from that cause, would be willing to become Turks. Under the goad and lash of a barbarous overseer, slaves work hard, produce wealth; neither murder, rob or rape, and yet few would infer that therefore this overseer was a benefit to the country, or an institution of God. To secure to man the liberty of progressing in powers of intellect, in discovery of principles or their application, in freedom of thought, speech, and action, without also giving him greater liberty to commit crime, if he so will, is impossible. Opportunities of elevation and degradation must be equal. Nations renowned for their great and good, have also become infamous for their bad men. The Hebrew nation itself, when its opportunities and its greater light is considered, were the most wicked people on the earth. Other people have arisen, and lit by the star-glimmers of their vague intuitions, have culminated to their meridian, and then sank into the silence and obscurity of an eternal night; while the Hebrews, whom God has endeavored especially to direct and bless, have only left an equally checkered history, bright with illustrious characters, and black with outrageous sins. At either side of the broad line of mediocrity there is an infinite; and the only means by which the one side can be trodden over, is by leaving the other equally free. The system, therefore, that degrades all men to one miserable level of fanaticism and mental debasement is fallacious, however successful it may be in the suppression of a few of the worst crimes. To repair a partial evil, the remedy is too universally applied. To preserve a few from sinking too low, all have to be prevented from rising at all.
