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Show 38 LIBERTY AND SLAVERY. liberty are not "among these." There are inalienable rights, we admit, but then such abstractions are the edge-tools of political science, with which it is dangerous for either men or children to play. They may inftict deep wounds on the cause of humanity; they can throw no light on the great problem of slavery. One thing seems to be clear and fixed; and that is, that the rights of the individual are sub· ordinate to those of the community. An inalienable right is a right coupled with a duty; a duty with which no other obligation can interfere. But, as we have seen, it is the duty, and consequently, the right, of society to make such laws as the general good demands. This inalienable right is conferred, and its exercise enjoined, by the Creator and Governor of the universe. .All individual rightB are subordinate to this inherent, universal, and inalienable right. It should be observed, however, that in the exercise of this paramount right, this supreme authority, no society possesses the power to contravene the principles of justice. In other words, it should be observed that no unjust law can ever promote the public good. Every law, then, which is not unjust, and which the public good demanC: o, should be enacted by society. NATURE OF CIVIL LIBERTY. 39 But we have already seen and shall still more fully see, that the law which ordains slavery is not unjust in itself, or, in other words, that it interferes with none of the inalienable rightB of man. lienee, if it be shown that the public good, and especially the good of the slave, demands such a law, then the question of slavery ,viJl be settled. we purpose to show this Defore we have done with the present discussion. And if, in the prosecution of this inquiry, we should be so fortunate as to throw only one steady ray of light on the great question of slavery, by which the very depths of society have been so fearfully convulsed, we shall be more than rewarded for all the labour which, 1vith no little solicitude, we have felt constrained to bestow upon an attempt at its solution. § VII. Conclusion of the first chapter. In conclusion, we shall merely add that if the foregoing remarks be just, it follows that the great problem of political philosophy is not precisely such as it is often taken to be by statesmen and historians. This problem, according to Mackintosh and Macau lay, consists in finding such an adjustment of the antagonistic principles of public order and private liberty, |