Priority right

“ We can provide for our future necessities. We can raise up a great and mighty people, who will be led and governed by the principles of righteousness, and we have now an opportunity of doing it in these valleys. ”

“ After telling us that the 'general will is always right, and always tends to the public good,' he adds, 'but it does not follow that the deliberations of the people have always the same rectitude.... There is often a great difference between the will of all and the general will. ”

“ Virtue and right conduct consist in those affections and actions which terminate in the public good; justice and veracity, for instance, having nothing intrinsically excellent in them, separate from their relation to the happiness of mankind; and the whole system of right to power, property, and every thing else in society, must be regulated by the same consideration: the decisive question, when any of these subjects are examined, being, What is it that the good of the community requires? ”

“ Whatever power of regulation, change or control we possess over these functions does not belong to the powers themselves, but to the will or the personal capacity of free choice and self-regulation. It is only through our will-power that we can handle and direct our thinking or control the direction and force of our feelings. So, too, the ideas of right and wrong, the perceptions of duty and the sense of obligation come into the presence of the will of necessity. ”

“ Is the corporation more powerful than the state? Is a voluntarily executed mortgage more valid than a statute? If, in fact, in pursuance of such a statute, a mortgage to each separate creditor was given and recorded as fast as the corporation came under obligation to him, could a nonresident creditor question the validity of the mortgage or the priority given thereby? And is the effect of the statute in controversy anything other than the imposition upon the assets of the corporation within the state of a single mortgage in favor of home creditors? ”

“ The interest of the State, in so far as it is directed by the General Will, must be the interest of every individual, in so far as he is guided by his real will, that is, in so far as he is acting universally, rationally and autonomously. ”

“ It proposes to supplant what you have been trained to consider the foundation of your life, of society, of order, and you have been trained to believe that your most precious rights are bound up with that system. ”

“ Govern yourselves first. If you are not fit to govern yourselves, you are certainly not fit to take part in governing us.” Will this be uncharitable? Charity begins at home. To perpetuate our institutions is our first duty. ”

“ You yourselves know that I have never spared, nor will I spare, either myself or my labours for the needful service of my whole people.... I have vowed to God Himself, henceforth to reform my life in all things, and justly and piously to govern the kingdoms and the peoples subject to me, and to maintain equal justice in all things. ”

“ Who is to be the judge of this sort of necessity? By what measure is the comparative value of lives to be measured? Is it to be strength, or intellect, or what? It is plain that the principle leaves to him who is to profit by it to determine the necessity which will justify him in deliberately taking another's life to save his own. ”

“ The first principles of power are in the people; and all the projects of men in power ought to refer to the people, to aim solely at their good, and end in it: And whoever will pretend to govern them without regarding them, will soon repent it. ”

“ The other is the profound need of justice, the presentiment of, and the demand for, a social order which would be harmonious and truly human, from which the present reality is still far off, but which is bound to realize itself. ”

“ To do and bear whatever is necessary to maintain that organization of life which the state represents is the imperative duty of every citizen. This duty to serve the country is correlative to the right to be a citizen. ”

“ It will come only when the whole nation, as one man, shall be guided in every transaction, small and great, by justice and judgment, and not till then. In the mean time, it is every man’s duty, who sees and acknowledges this truth, to do all in his power to give it vitality in the minds of the people. ”

“ Some of these moral conceptions are that all have common rights, that each owes to all common duties, that there should be no right without duties, and that duties should be proportioned to capabilities. ”

“ The power, which is at once spring and regulator in all efforts of reform, is the conviction that there is an infinite worthiness in man which will appear at the call of worth, and that all particular reforms are the removing of some impediment. Is it not the highest duty that man should be honored in us? ”

“ The men in authority, who provoked the matter and coöperated in it and directed it, will say that they are doing what they are doing because such matters are necessary for the maintenance of the existing order; and the maintenance of the existing order is necessary for the good of the country and of humanity, for the possibility of a social life and a forward movement of progress. ”

“ The capacity, then, on the part of the individual of conceiving a good as the same for himself and others, and of being determined to action by that conception, is the foundation of rights; and rights are the condition of that capacity being realised. ”

“ Politics looks at the universal needs of all men,—those needs which each man has in common with all humanity—and from the universal needs assumes a universal unalienable right of each against each other and against all, and a universal duty of each toward each other and toward all, to supply these needs. ”

“ We have no other choice and I ask you once more, for the sake of suffering humanity, to accept the leadership of this worthy cause which will do more for the people than all other reform movements combined. ”

“ But moral, political, intellectual improvement are duties assigned by the Author of Our Existence to social no less than to individual man.
For the fulfillment of those duties governments are invested with power, and to the attainment of the end--the progressive improvement of the condition of the governed--the exercise of delegated powers is a duty as sacred and indispensable as the usurpation of powers not granted is criminal and odious. ”

“ Occupied in our own affairs, we have not leisure for these studies; nor can we exercise these functions in our own persons. Let us choose, then, among ourselves, such persons as are capable of this employment. To them we will delegate our powers to institute our government and laws. They shall be the representatives of our wills and of our interests. And in order to attain the fairest representation possible of our wills and our interests, let it be numerous, and composed of men resembling ourselves. ”

“ Neither the few nor the many have a right to act merely by their will, in any matter connected with duty, trust, engagement, or obligation. ”

