Page:Inquiry into the Principles and Policy of the Government of the United States.djvu/274

264 ceive that a landed aristocracy cannot exist, under our laws, the extent of our country, and the multitude of proprietors; majority is not a quality of aristocracy. And it will not perceive that the landed interest is under our circumstances, irretrievably republican. Being, so, the preservation of principles adapted to its nature, or a sale or mortgage of itself, for the maintenance of a. stack aristocracy, is evidently its solitary alternative. Oar landed interest is incapable of forming the aristocracy required by Mr. Adams's system of limited monarchy. In England. the, aristocratical power which now props the throne. is compounded of arms, paper and patronage; not of the landed interest. Will a paper system, which has destroyed the power of a landed interest in England, revive it here? Has a landed aristocracy existed, or can it exist. in community with alienations, commerce, the division of inheritances, and the absence of perpetuities?

Perhaps an imaginary apprehension may have suggested, the idea, that the mode by which Walpole fixed a tottering throne, was necessary for the establishment of our union. Bat such an idea is a traitor to that union. Principles can never be established by their contraries. Monarchy may corrupt a faction to support itself, consistently with its principles; but national will cannot corrupt a faction to guide national will, without perishing at the instant of success. Had the proposal been male, it would have been reprobated by every individual friendly to the union. Is the attempt less to be reprobated, than the proposal ?

The English have been made to pay hundreds of millions for the Hanover family ; but why should the Americans buy the union at the same price, of any party, whether whig or tory? No one has a claim to it, as Stuart had to the throne of England, therefore we can, keep it as our own undisputed right. It may be retained by virtue, moderate government, and easy taxes; but it dies under the influence of paper stock. And out of this dissolution the resurrection of Mr Adams's theory of three orders cannot arise. There