-
But he must have a small share of fortitude indeed, who is put out
of countenance by hard speeches without sense and meaning, or
affrighted from the path of duty by the rude language of
Billingsgate - For my own part, I smile contemptuously at such
unmanly efforts: I would be glad to hear the reasoning of Chronus,
if he has a capacity for it; but I disregard his railing as I would
the barking of a "Cur dog".
The dispassionate and rational Pennsylvania Farmer has told us, that
"a perpetual jealousy respecting liberty, is absolutely requisite in
all free states." The unhappy experience of the world has frequently
manifested the truth of his observation. For want of this jealousy,
the liberties of Stain were destroyed by what is called a vote of
credit; that is, a confidence placed in the King to raise money upon
extraordinary emergencies, in the intervals of parliament. France
afterwards fell into the same snare; and England itself was in great
danger of it, in the reign of Charles the second; when a bill was
brought into the house of commons to enable the King to raise what
money he pleased upon extraordinary occasions, as the dutch war was
pretended to be - And the scheme would doubtless have succeeded to
the ruin of the national liberty, had it not been for the
watchfulness of the "intemperate patriots ", and "wrong-headed
politicians" even of that day.
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