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are the faithful guardians, the active monitors of our duty, the true supporters of all liberal and manly morals[1].'—What do you mean by inbred sentiments? From whence do they come? How were they bred? Are they the brood of folly, which swarm like the insects on the banks of the Nile, when mud and putrefaction have enriched the languid soil? Were these inbred sentiments faithful guardians of our duty when the church was an asylum for murderers, and men worshipped bread as a God? when slavery was authorized by law to fasten her fangs on human flesh, and the iron eat into the very soul? If these sentiments are not acquired, if our passive dispositions do no expand into virtuous affections and passions, why are not the Tartars in the first rude horde endued with sentiments white and elegant as the driven snow? Why is passion or heroism the child of reflection, the
- ↑ Page 128.
consequence
