A NEW ERA

Those who expect to reap the benefits of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.   Some writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins … Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.   When the government fears the people, it is liberty. When the people fear the government, it is tyranny.   A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody.   These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it now deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as Freedom should not be highly rated.   Government ought to be as much open to improvement as anything which appertains to man, instead of which it has been monopolized from age to age, by the most ignorant and vicious of the human race. Need we any other proof of their wretched management, than the excess of debts and taxes with which every nation groans, and the quarrels into which they have precipitated the world?“   It is the duty of the patriot to protect his country from its government.   Not a place upon earth might be so happy as America. Her situation is remote from all the wrangling world, and she has nothing to do but to trade with them.   An Avidity to punish is always dangerous to liberty. It leads men to stretch, to misinterpret, and to misapply even the best of laws. He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he a establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.