This  Ihews,  in  my  opinion,  how  very  quick  and
awakened  all  men  ought  to  be,  who  are  looked
up  to  by  the  public,  and  who  deferve  that  confi-
dence, to  prevent  a  furprife  on  their  opinions,  when
dogmas  are  fpread,  and  projects  purfued,  by  which
the  foundations  of  fociety  may  be  affected. Before
they  liften  even  to  moderate  alterations  in  the  govern-
ment  of  their  country,  they  ought  to  take  care  that
principles  are  not  propagated  for  that  purpofe,
which  are  too  big  for  their  object. Doctrines  limit-
ed in  their  prelent  application,  and  wide  in  their
general  principles,  are  never  meant  to  be  confined
to  what  they  at  firft  pretend. If  I  were  to  form  a
prognoftic  of  the  effect  of  the  prefent  machinations
on  the  people,  from  their  fenfe  of  any  grievance  they
fuffer  under  this  conftitution,  my  mind  would  be  at
cafe. But  there  is  a  wide  difference  between  the
multitude,  when  they  act  againft  their  government
from  a  fenfe  of  grievance,  or  from  zeal  for  fbme
opinions. When  men  are  thoroughly  poflefled  with
that  zeal,  it  is  difficult  to  calculate  its  force. It  is
certain,  that  its  power  is  by  no  means  in  exact
proportion  to  its  reafonablenefs. It  muft  always  have
been  difcoverable  by  perfons  of  reflection,  but  it
is  now  obvious  to  the  world,  that  a  theory  con-
cerning government  may  become  as  much  a  caufe
of  fanaticifm  as  a  dogma  in  religion. There  is  a
boundary  to  men's  pafiions  when  they  act  from
feeling  i  none  when  they  are  under  the  influence
of  imagination. Remove  a  grievance,  and,  when
men  act  from  feeling,  you  go  a  great  way  towards
uieting  a  commotion. But  the  good  or  bad  con-
of  a  government,  the  protection  men  have  en-
joyed,


joyed,  or  the  oppreffion  they  have  fuffered  under  it,
are  of  no  fort  of  moment,  when  a  faction  proceeding
upon  Ipeculative  grounds,  is  thoroughly  heated
againft  its  form. When  a  man  is,  from  fyftem,  furious
againft  monarchy  or  epifcopacy,  the  good  conduct  of
the  monarch  or  the  bifhop  has  no  other  effect  than
further  to  irritate  the  adverlary. He  is  provoked
at  it  as  furnifhing  a  plea  for  preferving  the  thing
which  he  wiflies  to  deftroy. 