Similar results he saw from similar causes, in
the operations of inanimate life. The design of the tree was to grow
upward, but an unnatural obstacle, in the falling of another, bends it
away, and its growth is perverted from the original design, yet it
grows on and completes the cycle of its destiny.
The stream flows onward, naturally obeying a natural law; but an
obstacle interposes and interrupts the design; still it will go on to
complete its cycle, obedient to its destiny, though turned from its
natural channel: and these are the same in the end with those
undisturbed in the fulfilment of their designs. All crime or vice is
of time, and made such by the laws of man. The aggregation of men into
societies or communities necessitate laws to establish moral, legal,
and political duties, and to provide punishments for the infraction of
these. The right to acquire and possess the fruits of labor--the right
of free thought--the right to enjoy the natural relations of life, and
the privileges conferred by society--the right to live undisturbed,
all are the objects of legal protection; because the attributes of
man's nature, unrestrained in the discharge of his duties to his
fellow-man, will invade these rights, and hence the necessity of a
universal rule of action.
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