BY J. L. BAKER.
AUTHOR OF "EXPORTS AND IMPORTS," "MEN AND THINGS," &c.
The recent attempt of John Brown to incite an insurrection at Harper's Ferry has created no little excitement throughout the country. Strange and desperate as the movement was, it seems to have been the natural and necessary result of the long twenty years' war, waged in the free States upon the institutions of the South, the culminating point, it is to be hoped, in a reform based on no sound principle, and which, like an epidemic, has swept over the land, fruitful only in bitter words, harsh recrimination, sectional hostility, and ending, like the last act of a tragedy, in violence and murder.
The scene that has been enacted at Harper's Ferry will perhaps have the effect to open the eyes of the nation, so that they can see fully the yawning gulf, the brink of which they have at last reached, and lead them to examine the ground on which they stand; inquire what they have been doing, and what good cause can be served by a course of action which has led to such fatal results. Many lives have been sacrificed. A whole family has been ruined, and an old man has been led out to suffer the last and most terrible infliction of the law. He has been but an instrument in the hands of others, who have acted, with the exception of some political leaders, from honest convictions.
The time has now come, however, for them to inquire, and for all to inquire with the utmost seriousness, if these convictions of duty have been just and commendable, or if they have been mistaken, and therefore to be condemned. Zeal without knowledge is a dangerous weapon, as all history has proved, and it is incumbent upon all, not only to do right, but to think right. It is an old maxim that ignorance of the law excuses no man, and it is equally true that we are not at liberty to follow our blind impulses, but are bound to inform ourselves, and to know whether a particular course of action, however well intended, is such as will not defeat the very purposes we have in view, while it brings misery and ruin to thousands of our fellow beings.
Liberty has been in all ages of the world a most fruitful theme for the poet and the orator, and still its true nature and conditions are but imperfectly understood. Constitutional liberty, such as that of England and the United States, is possible only to a race that has a physical temperament that fits it for self-control or self-government, and to such a race only is it a blessing. But few such races have been known in history. One of them was the Grecian, and afterwards the Roman, but both became degenerated, and lost the capacity of self-government.
In modern times the English nation has exhibited the same capacity, which belongs also to ourselves, who are of the same blood. No other people have those constitutional traits which fit them for self-government, which is but another name for self-restraint. The Frenchman is volatile, fickle, and fond of glory, and less free to-day than he was under Louis the Sixteenth. He has a government which answers to his wants and his genius, which exactly represents his condition, and contributes, therefore, most to his happiness. Should he, in the course of centuries, become changed in his physical and mental constitution, he will find, necessarily, a government that corresponds to the progress he has made. Governments are but the agents and representatives of the people. They reflect very nearly the condition of the governed, and change to meet the changes of those they represent. No mortal power can prevent any people from taking and enjoying that degree of freedom they are capable of enjoying, and which would, therefore, contribute to their happiness. What is true of France, is true of the other European nations, and of all nations; so that we never deceive ourselves more completely than when we talk of political liberty as something equally applicable to all, and attainable by all.