The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1890-03-22
NATURAL INEQUALITY.
so Long rs Men Are Men Human Equalit
Will BE u Dream,

VINO were as much ''philosophs" as their
inherited common sense and their prac-
veal acquaintance with men and with
lhalrs would let them be, put. forth as
he foundation of the Declaration of
lndependence?" ] have seen a con-
siderable number of new born infants.
Without wishing to speak of them with
NE least dlsrespect-a thing no man can
20, without, as the proverb says, 'foul-
hg his own nest"-I fail to understand
bow they can be affirmed to have any
plitical qualities at all. How can it be
aid these poor little mortals who have
not even the capacity to kick to any
ehnite end, nor indeed to do any thing
cut vaguely squirm and squall, are
equal politically, except as all zeros
nay be said to be equal? How can little
cnatures be said to be free" of whom
not one would live for four and twenty
hours if it were not imprisoned by
Kindly hands and coerced into applying
1T foolish wandering mouth to the
beast it could never find for itself?
INV is the being whose brain is still too
papy to hold an idea of any description
ttbe moral agent either good or bad?
Srely it must be a joke, and rather a
cnical one, too, to talk of the political
sttus of a newborn child! But we
LAY 9srry our questions step further
Tit is mere abracadabra to speak of
men being born in state of political
freedom and equality, thus fallaciously
confusing positive equality-that is to
say, thu equality of powers-with the
equality OF impotences; in what con-
ceivable state of society is it possible
that men should not merely be born,
but pass through childhood and still re-
main, free' Has child at fourteen
been free te;hoose its language and all
the connotafons with which words be-
came burdepd in their use by genera
ton after gehration? Has it been free
to choose the habits enforced by precept
and more surely driven home by ex-
ample? Has itbeen free to invent its
own standard OF right and wrong? Or,
rather, has it no been as much held in
bondage by its Surroundings and driven
hither and thithr by the scourge of
opinion, as veriable slave, although
the letters and thewhip may be invisi-
BILE and intangible Surely, Aristotle
was much nearer the truth in this mat
ter than Hobbies or Rousseau. And if the
predicate born slave'Hould more nearly
agree with fact than "born free, what
is to be said about born equal?" Rous-
seau, like the sentimental rhetorican
that he was, and half, or more than
half, sham, as all sentimental rhetor-
leans are, sagaciously fought shy, as we
have seen, of the question of the in
fluence of natural upon political equal
itv. But those of us who do not care
for sentiment and do care for truth, may
not evade the consideration of that
which is really the key of the position
If Rousseau, instead Of letting his chill
dren go to the enf0nts trouce$, had taken
the trouble to discharge fathers duty
toward them, he would hardly have
talked so fast about men being born
equal, even in political sense. For, if
that merely means that all newborn
9bildgh are political Zeros, it is, as we
Nave seen, though true enough, nothing
to the purpose; while, if it means that,
in their potentiality of becoming fac
tors in any social organization-citi-
zens in Rousseau's sense-all men are
born equal, it is probably the most
astounding falsity that ever was put
forth by a political Spectator; and that,
as all students of political speculation
will agree, is saying a good deal for
it. In fact, nothing is more remarkable
than the wide inequality which children,
even of the same. family, exhibit, as soon
as the mental and moral qualities begin
to manifest themselves, which is earlier
than most people fancy. Every family
spontaneously becomes polity. Among
the children, there are some who con-
time to be 'more honored and moro
powerful than the rest, and to make
themselves obeyed" sometimes, indeed,
by their elders) in virtue of nothing but
their moral and mental qualities. Here,
political inequality visibly dogs the
heels of natural" inequality. The
group of children becomes a political
body, cicitas, with its rights of prop
ertv, and it's practical distinctions of
RANK and power. And all this comes
abolt neither by force nor by fraud, but
as the necessary consequence of the in
nate inequalities of capability. Thus
mer are certainly not born free and
equal in natural qualities; when they
are born, the predicates free" and
''eoual' in the political sense are not
applicable to them, and as they develop,
year by year, the differences in the po-
litical potentialitieS with which they
really are born, become more and more
obviously converted into actual differ
ences-the inequality of political faculty
shows itself to be a necessary conse-
uuence of the inequality of natural
faculty 1t is probably true that the
earliest men were nomads. But among
"a body of naked, wandering savages,
though there may be no verbally recog-
nized distinctions of rank or Office, SUI
perior strength and cunning confer
authority of more valid kind than that
secured by acts of Parliament; there
may be no property in things, but the
witless man will be poverty stricken in
ideas, the clever man will be a capitalist
in that same commodity, which in the
long run buys all other commodities;
one will miss opportunities, the other
will make them; and, proclaim human