Weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1858-1865, 1860-04-25
Enthusiasm and Fanaticism.


These words which are often COMPOUNDED or used
INTERCHANGEABLE rot only essentially distinct in
meaning but directly opposed in character and ten
dency motive and end. Fanaticsm is selfish en-
|thusasm generous. Fana tcism dcbases, corrupts
and contracts the soul enthusiasm exalts purifes
and expands it. Fanaticsm has impelled the vest
oppressors and fercest prosecutors of the race en-
thusiasm has inspired the most gifted, the most be-
nevolent and the most useful of mankind. Torque
mazda and Loyola were fanatics Luther and Knox
enthusiasts; Robespierre and John Brown were ia
natics Lafayette and Washington enthusiasts
Alike as active forces of prodigious power and re-
sembling in partial external manifestations it is not
at all surprising that they should be SO often con-
founded, or the one mistaken for the other. We
sometimes witness the singular spectacle of the very
same man at different stages Of his career putting
off the one character and putting on the other
Thus Saul of Tarsus making havoc of the church
and verify thinking all the time that he was doing
Gods service. was fanatic; and Paul the apostle
counting all things but loss for the excelency Of
the knowledge of Christ and ready not to be bound
only, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name Of
the Lord Jesus was an enthusiast. In the fanatic
f there is always faint of knavery In the enthusiast
there is always tincture of heroism. Fanaticsm is
akin to hypocrisy enthusiasm is allied to candor.
Fanatcism is not rarely the vice Of old age enthu
siasm is the appropriate virtue of youth.
In nations, periods of fanaticsm are periods of
public corruption and ignominy; periods of enthu-
siasm are periods of public virtue and glory. The
prevalence of the marks the rising genius and
power of people; the ascendancy of the other in
dicates their weakness and decline. Fanaticism
! ragged in France in 1872 under Charles TX and
his endish mother, and exploded in the massacre of
St Bartholomew, in which it is estimated that thir-
' ty thousand persons persisted in thirty days. 1t
reappeared with added fury in the closing years Of
the reign Of Louis 14th-the time of the dragonades
and of the revocation of the cdict of Nantes
All the great achievements of freedom and virtue
have been made under the sublime inspiration of
enthusiasm, individual or national 1t was this
which infamed the eloquence of Henry and nerved
the arm of Washington. 1t was enthusiasm for
good cause and great object which sustained that
dauntess hand of devoted patriots who in the most
glorious revolution recorded in the annals of man,
achieved the independence of America. The distnc-
ton which we have sought to establish, was never
more important than now and is frausht with many
fruitful and far reaching consequences to pco-
pie. 1t is painful fact that we cannot deny and
should not conceal that while fanaticism is rampant
in our own and in other lands, enthusiasm for any,
thing for art, for TRUTH for liberty if not quite ex
tinct is rarely found. Much of the benevolence of
our time is malignant; much of its philanthropy
selfish; much of its charity cruel. What specta-
Gle is presented by the abolitionsts of our own
country! With the sefcomplacent spirit Of the
Pharisee, denouncing whole classes and commune
ties of men as brutal and Godforsaken, for sus tain
ing relation coeval with human history and reeog-
nized as legitimate by the Maker and Redeemcr of
man and his inspired Apostles, while themselves
partakers Of the sn if sin it be-growing fat on the
proceeds of slave labor not merely subsistng its
products and clothed in its fabrcs-but glorying in
the wealth which this system has directly supplied
And only look at great Britain! First forcing
the system on us, her reluctant colonies, unwilling
to receive it-protesting against retaining it Now
kept from revolution, from starvation, from ruin by
the products of slave labor as vitality connected with
the system as any portion of the South hcrself-as
absolutely dependent on the crops which it secures
as any Southern State-yet stigmatzing us as saw
ages and heathens, for sustaining the hated system
And what is of all, perhaps, most inconsistent and
most incredible confessing that the emancipation of
ner own slaves in the West Indies, was great
ounder and great evil, policy fatal not merely
70 the material but to the social and moral interests
S u, 'he slaves themselves-yet urging the Southern
states Of this confederacy to liberate every slave,
"''h0ut exception and without delay, without re-
e'. 10 consequences without regard to the lessons
VI "'S'ory in contempt of the dictates of com.
nv" sense and in defiance of the claims of Christian
charity. $500 - =, .s1'-l"I,"' :
m.a. OAh AiD.-our thanks to A. Dixon, Esq, post
master at Elevation, Johnston county. for a club Of