Speeches, Addresses, and Occasional Sermons, Volume 3 (of 3)Parker, Theodore
Religion
Speeches, Addresses, and Occasional Sermons, Volume 3 (of 3)
Parker, Theodore
Sermons, American; Unitarianism
Look at the next safeguard of society. Setting aside the institution of
slavery, and the statutes relating thereto, I think we have the most
righteous Establishments in the world. By no means perfect, they produce
the greatest variety of action in the individuals, the greatest unity of
action in society, and afford an opportunity to achieve the purpose of
social and individual life. Here is the great institution of democracy,
the government of all, by all, and for all, resting on the American
idea, that all men have natural rights which only the possessor can
alienate; that all are equal in their rights; that it is the business of
government to preserve them all for each man. Under this great
institution of a free State, there naturally come the church, the
school, the press,--all free. In politics, and all depending thereon, we
are coming to recognize this principle, that restraint is only to be
exercised for the good of all, the restrainer and the restrained.
Let me single out two excellent institutions, not wholly American,--The
contrivance for making laws, and that for executing them. To make laws,
the people choose the best men they can find and confide in, and set
them to this work. They aim to take all the good of past times, of the
present times, and add to it their private contribution of justice. Each
State Legislature is a little political academy for the advancement of
jural science and art. They get the wisest and most humane men to aid
them. Then after much elaboration the law is made. If it works well in
one State it is soon tried in others; if not, it is repealed and ceases
to be. The experience of mankind has discovered no better way than this
of popular legislation, for organizing the ideal justice of the people
into permanent forms. If there is a man of moral and political genius in
the community, he can easily be made available to the public. The
experiment of popular legislation has been eminently successful in
America.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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