In the claim now made in behalf of English authors, there is great
apparent justice; but that which is not true, often puts on the appearance
of truth. For thousands of years, it seemed so obviously true that the sun
revolved around the earth that the fact was not disputed, and yet it came
finally to be proved that the earth revolved around the sun. Ricardo's
theory of the occupation of the earth, the foundation-stone of his system,
had so much apparent truth to recommend it, that it was almost universally
adopted, and is now the basis of the whole British politico-economical
system; and yet the facts are directly the reverse of what Ricardo had
supposed them to be. Such being the case, it might be that, upon a full
examination of the subject, we should find that, in admitting the claim of
foreign authors, we should be doing injustice and not justice. The English
press has, it is true, for many years been engaged in teaching us that we
were little better than thieves or pirates; but that press has been so
uniformly and unsparingly abusive of us, whenever we have failed to grant
all that it has claimed, that its views are entitled to little weight. At
home, many of our authors have taken the same side of the question; and
the only answer that has ever, to my knowledge, been made, has been, that
if we admitted the claims of foreign authors, the prices of books would be
raised, and the people would be deprived of their accustomed supplies of
cheap literature--as I think, a very weak sort of defense. If nothing
better than this can be said, we may as well at once plead guilty to the
charge of piracy, and commence a new and more honest course of action.
Evil may not be done that good may come of it, nor may we steal an
author's brains that our people may be cheaply taught. To admit that the
end justifies the means, would be to adopt the line of argument so often
used by English speakers, in and out of Parliament, when they defend the
poisoning of the Chinese people by means of opium introduced in defiance
of their government, because it furnishes revenue to India; or that which