ope for, but by
perpetuating of the same in themselves; which came to blood and ended in
tyranny. The opinion of Verulamius is safe: 'The errors,' says he, 'of
young men are the ruin of business; whereas the errors of old men amount
but to this, that more might have been done, or sooner.' But though
their wisdom be little, their courage is great; wherefore (to come to
the main education of this commonwealth) the militia of Oceana is the
province of youth.

"The distribution of this province by the essays is so fully described
in the order, that I need repeat nothing; the order itself being but a
repetition or copy of that original, which in ancient prudence is of all
others the fairest, as that from whence the Commonwealth of Rome more
particularly derived the empire of the world. And there is much more
reason in this age, when governments are universally broken, or swerved
from their foundations, and the people groan under tyranny, that the
same causes (which could not be withstood when the world was full of
popular governments) should have the like effects.

"The causes in the Commonwealth of Rome, whereof the empire of the
world was not any miraculous, but a natural (nay, I may safely say a
necessary) consequence, are contained in that part of her discipline
which was domestic, and in that which she exercises in her provinces or
conquest. Of the latter I shall have better occasion to speak when we
come to our provincial orbs; the former divided the whole people by
tribes, amounting, as Livy and Cicero show, at their full growth to
thirty-five, and every tribe by the sense or valuation of estates into
five classes: for the sixth being proletary, that is the nursery, or
such as through their poverty contributed nothing to the commonwealth
but children, was not reckoned nor used in arms. And this is the first
point of the militia, in which modern prudence is quite contrary to the
ancient; for whereas we, excusing the rich and arming the poor, become
the vassals of our servants, they, by excusing the poor and arming
such as were rich enough to be freemen, became lords of the earth. The
nobility and gentry of this nation, who understand so little what it is
to be the lords of the earth that they have not been able to keep their
own lands, will think it a strange education for their children to be
common soldiers, and obliged to all the duties of arms; nevertheless it
is not for four shillings a week, but to be capable of