IV.
FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES.
Courtesy is the beautiful part of morality, justice carried to the utmost, rectitude refined, magnanimity in trifles.—Life Illustrated.
I.—MANNERS AND MORALS.
ood manners and good morals are founded on the same eternal principles of right, and are only different expressions of the same great truths. Both grow out of the necessities of our existence and relations. We have individual rights based on the fact of our individual being; and we have social duties resulting from our connection, in the bonds of society, with other individuals who have similar rights. Morals and manners alike, while they justify us in asserting and maintaining our own rights, require us scrupulously to respect, in word and act, the rights of others. It is true that the former, in the common comprehension of the term, is satisfied with simple justice in all our relations, while the latter often requires something more than the strictest conscientiousness can demand—a yielding of more than half the road—an exercise of the sentiment of benevolence, as well as of equity; but the highest morality really makes the same requisition, for it includes politeness, and recognizes deeds of kindness as a duty.
II.—RIGHTS.
In this country we need no incitements to the assertion and maintenance of our rights, whether individual or national. We are ready at all times to do battle for them either with the tongue, the pen, or the sword, as the case may require. Even women have discovered that they have rights, and he must be a bold man indeed who dares call them in question. Yes, we all, men, women, and children, have rights, and are forward enough in claiming then. Are we equally ready to respect the rights of others?