CHAP. XI.
DUTY TO PARENTS.
There seems to be an indolent propensity in man to make prescription al-
ways take place of reason, and to place every duty on an arbitrary founda-
tion. The rights of kings are deduced in a direct line from the King of kings;
and that of parents from our fi rst parent.
Why do we thus go back for principles that should always rest on the
same base, and have the same weight to-day that they had a thousand years
ago — and not a jot more? If parents discharge their duty they have a strong
hold and sacred claim on the gratitude of their children; but few parents are
willing to receive the respectful affection of their offspring on such terms.
They demand blind obedience, because they do not merit a reasonable ser-
vice: and to render these demands of weakness and ignorance more bind-
ing, a mysterious sanctity is spread round the most arbitrary principle; for
what other name can be given to the blind duty of obeying vicious or weak
beings merely because they obeyed a powerful instinct?
The simple defi nition of the reciprocal duty, which naturally subsists
between parent and child, may be given in a few words: The parent who
pays proper attention to helpless infancy has a right to require the same
attention when the feebleness of age comes upon him. But to subjugate
a rational being to the mere will of another, after he is of age to answer
to society for his own conduct, is a most cruel and undue stretch of
power; and, perhaps, as injurious to morality as those religious systems
which do not allow right and wrong to have any existence, but in the
Divine will.