ument that
all created Beings, all sublunary Institutions, however wisely composed,
in the very Essence of their Creation, and in the very Rudiments of their
Formation, comprehend, at the same Time, the Seeds of Dissolution: Yet it
is not more remarkable than true, that in the most boisterous Periods of
this Kingdom's antient Establishment, the Arts and Sciences, with the
fundamental Principles of Constitution, were preserved and cherished with
inviolable Assiduity. The Priests, Philosophers, Advocates, Annalists,
Poets and Musicians, were obliged to preserve Religion, political Wisdom,
Law, History, _&c._ hereditarily in their respective Tribes, and to
educate in these different Branches the Chiefs and Nobles of the Land, for
which they were graciously maintained in secure and splendid Tranquillity:
Those Sages attended the National Conventions, where all publick Acts were
religiously recorded, and all Abuses of Power and Government retrenched or
reformed; nor were they permitted, except in Case of extraordinary
Necessity, or uncommon Merit, to deviate from their proper and primitive
Spheres of Action: Since, where an harmonious Subordination of Rank and
Order hath not been duly preserved, even in free Estates, Liberty itself
(wisely attempered, the greatest of all social Blessings) hath often, from
Abuse and Neglect, sickened into Licentiousness, the immediate lewd Mother
of Anarchy! In the visible Creation, the direct Result of infinite Wisdom,
the lesser Planets do not interfere with, much less shock or oppose the
Motions and Revolutions of the greater; they constantly keep the Distances
first prescribed them, and all move regularly to their respective Ends.
The most verdant and fragrant Meadows may, from the too frequent Irruption
of muddy Waters, degenerate into noxious Marshes, if some Care was not
taken to divert those impure Gushings into their proper Channels. Hence it
may be inferred, that laying open the most honorary, as well as important
and useful Professions of Society, to the Intrusion, or rather pyratical
Invasions, of the Scum and Dregs of the People, cannot, however varnished
over with the fictitious Colourings of pretended Liberty, consist with
true Political Wisdom.

Those ancient _Sophi_ and _Literati_ enjoyed their Places with the greater
Security, that they were uninvadable by the inferior Classes of Mankind;
with the greater Content and Chearfulness, that much Esteem and Emolument
were connected