the Guelf cause had been right in the eleventh or twelfth, is a
fault of most universal application in all political questions,
and is often most seriously mischievous. It is deeply seated in
human nature, being, in fact, no other than an exemplification
of the force of habit. It is like the case of a settler,
landing in a country overrun with wood and undrained, and
visited therefore by excessive falls of rain. The evil of wet,
and damp, and closeness, is besetting him on every side; he
clears away the woods, and he drains his land, and he, by doing
so, mends both his climate and his own condition. Encouraged by
his success, he perseveres in his system; clearing a country is
with him synonymous with making it fertile and habitable; and
he levels, or rather sets fire to, his forests without mercy.
Meanwhile, the tide is turned without his observing it; he has
already cleared enough, and every additional clearance is a
mischief; damp and wet are no longer the evil most to be
dreaded, but excessive drought. The rains do not fall in
sufficient quantity; the springs become low, the rivers become
less and less fitted for navigation. Yet habit blinds him for a
long while to the real state of the case; and he continues to
encourage a coming mischief in his dread of one that is become
obsolete. We have been long making progress on our present
tack; yet if we do not go about now, we shall run ashore.
Consider the popular feeling at this moment against capital
punishment; what is it but continuing to burn the woods, when
the country actually wants shade and moisture? Year after year,
men talked of the severity of the penal code, and struggled
against it in vain. The feeling became stronger and stronger,
and at last effected all, and more than all, which it had at
first vainly demanded; yet still, from mere habit, it pursues