It never did occur to us, that the paupers had the best right to all the farms, until we saw this new application of the Higher Law. But 'tis clear as noon-day, if you grant the Higher Law, as expounded by Mr. Seward; and we expect soon to hear that they are bringing their titles into court. Anti-rentism looked this way, and anti-rentism chose its own Governor and Judges.
But Mr. Garrison outbids Mr. Smith all hollow for the pauper vote. He promises not only to every one his "vine and fig-tree," but a vine and fig-tree that will bear fruit without culture. He is going to get up a terrestrial paradise, in which there will be no jails, no taxes, no labor, no want, no sickness, no pain, no government—in fact, no anything. But he shall speak for himself. We find the following in the Liberator of 1st August:
"Indeed, properly speaking, there is but one government, and that is not human, but divine; there is but one law, and that is 'the Higher Law;' there is but one ruler, and that one is God, 'in whom we live and move, and have our being.' What is called human government is usurpation, imposture, demagoguism, peculation, swindling, and tyranny, more or less, according to circumstances, and to the intellectual and moral condition of the people. Unquestionably, every existing government on earth is to be overthrown by the growth of mind and moral regeneration of the masses. Absolutism, limited monarchy, democracy—all are sustained by the sword; all are based upon the doctrine, that 'Might makes right;' all are intrinsically inhuman, selfish, clannish, and opposed to a recognition of the brotherhood of man. They are to liberty, what whiskey, brandy and gin are to temperance. They belong to the 'Kingdoms of this World,' and in due time are to be destroyed by the Brightness of the coming of Him, 'whose right it is to reign;' and by the erection of a Kingdom which cannot be shaken. They are not for the people, but make the people their prey; they are hostile to all progress; they resist to the utmost all radical changes. All history shows that Liberty, Humanity, Justice and Right have ever been in conflict with existing governments, no matter what their theory or form."
Mr. Greely's Phalansteries, Mr. Andrews' Free Love, Mr. Goodell's Millenium, and Mr. Smith's Agrarianism, all pale before this Kingdom of Mr. Garrison's. He is King of the Abolitionists, Great Anarch of the North.
We cannot reconcile this millennial doctrine of Mr. Garrison's with another doctrine, which we have seen imputed to him in the Richmond Examiner, to wit, that there is no God, because no beneficent Creator would have so constituted mankind as to have made slavery almost universal. Now, assume, as he does, that slavery is a cruel, sinful and wicked institution, destructive alike of human happiness and well-being, and his conclusion is irresistible. To be consistent, all anti-slavery men should be atheists. Ere long, we suspect, their consistency will equal their folly and profanity.
With us, who think slavery a benevolent institution, equally necessary to protect the weak, and to govern the wicked and the ignorant, its prevalence is part of that order and adaptation of the universe that "lifts the soul from Nature up to Nature's God."