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America’s First Constitutions and Declarations of Rights
All sober inquirers after truth, ancient and modern, pagan and Christian, have declared that the happiness of man, as well as his dignity, consists in virtue. Confucius, Zoroaster, Socrates, Mahomet, not to mention
authorities really sacred, have agreed in this.
If there is a form of government, then, whose principle and foundation
is virtue, will not every sober man acknowledge it better calculated to
promote the general happiness than any other form?
Fear is the foundation of most governments; but it is so sordid and
brutal a passion, and renders men in whose breasts it predominates so
stupid and miserable, that Americans will not be likely to approve of any
political institution which is founded on it.
Honor is truly sacred, but holds a lower rank in the scale of moral excellence than virtue. Indeed, the former is but a part of the latter, and consequently has not equal pretensions to support a frame of government
productive of human happiness.
The foundation of every government is some principle or passion in
the minds of the people. The noblest principles and most generous affections in our nature, then, have the fairest chance to support the noblest
and most generous models of government.
A man must be indifferent to the sneers of modern Englishmen, to
mention in their company the names of Sidney, Harrington, Locke, Milton, Nedham, Neville, Burnet, and Hoadly. No small fortitude is necessary to confess that one has read them. The wretched condition of this
country, however, for ten or fifteen years past, has frequently reminded
me of their principles and reasonings. They will convince any candid
mind, that there is no good government but what is republican. That the
only valuable part of the British constitution is so; because the very definition of a republic is ‘‘an empire of laws, and not of men.’’ That, as a
republic is the best of governments, so that particular arrangement of the
powers of society, or, in other words, that form of government which is
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