OCR Text |
Show 42 Moral Good, Rectitude in all its branches, is the Supreme Good; by which I do not intend that it is the surest means to the security and prosperity of the state. Such, indeed, it is, but this is too low a view. It must not be looked upon as a Means, an Instrument. It is the Supreme End, and states are bound to subject to it all their legislation, be the apparent loss of prosperity ever so great. National wealth is not the End. It derives all its worth from national virtue. If accumulated by rapacity, conquest, or any degrading means, or if concentrated in the hands of the few, whom it strengthens to crush the many, it is a cmse. National wealth is a blessing, only when it springs from and represents the intelligence and virtue of the community, when it is a fruit and expression of good habits, of respect for the rights of all, of impartial and beneficent legislation, when it gives impulse to the higher faculties, and occasion and incitement to justice and beneficence. No greater calamity can befall a people than to prosper by crime. No success can be a compensation foo· the wound inflicted on a nation 's mind by renouncing Right as its Supreme Law. Let a people exalt Prosperity above Rectitude, and a more dangerous end cannot be proposed. Public Prosperity, General Good, regarded by itself, or apart from the moral law, is something 43 vague, unsettled, and uncertain, and will infallibly be so construed by the selfish and grasping as to secure their own aggrandizement. l t may be made to wear a thousand forms according to men's interests and passions. This is illustrated by every day's history. Not a party sprin gs up, which does not sanctify all its proj ects for monopolizing power by the plea of General Good. Not a measure, however ruinous, can be proposed, which cannot be shown to favor one or another national interest. The truth is, that, in the uncertainty of human affait·s, an uncertainty growing out of the infinite and very subtile causes which arc acting on communities, the com:equences of no measure can be foretold with certainty. The best concerted schemes of policy often fail; whilst a rash and profligate administration may, by unex pee ted concurrences of events, seem to advance a nation's glory. In regard to the means of national prosperity the wisest are weak judges. For example, the present rapid grow th of this country, carrying, as it does, vast multitudes beyond the in stitutions of religion and education, may be working ruin, whilst the people ex ult in it as a pledge of greatness. We arc too short-sighted to find our law in outward interests. To states, as to individuals, Rectitude is the Supreme Law. It was never desi•ned that the Public Good, as disjoined from this,0 as distinct from justice and rever~nce for all |