hen bad men
combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, an
unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.

It is not enough in a situation of trust in the commonwealth, that a man
means well to his country; it is not enough that in his single person he
never did an evil act, but always voted according to his conscience, and
even harangued against every design which he apprehended to be
prejudicial to the interests of his country. This innoxious and
ineffectual character, that seems formed upon a plan of apology and
disculpation, falls miserably short of the mark of public duty. That
duty demands and requires, that what is right should not only be made
known, but made prevalent; that what is evil should not only be detected,
but defeated. When the public man omits to put himself in a situation of
doing his duty with effect, it is an omission that frustrates the
purposes of his trust almost as much as if he had formally betrayed it.
It is surely no very rational account of a man's life that he has always
acted right; but has taken special care to act in such a manner that his
endeavours could not possibly be productive of any consequence.

I do not wonder that the behaviour of many parties should have made
persons of tender and scrupulous virtue somewhat out of humour with all
sorts of connection in politics. I admit that people frequently acquire
in such confederacies a narrow, bigoted, and proscriptive spirit; that
they are apt to sink the idea of the general good in this circumscribed
and partial interest. But, where duty renders a critical situation a
necessary one, it is our business to keep free from the evils attendant
upon it, and not to fly from the situation itself. If a fortress is
seated in an unwholesome air, an officer of the garrison is obliged to be
attentive to his health, but he must not desert his station. Every
profession, not excepting the glorious one of a soldier, or the sacred
one of a priest, is liable to its own particular vices; which, however,
form no argument against those ways of life; nor are the vices themselves
inevitable to every individual in those professions. Of such a nature
are connections in politics; essentially necessary for the full
performance of our public duty, accidentally liable to degenerate into
faction. Commonwealths are made of families, free Commonwealths of
parties also; and we may as well affirm, that our natural regards and
ties of bl