Year: 1859

% From Hutching's California Moga=iae, for
January, 1859, we make the following extract
from the 81 Experience of California World Re-
former" The advice is pertinent. PrO6atum est


DO not fear that by delay you will be antici-
| pated by any other writer. The world is not so
rich In thinkers as all that. You can safely take
all your years to work upon any social problem.
No great book ever came too late; many have
been forced upon the world too early / do not
advise you to be guilty of any falsehOod any hyp-
ocrisy any acquieseence. real or pretended direct
| or indirect, in superannuated and evil systems.
/ Whatever is pernieiOus, that 1 would still have
| you to hate. Whatever is good, | would still
/ have you adore. Abandon not the pure and bright
ideals OF your youthful enthusiasm. Be true to
/ yourself Guard the thoughts of your heart as
most sacred. Whatever noble aspirations you
now have still preserve. Yield not an inch to the
base fashions and rules which govern so many
about you.


| Remember, however, that this is an actual,
and not an ideal world, and govern yourself ac-
cordingly. If you propose to work for the good
of humanity, take care that your work shall have
an effect. ANY mere outcry of Reform, reform!'
amounts to nothing, and is no credit to the actor.
The cause of humanity is under obligation to no
reformers save those who evidently exert an indu-
ence to improve the condition Of men. To exert
such an influence, however, not zeal only, but also
y.
these belong to mature age rather than to youth.


- In cOunseling you to postpone the publication
of your ideas of reform, take into consideration
all that can be said in favor of early publication.
| If you wait you must look through long years of
the most griavous suffering, without daring to
make open protest, and show how worse than un-
necessary it is. Though full of ideas which ap-
pear TO you Of the utmost Importance for the well
fare Of your race, you must keep them to yourself
| for half q life time. You cannot crafty your no.
/ blest and most generous impulses by giving ex-
| pressions To their dictates you must keep the
best part Of your soul in the chains of silence.
Your darling doctrines dare not see the light until
age has chilled your fire; you must be the drudge
of gold, the slave of low wants, while the higher
and better half of your nature is cramped in idle
ness. You must long fOregO the sweet satisfaction
which you might every day enjoy in the secret con-
| temptation vf a good work well dOne,-nuch
abused perhaps, but none the less valuable or
gratifying for all that.


"You say you are prepared to submit to the in
cOnyeniences and losses which may result from the
hatred of bigots.' doubt whether you have any
clear conception of what those inconvenienees will
| be. don't like that word bgots.' Ii may,
perhaps, properly apply to all the enemies of free
inquiry, but it implies reproach where can at
taeh no fault.


| While you are about, money and maidens
| will be kept under lock and key children will be
| taught to shun YOU as a monster of iniOuitv
weak-minded friends will be afraid of your intima-
cy your books will be spoken of as dangerous;
the disgrace of your name will attach to your own
| family, and your weak-minded relatives, unable to
| appreciate the noble motives which aetuate you,
but fully alive to the fault-fndings of the slaves
of formulas, will feel like hiding their heads for
| shame when your name is mentioned. You would
thus indirectly infct serious pain every day upon
many who are dear to you, and to whom you are
now dear.


"If you will wait. however. until you shall
have fortified yourself in social position, and when
| long experience and study shall have prepared you
| to carry on the war more pTudently-as well rs
more eficently-than you now can, these same
weak-minded persons will look upon your hostility
to ancient social forms mere amiable eccentric


ty; whereas If YOU commence at once, YOU will be for
tunate If you escape general verdict OF insanity.
The man who devptes himself entirely to further
the welfare of his fellow-men. without regard to
his own individual interests, is supposed to be q
| fit subject for an insane asylum.


..Such is nv advice frankly and sincerely given.
IT, Notwithstanding all have said. you will still
commence the attack, forthwith, then 90 on, with
/ nv best wishes Make your battle strong fight
with all YOUR might make yourself terrible to
your enemies terrible by your holiness, and per-
/ tinacity. and power-nOt by malice or meanness.
Take care that you keep your temper. The
| Westminster Review says was too bitter and so
was. Do you not lay yourself open to the same
charge. The error is one very natural for young
men, so passionate and Jealous as you seem to be.
| Remember that the forms against which you fight
were once good were introduced as reforms
were decided improvements on preexisting sys-
tens were necessary steps in human progress
Remember that your enemies war against free IN
| quiry, for that has always been the policy of the
enemies Of progress they ordinarily do it in the
full belief in the sacred and exceptional character
of their system while they freely acknowledge
/ and are very proper subjects for investigation
| They imagine that the man who can be so wicked
"a to attack their precious system must be philo-
| sophical pirate, who has no claim upon the laws
of honorable warfare, and may be strung up at
once without hearing or trial"