along with the latest advices from Mexico, after dinner, and, it may
be, fall asleep over them both. What is the price-current of an honest
man and patriot today? They hesitate, and they regret, and sometimes
they petition; but they do nothing in earnest and with effect. They
will wait, well disposed, for others to remedy the evil, that they may
no longer have it to regret. At most, they give only a cheap vote, and
a feeble countenance and God-speed, to the right, as it goes by
them. There are nine hundred and ninety-nine patrons of virtue to
one virtuous man. But it is easier to deal with the real possessor
of a thing than with the temporary guardian of it.

  All voting is a sort of gaming, like checkers or backgammon, with
a slight moral tinge to it, a playing with right and wrong, with moral
questions; and betting naturally accompanies it. The character of
the voters is not staked. I cast my vote, perchance, as I think right;
but I am not vitally concerned that that right should prevail. I am
willing to leave it to the majority. Its obligation, therefore,
never exceeds that of expediency. Even voting for the right is doing
nothing for it. It is only expressing to men feebly your desire that
it should prevail. A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of
chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority.
There is but little virtue in the action of masses of men. When the
majority shall at length vote for the abolition of slavery, it will be
because they are indifferent to slavery, or because there is but
little slavery left to be abolished by their vote. They will then be
the only slaves. Only his vote can hasten the abolition of slavery who
asserts his own freedom by his vote.

  I hear of a convention to be held at Baltimore, or elsewhere, for
the selection of a candidate for the Presidency, made up chiefly of
editors, and men who are politicians by profession; but I think,
what is it to any independent, intelligent, and respectable man what
decision they may come to? Shall we not have the advantage of his
wisdom and honesty, nevertheless? Can we not count upon some
independent votes? Are there not many individuals in the country who
do not attend conventions? But no: I find that the respectable man, so
called, has immediately drifted from his position, and despairs of his
country, when his country has more reason to despair of him. He
forthwith adopts one of the candidates thus selected as the only
available one, thus proving that he is himself available for any
purposes of the demagogue. His vote is of no more worth than that of
any unprincipled foreigner or hireling native, who may have been
bought. O for a man who is a man, and, as my neighbor says, has a bone
in his back which you cannot pass your hand through! Our statistics
are at fault: the population has been returned too large. How many men
are there to a square thousand miles in this country? Hardly one. Does
not America offer any inducement for men to settle here? The
American has dwindled into an Odd Fellow-one who may be known by the
development of his organ of gregariousness, and a manifest lack of
intellect and cheerful self-reliance; whose first and chief concern,
on coming into the world, is to see that the almshouses are in good
repair; and, before yet he has lawfully donned the virile garb, to
collect a fund for the support of the widows and orphans that may
be; who, in short, ventures to live only by the aid of the Mutual
Insurance company, which has promised to bury him decently.

  It is not a man's duty, as a matter of course, to devote himself
to the eradication of any, even the most enormous, wrong; he may still
properly have other concerns to engage him; but it is his duty, at
least, to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer,
not to give it practically his support. If I devote myself to other
pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at least, that I do not
pursue them sitting upon another man's shoulders. I must get off him
first, that he may pursue his contemplations too. See what gross
inconsistency is tolerated. I have heard some of my townsmen say, "I
should like to have them order me out to help put down an insurrection
of the slaves, or to march to Mexico;- see if I would go"; and yet
these very men have each, directly by their allegiance, and so
indirectly, at least, by their money, furnished a substitute. The
soldier is applauded who refuses to serve in an unjust war by those
who do not refuse to sustain the unjust government which makes the
war; is applauded by those whose own act and authority he disregards
and sets at naught; as if the state were penitent to that degree
that it differed one to scourge it while it sinned, but not to that
degree that it left off sinning for a moment. Thus, under the name
of Order and Civil Government, we are all made at last to pay homage
to and support our own meanness. After the first blush of sin comes
its indifference; and from immoral it becomes, as it were, unmoral,
and not quite unnecessary to that life which we have made.

  The broadest and most prevalent error requires the most
disinterested virtue to sustain it. The slight reproach to which the
virtue of patriotism is commonly liable, the noble are most likely
to incur. Those who, while they disapprove of the character and
measures of a government, yield to it their allegiance and support are
undoubtedly its most conscientious supporters, and so frequently the
most serious obstacles to reform. Some are petitioning the State to
dissolve the Union, to disregard the requisitions of the President.
Why do they not dissolve it themselves- the union between themselves
and the State- and refuse to pay their quota into its treasury? Do not
they stand in the same relation to the State that the State does to
the Union? And have not the same reasons prevented the State from
resisting the Union which have prevented them from resisting the
State?

  How can a man be satisfied to entertain an opinion merely, and enjoy
it? Is there any enjoyment in it, if his opinion is that he is
aggrieved? If you are cheated out of a single dollar by your neighbor,
you do not rest satisfied with knowing that you are cheated, or with
saying that you are cheated, or even with petitioning him to pay you