virtues. But are the evils of despotism confined to the cruel and
sanguinary methods, by which a recent dominion over a refractory and a
turbulent people is established or maintained? And is death the greatest
calamity which can afflict mankind under an establishment by which they are
divested of all their rights? They are, indeed, frequently suffered to
live; but distrust and jealousy, the sense of personal meanness, and the
anxieties which arise from the care of a wretched interest, are made to
possess the soul; every citizen is reduced to a slave; and every charm by
which the community engaged its members, has ceased to exist. Obedience is
the only duty that remains, and this is exacted by force. If, under such an
establishment, it be necessary to witness scenes of debasement and horror,
at the hazard of catching the infection, death becomes a relief; and the
libation which Thrasea was made to pour from his arteries, is to be
considered as a proper sacrifice of gratitude to Jove the Deliverer.
[Footnote: Porrectisque utriusque brachii venis, postquam cruorem effudit,
humum super spargens, proprius vocato Quaestore, _Libemus_, inquit,
_Jovi Liberatori_. Specta juvenis; et omen quidem Dii prohibeant;
ceterum in ea tempora natus es, quibus firmare animum deceat constantibus
exemplis. _Tacit. Ann. lib._ 16.]

Oppression and cruelty are not always necessary to despotical government;
and even when present, are but a part of its evils. It is founded on
corruption, and on the suppression of all the civil and the political
virtues; it requires its subjects to act from motives of fear; it would
assuage the passions of a few men at the expense of mankind; and would
erect the peace of society itself on the ruins of that freedom and
confidence from which alone the enjoyment, the force, and the elevation of
the human mind, are found to arise.

During the existence of any free constitution, and whilst every individual