The American Democrat/On the Private Duties of Station
ON THE PRIVATE DUTIES OF STATION.
The private duties of the citizen, as connected with social station, are founded chiefly on the relations between man and man, though others may be referred to a higher source, being derived directly from the relations between the creature and his creator.
A regard for the duties of private station, are indispensable to order, and to the intercourse between different members of society. So important have they always been deemed, that the inspired writers, from the Saviour through the greatest of his apostles down, have deemed them worthy of being placed in conspicious characters, in their code of morals.
The first direct mandates of God, as delivered on Mount Sinai, were to impress the Jews with a sense of their duties to their Heavenly Father; the next to impress them with the first of their social duties, that of honor and obedience to their parents.
The fifth commandment, then, may be said to contain the first of our social duties. It is strictly one of station, for it enforces the obligation of the child to its parents. Nor is this all; the entire extent of the family relations are included in principle, since it cannot be supposed that those who precede our immediate parents, are excluded from the general deference that we owe to the greater experience, the love, and the care of our predecessors.
It is apparent throughout the code of christian morals, that a perfect reciprocity between the duties of social station is nowhere inferred. "Nevertheless," says St. Paul, "let every one of you in particular, so love his wife, even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband." There is an obligation of deference imposed on the wife, that is not imposed on the husband. "Servants be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in singleness of heart, as unto Christ." By these, and many similar mandates, we perceive that the private duties of station are constantly recognized, and commanded, by the apostles, as well as by the Saviour.
The old abuses of power, with the attendant reaction, have unsettled the publick mind,in many essential particulars, on this important point. Interested men have lent their aid to mislead the credulous and vain, until a confusion in the relations between the different members of society has arisen, that must, more or less, lead to confusion in society itself.
After the direct family relations, come the private duties that are generally connected with station, as between master and servant.
Whoever employs, with the right to command, is a master; and, whoever serves, with an obligation to obey, a servant. These are the broad signification of the two words, and, in this sense they are now used.
It is an imperative obligation on those who command, to be kind in language, however firm, and to use a due consideration in issuing their orders. The greater the duty of those, whose part it is to obey, to comply with all just and reasonable requisitions, or, in other words, to conform to the terms of their service, the greater is the duty of the master to see that he does not exact more than propriety will warrant. On the other hand, they who serve owe a respectful and decorous obedience, showing by their manner as well by their acts, they understand that without order and deference, the different social relations can never be suitably filled. So far from republican institutions making any difference in this respect, in favor of him who serves, they increase the moral duty to be respectful and assiduous, since service in such a case, is not the result of political causes, but a matter of convention, or bargain.
The relations between the master and the domestic servant, are peculiar, and are capable of being made of a very endearing and useful nature. The house servant, whether man or woman, fills a more honorable, because a much more confidential station, than the lower mechanic, or farm laborer. The domestics are intrusted with the care of the children of those they serve, have necessarily charge of much valuable property, and are, in a manner, intrusted with the secrets of the domestic economy. The upper servants of a considerable and well bred family, or of those who are accustomed to the station they fill, and have not been too suddenly elevated by the chances of life, are often persons of a good education, accustomed to accounts, and, in a measure, familiarized to the usages of polite life, since they see them daily practised before their eyes. Such persons invariably gain some of the refinement and tone of mind that marks the peculiar condition of their employers.
The rule of most civilized nations, is for the master to treat the servant as an humble friend. In the more polished countries of Europe, the confidential domestic holds a high place in the household, and, after a long service, is commonly considered as an inferior member of the family.
It is a misfortune of America to admit so many of the dogmas of the country from which she is derived, while living in a state of society so very different. An attempt to treat and consider a domestic, as domestics are treated and considered in England, is unwise, and, in fact, impracticable. The English servant fares worse, in many particulars, than the servant of almost every other nation. France would be a better and a safer model, in this particular, the masters of France being usually much milder and more considerate than those of England, while the servants are altogether superior. The French servant is not as cleanly and thorough in his work, as the English servant, a difference in the habits of the country forbidding it; but he is generally more attached, better informed, more agreeable as a companion, quite as serviceable, the exception mentioned apart, and more faithful, honest and prudent. This is true of both sexes; the female domestics of France, while less tidy in household work than those of England or America, being altogether superior to both, in moral qualities, tastes, general usefulness and knowledge.
A beautiful instance of the effect of the duties of social station is before the eyes of the writer, even while he pens this paragraph; that of an aged woman, who passed her youth in the service of one family, ministering to the wants of three generations, and is now receiving the gratitude which long and patient toil has earned. On the one side is affection, delicacy, and attention to the wants of age; on the other a love little short of that of a mother's, softened by the respect that has always marked the life of one in whom a sense of the duties of social station has never been weakened. Nothing still makes this venerable servant more happy, than to be employed for those whom she has seen ushered into life, whom she first fondled on the knee, while these, again, mindful of her years and increasing infirmities, feel it a source of pleasure to anticipate her little wants, and to increase her comforts. The conditions of master and servant are those of co-relatives, and when they are properly understood they form additional ties to the charities and happiness of life. It is an unhappy effect of the unformed habits of society in this country, and of domestic slavery, that we are so much wanting in this beautiful feature in domestic economy.
