119 _ on lotteries. Now. 27} 
precipitate to beggary, those whom they donot devote to 
_ erimes, and prepare an overcharge for the hospitals. 
Lotteries are, besides, a real tax. Whether it is com= 
manded by the sword, or by a foolifh hope, the’result is’ 
the same ; it isa tax, commanded and perceived, with 
this difference, that the consequences of this are incom- 
parably more fatal. We cannot too often repeat it,—lotte- 
ries are a wound in the body of the state, the depth of 
which has never been thoroughly examined. 
And, by some fatality, these lotteries, which deceive 
thus those who engage in them, present only an imagina- 
ry resource to the revenue! The advantagé which it is 
thought to derive from them, is entirely illusive and chi- 
merical. If so many millions which the unfortunate throw 
into it, by denying themselves the necefsaries. of life, in- 
creased the daily consumption,—if these millions whicle 
make so many’ families miserable, tended to promote acti- 
wity, and industry, and the national rights ; the public trea« 
sure would then be more considerable, and it would not 
be so often exhausted. 
But were the advantages derived from lotteries as real 
as they are indeed chimerical, a generous nation woul¢ 
scorn to make use of a branch of revenue of so destructive 
a tendency. 
These then are the detestable fruits of lotteries. May 
we see them ex.irpated among us, even to the memory of 
them! and in the interval which separates us from their 
proscription, it is the duty of every good man to haste: 
their fall ;—he would deserve a civic crown! . q 
(er A EAT AES ESTED SSE STS 
ON THE DISADVANTAGES ATTENDANT UPON GENIUS. — 
Tue disadvantages which a man of genius has to combat 
against are of so peculiar and malignant a nature, a& 
