82 THE LAWS OF SOCIAL INEQUALITY 



incarcerated ! In this country, men are not disposed to cringe 

 before any despotism, however ancient and colossal. Here we 

 live in peace and charity with our neighbor, although we differ 

 in religious opinions. Is this a condition of things to be lament- 

 ed ? Have you the effrontery to deny the fact that men live 

 together more happily, now that religious and political freedom 

 is enjoyed by all ? You would have the people give up this 

 " infidel freedom," (the language of baffled imposture !) those 

 precious liberties claimed for them by their greatest statesmen, 

 and purchased by the blood of heroes ! You would revive in 

 our midst the bloody massacres, barbarous cruelties, and invet- 

 erate religious hatreds of former ages ! Is it possible that you 

 expect a people, now happy, enlightened, and free, making daily 

 advances in science and in all the arts that humanize mankind, 

 to succumb to your wretched, darkening, and enslaving policy? 

 Yet you are moving forward in the dark with slow and stealthy 

 step ; but, the friends of freedom are on the watch, and the 

 moment you boldly reveal in the broad glare of day the 

 tyranny of your purpose, Columbia will prove, as ever, the 

 bravest defender of the religious and political liberties of man- 

 kind. Nothing but benevolence and good-will to the human 

 race is. written on her youthful, noble, starry brow. 



This then is the true social policy which is plainly indicated 

 by the tree. We see that the sap has a natural tendency to pass 

 to the leading branches from the branchlets and smaller twigs ; 

 so power passes away naturally from the hands of the many, 

 who are, comparatively speaking, without energy, to those of 

 the few who possess it in a pre-eminent degree. But power, 

 accumulated in the hands of any one man or body of men, is 

 ever dangerous to liberty. Human nature is not to be trusted 

 with irresponsible power, no matter what the plea. The 

 encroachments of monopoly, whether political, religious, or com- 

 mercial, must therefore be withstood. The tree must be made 

 to spread out on all sides. In a world like this it is necessary 

 for people to look out ; for the individual liberty of those who 

 occupy a subordinate and inferior position ' fc can only be main- 

 tained at the price of eternal vigilance." 



We have shown that the tree is a compound plant, built up 



