Page:Works of the Late Doctor Benjamin Franklin (1793).djvu/276

266 Compariſon of the Conduct of the Ancient, and of the in the United States of.

advocate for the propoſed Federal Conſtitution in a certain public aſſembly, ſaid, that "the repugnance of a great part of mankind to good government was ſuch, that he believed, that if an angel from heaven was to bring down a conſtitution formed there for our uſe, it would nevertheleſs meet with violent oppoſition."—He was reproved for the ſuppoſed extravagance of the ſentiment; and he did not juſtify it.—Probably it might not have immediately occurred to him that the experiment had been tried, and that the event was recorded in the moſt faithful of all hiſtories, the Holy Bible; otherwiſe he might, as it ſeems to me, have ſupported his opinion by that unexceptionable authority.

The Supreme Being had been pleaſed to nouriſh up a ſingle family, by continued acts of his attentive Providence, 'till it became a great people: and having reſcued them from bondage by many miracles performed by his ſervant Moſes, he perſonally delivered to that choſen ſervant, in preſence of the whole nation, a conſtitution and code of laws for their obſervance; accompanied and ſanctioned with promiſes of great rewards, and threats of ſevere puniſhments, as the conſequence of their obedience or diſobedience.

This conſtitution, though the Deity himſelf was to be at its head (and it is therefore called by political writers a Theocracy) could not be carried into execution but by the means of his miniſters; Aaron and his ſons were therefore