"T" is for Torrey

     Typical of the progressive leaders of Early America, Dr. Jesse Torrey, Jr., 1787-1834, a physician by vocation, was an advocate of "classical education".  He was a leader in the free library movement, and advocate of free public education, and, published several instructional readers for children.  Typical of the times, these readers advanced commonly held notions of natural law and morality.  His readers contained various guides to virtue and happiness and warnings against vice.  According to Torrey, "What is good according to the law of nature?--Whatever tends to preserve and ameliorate mankind.  What is evil?--Whatever tends to the destruction and deterioration of the human race.  What is a sin according to the law of nature?--Whatever tends to disturb the order established by nature, for the preservation and perfectability of man and of society."  Torrey, as did many other Early Americans, believed that children should study the lives and moral precepts of the most eminent ancient philosophers of Greece and Rome, a system of morality founded on natural law, the Bible, and the works of eminent German and English philosophers.  In a letter to James Madison dated Oct. 19, 1829, Torrey encourages Madison to exert his influence "in favor of securing to the present and all the future generations of Virginia, the greatest blessings that man ever yet received from man, free education, free knowledge, freedom of mind and person, virtue and happiness."  Note the association of "virtue and happiness". 
    Below, images from one of the OCHF Library's copies of various works by Torrey, Grigg & Elliot's Third Reader, 1845.  Click image for larger view.

 

 

"S" is for Ship of Fools

     A virtuous (disciplined) life is a happy life.  To allow one's life to be governed by vice is foolishness.  Both classical philosophy and biblical wisdom teach this, and the notion was for centuries the bedrock of Western civilization. 
     The pre-Reformation book, The Ship of Fools, satirized people who do not equate virtue with happiness, people whose life is governed by vice.  The book was a runaway best seller. 
     I can't imagine such a book being being widely accepted today.  In contrast to both classical moral philosophy and biblical wisdom (the marriage of these concepts once having been understood to be "common sense"), most people today believe that right and wrong are "relative" to ones personal circumstances (and whim) rather than a matter of discernable natural law.  In short, rather than ridiculing foolishness, the culture of today embraces it.  The concept of natural law and the relationship between natural law, virtue and happiness is lost to the vast majority of people.  Sail on Ship of Fools!
     Below, a leaf from a 1520 printing of Sebastian Brant's Ship of Fools (click image for larger view).
    



"Of foolish mockers, let wise men them eschew.

For no correction can bring them to virtue."

 

Leaf from OCHF Library archives.

 



"R" is for Rights conferred by God, not by the State

    

OCHF Library's copy of Blackstone's Commentaries on the

Laws of England

 

     Those of us who are Americans tend to take it for granted that we have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  Few of us, however, know the origin of those rights.  The origin is what the vast majority of early Americans of all religious persuasions referred to as "natural law".  The Declaration of Independence begins with an appeal to "the laws of nature and of God."  These laws are the "natural law".

     Some have said that the reference to God in the Declaration of Independence was merely an attempt to add legitimacy to the rebellion.  Not so!  This was no propagandists' machination designed to advance the Revolution!  The concept of natural law upon which the concept of our God-given rights is based was so common as to be held by the vast majority of educated persons in early America.

     Where did the Founders learn about natural law?--as children in their readers, and as adults in their historical and political studies.  Classical education fused with biblical studies stood as the norm, not the exception, in the early days of the Republic.  The concept of natural law was a familiar thread that ran through the Greek and Roman philosophers (such as Aristotle, Demosthenes, Seneca, and Cicero); the Anglo-Saxon tradition of common law; and many of the European and English political philosophers (such as Sir Edward Coke, John Locke, Baron Charles de Montesquieu, and especially Sir William Blackstone).

     William Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England were instrumental in transmitting to the American Colonies the concept of rights based upon natural law.  The Commentaries are often quoted as the definitive pre-Revolutionary source of common law by United States courts.  Opinions of the Supreme Court of the United States quote from Blackstone's work whenever they wish to engage in historical discussion that goes back that far, or further (for example, when discussing the intent of the Framers of the Constitution).

     The Ten Commandments are at the heart of Blackstone's philosophy.  Blackstone taught that man is created by God and granted fundamental rights by God.  Man's law must be based on God's law.  Our Founding Fathers referred to Blackstone more than to any other English or American authority.  Blackstone's great work, Commentaries on the Laws of England, was basic to the U. S. Constitution.  This work has sold more copies in America than in England and was a basic texbook of America's early lawyers.  It was only in the mid-Twentieth Century that America repudiated this aspect of our Christian heritage.

     The attack on our understanding of natural law has been justified by all kinds of high-minded doctrines, including, for example, "pluralism of religious cultures".  The attack on our understanding of natural law as it relates to our civil liberties is, nonetheless, an attack on the U. S. Constitution and the principles for which it stands.  If government officials take an oath pledging to defend the Constitution, are they not pledging to defend the concepts upon which this document originated!  The loss of understanding of, acceptance of, and respect for natural law among the majority of the Republic's citizens today places the rights recognized by the Constitution at risk.  This is not an academic discussion... it is a life and death issue affecting the future of the Republic.  The vast majority of Americans have forgotten their Christian heritage.  Oh how the mighty have fallen!  What tears ought to be shed over the state of our culture today, if only we had eyes to see and ears to hear!