When a
government subsists (as governments formerly did) on an estate of its
own, with but few and inconsiderable revenues drawn from the subject,
then the few officers which existed in such establishments were
naturally at the disposal of that government, which paid the salaries
out of its own coffers: there an exclusive preference could hardly merit
the name of proscription. Almost the whole produce of a man's industry
at that time remained in his own purse to maintain his family. But times
alter, and the _whole_ estate of government is from private
contribution. When a very great portion of the labor of individuals
goes to the state, and is by the state again refunded to individuals,
through the medium of offices, and in this circuitous progress from the
private to the public, and from the public again to the private fund,
the families from whom the revenue is taken are indemnified, and an
equitable balance between the government and the subject is established.
But if a great body of the people who contribute to this state lottery
are excluded from all the prizes, the stopping the circulation with
regard to them may be a most cruel hardship, amounting in effect to
being double and treble taxed; and it will be felt as such to the very
quick, by all the families, high and low, of those hundreds of thousands
who are denied their chance in the returned fruits of their own
industry.
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