Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 9.djvu/346

 318 T. W. Davenport. concerning miscegenation in the South where he had lived. Mr. Wait took his turn, and Mr. Jacobs closed the debate for that evening. Mr. Jacobs was willing to accept the restrictions placed upon the question by Mr. Foudray and say that it was not as to whether there should be more or less slaves in the United States, but as to whether the Oregonians should introduce slavery as a feature or ingredient of their political and social institutions. He had no doubt that the Oregon people were pretty well informed by printed publications that had been circulated, as to the expediency of adopting slavery here, but he was willing to look at it from a moral point of view, which so far had not been attempted, and he expected to show that what is moral is expedient and that what is immoral is inex- pedient; in fact, to make it appear to rational men that if morality and expediency are not synonymous terms, they are as closely related as lightning and thunder. He remarked the fact that the audience was made up of believers and unbe- lievers, as respects religious matters, and therefore would not refer to scripture for authority as to what is moral or the reverse, but seek the definition in the nature of things. In- deed, there is no need of going to the Pentateuch to find out what is right and what is wrong, and there is no pertinence in telling you the distinction between the two kinds of actions, for you all know it, even though you may never have read a line in the Bible or never been drilled in such catechism. How old does a child have to be before he knows it is wrong to steal from his playmate, though he may never have been told so ? He knows that he will be liable to the same treatment and he feels that he will be separated from him socially. And this is the genesis of moral evolution. Morals grow unavoida- bly out of the social state, and without such a state morals are the merest fancy. Robinson Crusoe alone on his island could commit no immorality. Think of it! In his isolation he could do nothing wrong, as respects morals. But when he had secured the release of his man Friday, then he was under some moral obligations, and when he returned to England, his