Equally ineffective are the declamations of Cosmo-politism on a mind filled with selfish passions;—they just serve it for a subterfuge.—The ties of ordinary life are broken in the first place, and the Citizen of the World is a wolf of the desart.
The unhappy consequence is, that the natural progress of liberty is retarded. Had this ignis fatuus not appeared and misled us, the improvements which true Illumination has really produced, the increase in sciences and arts, and the improvement in our estimate of life and happiness, would have continued to work silently and gradually in all nations; and those which are less fortunate in point of government would also have improved, by little and little, without losing any sensible portion of their present enjoyments in the possession of riches, or honours, or power. Those pretensions would gradually have come to balance each other, and true liberty, such as Britons enjoy, might have taken place over all.
Instead of this, the inhabitants of every state are put into a situation where every individual is alarmed and injured by the success of another, because all pre-eminence is criminal. Therefore there must be perpetual jealousy and struggle. Princes are now alarmed, since they see the aim of the lower classes, and they repent of their former liberal concessions. All parties maintain a sullen distance and reserve;—the people become unruly, and the sovereign hard-hearted; so that liberty, such as can be enjoyed in peace, is banished from the country.
VIII. When we see how eagerly the Illuminati endeavoured to insinuate their Brethren into all offices which gave them influence on the public mind, and particularly into seminaries of education, we should be particularly careful to prevent them, and ought to examine with anxious attention the manner of thinking of all who offer themselves for teachers of youth.