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viduals, or of combinations of individuals, well be distinguished

from that of the nation itself. the conduct of its members.

Every nation is responsible for This is the established doctrine

of the Law of Nations, and must unquestionably apply in all its force (a fortiori) to the very intimate relation subsisting among

the United States.*

3. Again, another way in which the harmony of the States, and also of still larger sections of the Union, has been, and may be still further impaired is, by the mutual abuse and vilification of one another's institutions and other peculiarities, circulated in newspapers, reviews, and sometimes in publications of more

* "If the other States of the Union," says the legislature of North Carolina, "were foreign states, it would be a violation of national law in them, either to set on foot themselves, or permit their own subjects to set on foot, any project the object or tendency of which would be to disturb our peace, by arraying one portion of society against another. The Constitution which unites us, and by virtue of which we have ceased to be foreign states in regard to each other, and have become bound in the closest union, and the most intimate relations, for the promotion of the common defence and general welfare, cannot be supposed to have lessened our mutual obligations, or to have made an act harmless, which would have been gross wrong, had we continued in respect to each other as we now are in respect to other nations, —in war, enemies, and only in peace, friends. It is evident, on the contrary, that every duty of friendship towards each other, which before existed, is by our union heightened in its obligation, and enforced by motives the most exalted and endearing. Whatever institution or state of society we think proper to establish or permit, is by no other State to be disturbed or questioned. We enter not into the inquiry, whether such institution be deemed by another State just or expedient. It is sufficient that we think proper to allow it. To protect us from attempts to disturb what we allow and they approve, would be to support not our institutions, but their own opinions, to exercise a supervising power over our legislation, and to insult us with a claim of superiority in the very offer to discharge the duty which our relations authorize us to require. As our right is indisputable to regulate exclusively, according to our own notions, the interior relations of our own people, the duty of preventing every attempt to disturb what we have established, results from the simple fact, that we have established it. And the propriety and impropriety, in the view of others, of such regulations as we have pleased to make, can never either enhance or lessen the duty of such prevention. No other State, therefore, and no portion of the people of any other State, can claim to interfere in any matter of ours, either by authority, advice, or persuasion; and such an attempt, from whatever quarter it may come, must ever be met by us with distrust, and repelled with indignation." (Report and Resolutions of North Carolina, on the Subject of Incendiary Publications, December 19th,

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grave importance. The relation of sisterhood is singularly expressive of the connexion which subsists between these States, the peculiarities and even the defects of any one or more of them, are entitled to be viewed with candor and even with indulgence by any others, who may feel themselves justified in regarding whatever pertains to themselves with peculiar complacency. At all events, it is not the part of individuals or communities, which stand in a relation so intimate to each other, whose highest interests, hopes, and prospects, nay, whose destinies are inseparably united, and who consequently must stand or fall together, who have so direct and palpable an interest in maintaining harmony, and in the mutual welfare and good opinion of each other, to seize every occasion to abuse, vilify, and misrepresent each other. Much mischief has been done by the mutual abuse, vilification, and misrepresentation, which have passed between the northern, southern, and western sections of the Union even thus far ; - and these divisions of the coungreat try, which ought to be indissolubly bound to one another by the golden chain of mutual harmony and good feeling, have been and may again be in danger, by reason very much of this mutual abuse and irritation, of being permanently alienated, and of being separated into as many alien, unsocial, jealous, and hostile sovereignties, feeble and despicable in respect to every thing foreign, and formidable only to one another.

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Finally, the several United States owe it to themselves, to each other, to the Union, and to the supremacy of moral principle, to observe, uphold, and adhere to the Constitution of the United States; to submit to its provisions, the laws made in pursuance thereof, and the decisions of its tribunals. The obligation of this duty is in proportion to their ability to make successful resistance. Many of the States are too powerful for coercion; they must be governed, therefore, not by physical force, but must be kept within the rightful limits of their constitutional duty by the strength of their inherent moral principle.

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PART THIRD.

THE CHIEF RELATIONS OF MANKIND TO ONE ANOTHER, AND THE DUTIES THENCE ARISING,— THAT IS, THE DUTIES WHICH MEN RECIPROCALLY OWE TO EACH OTHER.

