Letter Seven
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Letter VII June 3, 1843
SIR: Having, by your liberal permission, said so much publicly on the
above subject, it will be required that I should bring my observations
to some practical point, and probably to a conclusion. Supposing any
light to have been thrown on the subject, and a conviction to have been
produced that the present forceful order of things is inconsistent with
the principles we know and acknowledge to be true, the question will
naturally arise, "what are we to do?" As the religious teacher would
answer when such a question is put on the deepest ground, so I reply
"do nothing." - Whenever events turn out unhappily we have to adopt
this course. It is the best medicine, whether the mind or the body, the
Church or the State, be sick. Sometimes there may be some obnoxious
result of human activity in the way, which human activity may remove,
but generally human passivity is the preferable principle. In this
case, at all events, there can be no hesitation in presenting the
medicine of passivity. - "Leave it alone,"
is our best treatment. Like all our enemies, State oppression will die
of itself if we meddle not with it. If there be a voter in the land who
knows not how to take moral care of himself and family, I am sure the
State will not help him in that respect; so that he gains nothing by
contact with it. So far as he does know how to exercise such moral
provision, let him do it with all diligence, and in that act acquire
more ability. Let every one expend his energies within doors, and, by
moral means perfect domestic and family order. No argument is required
to show that if this were done in every house, no State legislation, and scarcely any township legislation would remain to be done. But the remark will be made that every house and every
person is not thus morally regulated; so that it is absolutely
necessary to introduce the influence force. Does, then, this
introduction of force pleasantly and effectually settle the matter?
Indeed not; it is just seconding the immoral beginning, and multiplying
it exceedingly. Now, I submit that this is the true way of looking at
the [matter.] The bad subjects of the State are amongst our neighbors,
they are very few, one in five hundred perhaps originally, whom our
injudicious treatment augments fourfold; whereas if we met them at once
on moral grounds we could manage at a much smaller cost, with a very
much better result. - Why should we make this public and congregative
noise about such an event as a robbery or a quarrel? If a person should
fall into the river we all run to help him out, and not a man of us but
would be glad to lose the whole day in his restoration. We should do so
singly with joy, and never think of calling a town meeting to debate
the subject. Why not then when a neighbor has fallen by bad education,
or unhappy organization, into the flood of immorality, should we not
willingly and spontaneously make the same sacrifices to help him out?
By so much as the soul is more precious than the body we should fly to
submit still greater offerings.
This is the very pith and heart of the subject. If the evil elements in
society were thus encountered at their sources there would be no
occupation left for the constable, the jailer and the executioner. Much
cheaper too such a system would be. Men appear to think they are
gainers by making these public officers to do the business which
privately and properly belongs to themselves. Individually some of the
wealthiest persons may be money gainers by this arrangement. But
morally and sentimentally they are great losers. And taking the whole
of society into consideration, the fact becomes very clear that it is a
losing plan. For, besides the cost of managing the original wayward
members of society, there is added to it the vast expenditure for the
extraneous machinery of judges, prisons, chaplains, and the host of
unloving instruments. And all this is because there are a few bad boys
in the town, or a few bad men in the State. If not on this account, why
at all is the machinery of State government kept in existence? The
good, it is confessed, require no such coercive control. They in fact,
however, erect this machinery, they sustain it, and what they have now
is to say to each other is, "why friends and neighbors, should we
prolong this incongruous state of things which we have made? We made
it, and we can unmake it. Let us try if we cannot work out something
better suited to the present condition of mankind."
When the North American republic was founded, it was an established
axiom in the world, that governors and governed were two distinct races
amongst men, one of which was born to submit to the other, just as is
now held to be the case as to blacks and whites. But a successful
experiment for above sixty years has demonstrated a different
principle, and we have advanced a good way into the truth that governor
and governed may be one. This is proved as far as the whole mass is
concerned. Now we have to prove the same fact in every individual. We
have to show that one hat can at one moment cover both these
characters. Instances not a few can be found amongst our private
acquaintance of persons who withdraw as much as possible from
interference in political affairs of any kind. These are generally the
highest moral beings which society contains. - Which is in fact the
reason why they shrink from inter-meddling with affairs of State,
necessarily as they are of an immoral tendency. We must do our best to
let this sort of mind be multiplied until it spread all over the land;
and the government of force be left to die off at leisure, superseded
by the government of love and sound sense.
