ce and Spain,
though less excusable; and so it ever will be in the like cases. But to
come to the second occasion of scandal by them given, which was in the
way of their propagation, it is not excusable; for they brought their
confederates under bondage, by which means Athens gave occasion of
the Peloponnesian War, the wound of which she died stinking, when
Lacedaemon, taking the same infection from her carcass, soon followed.

"Wherefore, my lords, let these be warnings to you not to make that
liberty which God has given you a snare to others in practising this
kind of enlargement to yourselves.

"The second way of propagation or enlargement used by commonwealths is
that of Switzerland and Holland, equal leagues; this, though it be
not otherwise mischievous, is useless to the world, and dangerous to
themselves: useless to the world, for as the former governments were
storks, these are blocks, have no sense of honor, or concern in the
sufferings of others. But as the AEtolians, a state of the like fabric,
were reproached by Philip of Macedon to prostitute themselves; by
letting out their arms to the lusts of others, while they leave their
own liberty barren and without legitimate issue; so I do not defame
these people; the Switzer for valor has no superior, the Hollander for
industry no equal; but themselves in the meantime shall so much the less
excuse their governments, seeing that to the Switz it is well enough
known that the ensigns of his commonwealth have no other motto than in
te converte manus; and that of the Hollander, though he sweats more gold
than the Spaniard digs, lets him languish in debt; for she herself lives
upon charity. These are dangerous to themselves, precarious governments,
such as do not command, but beg their bread from province to province,
in coats that being patched up of all colors are in effect of none. That
their cantons and provinces are so many arrows, is good; but they are so
many bows too, which is naught.

"Like to these was the commonwealth of the ancient Tuscans, hung
together like bobbins, without a hand to weave with them; therefore
easily overcome by the Romans, though at that time, for number, a far
less considerable people. If your liberty be not a root that grows,
it will be a branch that withers, which consideration brings me to the
paragon, the Commonwealth of Rome.

"The ways and means whereby the Romans acquired the patronage, and in
that the empire, of the world wer