; enduring all the sufferings of hunger and want, while they see an abundance around them, they are excited to the commission of any crime; and they care not the consequences of it. If they are sent to gaol, it is more a relief than a punishment, and if they escape, they are obliged to continue their dreadful pursuits. In short, none of us are happy; those who have wealth are afraid of losing it; they are tormented with all kinds of fears and anxieties; and those who have none are either starving, or in a state approaching to it. Now, these are the fruits of the present system; they are plain and visible before the eyes of all men; and will any man say they are good fruits? Can any man say it? No, it is impossible. Well, then, what is to be done? Why, "if a tree bring not forth good fruit, hew it down, and cast it into the fire." This is the command of Christ himself. Can anything be plainer? What, then, can our opponents say? Will they for a moment talk about consistency? Is it consistency to believe in the doctrines of Jesus Christ, and, at the same time, act in opposition to them? Is this Christianity? Yet the whole of those who call themselves Christians do this. Here is a system producing all the evils that any man can imagine, and, instead of putting an end to it according to the direction of Christ himself, they are actually supporting it; they are maintaining the very thing they ought to destroy. And what is the most unaccountable, while we are attempting to destroy it, by establishing a better, and thus obeying the commandment of Jesus Christ, our opponents have the modesty to call us Infidels and themselves Christians. So that, besides this abominable absurdity, here they are outraging the very dictionary; they are reversing the meaning of words. According to them, those who practise Christ's doctrines are Infidels, and those who do not are Christians. But such are their wise and rational proceedings. Now, considering for a moment the fruits of this system, the unlimited number of evils that flow from it in all directions, and the severity of these evils, what are we to think of the men who say that such a system is a good one, and that it needs no alteration? Can such men care a farthing about morality or virtue? Can they care a farthing about common humanity? Above all, can they care a farthing about religion? Yet (and who could believe it ?) the ministers of the gospel, the promoters of morality and religion, are the very men who are first and foremost in maintaining this system. But I will leave the matter with themselves to settle. Christ says distinctly that such a system ought to be destroyed, and with him they may settle their difference. To hear people talk about religion, about morality, about virtue, about venerable institutions, and about maintaining our glorious constitution in church and state, in the midst of these things, is truly abominable. Nothing can be more outrageously ridiculous. But even this is a faint description of the evils which surround us; it is quite impossible to comprehend them, much less describe them. It has been proved over and over again, before committees, of the House of Commons, that hundreds of people die through pure starvation and nothing else; that tens of thousands are laboring for four and five shillings a week; that this sum is all they have to maintain themselves and families; that their principal food is oatmeal and potatoes, with occasionally some salt herrings. Now, in the face of these things, what are we, to think when we consider that the people of this country can produce four or five times more wealth than they can consume? That they can produce more food and clothing than all of us could eat or wear,and yet thousands of us are starving? Does it not argue ignorance in some quarter? Does it not prove that those who manage our affairs are either grossly ignorant or that they grossly neglect their business? One or the other of these it must prove, and whichever it be, neither ought to be suffered to continue. Look for a moment into their own newspapers; read their own accounts of the evils that exist. See the anger, and hatred, and strife, and fraud, and deception, and theft, and robbery, and murder, and suicides, and crimes, and evils altogether unlimited in number, and all proceeding from this brutal arrangement of society. People are driven into all kinds of vice, solely from the want of the means of a livelihood. Thousands of females are driven to prostitution through this cause, and no other, and evidence_of it is to be found in their own newspapers. Yet we are told by the ministers of the gospel, whose duty it is to put an end to these things, that no alteration is required, that no change is necessary; and that we are Infidels for desiring it. Now, can anything be more enormously wicked? Can anything be more abominably outrageous? Because we wish to put an end to want, and vice, and wickedness, we are infidels, and bad men! They may go on a little longer in this way, but the time is not far distant when very different will be their language, and very different their proceedings. The veil which has for ever darkened the eyes of the people, is now being removed. It has been torn from the eyes of thousands, in spite of all the efforts of the priesthood to prevent it. And I beg to inform them, that in the course of a very few years longer, the whole will be as completely removed, as darkness is removed by the rising of the sun. Talk about morality, indeed! My opinion is, that he who would continue the present arrangement of society, is the most immoral man in existence. He might as well tell us at once, that star vation, and theft, and robbery, and murder, and suicide, and prostitution, are all good things, and ought to exist. These are the fruits of the present arrangement, and any man who maintains it, maintains at the same time, a continuarce of all its fruits. Can