These,
and these alone, remain: and they remain heightened in their principle
and augmented in their means. All the former correctives, whether of
virtue or of weakness, which existed in the old monarchy, are gone. No
single new corrective is to be found in the whole body of the new
institutions. How should such a thing be found there, when everything
has been chosen with care and selection to forward all those ambitious
designs and dispositions, not to control them? The whole is a body of
ways and means for the supply of dominion, without one heterogeneous
particle in it.
Here I suffer you to breathe, and leave to your meditation what has
occurred to me on the _genius and character_ of the French Revolution.
From having this before us, we may be better able to determine on the
first question I proposed,--that is, How far nations called foreign are
likely to be affected with the system established within that territory.
I intended to proceed next on the question of her facilities, _from the
internal state of other nations, and particularly of this_, for
obtaining her ends; but I ought to be aware that my notions are
controverted. I mean, therefore, in my next letter, to take notice of
what in that way has been recommended to me as the most deserving of
notice. In the examination of those pieces, I shall have occasion to
discuss some others of the topics to which I have called your attention.
You know that the letters which I now send to the press, as well as a
part of what is to follow, have been in their substance long since
written.
Pages:
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401
402
403
404
405
406