Wild digital books

Men are qualified for
civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral
chains upon their own appetites,--in proportion as their love to justice
is above their rapacity,--in proportion as their soundness and sobriety
of understanding is above their vanity and presumption,--in proportion
as they are more disposed to listen to the counsels of the wise and
good, in preference to the flattery of knaves. Society cannot exist,
unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere;
and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It
is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of
intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.
This sentence the prevalent part of your countrymen execute on
themselves. They possessed not long since what was next to freedom, a
mild, paternal monarchy. They despised it for its weakness. They were
offered a well-poised, free Constitution. It did not suit their taste or
their temper. They carved for themselves: they flew out, murdered,
robbed, and rebelled.


Pages:
60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84