th itself
is preferable; and yet this species of government, so justly condemned,
and so generally detested, is what infinitely the greater part of
mankind groan under, and have groaned under from the beginning. So that,
by sure and uncontested principles, the greatest part of the governments
on earth must be concluded tyrannies, impostures, violations of the
natural rights of mankind, and worse than the most disorderly anarchies.
How much other forms exceed this we shall consider immediately.

In all parts of the world, mankind, however debased, retains still the
sense of _feeling_; the weight of tyranny at last becomes insupportable;
but the remedy is not so easy: in general, the only remedy by which they
attempt to cure the tyranny is to change the tyrant. This is, and always
was, the case for the greater part. In some countries, however, were
found men of more penetration, who discovered "_that to live by one
man's will was the cause of all men's misery_." They therefore changed
their former method, and assembling the men in their several societies
the most respectable for their understanding and fortunes, they confided
to them the charge of the public welfare. This originally formed what is
called an _aristocracy_. They hoped it would be impossible that such a
number could ever join in any design against the general good; and they
promised themselves a great deal of security and happiness from the
united counsels of so many able and experienced persons. But it is now
found by abundant experience, that an _aristocracy_, and a _despotism_,
differ but in name; and that a people who are in general excluded from
any share of the legislative, are, to all intents and purposes, as much
slaves, when twenty, independent of them, govern, as when but one
domineers. The tyranny is even more felt, as every individual of the
nobles has the haughtiness of a sultan; the people are more miserable,
as they seem on the verge of liberty, from which they are forever
debarred; this fallacious idea of liberty, whilst it presents a vain
shadow of happiness to the subject, binds faster the chains of his
subjection. What is left undone by the natural avarice and pride of
those who are raised above the others, is completed by their suspicions,
and their dread of losing an authority, which has no support in the
common utility of the nation. A Genoese or a Venetian republic is a
concealed _despotism_; where you find the same pride of the rulers,