“ The common duties of every-day life, and the common rules of social policy, are matters which no moralist states once for all: on the contrary, they are reiterated as often as occasion requires—and occasion requires them very often. ”

“ That reasons as well as feelings may help the establishment of happiness and liberty, on the basis of wisdom and virtue, be our aim and intention. Let us not be led into any means which are unworthy of this end, nor, as [Pg 250] so much depends upon yourselves, let us cease carefully to watch over our conduct, that when we talk of reform it be not objected to us, that reform ought to begin at home. In the interval that public or private duties and necessary labours allow, husband your time so that you may do to others and yourselves the most real good. ”

“ As a rule, politics we will not deal with. But questions of policy may never be divorced from the demands of morality. We will, therefore, as occasion many arise, discuss important political topics from the stand-point of justice and righteousness. ”

“ The questions we have to dispose of are not those of immediate life or death; but the bearing they have upon the future welfare of the nation, and upon those interests which most nearly affect us, is important enough to make us consider well what we are doing, to call for our best judgment and a strenuous effort to put that judgment into execution. ”

“ But we know what has happened, and we can, each one of us for himself, form an opinion as to whether we should do anything apt to be construed as an approval of it, and as an encouragement of a continuance of the same policy. ”

“ All rights, when the essence of them is spoken of, are powers; powers to an individual, which the governing members of the community guarantee; powers, more or less extensive, of making either a person or a thing subservient to the gratification of his desires. To be made to gratify the desire of an individual, is to be made to render him a service. ”

“ It is solely on the basis of this common interest that every society should be governed. ”

“ Among the multitude of plans proposed and opinions held, with reference to our cause and condition, we shall try to have a mind of our own, harmonizing with all as far as we can, and differing from any and all where we must, but always discriminating between men and measures. ”

“ Let us, by all means, make our own circumstances as easy as possible; but let us lay posterity under no difficulty in improving theirs, if they see it convenient: rather, let all plans of policy be such as will easily admit of extension, and improvements of all kinds, and that the least violence, or difficulty of any kind, may attend the making of them. ”

“ Supposing that philosophers can find exquisite reasons for considering the institutions and requirements which have resulted from all this self-seeking and violence to be contributory to the common good of those who have to submit to them, is it not trifling to speak of them as founded on or representing a conception of this good, when no such conception has influenced those who established, maintain, or submit to them? ”

“ What was now wanted was, that the rulers should be identified with the people; that their interest and will should be the interest and will of the nation. The nation did not need to be protected against its own will. ”

“ With an anxious desire for the completion of the works which are regarded by all good citizens with sincere interest, I have deemed it my duty to ask at your hands a deliberate reconsideration of the question, with a hope that, animated by a desire to promote the permanent and substantial interests of the country, your wisdom may prove equal to the task of devising and maturing a plan which, applied to this subject, may promise something better than constant strife, the suspension of the powers of local enterprise, the exciting of vain hopes, and the disappointment of cherished expectations. ”

“ If you will not of your own accord do your duty, those to whom performance of the duty is owing have a right to use means to make you—foul means if fair means will not avail. If, then, you hesitate to do your utmost for the interests of society, society is warranted in taking measures to accelerate your movement. ”

“ Who has solved these questions? And if you have solved them for yourselves, where do you find the authority to solve them for others? Do not take useless responsibilities on yourselves. Everyone has his own, and that is sufficient. ”

“ We see, then, that in the total absence of any fixed principles on which men can unite, the policy required is one which shall be purely provisional, and limited almost entirely to the maintenance of material order. ”

“ Can there then be a more stringent public duty for every man—and the greater the intelligence the greater the duty—than to take care, by all the influence he can command, that the country, the majority, public opinion, shall have a mind to do only what is just and pure and humane? ”

“ And, whether the demand is rightly or wrongly expressed, we must, I think, admit that the real force with which we have to reckon is the demand for justice and for equality as somehow implied by justice. ”

“ Let the people see to it that they get righteous men to be their leaders, who will labour with their hands and administer to their own necessities, sit in judgment, legislate, and govern in righteousness ”

“ As to the share of power, authority, direction, which each individual ought to have in the management of the state, that I must deny to be amongst the direct original rights of man in civil society."—Ibid. ”

“ I am properly obliged to those actions and forbearances which are necessary to the general freedom, necessary if each is not to interfere with the realisation of another's will. My duty is to be interested positively in my neighbour's well-being. And it is important to understand that, while the enforcement of obligations is possible, that of moral duties is impossible. But the establishment of obligations by law or authoritative custom, and the gradual recognition of moral duties, have not been separate processes They have gone on together in the history of man. ”

“ All these are inferior considerations which do not avail to determine duty and do not go deep enough to constitute the real foundation of our obligation. They are considerations which can scarcely be shut out, and should be taken in determining the weight of our obligation, in shaping the selection of our duties, in stimulating the zeal and sedulousness with which we do what we know to be right. ”

“ Indeed, we want your aid in the pursuit of our purposes, as well as the aid of all men who act on the same principles in political life in the way of criticism, suggestion, advice and impulse—and I hope we shall have it. ”

“ The more the functions of the state are enlarged, the greater the opportunities afforded for the development of the individual's capacities and powers. And the individual's interests are not inconsistent with those of the state. ”

“ Some reluct at the long time requisite to change the institutions of a nation, or regenerate its public sentiment. But here, too, a moment's thought shows us, how wise in this respect is the order of Providence. ”