The social duties of a gentleman are of a high order. The class to which he belongs is the natural repository of the manners, tastes, tone, and, to a certain extent, of the principles of a country. They who imagine this portion of the community useless, drones who consume without producing, have not studied society, or they have listened to the suggestions of personal envy, instead of consulting history and facts. If the laborer is indispensable to civilization, so is also the gentleman. While the one produces, the other directs his skill to those arts which raise the polished man above the barbarian. The last brings his knowledge and habits to bear upon industry, and, taking the least favorable view of his claims, the indulgence of his very luxuries encourages the skill that contributes to the comforts of the lowest.
Were society to be satisfied with a mere supply of the natural wants, there would be no civilization. The savage condition attains this much. All beyond it, notwithstanding, is so much progress made in the direction of the gentleman, and has been made either at the suggestions, or by the encouragement of those whose means have enabled, and whose tastes have induced them to buy. Knowledge is as necessary to the progress of a people as physical force, for, with our knowledge, the beasts of burthen who now toil for man, would soon compel man to toil for them. If the head is necessary to direct the body, so is the head of society, (the head in a social, if not in a political sense,) necessary to direct the body of society.
Any one may learn the usefulness of a body of enlightened men in a neighborhood, by tracing their influence on its civilization. Where many such are found, the arts are more advanced, and men learn to see that there are tastes more desirable than those of the mere animal. In such a neighborhood they acquire habits which contribute to their happiness by advancing their intellect, they learn the value of refinement in their intercourse, and obtain juster notions of the nature and of the real extent of their rights. He who would honor learning, and taste, and sentiment, and refinement of every sort, ought to respect its possessors, and, in all things but those which affect rights, defer to their superior advantages. This is the extent of the deference that is due from him who is not a gentleman, to him who is; but this much is due.
On the other hand, the social duties of an American gentleman, in particular, require of him a tone of feeling and a line of conduct that are of the last importance to the country. One of the first of his obligations is to be a guardian of the liberties of his fellow citizens. It is peculiarly graceful in the American, whom the accidents of life have raised above the mass of the nation, to show himself conscious of his duties in this respect, by asserting at all times the true principles of government, avoiding, equally, the cant of demagogueism with the impracticable theories of visionaries, and the narrow and selfish dogmas of those who would limit power by castes. They who do not see and feel the importance of possessing a class of such men in a community, to give it tone, a high and far sighted policy, and lofty views in general, can know little of history, and have not reflected on the inevitable consequences of admitted causes.
The danger to the institutions of denying to men of education their proper place in society, is derived from the certainty that no political system can long continue in which this violence is done to the natural rights of a class so powerful. It is as unjust to require that men of refinement and training should defer in their habits and associations to the notions of those who are their inferiors in these particulars, as it is to insist that political power should be the accompaniment of birth. All, who are in the least cultivated, know how irksome and oppressive is the close communion with ignorance and vulgarity, and the attempt to push into the ordinary associations, the principles of equality that do and ought to govern states in their political characters, is, virtually, an effort to subvert a just general maxim, by attaching to it impracticable consequences.
Whenever the enlightened, wealthy, and spirited of an affluent and great country, seriously conspire to subvert democratical institutions, their leisure, money, intelligence and means of combining, will be found too powerful for the ill-directed and conflicting efforts of the mass. It is therefore, all important, to enlist a portion of this class, at least, in the cause of freedom, since its power at all times renders it a dangerous enemy.
Liberality is peculiarly the quality of a gentleman. He is liberal in his attainments, opinions, practices and concessions. He asks for himself, no more than he is willing to concede to others. He feels that his superiority is in his attainments, practices and princiciples, which if they are not always moral, are above meannesses, and he has usually no pride in the mere vulgar consequence of wealth. Should he happen to be well born, (for birth is by no means indispensable to the character,) his satisfaction is in being allied to men of the same qualities as himself, and not to a senseless pride in an accident. The vulgar-minded mistake motives that they cannot feel; but he, at least, is capable of distinguishing between things that are false, and the things which make him what he is.
An eminent writer of our own time, has said in substance, that a nation is happy, in which the people, possessing the power to select their rulers, select the noble. This was the opinion of a European, who had been accustomed to see the liberal qualities in the exclusive possession of a caste, and who was not accustomed to see the people sufficiently advanced to mingle in affairs of state. Power cannot be extended to a caste without caste's reaping its principal benefit; but happy, indeed, is the nation, in which, power being the common property, there is sufficient discrimination and justice to admit the intelligent and refined to a just participation of its influence.