them full information of their affairs through the channel of the public papers, and to contrive that those papers should penetrate the whole mass of the people. The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man was to receive those papers, and be capable of reading them.

I am convinced that those societies (as the Indians) which live without government, enjoy in their general mass a greater degree of happiness than those who live under the European governments. Among the former, public opinion is in the place of the law, and restrains morals as powerfully as laws ever did anywhere. Among the latter, under pretence of governing, they have divided their nations into two classes, wolves and sheep. I do not exaggerate. This is a true picture of Europe. Cherish therefore the spirit of our people, and keep alive their attention. Do not be too severe upon their errors, but reclaim them by enlightening them. If once they become inattentive to the public affairs, you and I, and Congress and Assemblies, Judges and Governors, shall all become wolves. It seems to be the law of our general nature, in spite of individual exceptions; and experience declares that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the governments of EUROPE, and the general prey of the rich on the poor.

W

ERE armies to be raised whenever a speck of

war is visible in our horizon, we never should have been without them. Our resources would

have been exhausted on dangers which have never happened.

Instead of being reserved for what is really to take place. A steady, perhaps a quickened pace, in preparations

3. 425. for defence of our seaport towns and waters; an early settlement of the most exposed and vulnerable parts of our country; a militia so organized that its effective portions can be called to any portion of the Union, or volunteers instead of them to serve a sufficient time, are means which may always be ready, yet never preying upon our resources until actually called into use. They will maintain the public interests while a more permanent force is in course of preparation. But much will depend upon the promptitude with which these means can be brought into activity. If war be forced upon us in spite of our long and vain appeals to the justice of nations, rapid and vigorous movements in its outset will go far toward securing us in its course and issue, and toward throwing its burdens upon those who render necessary the resort from reason to force.

I

CONSIDER the people who constitute a society or na

tion as the source of all authority in that nation; as free to transact their common concerns by any agents they think proper; to change these agents individually, or the organization of them in form or function whenever they please; that all the acts done by these agents under the authority of the nation, are the acts of 3. 227. the nation, are obligatory to them and inure to their use, and can in no wise be annulled or affected by any change in the form of government, or of the persons administering it, consequently the treaties between the United States and France were not treaties between the U. S. and Louis Capet, but between the two nations of America and France.

I

CHAPTER VIII.

GENERAL VIEWS

PROPOSED, therefore, to adopt the Dollar as our unit of account and payment, and that its divisions and subdivisions should be in the decimal ratio. This was and is the system that now prevails.

adopted

I. 73.

T

HE qualifications of self-government in society are not innate. They are the result of habit and long training, and for these they will require time and probably much suffering.

16. 22.

I

I

T is a happy circumstance in human affairs, that evils which are not cured in one way will cure themselves in some other.

WILLINGLY acquiesce in the institutions of my country, perfect or imperfect; and think it a duty to leave their modifications to those who are to live under them, and are to participate of the good or evil they may produce. The present generation has the same right of self-government which the past one has exercised for itself. And those in the full vigor of body and mind are more able to judge for themselves than those who

16. 29.

are sinking under the wane of both

I

THINK, myself, that we have more machinery of gov

ernment than is necessary, too many parasites living on

the labor of the industrious. I believe it might be much

simplified to the relief of those who maintain it.

16. 76.

T

HAT I should lay down my charge at a proper period

is as much a duty as to have borne it faithfully. If some termination to the services of the chief magistrate be not fixed by the Constitution or supplied by practice, his office, nominally for years will, in fact, become for life; and history shows how easily that degen16. 293. erates into an inheritance.

E

XCITED by wrongs to reject a foreign government which directed our concerns according to its own interests, and not to ours, the principles which justified us were obvious to all understandings, they were imprinted in the breast of every human being; and Providence ever pleases to direct the issue of our contest in 16. 317. favor of that side where justice was.

A

GOVERNMENT regulating itself by what is wise and just for the many, uninfluenced by the local and selfish views of the few who direct their affairs, has not been seen, perhaps, on earth. Or, if it existed, for a moment, at the birth of ours, it would not be easy to fix the term of its existence.

15. 31.

G

I

OVERNMENTS are republican only in proportion as they embody the will of the people, and execute it. 15. 33.

THANK you, Sir, for the copy of the new constitution of Spain there is one provision which will immortalize its inventors. It is that which, after a certain epoch, disfranchises every citizen who cannot read and

write. This is new, and is the fruitful germ of the improvement of everything good, and the correction 14. 130. of everything imperfect in the present constitution. This will give you an enlightened people, and an energetic public opinion which will control and enchain the aristocratic spirit of the government.

W

ITHDRAWING myself within the shell of our own State, I have long contemplated a division of it into hundreds or wards, as the most fundamental measure for securing good government, and for instilling the principles and exercise of self-government into every fibre of every member of our commonwealth. It is for some of you young legislators to immortalize yourselves by laying this stone as the basis of our political edifice.

14. 70.

Τ

HERE are two subjects, indeed, which I shall claim

a right to further as long as I breathe, the public education, and the subdivision of counties into wards. I consider the continuance of republican government as absolutely hanging on these two hooks.

14. 84.

I

SEE our safety in the extent of our confederacy, and in the probability that in the proportion of that the sound parts will always be sufficient to crush local poisons. 14. 120.

T

HE fondest wish of my heart ever was, that the surplus portion of these taxes, destined for the payment of that debt, should when that object was accom