Wesley Corpus

“In this case, a state is still free,” (but this case has no being,) “if the representatives are chosen by the umbiassed voices of the majority.” Hold ! this is quite another case; you now shuffle in a new term: The majority we were not talking of, but all the members of a state. The majority are not all the individuals that compose it; and pray, how came the minority to be deprived of those rights, which you say are “unalienable from human nature?”-- “But we disguise slavery, keeping up the form of liberty, when the reality is lost.” It is not lost; I now enjoy all the real liberty I can desire, civil as well as religious. The liberty you talk of was never found; it never existed yet. But what does all this lead to, but to stir up all the inhabit ants of Great Britain against the Government? 34. To inflame them still more, you go on: “Liberty is more or less complete, according as the people have more or less share in the Government.” This is altogether contrary to matter of fact: The greater share the people have in the Government, the less liberty, either civil or religious, does the nation in general enjoy. Accordingly, there is most liberty of all, civil and religious, under a limited monarchy; there is usually less under an aristocracy, and least of all under a democracy. What sentences then are these: “To be guided by one's own will, is freedom; to be guided by the will of another, is slavery?” (Page 11.) This is the very quintessence of republicanism; but it is a little too barefaced; for, if this is true, how free are all the devils in hell, seeing they are all guided by their own will ! And what slaves are all the angels in heaven, since they are all guided by the will of another ! See another stroke: “The people have power to model Government as they please.” (Page 12.) What an admirable lesson, to confirm the people in their loyalty to the Government ! Yet again: “Government is a trust, and all its powers a delega tion.” (Page 15.) It is a trust, but not from the people: “There is no power but of God.” It is a delegation, namely, from God; for “rulers are God’s ministers,” or delegates. 35.