New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1850-06-22


ble sn,ocrat. enthroned we know not where, aud
,sisnipo. we know Dot how or why, bat still reign
inc. And at the feet Of this unseen monarch all
TIE families Of the earth PROSTATE themselves. re
ceive their op Mons their tastes, their ha5itudes
their very wills and consciences at MS IN
visible nod What does the world reqaWe
il the one question by which the VIII oil lfee
minds, by which nations and races regu'a'e
their daily conduct. The one great abiding tr-
amy of earth, the system compared with "n'cn
all other firms of arbitrary rule and imperial pow
Or ere the exactions Of school boys or the opPres-
Sims Of nurses,-.he one master tyranny OF ear'n
is that silent omnpresent sway, that reslstles
and all subduipg sweep Of public opinion, beiore
which the will of wills bend like willows In the
tempest. How few Of our race have at command
the moral integrity, the courage and the indePen-
dence to brave the censures OF this Imperial Trahr
even in the tie of cravat or the trimming Oh a
hopnetl Such is the scheme of social usage and
government which prevails wherever the Church
has home And what peris temptations and dis
asters. what wounds in character, what dsordersin
History spring from the sightess scePter OF this IN
! visible ruler And how do the expressions and the
Injuries of public opinion demand for society an In
slant and thorough work OF reconstructlon-tne
work assigned in the Scripture as the preoeS'ioeo
homework Of the Church!
This hssty glance at the actual structure and the
known developments Of human society, Is enougnto
convince the most superficial spectator that when
the Scriptures portray the homework OF the Churcn
as great work of social Reorganization and recon
struction, they describe work for which the worid
ia in waiting, a work for which Society has tnou
,.nd CRYING occasions, and History thousand sup
plant tongues
LET n, then turn 10 the more particular study oil
this great work of reconstruction and contemplate
| IL in some of its more conspicuous details
TIE home work of the Church demands at her
hands the experimental and public solution OF all
| those social problems on which the possible re-
| construction and wel-being of society depend So
ciety exists. as we have seen. in its Institutions
upfods its powers, sends out its passions, AID de-
velops its history, through these institutions, as
her appended and vital organs. These iastitu-
tons, organs of the social mind, and parasites oil
humanity, are absolutely inseparable from social
existence. And yet in their actual working and
their historic results, during experiment OF 5000
years these institutions Of society have been, as
we have said, engines OF disorder celebrating lusts
and crimes and sins wherever they have appeared.
The marriage institution the family, the priest.
hood the religion the government the distribution
Of property the system Of public instruction, these
arrangements have been present in all human So
ciety-tbe normal methods of social existence, the
abiding forms Of social development Bat take any
one of these institutions-take, for example, the
Family-and trace its history and note its fruits in
the slow and steady development OF sixty centu
| ries How many bad passions, passions that have
covered and cursed the earth, have been born aud
nursed in this eternal cradle ofswarming usts, the
| Family; and how many sins, sins that have gone
forth like evil angels on errands Of death to nations
have been fed and fedged in the family. And
who can catalogue the sorrows and the disasters
which marriage and the parental relation have en-.
tailed upon the world What now shall be done
with this primary social institution, to reform its
disorders and axe il the friend of history and the
mother of peace Thisis one oftne questions which
is at this moment forcing itself upon the perplexed
attention ofthe cviizedworld. Society has length
attained to such stage Of knowledge, and to such
mowers of reflection that it is now an asceraned
|
this one social institution the hope Of ameoraton
TO the race is delusive aud vain; something must
be done, 10 make the family what it is not or the
world, which is but an aggregate of families must
persist in disorder The conviction Of this fact
is rousipg the thinkers and the philanthropists of
Cbristendom to the inquiry, What shall be done
with this Family Institute to prevent its cursing
the world7 Shall it be dissolved and done away :
Shall it organise and its numbers be regulated by
municipal laws and edicts Shall there be free
dom Of divorce, and liberty Of voluntary dissolu-
,;on7 Shall the children of the family be len to
the culture Of parental instruction. or be taught
end trained and governd by the State, as children
NOT NJ the House bat of the Commonwealth 10
what way shall this primal and fundamental so
c;s, ip.t;tute be regulated and repaired. as to
make il an engine Of blessing and a fountain OF
virtue for the world This is the inquiry which
iswaking and concentrating the attention Of the
worlds thinkers, at this moment. And this ques
ton must be answered History, Society aud all
the hopes and all the prospects Of advancing civil
ization, require speedy and right solution Of the
problem, how to regulate the family, so as to make
il n culturer and an improver Of the race. And
though the philosophers, philanthropsts reformers,
ssses, socialists and statesmen, are all at work,
giving their answers to this inquiry though the
spsrtans of modern times, the Communists, the
Quakers the Simonites al still at their tables
, wrapped in study, connecting schemes and devils
ing mechanism by which to regulate and improve
the family, and draw out Of this newly Purged foun
tain streams of blessing for the race, yet the
history Of the world throws cloud of uncertainty
over all these devices and BIDS the race despair
. help or improvement from such attempts at artiii
> cial and outward reforms Society will never
answer for itself that one question how to form the
family institnte into boon and good. Il is gyar