14792. lucubrations of Timothy Hairbrain. 5x 
assuch? ‘ Some, (says Montesquieu,) have thought 
that liberty consisted in a facility of deposing a per- 
son on whom they had conferred a tyrannical autho- 
rity ; others in the power of choosing a person whom 
they are obliged to obey; others for the right of 
bearing arms, and of being thereby enabled to use 
violence ; cthers for the privilege of being gover- 
ned by a native of their own country, or by their own 
laws. A certain nation for a long time thought li- 
berty consisted in the privilege of wearing a long . 
beard.” And at present a certain nation believes, or 
at least withes others to believe, that liberty con- 
sists in allowing every man to do whatever he pleases, 
without the power of controul ; and this they dig- 
nify with the name of “‘ the rights of man.” Now 
_ though a sensible man who has got the talisman in 
his pocket, sees that all these privileges are mere 
bits of sticks, or straws, or uselefs baubles, yet were 
he to venture to say so in an afsembly of these in- 
fatuated idolaters, they would laugh him to scorn, if 
they were not very deeply tinctured with the rabies dic- 
tandi at the time ; but if they were in the height of their 
paroxysm, the unhappy philosopher without doubt 
would be torn in pieces. Were IJ, for example, at this 
moment in France, I fhould as soon eat a piece off my 
_ fingers, as utter a syllable against liberty, and equali- 
ty, and the rights of man. J fhould bawl out as loud - 
as the best of them, that this is the land of free- 
dom, and liberty ; though I knew wel] I neither durst 
say what I theught, go where I inclined, or have 
any afsurance that either my life or my property 
were secured to me for a single hour. Are not those 
