NO. 10.

CONTAINING

SITUATIONS,

BY

ROBERT DALE QWEN.

He is immorally situated, whose apparent interest tells him one thing, and his duty another.

NEW-YORK:

PUBLISHED AT THE OFFICE OF THE FREE ENQUIRER.

SITUATIONS.

[Extracted from the Free Enquirer.]

OF LAWYERS.

THE situation in which the members of the most influential classes in society find themselves placed, appears to me conducive neither to their own probity and happiness, nor to the welfare of the community. I am convinced that very many of the errors that prevail throughout our country, and very much of the difficulty which exists in removing these errors, may be traced to this source. I should conceive it much more easy to cure men of their credulities, and to establish rational virtue among them, if it were no one's apparent interest to make them credulous or quarrelsome. In like manner, I should expect much less disease among mankind, if physicians were remunerated according to the measure of health, and not according to the measure of disease, that exists around them.

Not that I attribute to lawyers, as a body, the deliberate intention to sow dissentions; nor to the clergy, as a body, an organized plan of attack on our credulity; nor to physicians, as a body, the desire to see disease prevail. But there are degrees of dishonesty; and a strong temptation placed before a whole class of men is seldom without its effects.. In illustration of these general observations, let us examine the situation and the temptations of one of these professions, that of the lawyers.

To the professed object of the law and lawyers no one will object. Men act unjustly towards each other, and it is desirable that such injustice should be remedied: men quarrel; and it is desirable that they should be reconciled. The law professes to remedy injustice and to reconcile quarrels, and if its practice corresponded to its professions, law would be one of the greatest blessings in social life. Is it so? Is law a blessing to this, or to any other country? Are lawyers the promoters of peace, harmony, and kindness? Are they not, even proverbially, the reverse?

I will ask yet more: is it not the positive, pecuniary interest

of the lawyer, that injustice should spread, and quarrels increase, around him? Ought it to be the interest of any one individual in society that his fellow creatures should be immoral and unhappy? OUGHT ANY MAN TO LIVE BY HIS NEIGHBOR'S VICES? Do not lawyers live, directly and continually, by their neighbors' vices?

Again: Is it not the positive, pecuniary interest of lawyers, that the system of law should be complicated, and that it should be expensive? And is it not the positive, pecuniary interest of mankind, that the system of law should not be complicated, and should not be expensive? Are not lawyers, therefore, when called upon to simplify the legal code, called upon to take the money out of their own pockets, in order to benefit their fellow-citizens? IS NOT THIS A VITIATING SITUATION?

If the world were honest and virtuous, would not lawyers starve? Are not lawyers poor, in proportion as honesty and virtue prevail? If the lawyer, then, in common with other men, labors to make money, must he not feel that honesty and virtue are, virtually, his enemies? If a Devil exist, can he place his children more favorably for vice than this?

I would that I could adequately express the importance which I attach to these questions, and to their answers. If lawyers were few in number, and uninfluential in rank, and contemptible in talent, the evil were trifling. But they swarm over our land; three-fourths of our legislators and governors have risen to their situations through the law; and the best talents of our country are developed at the bar. The influence of lawyers, in these United States, is overwhelming. It is considerably greater, as I believe, than that of the clergy.

When a young man evinces, or is imagined to evince, uncommon talents, he is educated for the bar; that, thus, he may rise to honor and distinction. Study and practice render him eloquent, perhaps; and eloquence is all-powerful in a republic like ours. He learns to argue speciously and smoothly, if not soundly; and smooth and specious arguments lead easy, indolent man, almost to any absurdity.

Thus the most talented—and, because the most talented, the most influential also-among our youth, are trained to a profession, the interests of which are against every man, and every man's interests against it. We elect them as our representatives and rulers; and we expect them to legislate for our benefit. One would imagine that we thought human nature

could not be injured by any situation, nor seduced by any temptations. One would imagine that we thought all men so disinterestedly good, that they might be safely trusted to act and to legislate against themselves.

I hope and believe that there are honest, worthy men among lawyers, as among monarchs. Because I doubt whether any profession, however vitiating, be effectual to corrupt some noble characters. There are those who will pass through the fire of temptation, and come out, like platina, only brighter and purer. But the virtues of the mass of mankind are not of platina. They melt and disappear, when too strongly tried; and, therefore, the experiment is an unwise and an improper

one.

Power is dangerous at all times and in any hands. Let us not add to the danger, by placing it in the hands of those who must sacrifice their own interests to legislate for ours. Let us not demand too much, that we be not disappointed. Our public officers require all the aid which situation can give them, to act and to legislate wisely and justly. It is to be regretted, that their previous profession should add to their difficulties.

I can see no remedy for the manifold evils that result from the present system of law and legislation, except in paying our lawyers otherwise than according to our vices; or else, in choosing our legislators elsewhere than from among lawyers.

OF THE CLERGY.

In our last number I expressed my conviction that lawyers are a class of men unfavorably situated; unfavorably for themselves, and unfavorably for society. Yet I do not think them singular in that respect; for the situation of our clergy seems to me equally unfortunate.

Any extraneous temptation to hold, right or wrong, to our opinions, has an immoral and injurious tendency. It frequently acts as a bounty on falsehood. It sometimes induces hypocrisy. It awakens in us an artificial partiality for our own creed, which is the more prejudicial, inasmuch as we are already, from vanity and habit, much too prone to such partiality. It creates an artificial animosity against all dissenters from our creed; and this too is exceedingly pernicious; seeing

that frail human nature is already but too much given to intolerance, and that intolerance is the bane of all kindness and virtue in society. It bids us shrink from free enquiry, however useful; and fear conviction, however well-founded: while conscientiousness requires us to welcome free enquiry, and to yield implicitly to conviction. It acts as a drawback on the discovery of truth and the correction of error.

Thus all artificial inducements to adhere to any creed are mischievous. They add fuel to flame; they increase evils already too great; they flatter our weaknesses, and encourage our vices. We are addicted to selfish partiality; they increase the propensity. We are inclined to be uncharitable; they render us yet more so. We fear to throw off our prejudices: they add to the fear. The progress of improvement is slow; they tend yet more to retard it. Now, it is true that the clergy are not alone exposed to this artificial temptation. There exists, in all countries, and for all men, a premium upon orthodoxy; that is, a premium upon all opinions and customs which are generally received. Men win favor, gain patronage, obtain popularity, and make money by adopting and defending these. Thus, favor, and patronage, and popularity, and money, become so many prizes, offered by society as the reward of conformity.

But if all men are thus tempted in the degree, the clergy are so in the extreme. They have been trained as the servants and supporters of a religious system. As its servants and supporters they win a livelihood; and most of them have learnt no other profession. With their faith, therefore, they lose also their livelihood, unless they will consent to act the hypocrite. At the moment they become converts, they become beggars also; unless they will resolve to begin the world again, and learn to labor for their support. Their profession and its emoluments are their only property; and they cannot become honest sceptics, except under penalty of its confiscation.

How immoral, how vitiating is such a situation! How filled with temptations to evil, and inducements to dishonesty! What sacrifices does it require of him who may chance to see beyond the creed of his forefathers, and who has not learnt to say what he does not think! How richly it rewards hypocrisy ! and how heavily it clogs the wheels of improvement ! What should be said to such a law as this: whoever shall dissent from the popular creed, and shall openly express