much of our time, we have frequent quarrels in entering upon that subject, while each says all he can to defend his choice. For my own part, I have racked my fancy to the utmost; and sometimes with the greatest warmth of imagination have told him, that night was made before day, and many more fine things, though without any effect; nay, last night, I could not forbear saying with more heat than judgment, that the devil ought to be painted white. Now my desire is, sir, that you would be pleased to give us in black and white your opinion in the matter of dispute between us: which will either furnish me with fresh and prevailing arguments to maintain my own taste, or make me with less repining allow that of my chamber-fellow. I know very well that I have Jack Cleveland* and Bond's Horace on my side; but then he has such a band of rhymers and romancewriters, with which he opposes me, and is so continually chiming to the tune of golden tresses, yellow locks, milk, marble, ivory, silver, swans, snow, daisies, doves, and the lord knows what; which he is always sounding with so much vehemence in my ears, that he often puts me into a brown study how to answer him; and I find that I am in a fair to be quite confounded, without your timely assistance afforded to, Z. Sir, Your humble servant, way PHILOBRUNE.' * See Poems by J. Cleveland, 1653, 24mo. The Senses' Festival, p. 1. No. 287. TUESDAY, JANUARY 29, 1711-12. Ω φιλτάτη γῆ μῆτερ, ως σεμνὸν σφόδρ' εἰ Τοῖς νῦν ἐχεσι κλῆμα; MENAND. Dear native land, how do the good and wise I LOOK upon it as a peculiar happiness, that were I to choose of what religion I would be, and under what government I would live, I should most certainly give the preference to that form of religion and government which is established in my own country. In this point I think I am determined by reason and conviction; but if I shall be told that I am actuated by prejudice, I am sure it is an honest prejudice; it is a prejudice that arises from the love of my country, and therefore such a one as I will always indulge. I have in several papers endeavoured to express my duty and esteem for the church of England, and design this as an essay upon the civil part of our constitution, having often entertained myself with reflections on this subject, which I have not met with in other writers. That form of government appears to me the most reasonable, which is most conformable to the equality that we find in human nature, provided it be consistent with public peace and tranquillity. This is what may properly be called liberty, which exempts one man from subjection to another, so far as the order and economy of government will permit. Liberty should reach every individual of a people, as they all share one common nature; if it only spreads among particular branches, there had better be none at all, since such a liberty only aggravates the misfortune of those who are deprived of it, by setting before them a disagreeable subject of comparison. This liberty is best preserved, where the legislative power is lodged in several persons, especially if those persons are of different ranks and interests; for where they are of the same rank, and consequently have an interest to manage peculiar to that rank, it differs but little from a despotical government in a single person. But the greatest security a people can have for their liberty, is when the legislative power is in the hands of persons so happily distinguished, that by providing for the particular interests of their several ranks, they are providing for the whole body of the people; or in other words, when there is no part of the people that has not a common interest with at least one part of the legislators. Four If there be but one body of legislators, it is no better than a tyranny; if there are only two, there will want a casting voice, and one of them must at length be swallowed up by disputes and contentions that will necessarily arise between them. would have the same inconvenience as two, and a greater number would cause too much confusion. I could never read a passage in Polybius and another in Cicero to this purpose without a secret pleasure in applying it to the English constitution, which it suits much better than the Roman. Both these great authors give the pre-eminence to a mixt government, consisting of three branches, the regal, the noble, and the popular. They had doubtless in their thoughts the constitution of the Roman commonwealth, in which the consul represented the king, the senate the nobles, and the tribunes the people. This divi sion of the three powers in the Roman constitution was by no means so distinct and natural, as it is in the English form of government. Among several objections that might be made to it, I think the chief are those that affect the consular power, which had only the ornaments without the force of the regal authority. Their number had not a casting voice in it; for which reason, if one did not chance to be employed abroad, while the other sat at home, the public business was sometimes at a stand, while the consuls pulled two different ways in it. Besides, I do not find that the consuls had ever a negative voice in the passing of a law, or decree of the senate; so that indeed they were rather the chief body of the nobility, or the first ministers of state, than a distinct branch of the sovereignty, in which none can be looked upon as a part, who are not a part of the legislature. Had the consuls been invested with the regal authority to as great a degree as our monarchs, there would never have been any occasions for a dictatorship, which had in it the power of all the three orders, and ended in the subversion of the whole constitution. Such a history as that of Suetonius, which gives us a succession of absolute princes, is to me an unanswerable argument against despotic power. Where the prince is a man of wisdom and virtue, it is indeed happy for his people that he is absolute; but since in the common run of mankind, for one that is wise and good you find ten of a contrary character, it is very dangerous for a nation to stand to its chance, or to have its public happiness or misery depend on the virtue or vices of a single person. Look into the history I have mentioned, or into any series of absolute princes, how many tyrants must you read through, before you come to an emperor that is sup portable! But this is not all; an honest private man often grows cruel and abandoned, when converted into an absolute prince. Give a man power of doing what he pleases with impunity, you extinguish his fear, and consequently overturn in him one of the great pillars of morality. This too we find confirmed by matter of fact. How many hopeful heirs-apparent to grand empires, when in the possession of them have become such monsters of lust and cruelty as are a reproach to human nature! Some tell us we ought to make our governments on earth like that in heaven, which, say they, is altogether monarchical and unlimited. Was man like his Creator in goodness and justice, I should be for allowing this great model; but where goodness and justice are not essential to the ruler, I would by no means put myself into his hands to be disposed of according to his particular will and pleasure. It is odd to consider the connexion between despotic government and barbarity, and how the making of one person more than man, makes the rest less. Above nine parts of the world in ten are in the lowest state of slavery, and consequently sunk in the most gross and brutal ignorance. European slavery is indeed a state of liberty, if compared with that which prevails in the other three divisions of the world; and therefore it is no wonder that those who grovel under it, have many tracks of light among them, of which the others are wholly destitute. Riches and plenty are the natural fruits of liberty, and where these abound, learning and all the liberal arts will immediately lift up their heads and flourish. As a man must have no slavish fears and apprehensions hanging upon his mind who will indulge the flights of fancy or speculation, and push his researches into all the abstruse corners of truth, so it is necessary |