The Southern Review, Volume 2

Front Cover
Albert Taylor Bledsoe, Sophia M'Ilvaine Bledsoe Herrick
Bledsoe and Browne, 1867 - American essays

From inside the book

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 44 - The only part of the conduct of any one, for which he is amenable to society, is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.
Page 206 - But this momentous question, like a fire-bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I considered it at once as the knell of the Union. It is hushed, indeed, for the moment. But this is a reprieve only, not a final sentence.
Page 252 - Should a popular insurrection happen in one of the confederate states, the others are able to quell it. Should abuses creep into one part, they are reformed by those that remain sound.
Page 195 - But in cases of deliberate, dangerous, and palpable infractions of the Constitution, affecting the sovereignty of a State, and liberties of ihe people, it is not only the right but the duty of such a State to interpose its authority for their protection, in the manner best calculated to secure that end.
Page 60 - It holds out the hope of heaven and the threat of hell, as the appointed and appropriate motives to a virtuous life: in this falling far below the best of the ancients, and doing what lies in it to give to human morality an essentially selfish character, by disconnecting each man's feelings of duty from the interests of his fellow-creatures, except so far as a self-interested inducement is offered to him for consulting them.
Page 227 - I am compelled to declare it as my deliberate opinion, that, if this bill passes, the bonds of this Union are virtually dissolved; that the States which compose it are free from their moral obligations, and that, as it will be the right of all, so it will be the duty of some, to prepare definitely for a separation; amicably if they can, violently if they must.
Page 51 - First : The opinion which it is attempted to suppress by authority may possibly be true. Those who desire to suppress it of course deny its truth ; but they are not infallible. They have no authority to decide the question for all mankind, and exclude every other person from the means of judging. To refuse a hearing to an opinion because they are sure it is false, is to assume that their certainty is the same thing as absolute certainty. All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility.
Page 44 - The only freedom which deserves the name is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs or impede their efforts to obtain it.
Page 60 - Christian morality (so-called) has all the characters of a reaction; it is, in great part, a protest against Paganism. Its ideal is negative rather than positive; passive rather than active...
Page 452 - It is with heartfelt satisfaction, that the Commanding General announces to the army, that the operations of the last three days have determined that our enemy must either ingloriously fly, or come out from behind his defences, and give us battle on our own ground, where certain destruction awaits him.

Bibliographic information