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3. On Civil Liberty and Self-Government. By Francis Lieber, LL. D., C. M. French Institute, etc. Author of 'Political Ethics;' 'Principles of Legal and Political Interpretation; Essays on Labor and Property;' 'On Criminal Law;' Reminiscences of Niebuhr;' etc., etc. Philadelphia: Lippincott, Grambo & Co. 1853.

'There is no word,' says Montesquieu, 'that admits of more various significations, and has made more different impressions on the human mind, than that of Liberty. Some have taken it for a facility of deposing a person on whom they had conferred a tyrannical authority; others for the power of choosing a superior whom they are obliged to obey; others for the right of bearing arms, and of being thereby enabled to use violence; others, in fine, for the privilege of being governed by a native of their own country, or by their own laws. A certain nation, for a long time, thought liberty consisted in the privilege of wearing a long beard. Some have annexed this name to one form of government exclusive of others; those who had a republican taste, applied it to this species of polity; those who liked a monarchical state, gave it to monarchy. Thus they have all applied the name of liberty to the government most suitable to their own customs and inclinations; and as in republics, the people have not so constant and so present a view of the causes of their misery, and as the magistrates seem to act only in conformity to the laws, hence liberty is generally said to reside in republics, and to be banished from monarchies. In fine, as in democracies the people seem to act almost as they please; this sort of government has been deemed the most free; and the power of the people has been confounded with their freedom.'*

Balmes gives, if possible, a still more vivid conception of the incalculable ambiguities of the term liberty or freedom. 'Liberty! This is one of those words,' says he, 'which are as generally employed as they are little understood; words which, because they contain a certain vague idea, easily perceived, present the deceptive appearance of

*Spirit of Laws. Book XI. Chap. II. Protestantism and Catholicity Chap. XIII.

perfect clearness, while, on account of the multitude and variety of objects to which they apply, they are susceptible of a variety of meanings, and, consequently, are extremely difficult to comprehend. Who can reckon the number of applications made of the word liberty?' Then follows a long list of its applications, with which it is not necessary to weary the reader; the bare thought of such a variety of meanings is sufficient to oppress the imagination.

The term freedom,' says Hegel, as quoted in our first number, is an incalculable ambiguous term, and while that which it represents is the ne plus ultra of attainment, it is liable to an infinity of misunderstandings, confusions, and errors, and to become the occasion of all imaginable excesses,' This truth, he adds, has never been more clearly known and felt than in modern times.' In no age, and in no country, has this truth ever been more clearly seen, or more deeply felt, than in America at this moment.

'We live in a period,' says Dr. Lieber, when it is the duty of reflecting men to ponder conscientiously these important questions: In what does civil liberty consist? How is it maintained? What are its means of self-diffusion, and under what forms do its chief dangers present themselves?'* He gives many excellent reasons, why the nature of liberty should be carefully, conscientiously, and profoundly studied. But one of these reasons is sufficient. 'Disorders of great public inconvenience,' says he, 'even bloodshed and political crimes have often arisen from the fact that the two sacred words Liberty and People were freely and passionately used without a clear and definite meaning being attached to them;' a reason which has been inexpressibly augmented in force by the horrible course of recent events. A people that loves liberty,' he continues, 'can do nothing better to promote the object of its love than deeply to study it, and in order to be able to do this, it is necessary to analyze and to know the threads which compose the valued texture.' Now all this is very good. But how, in the name of common sense, can a people know whether it loves liberty or not, unless it first know what. Chap. I.

* Vol. I.

liberty is? Without this knowledge, in fact, the very thing which a people loves under the sacred name of liberty, may be as different from liberty itself as darkness is from light, or as the malignity of fiends is from the mercy of ministering angels.

The man, indeed, who speaks of liberty, without knowing how to define the word, talks quite at random. His speech may be full of sound and fury, and yet signify nothing. Or rather, it may signify anything, and therefore convey no intelligible idea. Precisely such, in fact, are the torrents of eloquence usually poured forth in praise of liberty; a roaring multitude of confused senses in a pleasing unity of specious sounds. Every man listens delighted; because every man attaches his own ideas to the discourse. No wonder, then, that liberty has so many admirers in the world; for she captivates every man's fancy, by appearing in that shape which is most agreeable to him. All men worship freedom. But if you ask them to define freedom, you will find that, instead of one worship, there is a vast multitude of deformed idols in the world. Grand temples of freedom have been erected among men; but, lacking the true image of Freedom, the blind worshippers have enjoyed the sweet privilege of making their own gods.

