Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol III).djvu/300

 292, which are apt at times to prevail in all governments. If the case should be, that he should, notwithstanding, be re-eligible, his wishes, if he should have any for office, would combine with his fears to debase his fortitude, or weaken his integrity, or enhance his irresolution.

§ 1425. There are some, perhaps, who may be inclined to regard a servile pliancy of the executive to a prevalent faction, or opinion in the community, or in the legislature, as its best recommendation. But such notions betray a very imperfect knowledge of the true ends and objects of government. While republican principles demand, that the deliberate sense of the community should govern the conduct of those, who administer their affairs, it cannot escape observation, that transient impulses and sudden excitements, caused by artful and designing men, often lead the people astray, and require their rulers not to yield up their permanent interests to any delusions of this sort. It is a just observation, that the people commonly intend the public good. But no one, but a deceiver, will pretend, that they do not often err, as to the best means of promoting it. Indeed, beset, as they are, by the wiles of sycophants, the snares of the ambitious and the avaricious, and the artifices of those, who possess their confidence more, than they deserve, or seek to possess it by artful appeals to their prejudices, the wonder rather is, that their errors are not more numerous and more mischievous. It is the duty of their rulers to resist such bad designs at all hazards; and it has not unfrequently happened, that by such resistance they have saved the people from fatal mistakes, and, in their moments of cooler reflection, obtained their gratitude and