Page:Inquiry into the Principles and Policy of the Government of the United States.djvu/78

68 their prejudices. The sacred nature of law charters, is the sword of their enemies at the throats of the bigotted Israelites on their sabbath day. They are extended to periods, within which the grantees may acquire so much wealth, and corrupt such a proportion of talents, as to secure a continuance. The question is, shall the nation destroy charters, or charters destroy the nation? The dogma declares charters to be sacred, and forbids the nation to resist until they have acquired an irresistible maturity. Even the Jews, obstinate as they were, at length discovered fighting on the sabbath day to be preferable to death; but the enlightened nations of Europe, who laugh at their sabbatism, piously believe, that there is a charm in the words charter, credit and publick faith; making slavery preferable to a fair and free government.

A gradual monopoly of lands and wealth, overturned the Roman Republick. By assailing it in time, it might have been suppressed. The murder of the Gracchi is a proof, that usurpation can only be corrected in its infancy, and that fraudulent acquisitions will perpetrate any crime for self-defence. But this system of monopoly was suffered to proceed to maturity, and the commonwealth was poisoned by the miasma it diffused. It was a consequence of the Roman conquests which avenged the injured nations; but do the Americans equally merit the vengeance of the English system of paper and patronage, for having '^ indicated their liberty against it?

The idea annexed by this system of monopoly to private property, requires a nation to sacrifice itself for the benefit of an individual. This is a new principle of moral rectitude, which fraud only could suggest, and folly alone adopt. Heretofore, individuals who sacrificed themselves for a nation, hare been celebrated as performing an act of heroick virtue. Heretofore, a suppression of personal appetites, for the sake of advancing public good, has been thought a species of morality, highly meritorious; and a destruction of publick good, to gratify personal appetites, a species of