persons in a part of Italy, and found informations of this nature still multiplying upon him. There is a similar, or rather a worse instance in the more early times of the commonwealth; so depraved in private life were that people, whom in their histories we so much admire. I doubt not but they were really more virtuous during the time of the two Triumvirates, when they were tearing their common country to pieces, and spreading slaughter and desolation over the face of the earth merely for the choice of tyrants.
Here, then, is a sufficient inducement to maintain, with the utmost zeal, in every free state, those forms and institutions by which liberty is secured, the public good consulted, and the avarice or ambition of particular men restrained and punished. Nothing does more honour to human nature than to see it susceptible of so noble a passion, as nothing can be a greater indication of meanness of heart in any man than to see him devoid of it. A man who loves only himself, without regard to friendship and merit, is a detestable {p239} monster; and a man who is only susceptible of friendship, without public spirit or a regard to the community, is deficient in the most material part of virtue.
But this is a subject which needs not be longer insisted on at present. There are enough of zealots on both sides who kindle up the passions of their partisans, and under the pretence of public good pursue the interests and ends of their particular faction. For my part I shall always be more fond of promoting moderation than zeal, though perhaps the surest way of producing moderation in every party is to increase our zeal for the public. Let us therefore try, if it be possible, from the foregoing doctrine to draw a lesson of moderation with regard to the parties into which our country is at present divided; at the same time, that we allow not this moderation to abate the industry and passion with which every individual is bound to pursue the good of his country.
Those who either attack or defend a minister in such a government as ours, where the utmost liberty is allowed, always carry matters to an