that Wine, or Folly, or Jealousy, may suspect to be an Affront; the whole Power of the Government should be exerted to suppress them.—
If a Time should ever come when such Notions shall prevail in this Province to a Degree that no Priviledges shall be able to exempt Men from Indignities and personal Attacks; not the Priviledge of a Councellor, not the Priviledge of an House of Representatives of “speaking freely in that Assembly, without Impeachment or Question in any Court, or Place,” out of the General Court; when whole armed Mobs shall assault a Member of the House—when violent Attacks shall be made upon Counsellors—when no Place shall be sacred, not the very Walls of Legislation—when no Personages shall over awe, not the whole General Court, added to all the other Gentlemen on Change—when the broad Noon-Day shall be chosen to display before the World such high, heroic sentiments of Gallantry and Spirit,—when such Assailants shall live unexpelled from the Legislature—when slight Censures and no Punishments shall be inflicted—there will really be Danger of our becoming universally ferocious, barbarous and brutal, worse than our Gothic Ancestors before the Christian Æra.
The Doctrine that the Person assaulted “should act with Spirit,” “should defend himself, by drawing his Sword, and killing, or by wringing Noses and Boxing it out, with the Offender,” is the Tenet of a Coxcomb, and the Sentiment of a Brute.—The Fowl upon the Dung-Hill, to be sure, feels a most gallant and heroic Spirit at the Crowing of another and instantly spreads his Cloak and prepares for Combat.—The Bulls Wrath inkindles into a noble Rage, and the Stallions immortal Spirit can never forgive the Pawings, Neighings, and Defiances of his Rival. But are Cocks, and Bulls and Horses, the proper Exemplars for the Imitation of Men, especially of Men of Sense, and even the highest Personages in the Government!
Such Ideas of Gallantry have been said to be derived from the Army. But it was injuriously said, because not truly. For every Gentleman, every Man of Sense and Breeding in the Army has a more delicate and manly Way of thinking; and from his Heart despises all such little, narrow, sordid Notions. It is true that a Competition, and a mutual Affectation of Contempt, is apt to arise among the lower, more ignorant and despicable of every Rank and Order in Society. This Sort of Men, (and some few such there are in every Profession) among Divines, Lawyers, Physicians, as well as Husbandmen, Manufacturers and Labourers, are prone from a certain Littleness of Mind to imagine that their Labours alone are of any Consequence in the World, and to affect a Contempt for all others. It is not unlikely then, that the lowest and most despised Sort of Soldiers may have expressed a Contempt for all other Orders of Mankind, may have indulged a Disrespect to every Personage in a Civil Character, and have acted upon such Principles of Revenge, Rusticity, Barbarity and Brutality, as have been above described. And indeed it has been observed by the great Montesquieu, that “From a Manner of Thinking that prevails among Mankind (the most ignorant and despicable of Mankind, he means) they set an higher Value upon Courage than Timourousness, on Activity than Prudence, on Strength than Counsel. Hence the Army will ever despise a Senate, and respect their own Officers; they will naturally slight the Orders sent them by a Body of Men, whom they look upon as Cowards; and therefore unworthy to command them.”—This Respect to their own Officers, which produces a Contempt of Senates and Counsels, and of all Laws, Orders, and Constitutions, but those of the Army and their Superiour Officers; tho’ it may have prevailed among some Soldiers of the illiberal Character above described, is far from being universal. It is not found in one Gentleman of Sense and Breeding in the whole Service. All of this Character know that the Common Law of England is Superiour to all other Laws Martial or Common, in every English Government; and has often asserted triumphantly its own Preheminence against the insults and Encroachments of a giddy and unruly Soldiery. They know too that Civil Officers in England hold a great Superiority to Military Officers; and that a frightful Despotism would be the speedy Consequence of the least Alteration in these Particulars.—And knowing this, these Gentlemen who have so often exposed their Lives in Defence of the Religion, the Liberties and Rights of Men and Englishmen, would feel the utmost Indignation at the Doctrine which should make the Civil Power give Place to the Military; which should make a Respect to their superior Officers destroy or diminish their Obedience to Civil Magistrates, or which should give any Man a Right, in Conscience, Honor, or even in Punctilio and Delicacy, to neglect the Institutions of the Public, and seek their own Remedy for Wrongs and Injuries of any Kind.
The importance of public virtue for a self-governing people, and the importance of religion for public virtue, were constant themes during the founding era. This short piece, published in the September 17, 1764 issue of the Boston Gazette, is representative of many similar essays to be found in newspapers throughout the founding era.
To the PUBLISHERS, &c.
There is an inseparable connection between publick virtue and publick happiness: Individuals, we are assured, must render an account hereafter of every part of their moral conduct in this state; but communities, as their existence will cease with this world, can neither be rewarded or punish’d as such in the next: It therefore appears rational to conclude, that present rewards and punishments are distributed to them, according to their present moral behaviour. Hence we see the importance of morality to a community: It should engage the serious attention of every individual, and his endeavor, to do all that lies in his power in his own sphere to encourage and promote it; and I think it is worth consideration, whether the decay of morality, which is too visible among us, is not very much owing to too much laxness in family government: I am far from being austere in my principles of the government of a family: I believe that too rigid a restraint upon young folks is usually attended with bad effects in the end; yet I will venture to ask whether we are not in general in the opposite extreme, and whether there are not already some instances of the fatal consequences of it?
I believe it will be allowed by all christians, that a due observation of the Lord’s Day is one material branch of moral duty: The legislature of Great-Britain, and every subordinate legislature in her dominions, and to be sure the civil authority of this province, have always consider’d the first day of the week as wholly set apart for the purposes of devout religion: If then the supreme civil power; & if by far the greater part, if not every private individual, who is a serious christian, are not all mistaken in this matter, it must be very affecting to see the contempt that is cast, and the opposition that is made by some of our youth, to the good and wholesome laws of the province for the strict observation of that day. It is evident I think, that it is not only the particular law lately made that gives offence to these young people: let any one recollect four or five years ago, before this law was pass’d, what opposition was made to the Sabbath laws then in being: this his Honor the chief justice was pleas’d to observe upon in open court, the last Week: As much contempt was cast upon the justices of the peace who executed those laws then, as is now cast upon the gentlemen appointed to execute this: so that it rather seems to be an impatience in these thoughtless giddy youth under the restraint of any law at all: such restraint they cry out against as an attack upon their liberty: and so it is, upon a liberty to prophane a part of time which GOD ALMIGHTY at the creation of the world was pleas’d to pronounce holy: corrupt minds are apt to mistake all laws for reformation as an attack upon liberty: these young people it is to be fear’d are countenanced by some others, from whom as citizens at least, better things might be expected: but tis hoped their parents or masters will instruct them otherwise.
A good deal depends upon the youth of a country being train’d up to virtue and good manners: They are to act upon the stage of life, when the present generation is gone: It ought therefore to be the common concern of all—magistrates—ministers