Liberality

“ This is not the liberality and equality which constitute democracy as the social order in which popular sovereignty is most fully realized because, through the discipline of reason, men have the authority to govern themselves and use the freedom of self-government. ”

“ In the zeal to draw sectional contrasts, we have been told by one gentleman, that gentlemen from one district of country talk of their morality, while those of another practice it. And the superior liberality has been asserted of southern gentlemen over those of the north, in all contributions to moral institutions, for bible and missionary societies. Sir, I understand too well the pursuit of my purpose, to be decoyed and drawn off into the discussion of a collateral subject* I have no inclination to controvert these assertions of comparative liberality. ”

“ Yet although these truths are very widely recognised, and freedom both of opinion and of discussion is admitted as an axiom in all free countries, this apparent liberality and tolerance has acquired so little of the authority of a principle, that it is always ready to give way to the dread or horror inspired by some particular sort of opinions. ”

“ But these individual instances of prejudice or liberality were submerged and lost in the current of popular opinion springing from prevailing interests in the respective localities, and institutions molded principles, until in turn principles should become strong enough to reform institutions. ”

“ As a consequence, our actual system is an inconsistent mixture. Certain studies and methods are retained on the supposition that they have the sanction of peculiar liberality, the chief content of the term liberal being uselessness for practical ends. ”

“ There is nothing which destroys itself so much as liberality, for by using it you lose the power of using it, and become either poor and despicable, or, to escape poverty, rapacious and hated. And of all things that a prince must guard against, the most important are being despicable or hated, and liberality will lead you to one or other of these conditions. It is, therefore, wiser to have the name of a miser, which produces disgrace without hatred, than to incur of necessity the name of being rapacious, which produces both disgrace and hatred. ”

“ The Liberal who no longer feels at the bottom of his heart a sympathy with the rebel who chafes against the institutions of society, whether religious, political, social or economic, is well on the road to the other camp. But the dynamic force of Liberty, that great motive power of progress, though a good servant, may be a bad master; and the perennial problem of society is to harmonise its aims with those of the common good. ”

“ We have been solicitous to procure a just taste in policy and government, and have at length succeeded in this first and highest emulation. It may now be proper to apply the liberty, we have so happily gained, to other improvements. There is something, I have ever observed, congenial to the liberal arts in the reigning spirit of a free people. It must then be our own fault, if our progress in every elegant pursuit do not keep pace with our excellent constitution. ”

“ The Liberal declares that human beings exist before the State, and control it, that their opinion determines in what way the State, like the Church, the industrial system, and the home, shall be constructed, that opinion varies in different countries and in different ages, and will at one time and in one place acquiesce in despotism and at another time and in another place require adult suffrage, but that always, first and last, the subjects are masters of the State. ”

“ Is our grand Republic, its destiny, its administration, its policy, to be forever floating hither and thither upon the uncertain billows of this beautiful but dangerous sea of political metaphysics? Are these gentlemen prepared to say that every institution of society must stand or fall, according as it conforms, or fails to conform, to some principle of natural right, deduced by each generation from natural reason? Where, sir, would such a principle stop? ”

“ I began my public life by being a liberal; and now, by force of reason, by the teachings of experience, and by an increased knowledge of mankind, I have learned, loving my country, wishing her good and her greatness, to become a conservative,—an upholder of authority. ”

“ Why do Liberals now wish to add to the power and authority of the State? To be able to ameliorate the intellectual, moral, and material condition of a greater number of citizens. There is no inconsistency in their programme; the object in view, which is the great aim of all civilization, has been always the same—to assure to each individual liberty and well-being in proportion to his merit and activity! ”

“ Acknowledge the right to control government, and you acknowledge the right to control life. So long as it lies in the power of one class to impose taxes, to regulate the hours of labour, to admit and to exclude from occupations, and generally to control the political organization of society, so long will its members be tempted to dispose of the members of the subject class in every part of life. When the equality of both classes in the State is admitted, the admission of their equal worth in all their private relations inevitably follows. ”

“ Mill. "There are the historical Radicals, who demand popular institutions as the inheritance of Englishmen, transmitted to us from the Saxons or the barons of Runnymede. There are the metaphysical Radicals, who hold the principles of democracy, not as means to good government, but as corollaries from some unreal abstraction,—from 'natural liberty' or 'natural rights.' There are the radicals of occasion and circumstance, who are radicals because they disapprove the measures of the government for the time being. ”

“ They assailed liberalism in every form, from the French Encyclopædists to the humblest advocate of popular government, consigning all of them to eternal tortures for venturing to assert the natural right of mankind to civil and religious liberty. ”

“ In other words, you, my Democratic friends, in the name of liberty asserted the right of one man, under State law, to deprive another man of his freedom; in the name of democracy you asserted the right of one class of people under State law to rule despotically over another class; in the name of self-government you asserted the right of the States to exclude a large portion, sometimes even amounting to a majority of their population, from all participation in self-government. ”

“ They go to the form and substance of government, not to its policy, as in America, where every party cry, radical or conservative, is attuned to the music of a republican federation, and which is the sine qua non to all political conclusions. How can a nation progress until its people have chosen, or are competent to choose, a stable form of government, and are satisfied with certain organic political principles? ”

“ Neither our conservatism nor our liberalism, neither our oligarchic nor our ‘levelling’ zeal, can find much to claim as its own in a struggle which was for a hierarchy under royal licence on the one side, and for a freedom founded in grace on the other. ”

