Chapter 8
Garrison the
Non-resistant
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Oh,
it is excellent
To
have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous
To use it like a giant.
-- Shakspere,
"Measure for Measure."
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It
is not without reason that I am treating Garrison as primarily a non-resistant,
and only secondarily as an Abolitionist; for it was only by chance that his
attention was turned to the abolition of slavery, while his instinctive dislike
of coercion and love of freedom were wider and earlier. They accounted for his
condemnation of war, and they would have led him in his youth to take the side
of liberty in any conflict which the condition of the times might have forced
upon him. Garrison recognized fully the profounder claims of non-resistance and
the fact that the abolition of slavery was a mere episode in its history. The
coercion of man by man was the root of slavery, and it is also the root of a
thousand other ills. Between nations it means war and conquest and imperialism
and international misunderstandings and hatreds and tariffs. Massachusetts and
Boston have had the honor of leading in many campaigns for freedom. They were
the first to resent the tyranny of George III. Under Garrison they were the
headquarters of the anti-slavery movement. Recently we have found there the
center of protest against the seizure and subjugation of the Philippines. But in
every case it has been a select minority which has taken up the cause of
liberty, and in every case this minority has been reviled and despised. Sam
Adams was not respectable. Garrison was an "infidel" agitator. And
to-day the anti-imperialists, the logical successors of Adams and Garrison in
claiming freedom for all, are treated with scant courtesy. Let them possess
their souls in patience. They will have their reward.
But
each of these movements was but an incident in the grand march toward freedom,
and Garrison saw the wider aspects of his faith. He was one of the heralds of a
new instinct -- the instinct that man belongs to a higher plane than that of
physical violence, and that he must rise above the methods of brute force in
dealing with his fellows. The evolution of the race is a mysterious thing.
Whence came the ideas of association, of love of neighbor, and of love of
enemies? The new seed-thoughts take root at first in a single mind or in a very
few select ones, and centuries pass before the stony hearts of men at large are
fructified. These are real instincts, like that which sends the chick after its
food before it is quite free of the egg. And the faint promise of that desire in
the egg may have induced it to make an immense effort in the dark -- to attempt
the impossible -- to break down its old environment, apparently impervious and
eternal, and seek a new world of infinite possibilities. There are two sides to
evolution -- that usually dwelt upon, of conformity to environment -- and that
far more significant one of dissatisfaction with environment, determination to
rise above it, and the actual effort against all nature to discover or create a
new one. Life means not submission to, but mastery of, environment, and every
seed is at heart a rebel. The parts of chaos were well suited to each other and
to the whole. Whence came the whisper that there was something better, and the
struggle of the universe to lift itself, as it were, by its own waist-band? It
was an effort to do the impossible, and it succeeded. Discontent with
environment is a motive power, and Garrison's instinctive aversion to coercion
was a new creative principle which will yet have its preponderant part to play
in the history of man. Of course, I do not mean to say that he was the first man
to feel the novel truth. It had been let loose many centuries earlier, and here
and there there had always been witnesses to it; but in his own day and
generation Garrison was a pioneer of non-resistance, and he was no imitator or
repeater, but he felt its direct claims in his own consciousness.
