Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol I).djvu/526

 486 be any thing, which may justly challenge the admiration of all mankind, it is that sublime patriotism, which, looking beyond its own times, and its own fleeting pursuits, aims to secure the permanent happiness of posterity by laying the broad foundations of government upon immovable principles of justice. Our affections, indeed, may naturally be presumed to outlive the brief limits of our own lives, and to repose with deep sensibility upon our own immediate descendants. But there is a noble disinterestedness in that forecast, which disregards present objects for the sake of all mankind, and erects structures to protect, support, and bless the most distant generations. He, who founds a hospital, a college, or even a more private and limited charity, is justly esteemed a benefactor of the human race. How much more do they deserve our reverence and praise, whose lives are devoted to the formation of institutions, which, when they and their children are mingled in the common dust, may continue to cherish the principles and the practice of liberty in perpetual freshness and vigour.

§ 507. The grand design of the state governments is, doubtless, to accomplish this important purpose; and there can be no doubt, that they are, when well administered, well adapted to the end. But the question is not so much, whether they conduce to the preservation of the blessings of liberty, as whether they of themselves furnish a complete and satisfactory security. If the remarks, which have been already offered, are founded in sound reasoning and human experience, they establish the position, that the state governments, per se, are incompetent and inadequate to furnish such guards and guaranties, as a free people have a right to require for the maintenance of their vital interests, and especially