heels as a hireling; above all, of the educated and literary hireling? He has sold his manhood for a little pelf; he must revile, and he must glorify; he must shout huzzas, or whisper calumnies, just as he is bidden. His time is not his own. His thoughts are not his own. His soul is not his own.

Strange thing it is, but true, that in this our republic, the land of abundance, the native soil of independence, there may be found some Americans of talent and information as abject in the submission of their understanding and will to the dictation of another, as was ever the most awe-struck courtier of the Russian czar, and who can fawn upon the dispensers of office with a cringing servility that would have mantled with shame the cheek of the worst hireling of Walpole, or the most profligate parasite of Dubois, the scandal of the church, or of Jeffries, the reproach of the law.

GULIAN C. VERPLANCK.

143. MILITARY GLORY.

THE idea of Honor is associated with war. But to whom does the honor belong? If to any, certainly not to the mass of the people, but to those who are particularly engaged in it. The mass of a people, who stay at home and hire others to fight, who sleep in their warm beds and hire others to sleep on the cold and damp earth, who sit at their well-spread board and hire others to take the chance of starving, who nurse the slightest hurt in their own bodies and hire others to expose themselves to mortal wounds and to linger in comfortless hospitals, certainly this mass reap little honor from war. The honor belongs to those immediately engaged in it. Let me ask, then, what is the chief business of war. It is to destroy human life, to mangle the limbs, to gash and hew the body, to plunge the sword into the heart of a fellow-creature, to strew the earth with bleeding frames, and to trample them under foot with horses' hoofs. It is to batter down and burn cities, to turn fruitful fields into deserts, to level the cottage of the peasant and the magnificent abode of opulence, to scourge nations with famine, to multiply widows and orphans. Are these honorable deeds? Were you called to name exploits worthy of demons, would you not naturally select such as these? Grant that a necessity for them may exist; it is a dreadful necessity, such as a good man must recoil from with instinctive horror; and though

it may exempt them from guilt, it cannot turn them into glory. We have thought that it was honorable to heal, to save, to mitigate pain, to snatch the sick and sinking from the jaws of death. We have placed among the revered benefactors of the human race, the discoverers of arts which alleviate human sufferings, which prolong, comfort, adorn, and cheer human life, and if these arts be honorable, where is the glory of multiplying and aggravating tortures and death?

DR. CHANNING.

144. FALSE COURAGE.

COURAGE, considered in itself, or without reference to its origin and motives, and regarded in its common manifestations, is not virtue, is not moral excellence; and the disposition to exalt it above the spirit of Christianity is one of the most ruinous delusions which have been transmitted to us from barbarous times. In most men, courage has its origin in a happy organization of the body. It belongs to the nerves rather than to the character. In some, it is an instinct bordering on rashness. In one man it springs from strong passions obscuring the idea of danger. In another, from the want of imagination, or from the capacity of bringing future evils near. The courage of the uneducated may often be traced to stupidity, to the absence of thought and sensibility. Many are courageous from the dread of the infamy absurdly attached to cowardice. One terror expels another. A bullet is less formidable than a sneer. To show the moral worthlessness of mere courage, of contempt of bodily suffering and pain, one consideration is sufficient. The most abandoned have possessed it in perfection. The villain often hardens into the thorough hero, if courage and heroism be The more complete his success in searing conscience and defying God, the more dauntless his daring. Long-continued vice and exposure naturally generate contempt of life and a reckless encounter of peril. Courage, considered in itself, or without reference to its causes, is no virtue, and deserves no esteem. It is found in the best and the worst, and is to be judged according to the qualities from which it springs and with which it is conjoined.

one.

DR. CHANNING.

145. TRUE COURAGE.

THERE is a virtuous, glorious courage; but it happens to be found least in those who are most admired for bravery. It is the courage of principle, which dares to do right in the face of scorn, which puts to hazard reputation, rank, the prospects of advancement, the sympathy of friends, the admiration of the world, rather than violate a conviction of duty. It is the courage of benevolence and piety, which counts not life dear in withstanding error, superstition, vice, oppression, injustice, and the mightiest foes of human improvement and happiness. It is moral energy, that force of will in adopting duty, over which menace and suffering have no power. It is the courage of a soul which reverences itself too much to be greatly moved about what befalls the body; which thirsts so intensely for a pure ward life, that it can yield up the animal life without fear; in which the idea of moral, spiritual, celestial good has been unfolded so brightly as to obscure all worldly interests; which aspires after immortality, and therefore heeds little the pains or pleasures of a day; which has so concentered its whole and life in the love of Godlike virtue, that it even finds a joy in the perils and sufferings by which its loyalty to God and virtue may be approved. This courage may be called the perfection of humanity, for it is the exercise, result, and expression of the highest attributes of our nature. DR. CHANNING.

