themselves,
high-minded men, about putting down the mob; but all true physicians
know that it is better to sweeten the blood than attack the tumour, to
apply the emollient rather than the cautery. It is absurd, in a
country like England, where there is so much freedom, and such a
jealousy of right, for any man to assume an aristocratical tone, and
to talk superciliously of the common people. There is no rank that
makes him independent of the opinions and affections of his
fellow-men; there is no rank nor distinction that severs him from his
fellow-subjects; and if, by any gradual neglect or assumption on the
one side, and discontent and jealousy on the other, the orders of
society should really separate, let those who stand on the eminence
beware that the chasm is not mining at their feet. The orders of
society, in all well-constituted governments, are mutually bound
together, and important to each other; there can be no such thing in a
free government as a vacuum; and whenever one is likely to take place,
by the drawing off of the rich and intelligent from the poor, the bad
passions of society will rush in to fill up the space, and rend the
whole asunder.

Though born and brought up in a republic, and more and more confirmed
in republican principles by every year's observation and experience,
yet I am not insensible to the excellence that may exist in other
forms of government, nor to the fact that they may be more suitable to
the situation and circumstances of the countries in which they exist:
I have endeavoured rather to look at them as they are, and to observe
how they are calculated to effect the end which they propose.
Considering, therefore, the mixed nature of the government of this
country, and its representative form, I have looked with admiration at
the manner in which the wealth and influence and intelligence were
spread over its whole surface; not as in some monarchies, drained from
the country, and collected in towns and cities. I have considered the
great rural establishments of the nobility, and the lesser
establishments of the gentry, as so many reservoirs of wealth and
intelligence distributed about the kingdom, apart from the towns, to
irrigate, freshen, and fertilize the surrounding country. I have
looked upon them, too, as the august retreat of patriots and
statesmen, where, in the enjoyment of honourable independence and
elegant leisure, they might train up their minds to appear in those
legisla