on Davis, and the American
Congress, and Quakerism, and William Henry Channing, and his journey to
England, and Free-soil, and the Public Lands, and the Common Right to
the Soil, and Rent, and Interest, and Capital, and Labor, and
Fourierism, and Congeniality of Spirit, and Natural Affinities, and
Domestic Difficulties, and--the Good time Coming. All were full of
reform, and most were wild and fanatical. Some regarded marriage as
unnatural, and pleaded for Free-love as the law of life. Some were for
Communism, but differed as to the form which it ought to assume. One
contended that all should be perfectly free,--that each should be a law
unto himself, and should work, and rest, and eat, and drink, as his own
free spirit should prompt him. Another said that the principle had been
tried, and had failed,--that some were anxious to do all the eating, and
sleeping, and loving, and left others to do all the working. Joseph
Treat was there, advocating Atheism, and defending the right of men and
women, married or single, to give free play to native tendencies and
sexual affinities. But Treat was indifferently clad, and not well
washed, and he was evidently no great favorite. * * * Most were in favor
of non-resistance, and full individual freedom. To acknowledge the right
of human government and of human laws, was treason to humanity. Man is a
law to himself. He is his own governor. The Protestant principle of the
right of private judgment and liberty of conscience strikes at the root
of all the governments on earth. Each one's nature is his own sole law.
The one principle of duty is, for every one to do that which is right in
his own eyes. The principle of the Anti-Slavery Society means that, and
neither more nor less. And the Anti-Slavery Society will, after
emancipating the negro, destroy all the governments, remodel all the
laws and institutions, and emancipate all the nations of the earth. Of
course the laws of marriage will fall to the ground. Why not? They
originated only with men,--with men who lived in darker times, and who
were less developed, than we. It would be strange if children could make
laws fit to govern men. And with the laws of marriage will go the laws
of property in land. Land was common property at first, and what right
had any one to make it private? The first man who appropriated land was
a thief. And those who inherited it from him were receivers of stolen
goods. And the title that was vicious at first c