your lordship is born a member of that order of men, in whom a third part of the fupreme power of the government refides: and your right to the exercife of the power belonging to this order not being yet opened, you are chofen into another body of men, who have a different power and a different constitution, but who poffefs another third part of the fupreme legislative authority, for as long a time as the commiffion or truft delegated to them by the people lafts. Free-men, who are neither born to the firft, nor elected to the last, have a right however to complain, to reprefent, to petition, and, I add, even to do more in cafes of the utmost extremity. For fure there cannot be a greater abfurdity, than to affirm, that the people have a remedy in refiftance, when their prince attempts to enslave them; but that they have none, when their reprefentatives fell themselves and them.

THE fum of what I have been saying is, that, in free governments, the public fervice is not confined to thofe whom the prince appoints to different pofts in the administration under him; that there the care of the ftate is the care of multitudes; that many are called to it in a particular manner by their rank, and by other circumftances of their fituation; and that even those whom the prince appoints are not only answerable' to him, but like him, and before him, to the nation, for their behaviour in their feveral posts. It can never be impertinent nor ridiculous therefore in fuch a country, whatever it might be in the

abbot of ST. REAL'S, which was Savoy I think; or in Peru, under the Incas, where, GARCILASSO DE LA VEGA fays, it was lawful for none but the nobility to study for men of all degrees to inftruct themselves in thofe affairs wherein they may be actors, or judges of those that act, or controulers of those that judge. On the contrary, it is incumbent on every man to inftruct himself, as well as the means and opportunities he has permit, concerning the nature and interefts of the governments, and those rights and duties that belong to him, or to his fuperiors, or to his inferiors. This in general; but in particular, it is certain that the obligations under which we lie to ferve our country increafe, in proportion to the ranks we hold, and the other circumstances of birth, fortune, and fituation that call us to this fervice; and, above all, to the talents which God has given us to perform it.

IT is in this view, that I shall addrefs to your lordship whatever I have further to fay on the study of history.

LETTER VI.

From what period modern hiftory is peculiarly ufeful to the fervice of our country, viz.

From the end of the fifteenth century to the prefent.

The divifion of this into three particular periods:

In order to a sketch of the history and state of
Europe from that time.

SINCE

then you are, my lord, by your birth, by the nature of our government, and by the talents God has given you, attached for life to the service of your country; fince genius alone cannot enable you to go through this fervice with honor to yourself and advantage to your country, whether you fupport or whether you oppofe the adminiftrations that arife; fince a great stock of knowledge acquired betimes and continually improved, is neceffary to this end; and fince one part of this stock must be collected from the study of history, as the other part is to be gained by obfervation and experience; I come now to speak to your lordship of fuch hiftory as has an immediate relation to the great duty and business of your life, and of the method to be obferved in this ftudy. The notes I have by me, which were

Y

of fome little ufe thus far, ferve me no farther, and I have no books to confult. No matter; I shall be able to explain my thoughts without their affiftance, and lefs liable to be tedious. I hope to be as full and as exact on memory alone, as the manner in which I shall treat the fubject requires me to be.

I SAY then, that however closely affairs are linked together in the progreffion of governments, and how much foever events that follow are dependent on those that precede, the whole connexion diminishes to fight as the chain lengthens; till as laft it feems to be broken, and the links that are continued from that point bear no proportion nor any fimilitude to the former. I would not be understood to speak only of thofe great changes, that are wrought by a concurrence of extraordinary events; for instance the expulfion of one nation, the deftruction of one government, and the establishment of another: but even of those that are wrought in the fame governments and among the fame people, slowly and almost imperceptibly, by the neceffary effects of time, and flux condition of human affairs. When fuch changes as these happen in several states about the fame time, and confequently affect other ftates by their vicinity, and by many different relations which they frequently bear to one another; then is one of thofe periods formed, at which the chain fpoken of is fo broken as to have little or no real or visible connexion with that which we fee continue. A new fituation, different from the former,

1

begets new interefts in the fame proportion of difference; not in this or that particular state alone, but in all those that are concerned by vicinity or other relations, as I faid juft now, in one general fyftem of policy. New interefts beget new maxims of government, and new methods of conduct. Thefe, in their turns, beget new manners, new habits, new customs. The longer this new constitution of affairs continues, the. more will this difference increase: and although fome analogy may remain long between what preceded and what. fucceeded fuch a period, yet will this analogy foon become an object of mere curiofity, not of profitable enquiry. Such a period therefore is, in the true fenfe of the words, an epocha or an aera, a point of time at which you stop, or from which you reckon forward. I fay forward; because we are not to study in the prefent cafe, as chronologers compute, backward. Should we perfift to carry our researches much higher, and to push them even to fome other period of the same kind, we should mifemploy our time; the caufes then laid having spent themselves, the feries of effects derived from them being over, and our concern in both confequently at an end. But a new system of caufes and effetcs, that fubfifts in our time, and whereof our conduct is to be a part, arifing at the laft period, and all that paffes in our time being dependent on what has paffed fince that period, or being immediately relative to it, we are extremely concerned to be well informed about all thofe paffages. To be entirely ignorant: about the