he eye of those, whose dislike or kindness they have always
considered as the greatest evil or the greatest good.

This was, in the beginning of the present century, the state of the
Highlands. Every man was a soldier, who partook of national confidence,
and interested himself in national honour. To lose this spirit, is to
lose what no small advantage will compensate.

It may likewise deserve to be inquired, whether a great nation ought to
be totally commercial? whether amidst the uncertainty of human affairs,
too much attention to one mode of happiness may not endanger others?
whether the pride of riches must not sometimes have recourse to the
protection of courage? and whether, if it be necessary to preserve in
some part of the empire the military spirit, it can subsist more
commodiously in any place, than in remote and unprofitable provinces,
where it can commonly do little harm, and whence it may be called forth
at any sudden exigence?

It must however be confessed, that a man, who places honour only in
successful violence, is a very troublesome and pernicious animal in time
of peace; and that the martial character cannot prevail in a whole
people, but by the diminution of all other virtues. He that is
accustomed to resolve all right into conquest, will have very little
tenderness or equity. All the friendship in such a life can be only a
confederacy of invasion, or alliance of defence. The strong must
flourish by force, and the weak subsist by stratagem.

Till the Highlanders lost their ferocity, with their arms, they suffered
from each other all that malignity could dictate, or precipitance could
act. Every provocation was revenged with blood, and no man that ventured
into a numerous company, by whatever occasion brought together, was sure
of returning without a wound. If they are now exposed to foreign
hostilities, they may talk of the danger, but can seldom feel it. If
they are no longer martial, they are no longer quarrelsome. Misery is
caused for the most part, not by a heavy crush of disaster, but by the
corrosion of less visible evils, which canker enjoyment, and undermine
security. The visit of an invader is necessarily rare, but domestick
animosities allow no cessation.

The abolition of the local jurisdictions, which had for so many ages been
exercised by the chiefs, has likewise its evil and its good. The feudal
constitution naturally diffused itself into long ramifications of
subordinate