And
men are governed and must be governed by their feelings. We are in the habit of
talking of logic as if it were superior to sentiment; but all logic starts out
from sentiment, and every syllogism can be traced back to a feeling -- a taste
-- about which it is not to be disputed. Even mathematics, the most logical of
sciences, rests upon axioms, and axioms are feelings. We say that a straight
line is the shortest distance between two points, because we "feel"
that it is; and in the same way we believe that two parallel lines can never
meet, and that one and one always make two. But these are all mere feelings, and
the new mathematicians are actually arguing to-day that parallel lines can meet,
and that our axiomatic feelings are erroneous. Men often think that they are
guided by reason, while as a matter of fact they really feel their way; and it
is not a bad plan when logic leads you to some act which shocks your feelings,
to use these latter as tests of logic. It is this humble, instinctive way of
behaving which we call common-sense, and common-sense is the natural corrective
of logic -- just as when, sailing by right ascension and declination, we see the
breakers ahead, we do not hesitate to fall back on the vulgar assistance of the
lead. There is no such thing as pure logic. We are always guided either by
feeling or by feeling-plus-logic; and hence logic, so far from adding certainty
to our conclusions, rather, by bringing in a new element, adds a new possibility
of error. The chief use of logic is not to show me what to do, but to afford me
a rational excuse for doing what common-sense dictates. It is not the foundation
on which I build my wall, but the prop with which I shore it up when it begins
to look shaky. All the good and all the evil in the world have been caused by
feelings, but probably feelings-plus-logic have done more harm in the long run
than undiluted feelings. Logic is relentless. The logic of Torquemada was
unanswerable. Heretics were damned. They made converts who were also damned. It
was better to torture and kill a few of them than to consign a large portion of
the race to hell forever. Q. E. D. The argument is unassailable, but if
Torquemada had consulted his heart for a moment he would have thrown the whole
flimsy sophism overboard. If I may indulge in a Hibernicism I would say that it
is a good thing to keep your heart at your elbow. For the heart is the root of
all, and feeling is the mother of logic, though logic often disowns its mother
and endeavors to cut loose from her apron strings, ashamed apparently of its low
birth. True logic should be proud of its maternal ancestor, and delight in
calling in the good old lady whenever it seems to be coming to grief.
And
clearly the idea that logic can independently lay down eternal truths is a
fallacy, for the human race is living and growing. Our viewpoints vary and
change from day to day. Our feelings are different from those of our fathers,
and the logical structure which we rear upon them merely adds to the confusion.
Garrison and Draco could not have argued intelligibly together because their
root-feelings were different -- they belonged to different epochs. Axioms alter
from age to age, and the Quod erat demonstrandum of one period is the Reductio
ad absurdum of the next. And the hard logic of an earlier age often
survives into a new generation against whose deepest instincts it offends, and
yet we persist in our allegiance to the old truth, become falsehood. There is
therefore a grain of truth in the common saying that a rule of action is correct
in theory but not in practice. Thus the axiom that it is best to hit a man who
differs from you over the head has been fossilized and preserved by the logical
institutions founded upon it, into the midst of a period in which men feel
instinctively that other less clumsy methods of treatment are better. We owe a
lot of trouble to the Q. E. D.'s. And Garrison's mistake was not that he adopted
a wrong principle, but that he was ahead of his times. He believed that the
declaration of the non-resistant convention would sweep over the country as the
Declaration of Independence had done, only with a more profound and intense
effect, as it was infinitely wider in scope. But two things are necessary to the
success of a cause -- not only a prophet, but also a people capable of
understanding the prophet; and this audience was lacking to Garrison. He would
have liked to be a leader to guide the world into the paths of peace. He had to
content himself in this regard with acting as a pioneer to stake out the land
which some day mankind will occupy. His immediate leadership was confined to a
cause which in comparison was limited and local.
But
was this non-resistance principle of Garrison's a true one? And is there any
prospect that it will triumph in the future? As an axiomatic statement its final
sanction must be found in the individual consciousness. Answer for yourself. Is
there nothing at the bottom of your heart which suggests to you at your best
moments that the exercise of physical force against your fellows is unworthy of
you? Has not the advance of civilization made men more and more skeptical of the
virtues of violence? Many men, at any rate, while repudiating the claims of
non-resistance, pay it the indirect compliment of worshiping or honoring
supremely the men who have taught it. There can be no doubt about it -- violence
is played out. The use of physical force in the management of rational creatures
is a survival of less enlightened times. The tendency is away from violence of
all kinds. Most of the evils of the world are caused by violence. Read the
history of mankind from the monuments of Assyria and Egypt down to the morning's
news, and you will see that it is one long record of violence -- man lifting up
his hand against man and nation against nation. Murder, arson, robbery --
robbery, arson, murder -- it is the same old story over and over again. And
to-day the dead and wounded lie all around us, not on the obvious battlefield
only, but in city and town and hamlet. Visit the slums of New York or Chicago or
London. See the poverty and crime and disease which come from overcrowding and
enforced idleness and excessive labor side by side -- the necessary consequences
of monopolizing by force the natural opportunities of the earth; men and women
suffering from a rigid and artificial arrangement of things formed and
perpetuated in the last resort by the mailed hand of society, held ever in
readiness to crush the offender. The physical struggle has never ceased,
disguise it as we may endeavor. Society has always been a Donnybrook Fair, and
it is high time that we should be ashamed of our manners, for nothing could be
more vulgar than this everlasting appeal to the cudgel.