Such was the sad condition of mankind, such the deplorable ignorance of the very worshippers of Freedom, when Mr. John Stuart Mill made his appearance to chase away the darkness, and reveal to their ravished vision the true object of their worship. Pronounced, by his followers, 'the King of thinkers,' his advent was hailed with joy, and the most exalted hopes entertained, in advance, respecting the transcendent value of his mission. No sooner had his work On Liberty' appeared, than it was hailed, by thousands, as the glorious 'evangel of the nineteenth century,' and eagerly devoured as the bread of life. We could not, we are sorry to say, indulge in these fond anticipations; for we could neither believe, that a radical could be 'the King of thinkers,' nor that he could even open his mind to embrace the glorious form of Liberty. But his new gospel' is before us, inviting, at our hands, a criti

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cal analysis and just estimate of its merits. Accordingly, these we shall proceed to give; and, also, the grounds and reasons on which they are based.

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Mr. Mill begins, very properly, with the statement of the grand theme of his book. The subject of this Essay,' says he, is not the so-called Liberty of the will.........; but Civil, or Social Liberty: the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual. A question seldom stated, and hardly ever discussed, in general terms, but which profoundly influences the practical controversies of the age by its latent presence, and is likely soon to make itself recognized as the vital question of the future.' (p. 1.) A question seldom stated! Few questions, in fact, have ever been more frequently stated, or more earnestly considered. It is precisely the question which Herbert Spencer has, in his 'Social Statics,' stated and discussed under the head of 'The limits of State duty;' which Sir James Mackintosh, in his Vindicia Gallica,' so elaborately considers in treating of the line which limits the legitimate authority of the State on the one side, and the reserved rights of the individual on the other. Nay, it is precisely the question which the legislators of 1787, assembled to make a new Constitution for America, laid down as the great fundamental problem to be solved by them, as well as by all other legislators. Individuals entering into society,' say they, 'must give up a share of their liberty to preserve the rest;' that is, they must surrender a share of their liberty to State authority, in order to secure the portion they retain. But where shall the line be drawn, which separates the legitimate authority of the Siate from the reserved rights or liberty of the individual? 'It is at all times difficult,' say they, to draw with precision the line between those rights which must be surrendered and those which may be retained; or, in other words, between the rights which may be exercised by society over the individual, and the rights retained by the individual in society. We might, if necessary, easily produce a hundred other instances, in which the precise question propounded by Mr. Mill, has been

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distinctly stated by former writers. Mr. Mill merely changes the mode of expression a little, and then fancies that he has stated a great question, which has failed to engage the attention of philosophers and statesmen !

Mr. Mill ought to have known, that such a question must have been frequently stated, and deliberately considered, by the great thinkers of the world. For he says himself: 'The struggle between Liberty and Authority is the most conspicuous fact in the portions of history with which we are earliest familiar, particularly in that of Greece, Rome, and England.' Now how is it possible, that this struggle between Liberty and Authority should have prevailed from time immemorial, presenting the most conspicuous fact in all history; and that, nevertheless, the question respecting the limits of Authority should have been seldom stated, and hardly ever discussed?' The friends of liberty, on the one side, and those of authority on the other, have kept up an eternal quarrel about the extent of their respective dominions, and yet little, or nothing, has ever been said about the line which divides them! The thing is utterly incredible. Mr. Mill ought to have known better. A little reflection, or common sense, would have sufficed to convince him, that such a question must have been frequently stated, as well as earnestly discussed; and a little research, or examination, would have shown him, that his great question has been anticipated by more than a hundred celebrated authors.

But Mr. Mill complains, that no general solution has been given to the great problem stated by himself, as to the rules which limit the power of society over the individual.' 'What these rules should be,' says he, 'is the principal question in human affairs; but if we except a few of the most obvious cases, it is one of those in which. least progress has been made in resolving. No two ages, nor scarcely any two countries, have decided it alike; and the decision of one age or country is a wonder to another.' (p. 3.) He wants, then, one decision, one solution, for all ages and all countries. We can tell him beforehand, that he will never find such a solution; and if he fancies that

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