anything be plainer than this? Can anything be more logical? Let the parsons who have been at their universities, refute it if they can. Now, as to the human suffering that this system must occasion, there is no estimating he amount. It is altogether inconceivable. Look at the num ber of suicides that take place weekly, through a reverse of fortune, embarrassed affairs, and various other causes springing out of this system. Think of the mental agony of the families of these people. Look at the thousands of people walk. ing about in utter destitution; driven about from parish to parish; their sufferings mocked instead of relieved. Read the account of a poor woman in London, who had a child dead; read of her wandering about from parish to parish for assist ance, to enable her to bury it; and read of a brutal overseer, after refusing her relief, telling her to go to the doctor's and sell it! Think of the distraction of this poor woman, and the outrage thus done to her feelings. Read also of a case which lately happened in Scotland; a poor man having a child dead, had it buried, but not having the means of paying the burial dues, it was ordered to be taken up again, and the wretched man carried it home under his arm. These are fine samples of Christian charity and benevolence. These are fine specimens of the benign influence of the Christian religion. Read also of a poor woman and her two children, in a state of complete exhaustion and despair, taking refuge among pigs; read of her children being found next morning dead by her side; and herself insensible, and scarcely alive. Read of these things, and thousands of others which happen daily, and then comprehend, if you can, the wickedness of the men who would continue such a system. And in the face of these things, does it become us to talk about our Christian charity and benevolence; our " venerable institutions," and such like stuff? Think also of the sufferings of thousands of people who are confined in prisons, and of others who have been transported from their native country, think of the sufferings of the families and relations of all these people, and then consider that the whole of them might have been made, under wise and rational arrangements, intelligent and virtuous men and women. Consider this, and then estimate the wisdom and humanity of those who manage our affairs. Talk about humanity! Why, if there were one particle left among the intelligent part of the people of this country, could they remain silent under such scenes? Could they see all this misery and suffering inflicted upon their fellow-creatures, without attempting to relieve them? Yet they do see it, and they see it apparently with callous indifference. But the reason is, this brutalizing system has destroyed the best feelings that belong to our nature. It has made man the enemy of man, by the scramble which is going on for wealth. The interest of one man is opposed to that of the other, and hence these scenes of outrage and dis order. But the evils of the present system are altogether unbounded. They are daily and hourly to be seen; and, therefore, to enumerate any more is both useless and a waste of time. I have already noticed fifty times more than sufficient to ought immediately to alter it. Having then setprove that the system is a bad one, and that we tled this point, I now come to the errors upon which it is built; the ground and source of all its manifold evils. The source, then, of all our troubles, is the belief of man's responsibility, in conjunction with a system of individual property. This is the volcano from which issue all the evils that afflict us. Not an evil can be mentioned, that cannot be traced to this source. All the anger, all the hatred, all the revenge, all the deception, all the fraud, all the uncharitableness of every kind, all the vice, all the theft, all the robberies, all the murders, all the wars, all the suicides, all the prostitution, and every other species of evil that exists, can be as clearly traced to this cause as the branches of a tree can be traced to its root. Now this being the case, when we can trace all these evils to the belief of man's responsibility,is that alone not sufficient to prove it false? Truth could never occasion these things. Truth is the source of good, and error alone the source of evil. Were it otherwise, then, indeed, we might complain of some imperfection in nature; then, we might talk about the fall of man, the depravity of his heart, his inward corruption, and all such vulgar and ignorant nonsense. But, when we can trace all our evils to gross and palpable errors; when we find invariably that truth produces good, and error produces evil; then, indeed, we are sensible of the beauty and harmo ny of nature's laws; then we are impressed with their grandeur and excellence, and filled with feelings of wonder and admiration. Perhaps, of all the absurdities that are to be found in the minds of Christians, the one that here presents itself is the greatest. They tell us that man is a responsible being; that he ought to be punished for his wickedness; and if we ask them what makes man wicked? "Oh," say they, "it is his corrupt nature, his depraved heart." Now, although our opponents say many wild and curious things, although they stick not at trifles, surely they will never presume to say that man makes his own nature or his own heart. Yet, unless they do this, what are they to do? His deprav ed heart and corrupt nature lead him into wickedness, and if he did not make these himself, surely they are not so cruel as to make him responsible for them. If man has a depraved heart and a corrupt nature, how can he help it? He did not make them so; he could not make his own nature or his own heart, and if these are bad why blame him for it? He could not help it. But, besides this, here they are actually charg. ing God with making man depraved and corrupt. Now, if we