Ij8 EXCURSION TO THE REALMS BELOW. 



cefTary for a nation to be governed, is merely in this 

 limilarity between great and little children. Both have 

 a natural difpofition to fociety, to common enterprifes 

 and fports : but the frequent clafhings of their claims 

 and pretentions, and the little command they have over 

 their ealily inflammable paffions, occaHon diffentions 

 and violences every inftant among them; fuch as with the 

 great children would defcroy all the bands of fociety. 

 For guarding againfl this calamity, there mull be a 

 preponderant power which holds thofe bands together. 

 But this power may never be arbitrary, any more than 

 the other powers of nature — but mould and mufl ope- 

 rate by laws which are necefTarily founded in the nature 

 of man and in the ultimate end of civil fociety. Whe- 

 ther thefe laws be written or unwritten, clearly under- 

 llood or only confufedly imagined, it is enough that 

 they are there; they lie in the nature of the cafe, they 

 are the decrees of univerfal reafon, and mini be obfer • 

 ved, or the ends of civil fociety are directly defeated. 

 A government running counter to thefe laws is abufe 

 of the fupreme authority, or tyranny ; and as the mi- 

 fery of the fubjects is the unavoidable confequence of 

 it, fo the latter have need of nothing but their own 

 feelings, for informing them whether they are well or 

 badly governed. Is the evil too great to be longer en- 

 dured ? then this fentiment will become general, and 

 will at length, if the abufes continue, kindle and rouze 

 another which has long lain dormant through fear, or 

 the habits of obedience, namely, the fentiment of their 

 ownphyhxal and moral flrength ; and this naturally breaks 

 forth in attempts to employ and exert it to their deliver- 

 ance., A people cannot govern itfclf ; but it can ufe its 



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