Every human being, is a distinct and separately accountable individual. To each one, God has given just such means of happiness, and placed him under such circumstances for improving those means of happiness, as it has pleased him. To one he has given wealth; to another, intellect; to another, physical strength; to another, health; and to all in different degrees. In all these respects, the human race presents a scene of the greatest possible diversity. So far as natural advantages are concerned, we can scarcely find two individuals, who are not created under circumstances widely dissimilar.

But, viewed in another light, all men are placed under circumstances of perfect equality. Each separate individual, is created with precisely the same right to use the advantages with which God has endowed him, as every other individual. This proposition seems to me in its nature so selfevident, as almost to preclude the possibility of argument. The only reason that I can conceive, on which any one could found a plea for inequality of right, must be inequality of condition. But this can manifestly create no diversity of right. I may have been endowed with better eye-sight than my neighbor; but this evidently gives me no right to put out his eyes, or to interfere with his right to derive from them whatever of happiness the Creator has placed within his power. I may have greater muscular strength than my neighbor; but this gives me no right to break his arms, or to diminish, in any manner, his ability to use them for the production of his own happiness. Besides, this supposition involves direct and manifest contradiction. For the principle asserted is, that superiority of condition confers superiority of right. But, if this be true, then every kind of superiority of condition must confer corresponding superiority of right. Superiority in muscular strength must confer it, as much as superiority of intellect, or of wealth; and must confer it in the ratio of that superiority. In that case, if A, on the ground of intellectual superiority, have a right

to improve his own means of happiness, by diminishing those which the Creator has given to B, B would have the same right over A, on the ground of superiority of muscular strength; while C would have a corresponding right over them both, on the ground of superiority of wealth; and so on, indefinitely; and these rights would change every day, according to the relative situation of the respective parties. That is to say, as right is, in its nature, exclusive, all the men in the universe have an exclusive right to the same thing; while the right of every one absolutely annihilates that of every other. What is the meaning of such an assertion, I leave it for others to determine.

But let us look at man in another point of light.

1. We find all men possessed of the same appetites and passions, that is, of the same desire for external objects, and the same capacity for receiving happiness from the gratification of these desires. We do not say, that all men possess them all in an equal degree; but only that all men actually possess them all, and that their happiness depends upon the gratification of them.

2. These appetites and passions are created, so far as they themselves are exclusively concerned, without limit. Gratification generally renders them both more intense and more numerous. Such is the case with the love of wealth, the love of power, the love of sensual pleasure, or with any of the others.

3. These desires may be gratified in such a manner, as not to interfere with the right which every other man has over his own means of happiness. Thus, I may gratify my love of wealth by industry and frugality, while I conduct myself towards every other man with entire honesty. I may gratify my love of science, without diminishing, in any respect, the means of knowledge possessed by another. And,

on the other hand, I am created with the physical power to gratify my desires, in such a manner as to interfere with the right which another has over the means of happiness which God has given him. Thus, I have a physical power to gratify my love of property by stealing the property of another, as well as to gratify it by earning property for myself. I have, by the gift of speech, the physical power to ruin the reputation of another, for the sake of gratifying my own love of approbation. I have the physical power to murder a man, for the sake of using his body to gratify my love of anatomical knowledge. And so of a thousand cases.

4. And hence, we see, that the relation in which human beings stand to each other is the following. Every individual is created with a desire to use the means of happiness which God has given him, in such a manner as he thinks will best promote that happiness; and of this manner he is the sole judge. Every individual is endowed with the same desires, which he may gratify in such a manner as will not interfere with his neighbor's means of happiness; but each individual has, also, the physical power of so gratifying his desires as will interfere with the means of happiness which God has granted to his neighbor.

5. From this relation it is manifest, that every man is under obligation to pursue his own happiness, in such manner only as will leave his neighbor in the undisturbed exercise of that common right which the Creator has equally conferred upon both; because in no other manner can the evident design of the Creator, the common happiness of all, be promoted.

That this is the law of our being, may be shown from several considerations:

1. By violating it, the happiness of the aggressor is not increased, while that of the sufferer is diminished; while, by obeying it, the greatest amount of happiness of which our

condition is susceptible is secured; because, by obeying it, every one derives the greatest possible advantage from the gifts bestowed upon him by the Creator.

2. Suppose any other rule of obligation, that is, that a man is not under obligation to observe, with this exactitude, the rights of his neighbor. Where shall the limit be fixed? If violation be allowed in a small degree, why not in a great degree? and if he may interfere with one right, why not with all? And, as all men come under the same law, this principle would lead to the same absurdity, as that of which we have before spoken; that is, it would abolish the very idea of right; and, as every one has an equal liberty of violation, would surrender the whole race to the dominion of unrestrained desire.

3. If it be said that one class of men is not under the obligation to observe this rule in its conduct towards another class of men, then it will be necessary to show that the second class are not men, that is, human beings: for these principles apply to men, as men; and the simple fact that a being is a man, places him within the reach of these obligations and of their protection. Nay, more, suppose the inferior class of beings were not truly men; if they were intelligent moral agents, I suppose that we should be under the same obligation to conduct ourselves towards them upon the principle of reciprocity. I see no reason why an angel would have a right, by virtue of his superior nature, to interfere with the means of happiness which God has conferred upon man. By parity of reasoning, therefore, superiority of rank would give to man no such power over an inferior species of moral and intelligent beings.

And, lastly, if it be true that the Creator has given to every separate individual control over those means of happiness which He has bestowed upon him, then the simple question is, which is of the highest authority; this grant of

the Creator, or the desires and passions of the creature? for these are really the notions which are brought into collision. That is to say, ought the grant of God, and the will of God, to limit my desires; or ought my desires to vitiate the grant, and set at defiance the will of God? On this question a 1 moral and intelligent creature can entertain but one opinion.

Secondly. Let us examine the teaching of the Holy Scriptures on this subject.

The precept in the Bible is in these words: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”

Two questions are here to be considered. First, to whom does this command apply; or, in other words, who is my neighbor? and, secondly, what is implied in the precept?

1. The first of these questions is answered by our Saviour himself, in the parable of the good Samaritan. Luke, x. 25-37. He there teaches us, that we are to consider as our neighbor, not our relation, or our fellow-citizen, or those to whom we are bound by the reception of previous kindness, but the stranger, the alien, the hereditary national enemy; that is, man as man, any human being to whom we may in any manner do good. Every man is our neighbor, and, therefore, we are under obligation to love every man as ourselves.

2. What is the import of the command to love such a one as ourselves?

The very lowest meaning that we can assign to this precept is as follows. I have already stated that God has bestowed upon every man such means of happiness, as, in his own sovereign pleasure, he saw fit; and that he has given to every man an equal right to use those means of happiness as each one supposes will best promote his own well-being.