I distinguish between the natural and accidental duty due to
parents.
The parent who sedulously endeavours to form the heart and enlarge
the understanding of his child, has given that dignity to the
discharge of a duty, common to the whole animal world, that only
reason can give. This is the parental affection of humanity, and
leaves instinctive natural affection far behind. Such a parent
acquires all the rights of the most sacred friendship, and his
advice, even when his child is advanced in life, demands serious
consideration.
With respect to marriage, though after one and twenty a parent
seems to have no right to withhold his consent on any account; yet
twenty years of solicitude call for a return, and the son ought, at
least, to promise not to marry for two or three years, should the
object of his choice not entirely meet with the approbation of his
first friend.
But, respect for parents is, generally speaking, a much more
debasing principle; it is only a selfish respect for property. The
father who is blindly obeyed, is obeyed from sheer weakness, or
from motives that degrade the human character.
A great proportion of the misery that wanders, in hideous forms
around the world, is allowed to rise from the negligence of
parents; and still these are the people who are most tenacious of
what they term a natural right, though it be subversive of the
birth right of man, the right of acting according to the direction
of his own reason.
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