of that high office.

tion are a part of wisdom, when we work only up on inanimate matter, furely they become a part of duty too, when the fubject of our demolition and conftruction is not brick and timber, but fentient beings, by the fudden alteration of whofe ftate, condition, and habits, multitudes may be rendered miferable. But it feems as if it were the prevalent opinion in Paris, that an unfeeling heart, and an undoubting confidence, are the fole qualifications for a perfect legiflator. Far different are my ideas The true lawgiver ought to have an heart full of fenfibility. He ought to love and refpect his kind, and to fear himfelf. It may be allowed to his temperament to catch his ultimate object with an intuitive glance; but his movements towards it ought to be deliberate. Political arrangement, as it is a work for focial ends, is to be only wrought by focial means. There mind muft confpire with mind. Time is required to produce that union of minds which alone can produce all the good we aim at. Our patience will atchieve more than our force. If I might venture to appeal to what is fo much out of fashion in Paris, I mean to experience, I should tell you, that in my course I have known, and, according to my measure, have co-operated with great men; and I have never yet feen any plan which has not been mended by the obfervations of those who were much inferior in understanding to the perfon who took the lead in the business. By a flow but well-fuftained progrefs, the effect of each step is watched; the good or ill fuccefs of the first, gives light to us in the fecond; and fo, from light to

light, we are conducted with fafety through the whole feries. We fee, that the parts of the system do not clash. The evils latent in the most promifing contrivances are provided for as they arife. One advantage is as little as poffible facrificed to another. We compenfate, we reconcile, we balance. We are enabled to unite into a confiftent whole the various anomalies and contending principles that are found in the minds and affairs of men. From hence arifes, not an excellence in fimplicity, but one far fuperior, an excellence in compofition. Where the great interefts of mankind are concerned through a long fucceffion of generations, that fucceffion ought to be admitted into fome fhare in the councils which are fo deeply to affect them. If juftice requires this, the work itself requires the aid of more minds than one age can furnish. It is from this view of things that the best legiflators have been often fatisfied with the establishment of fome fure, folid, and ruling principle in government; a power like that which fome of the philofophers have called a plaftic nature; and having fixed the principle, they have left it afterwards to its own operation.

To proceed in this manner, that is, to proceed with a prefiding principle, and a prolific ener→ gy, is with me the criterion of profound wisdom. What your politicians think the marks of a bold, hardy genius, are only proofs of a deplorable. want of ability. By their violent hafte, and their defiance of the procefs of nature, they are delivered over blindly to every projector and adventurer, to every alchymift and empiric. They de

fpair of turning to account any thing that is common. Diet is nothing in their fyftem of remedy. The worst of it is, that this their defpair of curing common diftempers by regular methods, arifes not only from defect of comprehenfion, but, I fear, from fome malignity of disposition. Your legiflators feem to have taken their opinions of all profeffions, ranks, and offices, from the declamations and buffooneries of fatirists; who would themselves be astonished if they were held to the letter of their own defcriptions. By liftening only to thefe, your leaders regard all things only on the fide of their vices and faults, and view thofe vices and faults under every colour of exaggeration. It is undoubtedly true, though it may feem paradoxical; but in general, thofe who are habitually employed in finding and difplaying faults, are unqualified for the work of reformation: because their minds are not only unfurnished with patterns of the fair and good, but by habit they come to take no delight in the contemplation of thofe things. By hating vices too much, they come to love men too little. It is therefore not wonderful, that they should be indifpofed and unable to ferve them. From hence arifes the complexional difpofition of fome of your guides to pull every thing in pieces. At this malicious game they difplay the whole of their quadrimanous activity. As to the rest, the paradoxes of eloquent writers, brought forth purely as a fport of fancy, to try their talents, to rouze attention, and excite furprize, are taken up by thefe gentlemen, not in 'the fpirit of the original

authors,

authors, as means of cultivating their tafte and improving their ftyle. Thefe paradoxes become with them ferious grounds of action, upon which they proceed in regulating the most important concerns of the ftate. Cicero ludicrously defcribes Cato as endeavouring to act in the commonwealth upon the school paradoxes which exercised the wits of the junior ftudents in the ftoic philofophy. If this was true of Cato, these gentlemen copy after him in the manner of fome perfons who lived about his time-pede nudo Catonem. Mr. Hume told me, that he had from Rouffeau himself the fecret of his principles of compofition. That acute, though eccentric, obferver had perceived, that to ftrike and intereft the public, the marvellous muft be produced; that the marvellous of the heathen mythology had long fince loft its effect; that giants, magicians, fairies, and heroes of romance which fucceeded, had exhaufted the portion of credulity which belonged to their age; that now nothing was left to a writer but that species of the marvellous, which might ftill be produced, and with as great an effect as ever, though in another way; that is, the marvellous in life, in manners, in characters, and in extraordinary fituations, giving rife to new and unlooked-for ftrokes in politics and morals. I believe, that were Rouffeau alive, and in one of his lucid intervals, he would be fhocked at the practical phrenzy of his fcholars, who in their paradoxes are fervile imitators; and even in their incredulity discover an implicit faith.

Men who undertake confiderable things, even in a regular way, ought to give us ground to prefume

fume ability. But the physician of the state, who, not fatisfied with the cure of diftempers, undertakes to regenerate conftitutions, ought to fhew uncommon powers. Some very unusual appearances of wisdom ought to display themselves on the face of the defigns of thofe who appeal to no practice, and who copy after no model. Has any fuch been manifested? I shall take a view (it shall for the fubject be a very short one) of what the affembly has done, with regard, first, to the constitution of the legislature; in the next place, to that of the executive power; then to that of the judicature; afterwards to the model of the army; and conclude with the fyftem of finance, to fee whether we can discover in any part of their schemes the portentous ability, which may justify these bold undertakers in the fuperiority which they affume over mankind.

It is in the model of the fovereign and prefiding part of this new republic, that we should expect their grand difplay. Here they were to prove their title to their proud demands. For the plan itself at large, and for the reafons on which it is grounded, I refer to the journals of the affembly of the 29th of September 1789, and to the fubfequent proceedings which have made any alterations in the plan. So far as in a matter fomewhat confufed I can fee light, the fyftem remains fubftantially as it has been originally framed. My few remarks will be fuch as regard its spirit, its tendency, and its fitnefs for framing a popular commonwealth, which they profefs theirs to be, fuited to the ends for which any commonwealth, and particularly