fspring of antiquated prejudices,
had moulded in its original stamina irresistible principles of decay and
dissolution. The ignorance of the people is a bottom but for a temporary
system; the interest of active men in the state is a foundation
perpetual and infallible. However, some circumstances, arising, it must
be confessed, in a great degree from accident, prevented the effects of
this influence for a long time from breaking out in a manner capable of
exciting any serious apprehensions. Although government was strong and
flourished exceedingly, the _court_ had drawn far less advantage than
one would imagine from this great source of power.

At the revolution, the crown, deprived, for the ends of the revolution
itself, of many prerogatives, was found too weak to struggle against all
the difficulties which pressed so new and unsettled a government. The
court was obliged therefore to delegate a part of its powers to men of
such interest as could support, and of such fidelity as would adhere to,
its establishment. Such men were able to draw in a greater number to a
concurrence in the common defence. This connection, necessary at first,
continued long after convenient; and properly conducted might indeed, in
all situations, be an useful instrument of government. At the same time,
through the intervention of men of popular weight and character, the
people possessed a security for their just proportion of importance in
the state. But as the title to the crown grew stronger by long
possession, and by the constant increase of its influence, these helps
have of late seemed to certain persons no better than incumbrances. The
powerful managers for government were not sufficiently submissive to the
pleasure of the possessors of immediate and personal favor, sometimes
from a confidence in their own strength, natural and acquired; sometimes
from a fear of offending their friends, and weakening that lead in the
country which gave them a consideration independent of the court. Men
acted as if the court could receive, as well as confer, an obligation.
The influence of government, thus divided in appearance between the
court and the leaders of parties, became in many cases an accession
rather to the popular than to the royal scale; and some part of that
influence, which would otherwise have been possessed as in a sort of
mortmain and unalienable domain, returned again to the great ocean from
whence it arose, and circulated among the pe