it is a practical matter; the want of it not only _is_,
but must of necessity be, felt by every man who lives under that want.
If it were proposed to the shopkeepers in a town, that a rich man or
two, living in the neighbourhood, should have power to send, _whenever
they pleased_, and take away as much as they pleased of the money of the
shopkeepers, and apply it to what uses they please; what an outcry the
shopkeepers would make! And yet, what would this be _more_ than taxes
imposed on those who have no voice in choosing the persons who impose
them? Who lets another man put his hand into his purse when he pleases?
Who, that has the power to help himself, surrenders his goods or his
money to the will of another? Has it not always been, and must it not
always be, true, that, if your property be at the absolute disposal of
others, your ruin is certain? And if this be, of necessity, the case
amongst individuals and parts of the community, it must be the case with
regard to the whole community.

348. Aye, and experience shows us that it always has been the case. The
natural and inevitable consequences of a want of this right in the
people have, in all countries, been _taxes_ pressing the industrious and
laborious to the earth; _severe laws_ and _standing armies_ to compel
the people to submit to those taxes; wealth, luxury, and splendour,
amongst those who make the laws and receive the taxes; poverty, misery,
immorality and crime, amongst those who bear the burdens; and at last
commotion, revolt, revenge, and rivers of blood. Such have always been,
and such must always be, the consequences of a want of this right of all
men to share in the making of the laws, a right, as I have before shown,
derived immediately from the law of Nature, springing up out of the same
source with civil society, and cherished in the heart of man by reason
and by experience.

349. Well, then, this right being that, without the enjoyment of which
there is, in reality, no right at all, how manifestly is it _the first
duty_ of every man to do all in his power to _maintain_ this right where
it exists, and to _restore_ it where it has been lost? For observe, it
must, at one time, have existed in every _civil_ community, it being
impossible that it could ever be excluded by any _social compact_;
absolutely impossible, because it is contrary to the law of
self-preservation to believe, that men would agree to give up the rights
of nature without stipula