happiness or virtue residing amongst a fallen people.

In looking over the globe, if we fix our eyes on those places where
wealth formerly was accumulated, and where commerce flourished,
we see them, at the present day, peculiarly desolated and degraded.

From the borders of the Persian Gulf, to the shores of the Baltic Sea;
from Babylon and Palmyra, Egypt, Greece, and Italy; to Spain and
Portugal, and the whole circle of the Hanseatic League, we trace the
same ruinous [end of page #iii] remains of ancient greatness,
presenting a melancholy contrast with the poverty, indolence, and
ignorance, of the present race of inhabitants, and an irresistible proof
of the mutability of human affairs.

As in the hall, in which there has been a sumptuous banquet, we
perceive the fragments of a feast now become a prey to beggars and
banditti; if, in some instances, the spectacle is less wretched and
disgusting; it is, because the banquet is not entirely over, and the
guests have not all yet risen from the table.

From this almost universal picture, we learn that the greatness of
nations is but of short duration. We learn, also, that the state of a
fallen people is infinitely more wretched and miserable than that of
those who have never risen from their original state of poverty. It is
then well worth while to inquire into the causes of so terrible a
reverse, that we may discover whether they are necessary, or only
natural; and endeavour, if possible, to find the means by which
prosperity may be lengthened out, and the period of humiliation
procrastinated to a distant day.