ON THE NATURAL INEQUALITY OF MEN. 769 



I am bound to confess, at the outset, that, while quite open 

 to conviction, I incline to think that the obvious practical conse- 

 quences of these propositions are not likely to conduce to the wel- 

 fare of society, and that they are certain to prove as injurious to 

 the poor as to the rich. Due allowance must be made for the pos- 

 sible influence of such prejudice as may flow from this opinion 

 upon my further conviction that, regarded from a purely theo- 

 retical and scientific point of view, they are so plainly and demon- 

 strably false that, except for the gravity of their practical conse- 

 quences, they would be ridiculous. 



"What is the meaning of the famous phrase that " all men are 

 born free and equal," * which gallicized Americans, who were as 

 much " philosophes " as their inherited common sense and their 

 practical acquaintance with men and with affairs would let them 

 be, put forth as the foundation of the " Declaration of Independ- 

 ence " ? I have seen a considerable number of new-born infants. 

 Without wishing to speak of them with the least disrespect a 

 thing no man can do, without, as the proverb says, " fouling his 

 own nest " I fail to understand how they can be affirmed to have 

 any political qualities at all. How can it be said that these poor 

 little mortals who have not even the capacity to kick to any definite 

 end, nor indeed to do anything but vaguely squirm and squall, 

 are equal politically, except as all zeros may be said to be equal ? 

 How can little creatures be said to be " free " of whom not one 

 would live for four-and-twenty hours if it were not imprisoned 

 by kindly hands and coerced into applying its foolish, wandering 

 mouth to the breast it could never find for itself ? How is the 

 being whose brain is still too pulpy to hold an idea of any de- 

 scription to be a moral agent either good or bad ? Surely it must 

 be a joke, and rather a cynical one too, to talk of the political 

 status of a new-born child ! But we may carry our questions a 

 step further. If it is mere abracadabra to speak of men being 

 born in a state of political freedom and equality, thus fallaciously 

 confusing positive equality that is to say, the equality of powers 

 with the equality of impotences ; in what conceivable state of 

 society is it possible that men should not merely be born, but pass 

 through childhood and still remain free ? Has a child of fourteen 

 been free to choose its language and all the connotations with 

 which words became burdened in their use by generation after 

 generation ? Has it been free to choose the habits enforced by 

 precept and more surely driven home by example ? Has it been 

 free to invent its own standard of right and wrong ? Or rather, 



henceforth, for the profit of a few ambitious persons, subjected the whole human race to 

 labor, servitude, and misery.) (" Discours," p. 278). Behold the quintessence of Rousseau- 

 ism method and results with practical application, legible by the swiftest runner ! 



* ["All men are created equal" is the wording of the " Declaration." Editor P. S. M.] 



VOL. XXXTI. 49 



