94 STUDIES OF NATURE. 



" Extenfive parks," fays 'Pliny *, *' and un- 

 *' unbounded domains, have ruined our own Italy, 

 *' and the Provinces which the Romans have con- 

 *' quered : for that which occafioned the viélories, 

 *' obtained by Nero (the Confulj in Africa, was 

 *' fimply this, fix men were in poffeffion of al- 

 *' moft one half of Numidia, when Nero defeated 

 *' them." Plutarch informs us, that in his time, 

 under Trajan^ you could not have raifed three 

 thoufand men in all Greece, which had formerly 

 furnifhed armies fo numerous; and that you might 

 have fometimes travelled a whole day, on the high 

 roads, without meeting a human being, except 

 now and then a draggling folitary fiiepherd. The 

 reafon was, Greece had by this time been parcelled 

 out among a few great proprietors. 



Conquerors have always met with a very feeble 

 refiftance in countries where property is very un- 

 equally divided. We have examples of this in all 

 ages, from the invafion of the Lower-Empire by 

 the Turks, down to that of Poland in our own 

 days. Overgrown eilates deftroy the fpirit of pa- 

 triotifm, at once, in thofe who have every thing, 

 and in thofe who have nothing. *' The Ihocks of 

 ** corn," faid Xenophon^ " inlpire thofe who raife 

 *' them with courage to defend them. The fight 



* Natural Hiltory, Book xviii. chap. iii. and vi. 



" of 