were to do this; if we were thus presumptuously to find fault with the works of God, why, all the dictionaries in the world would not afford them language sufficiently expressive to describe our horrible blasphemy, our daring insult to the Deity. But as it is, as the act is theirs, and not ours, it is all quite right. It is quite pious and quite religious. There is no blasphemy at all in it. They are one thing, and we are another, and this makes the difference. Our opponents presume to talk about our principles leading men into vice and crime; but if such notions as these have not that tendency, nothing in this world can have it. Here they tell the human race that they are all made corrupt and depraved, that they are "rotten to the very core," as Mr, Roebuck said, "that their hearts are deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked;" which is all blasphemy, if anything can be blasphemy; and the human race, believing all this, act, of course, as we see them act; they fall into all kinds of vice and wickedness. Were they told the contrary of this. they would then have some encouragement to be good; they would then know that they could be good. But to tell them they are bad by nature; that they are prone to evil, and especially when practising all kinds of vice, is, in my opinion, a direct encouragement to vice. If their tendency to evil is greater than that to good, how can they help it? It is perfect ly rational that they should be vicious. Their vice is the result of one of the natural laws of the universe. That which is heavy, will always weigh down that which is light. Any man who knows what a pair of scales are, knows this. But, let me ask here, is it possible that men who believe this can believe that man is a responsible being? Can they punish him for that which, they must admit themselves, is a natural result of the immutable laws which govern the universe? Yes, it is possible. There are thousands of men who believe this; and if we venture to express.however mildly our dissent from such no tions; oh, we are infidels. deists, and atheists, and bad men! Such is their wisdom and chari. ty. Now, were the human race told that all these notions were gross errors, that they were absolute trash; that man was not prone to evil, that he was not naturally corrupt, or depraved, that his nature was good, but that the source of his evil was his ignorance of what that nature is, and not in the nature itself, together with the institutions surrounding him, which have arisen out of that ignorance; were they told this, they could then remedy the evil. They would then set about acquiring knowledge of their nature, and this would enable them to alter existing institutions, and thus would the source of their evils be removed. But, to tell them that this source is their own bad nature, and not in existing institutions, is, as I said before, a direct encouragement to vice, and its present prevalence is a proof of it. They cannot alter their own nature, and hence they remain in the poverty, the vice, and the misery in which we now see them. But I must now return more immediately to my subject. These absurdities presented themselves so glaringly, that I thought I would finish them off before I proceeded further. Hitherto, I have only asserted that man is not a responsible being, but now I shall proceed to prove it. As some disputes have arisen as to what we really mean by this word, "responsibility," I will define it before I go further. Man, we say, is not a responsible being. By this we mean,that he is neither to be blamed nor praised, rewarded nor pun ished for either his thoughts, feelings, or actions. This is the utmost extent of our irresponsibility And the reason is, that all these are given to man independent of himself. That society has the power to give to each individual, good thoughts or bad thoughts, good feelings or bad feelings, and good actions or bad actions, and, in short, to make for each individual any sort of character it pleases Now, when this is the case, we say it is unrea sonable, irrational, and, at the same time, cruel, to make man responsible; that is to say, blame him or praise him, reward him or punish him, whatever his character may be. Now, that man's character is formed for him, and not by him, I shall now proceed to prove. When a child comes into the world, its character depends, in the first place, upon its physical organization; and, in the second place, upon the particular training up that it shall receive, and all external circumstances that shall surround it from birth Now, that the child had no power in forming its physical organization, no man, for a moment, can doubt. Its brain, and everything else were given to it altogether independent of itself, and therefore it cannot be responsible for these. Its particular training up is the next thing to look at. Has it any power over it? Can it direct its parents how they are to manage it? The thing must be evident. It has no more pow er in this case than it had in the other, and that was none at all; and hence it follows that its character was given to it independent of itself, and, therefore, it is not a responsible being. Is it not plain and simple that if it have a good organization, and a good training up, and placed in good circumstances, that it will have a good character; and if it have the opposite of these,is it not equally plain and simple that it will have a bad character? How is it that the English have one general character, the Scotch another, the Irish another, the French another, the Italians another, and so on through all the nations of the world? Is it because each nation has willed its particular character, or that it desired it in preference to any other? No. It is entirely because the circumstances surrounding each are different the training up is different, the education different, the religion different, the habits different, the |
