Page:Federalist, Dawson edition, 1863.djvu/398

 appointment should be made by the President himself.

As it can give no umbrage to the writers against the plan of the Fœderal Constitution, let us suppose, that as they are the most zealous, so they are also the most sagacious, of those who think the late Convention were unequal to the task assigned them, and that a wiser and better plan might and ought to be substituted. Let us further suppose, that their country should concur, both in this favorable opinion of their merits, and in their unfavorable opinion of the Convention; and should accordingly proceed to form them into a second Convention, with full powers, and for the express purpose of revising and remoulding the work of the first. Were the experiment to be seriously made, though it required some effort to view it seriously even in fiction, I leave it to be decided by the sample of opinions just exhibited, whether, with all their enmity to their predecessors, they would, in any one point, depart so widely from their example, as in the discord and ferment that would mark their own deliberations; and whether the Constitution, now before the public, would not stand as fair a chance for immortality, as gave to that of Sparta, by making its change to depend on his own return from exile and death, if it were to be immediately adopted, and were to continue in force, not until a, but until  should be agreed upon by this new assembly of Lawgivers.

It is a matter, both of wonder and regret, that those who raise so many objections against the new Constitution should never call to mind the defects of that which is to be exchanged for it. It is not necessary that the former should be perfect: it is sufficient that the latter is more imperfect. No man would refuse to give brass for silver or gold, because the latter had some alloy in it. No man would refuse to quit a shattered and