procured, and suffered themselves to be debarred from happiness by
obstacles which one united effort would have so easily surmounted.

But this gigantick phantom of collective power vanishes at once into air
and emptiness, at the first attempt to put it into action. The different
apprehensions, the discordant passions, the jarring interests of men,
will scarcely permit that many should unite in one undertaking.

Of a great and complicated design, some will never be brought to discern
the end; and of the several means by which it may be accomplished, the
choice will be a perpetual subject of debate, as every man is swayed in
his determination by his own knowledge or convenience. In a long series
of action some will languish with fatigue, and some be drawn off by
present gratifications; some will loiter because others labour, and some
will cease to labour because others loiter: and if once they come within
prospect of success and profit, some will be greedy and others envious;
some will undertake more than they can perform, to enlarge their claims
of advantage; some will perform less than they undertake, lest their
labours should chiefly turn to the benefit of others.

The history of mankind informs us that a single power is very seldom
broken by a confederacy. States of different interests, and aspects
malevolent to each other, may be united for a time by common distress;
and in the ardour of self-preservation fall unanimously upon an enemy,
by whom they are all equally endangered. But if their first attack can
be withstood, time will never fail to dissolve their union: success and
miscarriage will be equally destructive: after the conquest of a
province, they will quarrel in the division; after the loss of a battle,
all will be endeavouring to secure themselves by abandoning the rest.