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CHAPTER III.

Moderation.-Excitement; Passion; Revenge.-Obscuration of Judgment by Excitement. Honesty. Veracity. Kant's Opinion.-Honesty in Money Matters.-Desire of Wealth. Love of Independence.-Poverty; its Effect on Public Men in ancient and in modern Times.-Necessity of being free from Debts.-Liberality.-Peculation.-Bane of Public Covetousness.Public Defaulters.-Periods of Speculation.-Smuggling.

XXII. MODERATION or temperance, the keeping of the proper mean between extremes and the tempering of excitement or passion, is not so much a virtue in itself, as a means to obtain it. Yet it is so important a one for the frail nature of man, and so difficult to become master of, so necessary to train ourselves in, so that it may grow into a habit, without which we are always exposed to commit many acts which will cause regret, that the ancients, and the school philosophers after them, had good reason for counting it as one of the cardinal virtues. It has already been stated, that it is included in strict justice, and all that has been observed respecting calmness relates to the subject of moderation; yet so important is moderation in politics, because there are so many opportunities in all the spheres belonging to them, for excitement and passion, that it will need no excuse, if a few more remarks are added.

First of all it ought to be repeated that we cannot expect moderation to stand by us in the hour of trial,

as a true friend; we cannot expect to listen to its counsel or that it should speak with a voice sufficiently loud to be heard, when we are in a state of excitement; if we have not made it a habit of our life. Moderation cannot be acquired unless it be an honest, daily repeated endeavor to temper our appetites and impulses. No rider expects a spirited horse to be broken by only once putting a bridle on it; or that it should submit to his guiding hand when frightened or excited, unless he have it well trained by repeated and judicious and patient management when there are no startling causes surrounding it. And as no habit can be so easily and thoroughly acquired, that it becomes a second nature, as in youth, it is necessary that we should train ourselves in this indispensable habit from our early years. We ought never to forget that our Maker, having deeply implanted appetites and impulses into our soul, so deeply that they reappear in all their native vigor with each individual, because indispensable in the whole organization of the individual and household of society, likewise gives to each individual the faculty of reflection and reasoning, and in order to leave a moral value to each individual, leaves it likewise to each man to apply the latter to the former. Without it we should be machines directed from without, not individual moral beings determined from within.

Secondly, we must remember that in politics we act in a great number of cases in union with others, who, therefore, necessarily excite one another by mutual action and reaction; frequently we act like the pilot, surrounded by stirring and swiftly-impelling agents or bewildering dangers; we are often called upon to give our unqualified vote immediately after the most

exciting scenes, and in many cases we act while struggling with opponents or when we possess power, which in its nature is impatient of resistance. On this last point and the nature of power I have dwelt at some length elsewhere in this book. All these reasons then are very strong to induce us to train ourselves, and if the young are intrusted to our care as parents, guardians or teachers, to train them in moderation, while mutual moderation is one of the choicest fruits of true friendship in our political life no less than in the whole career of man.

XXIII. There are two evils in particular, which can be prevented by habitual moderation only, on the one of which some observations, indeed, have been offered already; and which I will endeavor to complete now as far as the object of this work seems to require; I mean excitement and revenge. Passion as much perverts our inner man as it hideously changes the outer, and which Seneca very justly depicts at the beginning of his treatise De Ira. Judgment, justice, truth, not to speak of the more delicate yet no less necessary qualities of kindness, clemency, generosity, or any other virtue which flows from the noblest part of the soul, are wholly banished from the passionate, at the moment of excitement, rage or ire; and a man who has not acquired the habit of moderation is like a tiger; he may be calm, but it does not depend upon him whether he will remain so; a single drop of blood, which accident may show, suddenly calls forth his fury. It is true, that some nations are much more prone to passion than others; climate, food, institutions and national education exercise a powerful influence. Thus the English, and it would

seem still more so the Americans, are less prone to ebullitions of temper, than the nations of the European continent, and again the Germans less so than the French and Spaniards; but all are men, all have the lurking fire within them, all stand in need of training, of being guided by the calmness and judgment of reason; especially so as regards not that passion which shows itself in sudden irruptions, but the excitement which gives us lasting oblique views, and perverts our judgment and train of reasoning enduringly.

On various occasions I have spoken of the very simple yet very important fact, that the nearer an object is to our eyes the larger it appears, and the less we are enabled to view it in all the proper relations of surrounding objects. All insulation magnifies. Now if we are engaged in an arduous endeavor to bring about a certain object-I do not speak merely of what more properly may be called a political struggle, but of all measures and actions in which we are engaged with ardent intent of purpose-this intent is apt to magnify the subject to our eyes, we gradually lose sight of other considerations, and not unfrequently are betrayed even so far as to forget the ultimate object, and to be ready to sacrifice every thing to the means. Not only are warriors prone to forget that the end and object of all war must be peace; even physicians have at times forgotten the end of all their art, healing the suffering, or assuaging their pain, in the interest of a curious operation or the trial of a new remedy. The effect of this circumstance in politics is not only that parties forget in their zeal, that parties can be defended only on the ground of the ultimate end of all politics, namely, the welfare of the whole, but also that we are very apt to 10

VOL. II.

consider each single case, in which we are thus zealously engaged, as a peculiar one, a crisis, demanding therefore peculiar means, and allowing a stretch of power, or the adoption of expedients which in other cases we should discountenance as inadmissible. When a late president of the United States changed the officers of government on a much larger scale than any of his predecessors had done, or than many citizens believed to be warrantable in a free government, where every one should be allowed to have his independent opinion, and to express it in a lawful manner; the measure, allowed to be extraordinary though within the letter of the law, was excused in the senate of the United States on the ground that there had been a crisis. Future historians, untouched by the exciting circumstances of the time, seeing the objects in their true respective dimensions, will judge, whether there was really a crisis, or whether it was only a state of things which presented itself as a crisis to those who had striven to place that president in the chair of the highest magistracy, and had become wrought up into that excitement which prevents calm judgment and clear vision.

There is no deviation from law, or right and justice, whether on a large scale, such as assuming power directly against the constitution of the land, or on a smaller scale, such as bribing at elections, which it is not attempted to justify on the ground of the urgency of the case for the public welfare-this public welfare, so truly the end of all government and yet so frequently made the pretext of partial measures, or the perversion of established law and the cause of justice. In South America the people unfortunately fly from one crisis to