Ch. vi. the principal Cause of Poverty, 8gc. 323 



falsity of these accusations, and the dreadful con- 

 sequences that would result from their being ge- 

 nerally admitted and acted upon, make it abso- 

 lutely necessary that they should at all events be 

 resisted ; not only on account of the immediate 

 revolutionary horrors to be expected from a move- 

 ment of the people acting under such impressions, 

 (a consideration v^hich must at all times have very 

 great weight) ; but also on account of the extreme 

 probability that such a revolution would terminate 

 in a much worse despotism than that which it had 

 destroyed. On these grounds a genuine friend of 

 freedom, a zealous advocate for the real rights of 

 man, might be found among the defenders of a 

 considerable degree of tyranny. A cause bad in 

 itself might be supported by the good and the 

 virtuous, merely because that which was opposed 

 to it was much worse ; and because it was abso- 

 lutely necessary at the moment to make a choice 

 between the two. Whatever therefore may be 

 the intention of those indiscriminate accusations 

 against governments, their real effect undoubtedly 

 is, to add a weight of talents and principles to the 

 prevailing power, which it never would have re- 

 ceived otherwise. 



It is a truth, which I trust has been sufficiently 

 proved in the course of this work, that under a 

 government constructed upon the best and purest 

 principles, and executed by men of the highest 

 talents and integrity, the most squalid poverty and 

 wretchedness might universally prevail from an 

 inattention to the prudential check to population. 



Y 2 



