agree with them at
least nine times in ten. If he does not concur in these general
principles upon which the party is founded, and which necessarily draw on
a concurrence in their application, he ought from the beginning to have
chosen some other, more conformable to his opinions. When the question
is in its nature doubtful, or not very material, the modesty which
becomes an individual, and (in spite of our Court moralists) that
partiality which becomes a well-chosen friendship, will frequently bring
on an acquiescence in the general sentiment. Thus the disagreement will
naturally be rare; it will be only enough to indulge freedom, without
violating concord or disturbing arrangement. And this is all that ever
was required for a character of the greatest uniformity and steadiness in
connection. How men can proceed without any connection at all is to me
utterly incomprehensible. Of what sort of materials must that man be
made, how must he be tempered and put together, who can sit whole years
in Parliament, with five hundred and fifty of his fellow-citizens, amidst
the storm of such tempestuous passions, in the sharp conflict of so many
wits, and tempers, and characters, in the agitation of such mighty
questions, in the discussion of such vast and ponderous interests,
without seeing any one sort of men, whose character, conduct, or
disposition would lead him to associate himself with them, to aid and be
aided, in any one system of public utility?

I remember an old scholastic aphorism, which says that "the man who lives
wholly detached from others must be either an angel or a devil." When I
see in any of these detached gentlemen of our times the angelic purity,
power, and beneficence, I shall admit them to be angels. In the
meantime, we are born only to be men. We shall do enough if we form
ourselves to be good ones. It is therefore our business carefully to
cultivate in our minds, to rear to the most perfect vigour and maturity,
every sort of generous and honest feeling that belongs to our nature. To
bring the, dispositions that are lovely in private life into the service
and conduct of the commonwealth; so to be patriots, as not to forget we
are gentlemen. To cultivate friendships, and to incur enmities. To have
both strong, but both selected: in the one, to be placable; in the other,
immovable. To model our principles to our duties and our situation. To
be fully persuaded that all virtue which is impracti