Page:Essay on the First Principles of Government 2nd Ed.djvu/278

 Supposing this wise system of perpetuation had occurred to our ancestors in the feudal times, and that an assembly of old English barons, with their heads full of their feudal rights and services, had imitated the wise Spartans, and perpetuated the severe feudal institutions; what would England at this day have been (with the unrivalled reputation of uniformity and constancy in its laws) but the most barbarous, the weakest, and most distracted state in Europe? It is plain from fact, that divine providence had greater things in view in favour of these kingdoms; and has been conducting them through a series of gradual changes (arising from internal and external causes) which have brought us to our present happy condition; and which, if suffered to go on, may carry us to a pitch of happiness of which we can yet form no conception.

Had the religious system of our oldest forefathers been established on these wise and perpetual foundations, we had now been pagans, and our priests druids.