in

power

146. MILITARY COURAGE.

THE Courage of military and ordinary life, instead of resting on high and unchangeable principles, finds its chief motive in the opinions of the world, and its chief reward in vulgar praise. Superior to bodily pain, it crouches before censure, and dares not face the scorn which faithfulness to God and unpopular duty must often incur. It wears the appearance of energy, because it conquers one strong passion, fear; but the other passions it leaves unmastered, and thus differs essentially from moral strength or greatness, which consists in subjecting all appetites and desires to a pure and high standard of rectitude. Brilliant courage, as it is called, so far from being a principle of universal self-control, is often joined with degrading pleasures, with a lawless spirit, with general licentiousness of manners, with a

hardihood which defies God as well as man, and which, not satisfied with scorning death, contemns the judgment that is to follow. So wanting in moral worth is the bravery which has so long been praised, sung, courted, adored. It is time that it should be understood. It is time that the old, barbarous, indiscriminate worship of mere courage should give place to a wise moral judgment. This fanaticism has done much to rob Christianity of its due honor. Men, who give their sympathies and homage to the fiery and destructive valor of the soldier, will see little attraction in the mild and peaceful spirit of Jesus. His unconquerable forbearance, the most genuine and touching expression of his divine philanthropy, may even seem to them a weakness. Will this delusion never cease? Will men never learn to reverence disinterested love? Shall the desolations and woes of ages bear their testimony in vain against the false glory which has so long dazzled the world? I do not ask these questions in despair. Whilst we lament the limited triumphs of Christianity over false notions of honor, we see and ought to recognize its progress. War is not now the only or chief path to glory. The greatest names are not now written in blood. The purest fame is the meed of genius, philosophy, philanthropy, and piety, devoting themselves to the best interests of humanity. The passion for military glory is no longer, as once, able of itself to precipitate nations into war.

DR. CHANNING.

147. THE MORAL CHARACTER OF WAR.

A NATION, in declaring war, should be lifted above its passions by the fearfulness and solemnity of the act. It should appeal with unfeigned confidence to heaven and earth for its uprightness of purpose. It should go forth as the champion of truth and justice, as the minister of God, to vindicate and sustain that great moral and national law, without which life has no security, and social improvements no defence. It should be inspired with invincible courage, not by its passions, but by the dignity and holiness of its cause. Nothing in the whole compass of legislation is so solemn as a declaration of war. By nothing do a people incur such tremendous responsibility. Unless justly waged, war involves a people in the guilt of murder. The state which, without the command of justice and God, sends our fleets and armies to slaughter fellow-creatures,

must answer for the blood it sheds, as truly as the assassin for the death of his victim. Oh, how loudly does the voice of blood cry to heaven from the field of battle! Undoubtedly, the men whose names have come down to us with the loudest shouts of ages, stand now before the tribunal of eternal justice condemned as murderers; and the victories, which have been thought to encircle a nation with glory, have fixed the same brand on multitudes in the sight of the final and Almighty Judge.

DR. CHANNING.

148. TRUTH.

But

FORCE of thought may be put forth to amass wealth for selfish gratification, to give the individual power over others, to blind others, to weave a web of sophistry, to cast a deceitful lustre on vice, to make the worse appear the better cause. energy of thought, so employed, is suicidal. The intellect, in becoming a pander to vice, a tool of the passions, an advocate of lies, becomes not only degraded, but diseased. It loses the capacity of distinguishing truth from falsehood, good from evil, right from wrong; it becomes as worthless as an eye which cannot distinguish between colors or forms. Woe to that mind which wants the love of truth! For want of this, genius has become a scourge to the world; its breath a poisonous exhalation; its brightness a seducer into paths of pestilence and death. Truth is the light of the Infinite Mind, and the image of God in his creatures. Nothing endures but truth. dreams, fictions, theories which men would substitute for it, soon die. Without its guidance, effort is vain, and hope baseless. Accordingly, the love of truth, a deep thirst for it, a deliberate purpose to seek it and hold it fast, may be considered as the very foundation of human culture and dignity. Precious as thought is, the love of truth is still more precious; for without it, thought wanders and wastes itself, and precipitates men into guilt and misery.

The

DR. CHANNING.

149. THOUGHT, THE PRIVILege of all mEN.

I DENY to any individual or class a monopoly of thought. Who among men can show God's commission to think for his