deserve to be classed and punished with those mischievious
persons who put obstructions on the railroads.

But, to speak practically and as a citizen, unlike those
who call themselves no-government men, I ask for, not
_at once_ no government, but at once a better government.
Let every man make known what kind of government would command
his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it.

After all, the practical reason why, when the power is
once in the hands of the people, a majority are permitted,
and for a long period continue, to rule is not because they
are most likely to be in the right, nor because this seems
fairest to the minority, but because they are physically the
strongest. But a government in which the majority rule in
all cases can not be based on justice, even as far as men
understand it. Can there not be a government in which the
majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but
conscience?--in which majorities decide only those questions
to which the rule of expediency is applicable? Must the
citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign
his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a
conscience then? I think that we should be men first, and
subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a
respect for the law, so much as for the right. The only
obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any
time what I think right. It is truly enough said that a
corporation has no conscience; but a corporation of
conscientious men is a corporation _with_ a conscience.
Law never made men a whit more just; and, by means of their