“ IX. Free association, liberty, which confines itself to the maintenance of equality in the means of production and equivalence in exchanges, is the only form of society possible, just, and true.
“X. Politics is the science of liberty; the government of man by man, under whatever name it may disguise itself, is oppression. ”

“ Let us suppose a monarchical state administered in such a way that, although all goes on according to the will of one person, each citizen could persuade himself that he governs and obeys only his own inclination, we should call that government a liberal government. ”

“ Without attempting to draw hard lines between communities, the Liberal sees in them distinctions of worth and capacity such as he sees in individuals, and he would give the same freedom of self-development to a nation as to a human being. ”

“ To men of all parties and opinions, who wish well to the Republic, and would preserve its good name, it appeals. Alike to the Conservative and the Reformer, it appeals; for it stands on the truest Conservatism and the truest Reform. In seeking the reform of existing evils, we seek also the conservation of the principles of our fathers. ”

“ Whatever logical answer there may be to the second, a Liberal State, accepting the equality of all sects as its first principle, must give them precisely the same liberty as the first. If a Churchman is not to count for more than a Dissenter, a Dissenter is not to count for more than a Churchman. ”

“ And you still call yourselves Democrats, and claim the confidence of the people by your fidelity to the great principle that popular liberty and free institutions must be secured by a strict limitation of the powers of government! ”

“ If the balance incline towards a more liberal form of government, towards democratic institutions, and therefore towards self-government, and the participation of the many rather than of the few in the affairs of the State, I am not to blame, nor is it my ordinance, but that of History and of Providence. ”

“ Resolved to broaden and strengthen the bounds of freedom, we who continue attached to the principles of our party will never swerve from the straight course, will never be daunted by the virulence or the violence of our opponents, will never forget to strive for that ideal of Liberalism—liberty of thought, equality of opportunity, and fraternity of aim. ”

“ Shall we not rather take the place to which we are entitled, as the leaders, rather than the followers, in the customs of society, turn back the tide of aristocratic inroads, and carry through the whole, not only of civil and political, but of social and domestic, life, the true principles of democratic freedom and equality? ”

“ In politics he held opinions which were astonishingly in advance of those of his contemporaries. He was a Free Trader. He favoured the election of local authorities, the abolition of alehouses, the encouragement of workmen's clubs and friendly societies, annual national holidays, cheap county courts, the conversion of prisons into reformatory institutions, and national compulsory education. [46] This practical Liberalism was inspired by original Liberal theory. The old feudalism and government by territorial aristocracy must go, and the middle and working classes must take its place. ”

“ We wish liberty, and we believe its existence incompatible with the existence of any power whatsoever, whatever its origin and form—whether it be elected or imposed, monarchical or republican—whether inspired by divine right or by popular right, by anointment or universal suffrage. ”

“ Consider first, then, in any given case, “Are those in the minority seeking to keep or filch liberty from you, or only to obtain such liberty as is already yours? Are they seeking to set up equality of condition or inequality? ”

“ I should much dread a power which, while maintaining order, would either in fact or appearance be sufficiently revolutionary to dispense with being liberal. I should be apprehensive that the country would too easily lend itself to such a rule. ”

“ Turning, thirdly, to those principles themselves, we have recognized Liberalism in every department as a movement fairly denoted by the name—a movement of liberation, a clearance of obstructions, an opening of channels for the flow of free spontaneous vital activity. Fourthly, we have seen that in a large number of cases what is under one aspect a movement for liberty is on another side a movement towards equality, and the habitual association of these principles is so far confirmed. ”

“ By placing political power in the hands of property, intelligence, independent position, and great interests naturally conservative, the system rested on the expectation that these interests would be habitually united, and would defend, in common accord, order and right against the spirit of license and revolution, the fatal bias of the age. ”

“ If they have interfered with liberty, they have interfered with liberty on one side only to enlarge it on another, and the money required for reform has been so provided as to reduce by as little as possible individual capacity for growth. Whatever the particular defects of these social reforms may be, their general character has been as Liberal as that of the reforms of 1832 and 1868. ”

“ Constitutional governments were born of liberalism, which replaced the autocracy that was the salvation of the Goys, for the constitution, as you well know, is nothing more than a school for dispute, discussion, disagreement, fruitless party agitation, dissension, party tendencies—in other words, a school for everything which weakens the efficiency of government. ”

“ It holds that the object of government is liberty, whereas the true object of government is justice; not the advantage of one class, even though that class constitute the majority, but right equity in the adjustment of the interests of all classes. ”

“ Out of the temporary evil we are now compelled to commit will emerge the good of an unshakeable rule, which will restore the regular course of the machinery of the national life, brought to naught by liberalism. ”

“ The speculations on political rights, to which the contest with Great Britain and the debates on the question of independence gave rise, greatly favored the doctrines of political equality and the hatred of power in any form that could control the public will. There are, in the heart of every man, principles which readily prepare him for republican doctrines, and after a few years some of the speculative politicians began to think that the free, simple, and equal government which was suited to the tastes and habits of our people, was also the best in theory. ”

“ On the other hand, lastly, we have seen numerous cases in which the exacter definition of liberty and the precise meaning of equality remain obscure, and to discuss these will be our task. We have, moreover, admittedly regarded Liberalism mainly in its earlier and more negative aspect. We have seen it as a force working within an old society and modifying it by the loosening of the bonds which its structure imposed on human activity. ”