when man regains his rights! But lately I held my life in jeopardy, because one man was unprincipled enough to assert what he knew to be false; I was destined to suffer an early and inexorable death from the hands of others, because none of them had penetration enough to distinguish from falsehood what I uttered with the entire conviction of a full fraught heart! Strange, that men from age to age should consent to hold their lives at the breath of another, merely that each in his turn may have a power of acting the tyrant according to law! Oh, God! give me poverty! shower upon me all the imaginary hardships of human life! I will receive them all with thankfulness.. Turn me a prey to the wild beasts of the desart, so I be never again the victim of man dressed in the gore dripping robes of authority! Suffer me at least to call life and the pursuits of life my own! Let me hold it at the mercy of elements, of the hunger of beasts, or the revenge of barbarians, but not of the cold-blooded prudence of monopolists and kings! T GODWIN. Caleb Williams, vol. ii. p. 9. [COULD men] but know The blessing which from INDEPENDENCE flow, But, if some playful child sets wide the door, Hail INDEPENDENCE!-tho' thy name's scarce 1 Thơ' thou, alas! art out of fashion grown, Tho' all despise thee, I will not despise, Nor live one moment longer than I prize Thy presence, and enjoy; by angry Fate Bow'd down, and almost crush'd, thou cam'st, tho" late, Thou cam'st upon me, like a second birth, And made me know what life was truly worth. Hail INDEPENDENCE!-never may my cot, Till I forget thee, be by thee forgot. CHURCHIL. Independence. vol. ii. p. 315-6. WHAT is life? "Tis not to stalk about, and draw fresh air, From time to time, or gaze upon the sun; 'Tis to be free. When liberty is gone, Life grows insipid, and has lost its relish. A day, an hour of virtuous liberty, Is worth a whole eternity of bondage. ADDISON. Cato, Act 2. 'Tis [i. e. liberty is] a substantial thing, and not a word, which, if once taken from us, Worth All other blessings leave us; 'tis a jewel Worth purchasing at the dear rate of life; BRAUMONT AND FLETCHER. Double Marriage, Act. v. SOME have said it is not the business of privat men to meddle with government :-a bold, false, and dishonest saying, which is fit to come from no mouth but that of a tyrant or a slave. To say that private men have nothing to do with government, is to say that private men have nothing to do with their own happiness or misery : -that people ought not to concern themselves whether they be naked or clothed, fed or starved, deceived or instructed, protected or destroyed. GORDON. Cato's Letters, vol. ii. No 38. WHEN the affairs of a nation are distracted, private people are justified in stepping a little out of their ordinary sphere. They enjoy a privilege of somewhat more dignity than that of idle lamentation over the calamities of their country. They may look into them narrowly, they may reason upon them liberally. BURKE. Thoughts on the Discontents, p. 2. THE poorest being that crawls on earth, contending to save itself from injustice and oppression, is an object respectable in the eyes of God and man. If any ask me what a free government is, I, answer, that, for any practical purpose, it is what the D the people think so; and that they, and not I, are the natural, lawful, and competent judges of this matter. I never knew a writer on the theory of government so partial to authority, as not to allow, that the hostile mind of the rulers to their people, did fully justify a change of government. IDEM. Letter to Sheriffs of Bristol, p. 26.55.34. In the situation in which we stand, I see no other way for the preservation of a decent attention to public interest in the representatives, but the interposition of the body of the people itself, whenever it shall appear by some flagrant and notorious act, by some capital innovation, that the representatives are going to overleap the fences of the law, and to introduce an arbitrary power. This interposition is a most unpleasant remedy. But if it be a legal remedy, it is is intended on some occasion to be used. IDEM. Thoughts on the Discontents, p. 100. WHENEVER the legislators endeavour to reduce [the people] to slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the people, who are thereupon absolved from any farther obedience, and are left to the common refuge, which God hath provided for all men against force or violence. Whenever therefore the legislative shall-either by ambition, fear, folly, or corruption, endeavour to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other, an absolute power over the lives, liberties, and estates of the people; by this breach of trust they forfeit the power the people had put into their hands for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the people, who have a right to resume their original liberty, and by the establishment of a new legislative, (such as they shall think fit) provide for their own safety and security, which is the end for which they are in society. What I have said here concerning the legislative in general, holds true also, concerning the supreme executor, who acts contrary to his trust, WHEN HE EITHER EMPLOYS THE FORCE, TREASURE, AND OFFICES OF THE SOCIETY, TO CORRUPT THE REPRESENTATIVES, AND GAIN THEM TO HIS PURPOSES; OR OPENLY PREENGAGES THE ELECTORS, AND PRESCRIBES TO THEIR CHOICE SUCH WHOM HE HAS BY SOLICITATIONS, THREATS, PROMISES, OR OTHERWISE, WON TO HIS DESIGNS; AND EMPLOYS THEM TO BRING IN SUCH WHO HAVE PROMISED BEFORE HAND WHAT TO VOTE, AND WHAT TO ENACT. cor LOCKE: Civil Government, b. ii. ch. 19. No society can at the time of its establishment put into the hands of a man the power of disposing of the property, the lives, and the liberty of the citizens at his pleasure. All arbitrary power is an usurpation against which a people may at all times revolt. -The laws that are sacred, are such as are conformable to the public in |