ral,
unalienable, and equal right to life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness.

Second, There is a great diversity of powers, and in virtue
thereof the strong man may rule and oppress, enslave and
ruin the weak, for his interest and against theirs.

Third, There is no natural law of God to forbid the strong
to oppress the weak, and enslave and ruin the weak.

That is the Idea of Slavery. It has never got a national
expression in America; it has never been laid down as a
Principle in any act of the American people, nor in any
single State, so far as I know. All profess the opposite;
but it is involved in the Measures of both State and Nation.
This Idea is founded in the selfishness of man; it is
atheistic.

The idea must lead to a corresponding government; that will
be unjust in its substance,--for it will depend not on
natural right, but on personal force; not on the
Constitution of the Universe, but on the compact of men. It
is the abnegation of God in the universe and of conscience
in man. Its form will be despotism,--the government of all,
by a part, for the sake of a part. It may be a single-headed
despotism, or a despotism of many heads; but whether a
Cyclops or a Hydra, it is alike "the abomination which
maketh desolate." Its ultimate consequence is plain to
foresee--poverty to a nation, misery, ruin.

* * * * *

These two Ideas are now fairly on foot. They are hostile;
they are both mutually invasive and destructive. They are in
exact opposition to each other, and the nation which
embodies these two is not a figure of equilibrium. As both
are active forces in the minds of men, and as each idea
tends to become a fact--a universal and exclusive fact,--as
men with these ideas organize into parties as a means to
make their idea into a fact,--it follows that there must not
only be strife amongst philosophical men about these
antagonistic Principles and Ideas, but a strife of practical
men about corresponding Facts and Measures. So the quarrel,
if not otherwise ended, will pass from words to what seems
more serious; and one will overcome the other.

So long as these two Ideas exist in the nation as two
political forces, there is no national unity of Idea, of
course no