Price] 310 [January. 



wrong, to provoke or bring it on, we must admit individuals ma}', 

 nay, must, act under the most exalted sense of duty, when they peril 

 life for the love of their country. 



Professor Peabody bears strong testimony to the value of the 

 family in this comprehensive summary. '< While Blial obedience 

 alone can train worthy subjects to the state, there are yet other as- 

 pects in which Government depends on the home-life, and is sus- 

 tained by the family relation, so that, for a homeless community, 

 anarchy or despotism would be the alternative. To an incalculable 

 degree the home instinct supplies (he place of law, supersedes the 

 harsher ministries of government, prevents crime, anticipates want, 

 divides and lightens burdens, which else no public organizations 

 could bear. The gravitation toward home is in every nation a 

 stronger force than its police and armies are or can be, and accom- 

 plishes many purposes of prime importance which they could in no 

 way fulfil. The few homeless members of a community are of im- 

 measurably more charge, burden, and peril to its constituted au- 

 thorities, than the overwhelming majority that have homes." As 

 much then as we should hold government and law in honor, and 

 cherish the sentiment of loyalty to it, we owe the like regard to that 

 smallest civil institution, the family; for without it social order could 

 not exist, government could not live, except it be as a despotic force, 

 to rule by military restraint the chaotic elements of an unorganized 

 people, preferring misrule, license, and disorder. Such people could 

 be no law or police to themselves. 



To encourage the family and its beneficent influences, we must 

 discourage all that militates against it. All .systems of communism 

 that tend to loosen the ties of family, or to dissever those ties, or to 

 prevent the formation of families, are to be discountenanced as nor- 

 mal institutions. Indeed, from the nature of man, these can never 

 be the general order of society. Spartan citizens may he separated 

 from their families, and be trained to the endurance of self-denials 

 and hai-dships, and to the observance of secrecy, by the iron disci- 

 pline of a Lycurgus; and religious orders, fleeing from the world, 

 repentant of their sins, may carry their self-discipline and penitential 

 inflictions to the extreme of human endurance, as imposed by a head 

 inexorable as a Loyola; but surely these results will be attained at 

 the fearful sacrifice of all that is genial in social life, and of all that 

 can make this life a happiness to its posses.sor. Modern reform 

 communities may be formed with the good purpose to make life 

 more cheerful and happy, as we have seen a number in our day; to 