And
the way to stop is to stop! This seems such a simple remedy that men will have
none of it. Yes, violence is an evil, they say; let us put it down by more
violence. And we start out, each of us with his own ideas and his own weapons,
and we proceed to break each other's heads again, and in so doing we are
repeating the old useless conflicts of the Pharaohs. This noisy, bloody business
is not the real history of the world. Its real history is the history of ideas.
The real battle that counts is in the minds and hearts of men. Let us order our
armies up to that plane. And at our best, I repeat it, we all feel a call to
rise to that higher level. There is something degrading in the use of force
against others, and we are all conscious of it at the time. It is impossible to
kick anything, I do not care what, and feel human. Catch yourself flagrante
delicto the next time and arraign yourself at your own bar, and I predict
that you will find yourself guilty. It is a debasing proceeding. It is not our
proper method, and if our environment seems to demand it, we must hope and pray
and work for a new one; and the best way to create a new one is (so far as in us
lies) to behave as if it had already arrived. Overcome evil with good. That is
the truly human way. Let others get the better of us in this matter of violence.
Forgive them. Let by-gones be by-gones. Stop this eternal bookkeeping of
offenses between you and your neighbor, and do what you can to bequeath a clean
slate to posterity.
And the non-resistant is no weakling. Garrison himself is proof
enough of that. The very renunciation of physical force seems to give a new and
loftier power to a man. No, the strenuous man is not the soldier on horseback
with saber drawn, but rather the man with folded arms who sees a new truth and
utters it regardless of consequences. No one can injure the man who refuses to
be hurt. You may kill him but you cannot touch the man in him. In another place
I have given some examples(1)
of the power and influence of such men even upon the savages of America and
Africa.(2) The most influential men in history
have eschewed physical force as an instrument. What man of all has exerted the
deepest, widest influence upon mankind? Surely Jesus Christ from whom the very
term "non-resistant" is derived. And after him? Siddartha, the Buddha,
who absolutely condemned all violence. What man to-day in the Russian Empire,
that home of brute force, has the greatest import for the world? Leo Tolstoy,
without doubt, the man who would not lift his hand to compel. And Garrison, how
do you explain the fact that he, with his hands tied behind his back, was the
main motive power in that movement which has dwarfed all the rest of our
history?
Let
us beware, however, of imitations and travesties of non-resistance. It is no
colorless, negative quality, and should have no taint of timidity, no suspicion
of effeminacy. Let us be quite sure that we are above violence, and not beneath
it. It is far better to fight to the death than to decline the combat from
cowardice, whatever may be the name behind which we mask it. A soft answer may,
too, be turned into an offense, if the wrong emphasis is placed upon it. An
apology should not come too easily. It ought to be a sort of self-punishment
which will make me hesitate another time before incurring my own displeasure. I
have a friend who apologizes at the least provocation -- "Oh, yes, to be
sure. You are quite right. I am awfully sorry;" and in five minutes he will
be doing the same thing again, and rattling off the same formula. An over-issue
of apologies is like an over-issue of paper dollars; it makes them altogether
valueless. The superficial readiness to forgive comes under the same category. I
once read a letter in which the writer apparently inflicted an injury upon the
recipient. He closed it glibly as follows: "I know you will resent this,
but I forgive you freely beforehand." Of course, this coin was counterfeit
on its face. Forgiveness and apology, from sinned against and sinning, must
represent positive sympathy with the other party, or they really become
affronts. Forgiveness is a sort of self-blame, too; you blame yourself for not
having forgiven before -- for having to forgive at all -- for taking any notice
whatever of the offense, and it is the lack of universal sympathy which makes
either necessary. You find yourself out of tune, like a violin, and you proceed
to screw yourself up to the proper pitch. The chief use of forgiveness and
apology is to the forgiver and apologizer.
1.
"Tolstoy and His Message," Funk & Wagnalls Company, New York.
2.
De Quincey in one of his articles on "Walking Stewart," the eccentric
traveller, quotes the latter to the following effect: "It was generally
supposed, he said, that the civilized traveller among savages might lay his
account with meeting unprovoked violence, except in so far as he carried arms
for his protection. Now he had found it by much the safer plan to carry no
arms."
