JI©
HISTORY OF SETTLEMENTS AND TRADE
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book been abortive, notwithftanding the fupport given them
. *VI"' . by the mother-country : but ftill they are equally cot.
cerned in the adminiftration as well as thofe of othajj
feds. None but Catholics have been excluded, ot
account of their refuting thofe oaths which the public
tranquillity feemed to require. In this view America)
government has deferved the greateft commendation;
but in other refpeds it is not fo well regulated.
Policy, in its aim and principal objed, refemhlef
the education of children.    They both tend to foul
men, and fhould be in feveral refpeds fimilar to eacil
,        other.    Savage people, firft united in fociety, requite,!
as much as children, to be fometimes led on by gentle
means, and fometimes reftrained by compulfion.  Fou
want of experience, which alone forms our reafon, _
thefe favages are incapable of governing themfelves ii
the feveral changes of things and the various concern!
that belong to a rifing fociety, the  government thai
conduds them fhould itfelf be enlightened, and guide
them by authority to years of maturity.    Thus it _
that barbarous nations are naturally fubjed to the op-
preflive yoke of defpotic power, till in the advance.'
ftate of fociety their interefts teach them to conned
themfelves.
Civilized nations, like young men, more or lefs ad-
vanced, not in proportion to their abilities, but from
the condud of their early education, as foon as they
become fenfible of their own ftrength and right, re-
quire to be managed, and even attended to by their
governors. A fon well educated fhould engage in noi
undertaking without confulting his father : a prince,
on the contrary, fhould make no regulations without
confulting his people : further, the fon, in refolutions
where he follows the advice of his father, frequently
hazards nothing but his own happinefs : in all that»;
prince ordains, the happinefs of his people is concern-;
ed. The opinion of the public, in a nation that thinks
and fpeaks, is the rule of the government ; and the
prince fhould never thwart that opinion without pub-
lic reafons, nor oppofe it without having firft convio-