Were a true parent unfortunately to have a child of decidedly vicious
organization, would he, for the purpose of being rid of such a trouble,
thrust him forth into the street to be derided and hooted by other
boys, or would he wish to foist him upon his neighbors? Would he not
rather, both in love for his boy and his country, endeavor to the
utmost to reform his character and elevate his sentiments? Very much
like this is the picture of society. The criminals are our malorganized
brethren. And let it be continually remembered that it is on account of
these, on account of a comparatively few, unfortunate near relations,
that we commit such a series of unprincipled, costly, and destructive
actions. On what poor pretences may a vast superstructure of actuality
be erected. Would it not be a preferable plan for every town to set its
own criminals to work in the fields, or the shop, before they have
grown into desperate characters, instead of passing them through state
trials and state prisons? If it is yet premature to expect every
separate family to ensure the moral conduct of its own members, it
would be some little amendment of our present system to let each group
of families take upon itself its own responsibilities. If each township
in Massachusetts having, by the absence of state interference, no other
resource than its own moral influence against any immoral influence
there might be, we should I believe have in respect to all the grosser
crimes a power of two hundred or three hundred to one individual. All
the crimes which the present rough unparental state of society can take
cognizance of, do not amount to so much as that. Then, at the same
time, those refined offences, the quiet frauds and deceptions which a
brute law cannot touch, would be more directly reached than they are
now, because such a moral preventive court of justice barely recognized
at present, would exist in full force and vigor.
Thought, kindly, loveful thought, I am sure will soon engender an
improved state of things. As to any hope for human advancement based on
the present order of brute force, it is quite absurd. It has been tried
in every conceivable shape, and has failed; and it must fail. The
representative system altogether is worn out. Cunning as well as force
is insufficient now to help humanity one step forward. It is the third
principle alone in which rational hope abides. We must begin with
confidence in the inherent goodness in humanity; and so beginning we
shall be sustained. Love, love only can rule men efficiently now.
Commanding talents, like commanding force, must be laid at the feet of
the benign nature in man. We live for this or we live for nothing. At
last we want to come round to this point; and I suppose that all the
struggles of the day, miltiform as they appear to be, have for their
common centre, the empire of love on earth. Reform, abolition, social
projects, church, state, prisons, aye even war must pretend to support
the reign of peace and love on earth. The debateable points refer only
to the best and shortest way of ensuring the triumph of goodness. The
direct and immediate object in these letters has been of a very humble,
and you may say very limited kind. - I have merely sought to show what
an obstacle to true progress the State now is, and how easily it could
be set aside or avoided. Easy as it is however, it will be needful for
some persons to experience some inconvenience, or worse, in order to
clear the ground of the incumbrance.
As Mr. Alcott's declining to contribute his poll assessment and
consequent imprisonment originated these letters, I may not inaptly
close by reference to further personal matters, related as they are
throughout to the common weal.
The assessor of this town, (Concord) has recently applied for an
inventory of the contents of my pocket and other effects, in order that
I may be taxed to pay soldiery, jailers, and other slaves, in whom I
have no faith. I have of course declined any voluntary participation in
the system, and having replied in the spirit of these letters, and
referred to them, I await the consequences.
In the mean time, it is needful to inform you that the season has arrived for laying down the pen and taking up the hoe.
Many of your readers are aware that my sojourn in this country has had
reference throughout to a connection with the land as the outward basis
of all the holy and wholesome existence; and in unity with Mr. Bronson
Alcott, and other friends, many persons have looked forward to the
commencement of a state of things some steps in advance of the present,
though possibly not comprehending all that is ideally living in the
mind. Such a commencement appears not to be practicable. An estate of
nearly one hundred acres is devoted to this purpose; if not totally
free from all relation to property; yet approaching as nearly as
circumstances will permit. It is remotely, though not distantly
situated; and as no house is owned, but one is merely lent for a short
time, you will perceive that for a party whose capital is exhausted in
obtaining the freedom of restoring, subduing and using a piece of God's
earth, there is plenty of work to be done, besides this of writing
which we have so long enjoyed together.
The press, is undoubtedly a mighty engine for the enlightenment and
reformation of men, but yet it is only an instrument; and I think every
one feels that there is something to be done greater and mightier than
printing or lecturing in order to [raise] man's elevation. The press
and the platform do but furnish faint echoes of a reality which must
move mankind in a deeper manner than to a change of opinion, or to a
scientific knowledge. The heart of man must be touched; and this cannot
be by appeals to his head. No intellectual effort can go deep enough
now nor at any other time in fact to secure the real wants and purposes
of humanity. Whether or not that which I design to do is that real deed
which I have faith it is, time, zeal and perserverance must help to
show. In the mean time you will oblige by forwarding your papers or
other favors to this place instead of Concord as heretofore. And
believe me, dear sir, in action as in speech, still, one with you in
the great enterprise of man's redemption, and consecration to all good.
C.L.
Harvard, Mass.
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[ VII ]
