42 Moral Responsibility. 



entirely among democracies or republics, where the sense of 

 mutual dependence, confidence, and security, was the leading 

 principle of action and thought ; and was far more slowly 

 and imperfectly introduced into despotic monarchies, where 

 that of dependence upon authority took its place. The 

 moral effect of social co-operative unity was strikingly 

 exemplified in the republics of Greece and Rome, where it 

 may be said to have attained a morbid growth ; for so inten- 

 sified by the aesthetic element was their moral sentiment of 

 patriotism and individual virtue, that in deference to it they 

 not only freely sacrificed their private interests and their lives, 

 but they frequently, on principle, involved their own adored 

 countries, as well as those of their adversaries, in the 

 miseries of war and devastation. Contrast with their con- 

 duct the debased condition of the eastern monarchies, where, 

 though civilization had an earlier beginning, the moral 

 development, not only then but almost ever since, has 

 notoriously exhibited altogether inferior results. 



I have characterised the exalted and generally admired 

 patriotic sentiment of the Greeks and Romans as morbid, 

 because the evil rf suits proved it to be, in such an extreme, 

 pernicious ; though doubtless it was necessary as a link in 

 the chain of events, and for the enlightenment of the human 

 mind to the advantages of mutual confidence and combina- 

 tion. Of the two, the Roman sentiment was the most 

 practical and least sesthetic ; and the stern vigour of their 

 morality, of which Regulus afforded a significant example, 

 had throughout Europe a powerful effect, which long out- 

 lived their political fabric. To its enervation, first by the 

 influence of the more aesthetic Greek development, and to 

 its subsequent rapid degeneration under the principle of 

 authority which supervened with the. emperors, do I attri- 

 bute its complete suppression, until the revival of trade and 

 commerce, and the consequent reappearance of the republican 

 spirit after the long night of the dark ages. For nearly a 

 thousand years did that enthusiasm, which lost its direction 

 and object on the severance of the old republican bonds of 

 mutual interest and united power, unfortunately find 

 nothing with which to ally itself, but the religious senti- 

 ment ; and thus formed with it the most appalling scourge 

 with which human nature has ever been afflicted— fanati- 

 cism. Engrossed exclusively by imaginary visions of super- 

 natural duties, and therefore bereft of data by which to 

 check and regulate their exaggerated exaltation, all scientific 



