In Search of Responsibility

Benjamin Martin: May I sit with you?
Charlotte Selton: It's a free country. Or at least it will be.
--The Patriot

Right on cue with the recent missive on the tradeoff between safety and freedom, I stumbled across this marvelous essay by William Faulkner.

Faulkner observes that we've been ceding freedom in favor of security (he emphasizes security of the economic nature) slowly since our founding. The primary mechanism, he posits, is abdication of our responsibility to live freely as our standard of living has increased over time.

Indeed.

Faulkner penned this piece in the early 1950s although, like many timeless works, could have been written yesterday.

He quotes Irish statesman John Curran, who noted in the mid 1700s, "God hath vouchsafed man liberty only on condition of eternal vigilance; which condition if he break it, servitude is the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt."

Faulkner hopes we can reverse the trend. Me too.