OUR relation to God and our country, and the duties thence arising, have been as fully considered as consists with my design. But we sustain other relations, of various kinds, and of various degrees of intimacy, the effect of all of which is, to charge us with peculiar duties and impose on us peculiar responsibilities. These are the relations of husband and wife, of parents and children, of brothers and sisters, of master and servant, of principal and agent, with their corresponding duties and rights. The relations of guardian and ward, and of instructer and pupil, are branches of, or rather substitutes for, the parental relation. The obligation of truth between man and man, and of the observance of promises, springs directly from the relation in which men stand to each other as moral and responsible beings. Contracts of various kinds include a very large part of the business transactions of mankind, and the relation of the contracting parties in forming and executing such contracts is another source of moral duties. Our social rank and relative standing in society place us in the relation of superiors, equals, or inferiors. If we are blessed with wealth and consequent leisure, we are thereby brought into new relations towards those who have been less favored than ourselves with the bounties of Providence ;we owe them our personal services in their behalf, and pecuniary relief, when they are destitute of the comforts and especially the necessaries of life. The duties of friendship and hospitality, and the mutual duties of benefactor and beneficiary, also claim a portion of our consideration and regard. The relation of good

neighbourhood, moreover, is one on which much of our peace and happiness depends.

This enumeration of the relations in which men stand to each other is not complete, nor is designed to be complete ; but it comprises all those which are usually made the subjects of inquiry in elementary treatises of moral philosophy. Some of them are natural, others voluntary, others both natural and voluntary. Some are permanent and sanctioned by law, others are transient and incidental. One (marriage) is sanctioned by the united power of personal choice, law, and religion. Our relative duties are chiefly performed in private, and are withdrawn from the gaze of the world; but they are extremely important, by reason of their number, the constancy of their recurrence, and the endless variety of their ramifications; by which they pervade human society in all its ranks, modifications, and degrees of improvement. The happiness of mankind, therefore, is deeply concerned in these relations being well understood, and the duties which flow from them being suitably performed. Some attention must have been given them in every stage of society. Their importance is of the first order; and, in every civilized country, they have been made the subject of anxious and careful consideration and inquiry. They are made the subject of three of the ten commandments, and the Hebrew Scriptures abound with precepts and examples, illustrating their nature, and enforcing their fulfilment. Christianity has recognised, strengthened, and refined these relations, and has prescribed and enforced the duties of many of them by new, positive, and more definite instructions. To collect these instructions, to arrange, amplify, limit, and apply them to the relations of life, giving their authority the first rank, and accompanying them with argument and elucidations drawn from reason, experience, authors ancient and modern, and every other accessible source, will swell this branch of my treatise much beyond the size of the other parts into which it is divided.

The key to the morals of this important branch of the subject, is given us by our Saviour in this saying, "All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them, for" (it is added to give preeminence to the precept) "this is

the law and the prophets.' ""* This is the grand rule, by which we must in all cases regulate our conduct towards others; and it is a rule, plain, simple, concise, intelligible, comprehensive, and every way worthy of its Divine Author. Whenever we are deliberating how we ought to act towards another person in any particular instance, we must, in imagination, change situations with him, we must place him in our circumstances, and ourselves in his, and then impartially inquire, how we might reasonably expect him to behave towards us, if our respective situations were exchanged. Every man, at first sight, must perceive, that this would lead to universal justice, truth, goodness, gentleness, compassion, beneficence, forgiveness, candor, and charity, and exclude every thing of an opposite nature. If we honestly proceeded in this way, we should seldom need a casuist, to teach us how we ought to act towards other men, in any possible situation or circumstances.

CHAPTER I.

THE DOMESTIC RELATIONS AND THE DUTIES SPRINGING
FROM THEM.

THE domestic relations and their appropriate duties, being first in the order of importance, deservedly claim the first rank. The family is the original of all societies, and contains the foundation and primitive elements of all other institutions. The family was instituted by God himself, † and with this institution, he crowned the fair creation which he had made in six days and pronounced very good. As it was the first of all human associations, so it is the most natural, the most permanent, and the most effective of good.

We are accustomed to unite ourselves into artificial associations, useful and valuable for the ends which they have in view; but they are the work of men's hands, they partake of the frailty

*Matt. vii. 12.

† See Genesis i. 26-28; ii. 18-24.

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