its government. The
same character of despotism insinuated itself into every court of
Europe,--the same spirit of disproportioned magnificence,--the same love
of standing armies, above the ability of the people. In particular, our
then sovereigns, King Charles and King James, fell in love with the
government of their neighbor, so flattering to the pride of kings. A
similarity of sentiments brought on connections equally dangerous to the
interests and liberties of their country. It were well that the
infection had gone no farther than the throne. The admiration of a
government flourishing and successful, unchecked in its operations, and
seeming, therefore, to compass its objects more speedily and
effectually, gained something upon all ranks of people. The good
patriots of that day, however, struggled against it. They sought nothing
more anxiously than to break off all communication with France, and to
beget a total alienation from its councils and its example,--which, by
the animosity prevalent between the abettors of their religious system
and the assertors of ours, was in some degree effected.

This day the evil is totally changed in France: but there is an evil
there. The disease is altered; but the vicinity of the two countries
remains, and must remain; and the natural mental habits of mankind are
such, that the present distemper of France is far more likely to be
contagious than the old one: for it is not quite easy to spread a
passion for servitude among the people; but in all evils of the opposite
kind our natural inclinations are flattered. In the case of despotism,
there is the _foedum crimen servitutis_: in the last, the _falsa SPECIES
libertatis_; and accordingly, as the historian says, _pronis auribus
accipitur_.

In the last age we were in danger of being entangled by the example of
France in the net of a relentless despotism. It is not necessary to say
anything upon that example. It exists no longer. Our present danger from
the example of a people whose character knows no medium is, with regard
to government, a danger from anarchy: a danger of being led, through an
admiration of successful fraud and violence, to an imitation of the
excesses of an irrational, unprincipled, proscribing, confiscating,
plundering, ferocious, bloody, and tyrannical democracy. On the side of
religion, the danger of their example is no longer from intolerance, but
from atheism: a foul, unnatural vice, foe to all the dignity and