l66 EXCURSION" TO THE REALMS BELOW. 



forward towards the fouth and weft, and from time to 

 time overflowed the opulent fouthern provinces like a 

 defolating torrent. Thefe nations have for thoufands 

 of years known no other than free conftitutions : for the 

 domeftic or patriarchal government is the primitive 

 plan of all political inftitutions, the ariftocratical juft as 

 well as the monarchical. In like manner as a family 

 fpreads itfelf abroad in feveral branches, the fathers of 

 thefe branches are the natural councillors and coadju- 

 tors of the common lire of the whole ftock. Each 

 branch, in procefs of time, becoming again a particu- 

 lar ftock, the idea of one common fire, or chief, has 

 been frequently loft ; each ftock maintaining its natural 

 independency on the others, without however entirely 

 renouncing the family connection, which would be 

 kept up by fpeaking the fame language and obferving 

 the fame manners. On occaftons of common danger 

 or of general enterprife, the heads of thefe fmall herds 

 compofed the general council of the one main ftock ; 

 a kind of rude but natural ariftocracy, which loft no- 

 thing of its inherent refpectability, even whenever par- 

 ticular circumftances made it neceflary for them to ap- 

 point a common conductor, or king ; for this was in 

 reality ftill only the foremoft among his equals, the 

 primus inter pares, as the found human intellect of his 

 voluntary fubjects, in certain cafes, where it feemed 

 requisite to the general good, feldom refufed him even 

 the moft unconditional obedience. As I faid before, 

 this has been, for thoufands of years, the form of go- 

 vernment among all the perambulatory fcythian and 

 Celtic peoples and tribes of the northern and weftern 

 parts of our globe. It was the moft natural and adequate 

 a to 



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