tereft in defending their country, having refigned the fword, muft pay for what they have ceafed to perform; and armies, not only at a distance from home, but in the very bofom of their country, are fubfifted by pay. A difcipline is invented to inure the foldier to perform, from habit, and from the fear of punishment, thofe hazardous duties, which the love of the public, or a national fpirit, no longer infpire.

WHEN we confider the breach that fuch an establishment makes in the fyftem of national virtues, it is unpleasant to obferve, that most nations who have run the career of civil arts, have, in fome degree, adopted this measure. Not only ftates, which either have wars to maintain or precarious poffeffions to defend at a distance; not only a prince jealous of his authority, or in hafte to gain the advantage of difcipline, are difpofed to employ foreign troops, or to keep ftanding armies; but even republics, with little of the former occafion, and none of the motives which prevail in monarchy, have been found to tread in the fame path.

IF military arrangements occupy fo confiderable a place in the domeftic policy of nations, the actual confequences of war are equally important in the hiftory of mankind. Glory and fpoil were the earliest fubjects of quarrels; a conceffion of fuperiority, or a ranfom, were the prices of peace. The love of fafety, and the defire of dominion, equally lead mankind to wish for acceffions of ftrength. Whether as victors or as

vanquifhed, they tend to a coalition; and powerful nations confidering a province, or a fortress acquired on their frontier, as fo much gained, are perpetually intent on extending the limits.

THE maxims of conqueft are not always to be diftinguifhed from thofe of felf-defence. If a neighbouring ftate be dangerous, if it be frequently. troublesome, it is a maxim founded in the confideration of safety, as well as of conqueft, that it ought to be weakened or difarmed: if, being once reduced, it be difpofed to renew the conteft, it must from thenceforward be governed in form. Rome never avowed any other maxims of conqueft; and fhe every where fent her infolent armies, under the fpecious pretence of procuring to herfelf and her allies a lafting peace, which he alone would referve the power to disturb.

THE equality of thofe alliances which the Grecian ftates formed against each other, maintained, for a time, their independence and feparation; and that time was the fhining and the happy period of their story. It was prolonged more by the vigilance and conduct which they feverally applied, than by the moderation of their councils, or by any peculiarities of domestic policy which arrested their progrefs. The victors were fometimes contented, with merely changing to a resemblance of their own forms the government of the states they fubdued. What the next ftep might have been in the progrefs of impofitions, is hard to determine. But when we confider,

that one party fought for the impofition of tributes, another for the afcendant in war, it cannot be doubted, that the Athenians, from a national ambition, and from the defire of wealth, and the Spartans, though they originally only meant to defend themfelves, and their allies, were both, at laft, equally willing to become the masters of Greece; and were preparing for each other at home that yoke, which both, together with their confederates, were obliged to receive from abroad.

IN the conquefts of Philip, the defire of felfpreservation and fecurity feemed to be blended with the ambition natural to princes. He turned his arms fucceffively to the quarters on which he found himfelf hurt, from which he had been alarmed or provoked: and when he had fubdued the Greeks, he propofed to lead them against their ancient enemy of Perfia. In this he laid the plan which was carried into execution by his fon.

THE Romans, become the master of Italy, and the conquerors of Carthage, had been alarmed on the fide of Macedon, and were led to cross a new fea in fearch of a new field, on which to exercise their military force. In profecution of their wars, from the earlieft to the latest date of their hiftory, without intending the very conquests they made, perhaps without foreseeing. what advantage they were to reap from the fubjection of diftant provinces, or in what manner they were to govern their new acquifitions,

they ftill proceeded to feize what came fucceffively within their reach; and ftimulated by a policy which engaged them in perpetual wars, which led to perpetual victory and acceffions of territory, they extended the frontier of a ftate, which, but a few centuries before, had been confined within the fkirts of a village, to the Euphrates, the Danube, the Wefer, the Forth, and the Ocean.

Ir is vain to affirm, that the genius of any nation is adverse to conqueft. Its real interefts indeed moft commonly are fo; but every ftate which is prepared to defend itself, and to obtain victories, is likewise in hazard of being tempted to conquer.

IN Europe, where mercenary and disciplined armies are every where formed, and ready to traverse the earth, where, like a flood pent up by flender banks, they are only reftrained by political forms, or a temporary balance of power; if the fluices fhould break, what inundations may we not expect to behold? Effeminate kingdoms and empires are fpread from the fea of Corea to the Atlantic ocean. Every state, by the defeat of its troops, may be turned into a province; every army oppofed in the field to-day may be hired to-morrow; and every victory gained, may give the acceffion of a new military force to the victor.

THE Romans, with inferior arts of communication both by fea and land, maintained their dominion in a confiderable part of Europe, Asia,

and Africa, over fierce and intractable nations: what may not the fleets and armies of Europe, with the accefs they have by commerce to every part of the world, and the facility of their conveyance, effect, if that ruinous maxim fhould prevail, that the grandeur of a nation is to be eftimated from the extent of its territory; or, that the intereft of any particular people confifts in reducing their neighbours to fervitude?

SECT. VI.

of Civil Liberty.

IF war, either for depredation or defence, were

the principal object of nations, every tribe would, from its earliest state, aim at the condition of a Tartar horde; and in all its fucceffes would haften to the grandeur of a Tartar empire. The military leader would fuperfede the civil magif trate; and preparations to fly with all their poffeffions, or to purfue with all their forces, would in every fociety, make the fum of their public arrangements.

He who first on the banks of the Wolga, or the Jenifca, had taught the Scythian to mount the horfe, to move his cottage on wheels, to harafs his enemy alike by his attacks and his flights, to handle at full speed the lance and the bow, and when beat from his ground, to leavẹ his arrows in the wind to meet his puifuer; he