efuse to submit to the
strongest. For the sake of their own peace and safety, they must have a
master, and must consent to obey him. This is the human origin of
government. And the Scripture teacheth us, that the Divine Providence has
not only allowed of the project, and the execution of it, but consecrated
it likewise by an immediate communication of his own power.(1063)

There is nothing certainly nobler or greater than to see a private person,
eminent for his merit and virtue, and fitted by his excellent talents for
the highest employments, and yet through inclination and modesty
preferring a life of obscurity and retirement: than to see such a man
sincerely refuse the offer made to him, of reigning over a whole nation,
and at last consent to undergo the toil of government, from no other
motive than that of being serviceable to his fellow-citizens. His first
disposition, by which he declares that he is acquainted with the duties,
and consequently with the dangers annexed to a sovereign power, shows him
to have a soul more elevated and great than greatness itself; or, to speak
more justly, a soul superior to all ambition: nothing can show him so
perfectly worthy of that important charge, as the opinion he has of his
not being so, and his fears of being unequal to it. But when he generously
sacrifices his own quiet and satisfaction to the welfare and tranquillity
of the public, it is plain he understands what that sovereign power has in
it really good, or truly valuable; which is, that it puts a man in a
condition of becoming the defender of his country, of procuring it many
advantages, and of redressing various evils; of causing law and justice to
flourish, of bringing virtue and probity into reputation, and of
establishing peace and plenty: and he comforts himself for the cares and
troubles to which he is exposed, by the prospect of the many benefits
resulting from them to the public. Such a governor was Numa, at Rome; and
such have been some other emperors, whom the people found it necessary to
compel to accept the supreme power.

It must be owned (I cannot help repeating it) that there is nothing nobler
or greater than such a disposition. But to put on the mask of modesty and
virtue, in order to satisfy one's ambition, as Dejoces did; to affect to
appear outwardly what a man is not inwardly; to refuse for a time, and
then accept with a seeming repugnancy, what a man earnestly desires, and
what he has been labouring