SERMON. II. SAMUEL XVI. 11, 12. LET HIM ALONE AND LET HIM CURSE; FOR THE LORD HATH BIDDEN HIM. IT MAY BE THAT THE LORD WILL LOOK ON MINE AFFLICTION, THIS DAY. MAGNANIMOUS King David, who won from the enemies of his nation a terror and a good will, which Solomon kept by inherited wisdom, knew that men cannot be on one side without being abused by some who are on another side; that one cannot be in the right without being cursed by some who are in the wrong. He was the beloved master of his country, a royal prophet, an inspired king; and his long and full life had taught him to expect to be cursed, by some who wished to be royal, and by some who felt inspired. Shimei is always throwing stones and dust at David. Twenty-nine hundred years has the air kept the rhythm of his curses. the few or To-day and throughout this year, your Excellency, and your honorable bodies, who represent such political wisdom and virtue as God has vouchsafed to the people of this Commonwealth, will probably be cursed as David was, as your predecessors were, and as not a few of you already have been. But, whoever does the cursing, the many, the great or the small,pendent minds, while offended by the blasphemy, are not shocked into a corresponding passion; counting it better to do wise deeds than to answer foolish words. Such words will come from many quarters. It may be of service to examine one of their sources. men of inde I propose to speak of fanaticism, that mental drunkenness which is often charged, truly or falsely, upon Massachusetts. The degree of the common charge is doubtless false; but whatever may be our share of a fault, whose temptations are not successfully avoided by our neighbors, it will furnish a proper subject for our consideration. If we have our own fanatics, let us try to understand them; as we wish that the men of other States understood their fanatics. Two hundred years agò the word fanatics was new; although fanatics had never failed since the 1 days of Shimei. The rude honesty and ruder ambition of Englishmen, with more choler than wisdom or virtue to bring to bear in great controversies, made frequent a troublesome character that has come down to us in a considerable force, which, happily for all, is weakened by its still greater variety. To describe the fanatics of our day and neighborhood would be to tell you of men and women whom you know too well; and perhaps my choice of instances, not suiting your humor, might divert our minds from the chief subject to which I ask your attention. I wish to remind you, not of what any of us think of special fanatics, but of what the truth is about the fanatical character. The fundamental trait of the fanatical character is irrational enthusiasm. Enthusiasm when controlled by reason is often of great service to mankind. Men who use their natural ardor of mind to add vigor to their search for knowledge, wisdom, and virtue, and to strengthen their efforts to benefit society, show that enthusiasm is a gift of God, whose proper use makes it a blessing. But when an enthusiastic disposition is permitted to curb the reason, and its possessors follow their passionate impulses as the true guides, enthusiasm degenerates into fanaticism. A man of a sound enthu He siasm, uses his feelings as the ministers of his reason. A fanatic dwarfs his reason into a servant of his feelings. An enthusiastic man may be a sober thinker, a thorough, scientific student, an impartial teacher, a just exemplar of true living, bound by no partisan rules, and as ardent to correct as to declare his creed. A fanatic studies as an advocate of a cause which he takes up, sometimes from rational conviction, sometimes from inheritance, sometimes from a social exigency, sometimes from momentary passion, and which he is determined, whatever his reasons may be, and whether he has any reasons or no, to maintain at all hazards. teaches but one side of a question, and lives not for all the truth he knows, but for the particular part of it about which his feelings have been excited. Compare the methods of the fanatic and the wise man. The fanatic sees, as it were through a microscope, the few objects of his enthusiasm. All other things are shut out of his field of vision, and within that field every object appears in magnified proportions, the degree of magnitude being in the ratio of the excitement of the observer. Hence the importance of the objects of his study is exaggerated when he compares them with other things which he has not examined in the same way, or which he has not seen at all. The wise man, on the contrary, looks at everything possible to his sight, and seeks a knowledge of the true proportions of the different parts of the truth. He may learn much from the fanatical observer about the special objects of his passionate study; but he seeks to understand, and to use the facts, thus learned, by comparison with and regard for other facts, learned perhaps from other fanatics devoted to different specialties, as well as from his own studies, and the observation of other wise men. The fanatic with his exaggerated notions of the importance of his own projects is ready, and even eager to do all the harm which may be involved in an immediate attempt at perfect success. He attacks institutions which have done and which continue to do good, not only because they ought to do more good, not only because they do a certain amount of evil, but also, and especially because he thinks that institutions which he wishes immediately to establish will do more good, and no harm. The wise man on the contrary, while he may be dissatisfied with existing institutions and desirous for reform, while he may be willing to inflict upon society, or to endure himself whatever suffering may be necessarily incident to a sound reform, remem |