more ill-judged than that intolerant spirit which has, at all
times, characterized political parties. For in politics, as in religion,
it is equally absurd to aim at making proselytes by fire and sword.
Heresies in either can rarely be cured by persecution.

And yet, however just these sentiments will be allowed to be, we have
already sufficient indications that it will happen in this as in all
former cases of great national discussion. A torrent of angry and
malignant passions will be let loose. To judge from the conduct of the
opposite parties, we shall be led to conclude that they will mutually
hope to evince the justness of their opinions, and to increase the
number of their converts by the loudness of their declamations and the
bitterness of their invectives. An enlightened zeal for the energy
and efficiency of government will be stigmatized as the offspring of a
temper fond of despotic power and hostile to the principles of liberty.
An over-scrupulous jealousy of danger to the rights of the people,
which is more commonly the fault of the head than of the heart, will be
represented as mere pretense and artifice, the stale bait for popularity
at the expense of the public good. It will be forgotten, on the one
hand, that jealousy is the usual concomitant of love, and that the noble
enthusiasm of liberty is apt to be infected with a spirit of narrow and
illiberal distrust. On the other hand, it will be equally forgotten that
the vigor of government is essential to the security of liberty; that,
in the contemplation of a sound and well-informed judgment, their
interest can never be separated; and that a dangerous ambition more
often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the
people than under the forbidden appearance of zeal for the firmness and
efficiency of government. History will teach us that the former has been
found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than
the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties
of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying
an obsequious court to the people; commencing demagogues, and ending
tyrants.

In the course of the preceding observations, I have had an eye, my
fellow-citizens, to putting you upon your guard against all attempts,
from whatever quarter, to influence your decision in a matter of the
utmost moment to your welfare, by any impressions other than those which
may result from the evidence o