148 



PREJUDICES. 



Prejudices, always into atheism. When a single point of faith is 



* ""V" attacked, the influence of the whole system is waken- 



ed ; and thus the opinions and the hopes which we 



were once taught to cherish are gradually undermined 



and destroyed. 



It is not, however, in matters of faith only that doubt 

 is the source of uneasiness. In other matters, whether 

 of a public or private nature, the same feelings are ex- 

 cited : we resist with eagerness the first intimations of 

 doubt, and endeavour to wrap ourselves up in confi- 

 dence and security. This lulls us into a state of men- 

 tal repose, which doubt immediately dissipates and 

 destroys. "When danger is inevitable, there are few 

 men who at once allow themselves to see it in its true 

 and alarming colours, and even when it may yet be 

 removed and resisted, men not unfrequently allow 

 themselves to remain insensible to their situations, and 

 regard as their enemy him who gave them the first in- 

 timation of their danger. When a man has been told 

 that his servants rob him, that his mistress betrays him, 

 that his friends are unfaithful to him, or, in a more 

 important case, that his public and political interests 

 are invaded, even when he is told all this, he list- 

 ens to the intelligence with prejudice, he believes, 

 or tries to believe, that it is unfounded, he endea- 

 vours to preserve the ease and repose of his mind, 

 a blessing which he seems to cherish with pecu- 

 liar delight. He feels displeased with the person who 

 wishes to excite his fears, he rejects his suspicions 

 and his intelligence, and applauds himself that he is 

 possessed of sufficient generosity not easily to believe 

 evil. 



If we endeavour to make him suspect the mode of 

 government under which he has lived, its legislation, 

 its political organization, he will oppose these endea- 

 vours with the most obstinate incredulity ; he will de- 

 fend the system to which he has hitherto submitted 

 with the keener inflexibility, in proportion as it has 

 been less the object of his study and investigation, or 

 in proportion as his attachment to it has been founded 

 on prejudice. An invincible terror causes him to re- 

 sist the destruction of all that he has known and ad- 

 mired from his infancy, of which his prejudices will 

 not permit him to examine the consequences. This 

 terror seems to be instinctive, which nature excites in 

 us at whatever is unknown, and which is often salu- 

 tary in making us shun dangers, the result of which 

 we cannot calculate. 



This dread of new experience, this repugnance to 

 doubt and distrust, this indolence and unwillingness 

 in exercising our faculties on subjects of speculation, to 

 which we have been unaccustomed, are increased and 

 fortified by personal and by national pride. We wish 

 not to allow that we, or those whom from our infancy 

 we have been accustomed to respect, have acted im- 

 properly, or have been actuated by bad motives. We 

 defend an ancient system of government, upon which 

 the will of tKe people have had no influence, on the 

 same principles that we defend a dogmatical religion. 

 There is no one point or department in it that we will 

 consent to abandon, because, in our estimation, every 

 part being connected with the whole is equally sacred : 

 which is, indeed, the case when they are all equally 

 founded on prejudice. A constitution, on the other 

 hand, on the formation and perfection of which reason 

 and judgment have been consulted, is not on every 

 point equally venerated ; its parts are more independ- 



ent of each other, and it can admit of corrections and Prejudices, 

 of changes without being entirely overthrown. ^ "V" 1 *' 



Such is undoubtedly the principal reason of the un- 

 shaken stability of these constitutions in the East, 

 which have enchained the faculties of the human mind, 

 and put a complete stop to the progress of improve- 

 ment ; and of the division of castes, which subjects a 

 vast proportion of the population to the most hopeless 

 and degraded state of misery and humiliation : a cir- 

 cumstance the more remarkable, as few or no advan- 

 tages result to the higher classes from this degradation 

 of their inferiors. We would at first sight suppose, 

 that this violence against nature could be maintained 

 only by force, and yet the contrary is the fact ; it is 

 maintained against a superior force, if the people, in 

 whose hands it is, knew or chose to exert it. 



The Jewish nation have been conquered by people 

 of a different religion and of different manners, who, 

 for centuries, have laboured to destroy their system ; 

 but, in defiance of every exertion, the oppressed classes 

 have submitted to disabilities and contempt ; they never 

 have revolted ; they have not endeavoured to shake oft' 

 the yoke, even when it was imposed on them by people 

 inferior in resources to themselves. The long duration 

 of Judaism is one of the most astonishing triumphs of 

 prejudice. The Jews have uniformly and inflexibly 

 resisted examination, and the force of every argument 

 brought to refute and counteract their opinions ; and, 

 in doing so, they have entrenched themselves behind 

 the principles already mentioned, the dread of new 

 opinions, mental indolence, and national pride. 



Prejudice is, by its very nature, stationary; but rea- 

 son is progressive. Legislators, therefore, who wish to 

 impart to their institutions and anactments an eternal 

 duration, have wisely endeavoured to enlist prejudice in 

 their favour, have founded them on the basis of that 

 indolence of the mind which we have been discussing, 

 have prohibited examination, and have banished reason 

 from their dominions. They have found in prejudice 

 a power always ready to defend existing establishments 

 against every innovation, however salutary, both to 

 the individuals immediately connected and to the ge- 

 neral interests of mankind. This plan may be prudent, 

 so far as legislators themselves are concerned, but its 

 results are uniformly injurious to society. With an 

 arrogance, which ill becomes man, they have set bounds 

 to the powers of the human mind, and, in their as- 

 sumed wisdom, have said, that their actions and views 

 have attained to the standard of perfection, and have 

 endeavoured to render improvement impossible. But 

 precautionary prejudices will not save social institu- 

 tions, either from gradual deterioration, or from cala- 

 mities which may overthrow them. Countries where 

 civilization is stationary, being always the same, are 

 really deteriorating, when compared with those that 

 are making regular advances in refinement and liberal 

 knowledge. Besides, where social institutions undergo 

 no change, the human character necessarily degene- 

 rates, because government, being fixed, neither excites 

 interest, nor affords scope for the exercise of genius and 

 talents ; because the arts which might otherwise have 

 flourished there gradually disappear ; and because the 

 stationary character of institutions does not defend 

 them either against conquests, or against tyranny, or 

 against pestilence and famine, or the numberless 

 scourges of earth or of heaven. When this stationary 

 system is proposed for our admiration by men who are 



