Newton’s First Law of motion—inertia, states that a body at rest will remain at rest unless an outside force acts on it, and a body in motion at a constant velocity will remain in motion in a straight line unless acted upon by an outside force.
Virtuous Liberty isn’t self-perpetuating. It’s evident Virtuous Liberty has no inherent inertia. That’s our role.
If one spends significant time in the trenches pursuing virtuous liberty, one is forced to grapple with these penetrating questions: “Is virtuous liberty self-perpetuating?” Does individual virtuous liberty continue without an external force? What if one or two generations ignore the principles of liberty? What happens? How long would it take for Virtuous Liberty to evanesce in America? Who or what is this force?
Thomas Paine provided a hint of what the founding generation believed, “Whenever we are planning for posterity, we ought to remember virtue is not hereditary.” It’s not in one’s DNA. English statesman, moralist, and playwright, Samuel Johnson agreed with our Founders, “No people can be great who have ceased to be virtuous.” Revolutionary War Princeton President John Witherspoon observed, “So true is this, that civil liberty cannot be long preserved without virtue.” Irish statesman Sir Edmund Burke concurred, “Among a people generally corrupt liberty cannot exist.” Frederick Douglass, understood the inextricable link between virtue and longevity, “The life of a nation is secure only while the nation is honest, truthful and virtuous.” Though millions believe otherwise, God doesn’t grade on a curve.
“Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace [to] any people.” God has ordained that certain principles of conduct and behavior are immutable-as are the subsequent consequences. This Ole Republic is a bit wobbly on virtue. Some warn we’re closer to paganism with rare pockets of exceptions. That should vex every Patriot’s soul.
“Liberty can no more exist without virtue and independence, than a body can live without a soul,” said John Adams in a paper to the inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts, on February 6, 1775. Among his many warnings was that the “License of the press may be an engine to complete their ruin.” Adam’s further condemnation of the press in his day was but a foreshadowing of today. “But if you look for liberty, you will grope in vain, and the freedom of the press, instead of promoting the cause of liberty, will hasten its destruction, as the best cordials, taken by patients, in some distempers, become the most rancid and corrosive poisons.” What was reportedly given for good, like a medical elixir, may in the end be deadly to the patient—as with a nation. This was a time when many colonies were preparing for armed military defense. Adams further observed, “That nothing, by the law of God, in the Old and New Testament, gave parliament authority over America, or the law of nature, or common law.”
Nearly forty-five years later in correspondence from Adams to Thomas Jefferson, Adams asked, referencing Rome of yesteryear, “Would the outcome have been different had Brutus and Cassius been conquers? Would they have restored virtue and liberty to Rome?” Once again, challenging his old adversary to remember a time in history of an example of a Nation once thoroughly corrupted, that was afterwards restored to Virtue. Adams answered his own rhetorical question, “And without Virtue, there can be no political Liberty.” Adams concluded, “That absent a Miracle of Divine Grace, that would instantaneously convert a whole Contaminated Nation from turpitude to purity.” Adams continued his use of rhetorical questions of how to prevent the predictable lure of power, luxury, and “intoxication extravagance of Vice and Folly.” He pressed his old friend and adversary, “When will you answer me these questions?”
It’s apparent to any reader of this correspondence, that without Virtue composing a national character, with traits such as frugality and Piety, liberty is not self-perpetuating. Many agree It was Adams who held great sway in our nation’s early perpetuation of liberty. He understood liberty must be anchored in law and virtue, not in political elites. Interestingly he used the word “liberty” less than contemporaries of the day. He was concerned that human frailty would confound liberty as a license to plunder and purloin, rather than do good. He advocated the concept of virtue driving liberty.
For context on constitutional longevity, consider that the Dominican Republic has had 32 constitutions since 1844. Venezuela 26, Haiti 24, and Ecuador 20. Why has ours endured for nearly two-and-a half centuries? Fiat? Providential intervention? That hackneyed phrase,Talk is cheap, demands context. Even on virtuous liberty, a vigorous conversation had to occur. Initially a group of prescient seers advanced that conversation into action. There were fence-sitters back then too. Not everyone was up for a fight. It’s impossible to know the exact number of American colonists who favored or opposed independence or a revolution. From the personal writings of John Adams, in 1815, he estimated that not more than 20% of colonists were loyalist. Consider Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense” pamphlet, that fanned the flame of the Patriot’s cause. However, in the end, many loyalists simply left America, and settled in Canadian provinces.
Samuel Adams believed liberty was more than a proclamation. Rather heroic efforts by a few brave souls believed the love of liberty was interwoven with the soul. Sir Edmund Burke understood that genuine liberty is grasped only by a minority. Going as far as to proclaim that the masses were indifferent to its cause then-and now. Once again, the Founders insisted patriotic citizens must understand liberty is like a delicate plant. Even watering it with the blood of martyrs is a dubious nutriment. Benjamin Franklin’s son, William, a loyalist governor of New Jersey, opposed the Revolution.
Our Constitution has God’s fingerprints all over it in spite of the secularist’s denial.
Apathy is a major obstacle to the cause of perpetuating virtuous liberty as a common cause. It becomes increasingly clear, that the ruling impulse of tyranny won’t be thwarted by dormancy, denial or dereliction of duty. Few things are self-sustaining, Constitutional liberty requires a force behind it equal to, or greater than, the object itself. The physics of virtuous liberty requires participation.
On May 18, 1947, three-term Democrat Massachusetts Congressman, John F. Kennedy, at a “I Am an American Day” program remarked, “The fires of liberty were not self-starting, nor are they self-perpetuating.” Kennedy understood liberty must be fueled by mental ascent and willful action. We’ll need dogged insistence that Virtuous Liberty, under God, must not fade from this Republic.
What if that mantle rested solely on our shoulders? What would it look like? Whether you passed physics or not, join us if you’re up for a fight for this noble cause. What do you think Patriots?
Mike Pyatt is President/Co-Founder of libertysplaceforyouwy.com His email is: mikepyatt44@gmail.com
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