24 



its ignorance and crime, possessed an equality of voices 

 in the legislative assemblies. Thus, folly and vice 

 neutralized probity and wisdom. Boeotian dullness 

 and Cretan falsehood, stood by the side of a Socrates, 

 and destroj-ed the influence of his justice and intelli- 

 gence. These and other defects, all exhibit alike, the 

 inertness of rules, upon a mass, incapable of moral 

 sentiment. The populace governed through fear, are 

 dangerous subjects. Tt is the free, and virtuous, who 

 can be trusted with power. 



Rome, during the periods of her kingdom, her re- 

 public, and her empire, was constantly trembling with 

 convulsions and deluged with blood. Still she ad- 

 vanced in the knowledge of government and laws. 

 The times were, however, not yet ripe for that moral 

 developement in the minds of her people, necessary to 

 insure a permanent and happy constitution. The most 

 dreadful, but fruitless revolutions, therefore, soon 

 sprang up in her bosom. If the violation of the chaste 

 Lucretia induced the expulsion of a Tarquin, it was 

 follo^ved by submission to an intollerani democracy: 

 if the w^ronos done a beautiful and artless Viroinia 

 roused the vigilance of sleeping liberty, it was only 

 that it might- slumber, again, on the bosom of luxury 

 and pleasure : if the pride of a plebian's wife induced 

 the elevation of that class to public honors, it was only 

 to exalt ignorance, and corrupt what remained of the 

 innocence of humble life. 



The state of the laws of ancient times, also forcibly 

 illustrates our position. These, like all human insti- 

 tutions, have varied ; at one time challenging the ad- 

 miration, at an another, the abhorrence of men, fre- 

 quently surrounded with a venerable mystery, into 



