Page:Struggle for Law (1915).djvu/152

 thinks, feels, and acts as the individuals that make it up think, feel, and act. If the feeling of legal right of the individuals of the nation is blunted, cowardly, apathetic; if it finds no room for a free and vigorous development, because of the hindrances which unjust laws and bad institutions put in its way; if it meets with persecution where it should have met with support and encouragement; if, in consequence of this, it accustoms itself to endure injustice and to look upon it as something which cannot be helped, who will believe that such a slavish, apathetic and paralyzed feeling of legal right can be aroused all at once to life and to energetic reaction, when there is question of a violation of the rights, not of an individual, but of the whole people; an attempt on their political freedom, the breach or overthrow of their constitution, or an attack from a foreign enemy? How can the person who has not been used to defending even his own rights feel the impulse voluntarily to stake his life and property for the community? How can the man who thinks