It is and will be
charged with all kinds of dreadful things, whatever it does, and it
has nothing to fear from an upright and downright declaration of its
faith. One part of the grateful work it has to do is to deliver us
from the curse of perpetual concession for the sake of a peace that
never comes, and which, if it came, would not be peace, but
submission,--from that torpor and imbecility of faith in God and man
which have stolen the respectable name of Conservatism. A question
which cuts so deep as the one which now divides the country cannot be
debated, much less settled, without excitement. Such excitement is
healthy, and is a sign that the ill humors of the body politic are
coming to the surface, where they are comparatively harmless. It is
the tendency of all creeds, opinions, and political dogmas that have
once defined themselves in institutions to become inoperative. The
vital and formative principle, which was active during the process of
crystallization into sects, or schools of thought, or governments,
ceases to act; and what was once a living emanation of the Eternal
Mind, organically operative in history, becomes the dead formula on
men's lips and the dry topic of the annalist. It has been our good
fortune that a question has been thrust upon us which has forced us to
reconsider the primal principles of government, which has appealed to
conscience as well as reason, and, by bringing the theories of the
Declaration of Independence to the test of experience in our thought
and life and action, has realized a tradition of the memory into a
conviction of the understanding and the soul.
Pages:
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296