1825.] 
that they more frequently kill than cure. 
It is prejudice which sends us to school,* 
there to waste the happiest portion of 
our lives in learning what most of us 
soon forget, or never can turn to any 
use; or which, at most, will teach us 
that we know nothing.- And it is pre- 
judice which impels us to consume the 
remaining part of our existence in labo- 
rious pursuits for the acquisition of 
honours, “ which are but a name,” of 
means of display, which: either create 
no enjoyment, or the enjoyment of 
which is too transient to-be worth the 
labour; or of wealth, from which. we 
may never reap any advantage. And 
while, from a prejudiced love of pro- 
perty, we often permit ourselves and 
others to live in actual want; from 
another prejudice, we frequently im- 
poverish the living, in order to procure 
that which is called’ a decent funeral 
for the dead. It is prejudice which 
maintains the distinction of rank among 
mankind ;—it is prejudice which taxes 
the industrious for the support of the 
idle—it is prejudice which makes a pub- 
lic concern of that which only rests 
between man and hiss Makér—it is pre- 
judice which has encumbered public 
justice with laws and lawyers» and 
forms which almost render it a curse to 
society—and itis prejudice which has 
separated mankind into hostile bodies, 
making war, and destroying one another 
for the benefit of hosts of idlers, who 
make slaughter their: trade, and. reap 
imaginary honours: at the expense of 
universal suffering. Can absurdity go 
further, than neglecting; nay: despising 
the honest industrious: tradesman, or 
mechanic, whose activity administers to 
the comfort of all, and who lives at the 
expense of no one~unless the. scanty 
remuneration of his important services 
be deemed expense; and honouring and 
caressing the military, or naval bravo 
for hiring himself to. his own, or a fo- 
reign government, at five, ten, fifteen, 
or twenty shillings a day, to cut the 
throats (if they happen not to cut. his) 
* By the leave of our, ingenious .anti- 
prejudist, this prejudice of going to. school 
is one of the last we should wish to see 
relinquished. —Ebprt. 
+ We should be very glad if schoo]-going 
could really teach us so much «for, instead 
of ignorantly and dogmatically knowing what 
nobody understands, we should perhaps. 
have achance of modestly believing what we 
had common sense (or uncommon sense) 
enough to perceive that others might as 
honestly doubt. —Jivrr. 
On Prejudice. 
325 
of whomsoever he may be ordered to 
destroy—to despise the bricklayer who 
builds, and the peasant who fertilizes, 
and to give homage to those who de- 
molish towns and villages, destroy har- 
vests, and depopulate countries, —in 
short, who spread famine and desolation 
at the nod of despotism, fanaticism, or 
ambition, and entail privation, degrada- 
tion, and slavery, for ages and genera- 
tions, on millions of their fellow-creatures. 
By what perversity of reasoning, on 
the other hand, do we abhor the public 
executioner, and fly his contact, as if his 
very touch could canker us with infamy? 
What is his crime? What renders him 
an outcast from society, who rids it of 
those whom the laws of their country 
have condemned, as the irreclaimable 
depredators of society—as rotten mem- 
bers, to be cut off for the preservation, 
or the benefit of the whole? I am 
aware, Sir, that, with such strong preju- 
dices existing against the employment 
of the executioner, the man who dares 
to brave public opinion on so sensitive a 
subject, for the mere love of lucre, must 
be a worthless being. 
It is also possible that the hireling 
warrior may be a worthy character (and 
indeed I have known many such myself), 
who (according to the natural course of 
prejudice) thinks his profession honour- 
able and moral, because all the world 
honours it, and its morality is rarely 
questioned; nor will I deny, that strong 
arguments may be adduced, to shew that 
the respect paid to the profession of 
arms, and.the horror against that of the 
executioner, had their. origin in feelings 
that do credit to humanity—but they 
are prejudices still; and.prejudices de- 
trimental to the real welfare of society, 
whatever a perverse policy may urge to 
the contrary. 
The distinction of rank is a subject 
so important, that it seems to require 
further illustration. _ In China, Turkey, 
and perhaps some other countries, rank 
adheres to office alone; and such a dis- 
tinction is wise and just. But what shall 
we say to rank adhering to blood,—to 
that imaginary nobility which has proved 
the curse of most countries of Europe; 
where a number of families, composed, 
for the most part, of men with less abili- 
ties and personal merit than may be 
found among the meanest labourers on 
their estates;{ by right of birth, usurping 
power, 
{ We cannot but observe, that the author’s 
own prejudices appear, in this and some 
other 
