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determined effort to stay the degradation, the degeneration
and the demoralisation of their wretched fellow
creatures; uidess means are forthcoming to arrest the
physical and moral plagues by which we are surrounded,
that our civilization, our free institutions, our noble
progress as an enlightened nation, enjoying more true
liberty than any other people ever did enjoy; all must
sink into the arms of some despotism, to hold together
the discordant elements of the degraded poverty and
physical misery of our lowest classes, and the absence of
sound thought, of practical wisdom and feeling of duty
which are too apparent in the masses of our monied
classes. We do certainly see many noble examples of
large wealth combined with that moral and religious
sense, which teaches those of its possessors, that, to be
entrusted with ample means, is to be entrusted also
with the solemn duty of raising their fellow creatures
from mere animals (for many human beings herd together
with more beastliness than the beasts themselves)
to percipient, reasonable, and religious beings. Doubtless,
much is attempted for the improvement of the
people; but practically, as yet, with too little success
to enliven the hope that our country, if the degeneration
of its people continues, will escape the fate of other
nations, to be degraded to some species of despotism by
the self-indulgence of its rich, and the base ignorance of
its poor. We might say the base ignorance of its
people as a whole, both rich and poor; for, can anything
be more evident, than that it is the real duty,
as well as the true source of happiness to the wealthy,
to improve the condition of those classes who
form the strength of a nation, and that, if these are
allowed physically to degenerate, as in the wretched
homes they occupy, and the degrading circumstances
under which too many now live, not only in great cities
but in many country districts, we are breeding up