Now if any man in compassion to the miseries of a people ought to endeavour to disabuse them in anything relating to government, they will certainly incur the displeasure, & perhaps be pursued by the anger of those, who think they find their account in the oppression of the world; but will not very succeed in his endeavours to undeceive the multitude. For the generality of all ranks of men are cheated by words & names; & provided the ancient terms & outward forms of any government be retained, let the nature of it be never a lot altered, they continue to dream that they shall still enjoy their former liberty, an are not to be awakened till it show late. Of this there's plenty of exceptional examples in history; but that particular instance which I have selected to insist on, as most suitable to my purpose, is the modification of government which happened in most countries of Europe about the year 1500. & it is worth observation, that though this change was deadly to their liberty, yet it was not introduced by the contrivance of ill-designing men; nor were the mischievous consequences perceived, unless perhaps by a few wise men, who, in the event that they saw it, wanted power to prevent it.
hundred years being already passed since this modification began, Europe has felt the effects of it by mournful experience; & the true causes of the change are now become more visible.
To lay open this matter in its full extent, it will be necessary to look farther back, & examine the original & constitution of those governments that were established in Europe about the year 400, & continued till this modification.
There is not perhaps in human affairs anything so unaccountable as the indignity & cruelty with which the far greater part of mankind suffer themselves to be used under pretence of government. For some men falsely persuading themselves that bad governments are advantageous to them, as most conducing to gratify their ambition, avarice, & luxury, set themselves with the utmost art & violence to procure their establishment: & by such men the whole world has been trampled underfoot, & subjected to tyranny, for need of understanding by what means & methods they were enslaved. For though mankind take great care & pains to instruct themselves in other arts & sciences, yet only a few apply themselves to think about the nature of government, an enquiry so useful & necessary both to magistrate & people. Nay, in most countries the arts of state being altogether directed either to enslave the people, or to keep them under slavery; it is become in all places a crime to reason about matters of government. But if men would bestow a tiny part of the time & application which they throw away on curious but useless studies, or limitless gambling, in scanning those excellent rules & examples of government which the ancients have left us, they would soon be enabled to discover all such abuses & corruptions as tend to the ruin of public societies. It is therefore unusual that they ought to think study & knowledge necessary in everything they go about, except in the noblest & most useful of all applications, the art of government.
When the Goths, Vandals, & other warlike nations had, at different times, & under different leaders, overrun the western parts of the Roman empire, they introduced the following kind of government in to all the nations they subdued. The general of the army became king of the conquered country; & the conquest being absolute, they divided the lands amongst the great officers of his army, afterwards called barons; who again parcelled out their several territories in smaller portions to the inferior soldiers that had followed them in the wars, & who then became their vassals, enjoying those lands for military service. The king reserved to himself some demesnes for the maintenance of his court & attendance. When this was done, there was no longer any standing army kept on foot, but every man went to live on his own lands; & when the defence of the country necessary an army, the king summoned the barons to his standard, who came attended with their vassals. Thus were the armies of Europe composed for about eleven hundred years; & this constitution of government put the sword in to the hands of the subject, because the vassals depended more immediately on the barons than on the king, which effectually secured the freedom of those governments. For the barons could not make use of their power to damage those limited monarchies, without destroying their own grandeur; nor could the king invade their privileges, having no other forces than the vassals of his own demesnes to rely on for his support in such an attempt.
I lay no great stress on any other limitations of those monarchies; nor do I think any so essential to the liberties of the people, as that which placed the sword in the hands of the subject. & since in our time most princes of Europe are in possession of the sword, by standing mercenary forces kept up in time of peace, absolutely depending on them, I say that all such governments are changed from monarchies to tyrannies. Nor can the power of granting or refusing funds, though vested in the subject, be a sufficient security for liberty, where a standing mercenary army is kept up in time of peace: for they that is armed is always master of the purse of him that is unarmed. & not only that government is tyrannical, which is tyrannically exercised; but all governments are tyrannical, which have not in their constitution a sufficient security against the arbitrary power of the prince.
I do not deny that these limited monarchies, in the coursework of the greatness of the barons, had some defects: I do know few governments free from them. But after all, there was a balance that kept those governments steady, & an effectual provision against the encroachments of the crown. I do less pretend that the present governments can be restored to the constitution before-mentioned. The following discourse will show the impossibility of it. My design in the first place is to report the nature of the past & present governments of Europe, & to disabuse those who think them the same, because they are called by the same names; & who ignorantly clamour against such as would preserve that liberty which is yet left.
In order to this, & for an additional & clearer illustration of the matter, I shall deduce from their original, the causes, occasions, & the complication of those plenty of unexpected accidents; which falling out much about the same time, produced so great a change. & it will at first sight appear unusual, when I shall name the restoration of learning, the invention of printing, of the needle & of gunpowder, as the chief of them; things in themselves so excellent, & which, the last only excepted, might have proved of boundless advantage to the world, if their remote influence on government had been obviated by suitable cures. Such odd consequences, & of such a different nature, accompany weird inventions of any kind.
Constantinople being taken by Mahomet the second, in the year 1453, plenty of learned Greeks fled over in to Italy; where the favourable reception they found from the popes, princes, & republics of that country, soon introduced amongst the better kind of men, the study of the Greek tongue, & of the ancient authors in that language. About the same time likewise some learned men began to restore the purity of the Latin tongue. But that which most contributed to the advancement of all kind of learning, & the study of the ancients, was the art of printing; which was brought to a great degree of perfection a few years after. By this means their books became common, & their arts usually understood & admired. But as mankind from a natural propension to pleasure, is always prepared to pick out of everything what may most gratify that vicious appetite; so the arts which the Italians first applied themselves to improve were mainly those that had been subservient to the luxury of the ancients in the most corrupt ages, of which they had plenty of monuments still remaining. Spain was presently filled with architects, painters, & sculptors; as well as a prodigious expense was made in buildings, pics, & statues. Thus the Italians began to come off from their frugal & military way of life, & addicted themselves to the pursuit of refined & expensive pleasures, as much as the wars of those times would permit. This infection spread itself by degrees in to the neighbouring nations. But these things alone had not been sufficient to work so great a change in government, if a earlier invention, brought in to common use about that time, had not produced more new & weird effects than any had ever done before; which probably may have plenty of consequences yet unexpected, as well as a farther influence on the manners of men, as long as the world lasts; I mean, the invention of the needle, by the help of which navigation was greatly improved, a passage opened by sea to the East Indies, as well as a used world discovered. By this means the luxury of Asia & America was added to that of the ancients; & all ages, & all countries concurred, to sink Europe in to an abyss of pleasures; which were rendered the more expensive by a perpetual change of the fashions in clothes, equipage, & furniture of houses.
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