I did not apprehend this, while I had American
ideas only. But I confess that what I have seen in Europe, has brought
me over to that opinion; and that though the day may be at some
distance, beyond the reach of our lives perhaps, yet it will certainly
come, when a single fibre left of this institution will produce an
hereditary aristocracy, which will change the form of our governments
from the best to the worst in the world. To know the mass of evil which
flows from this fatal source, a person must be in France; he must see
the finest soil, the finest climate, the most compact state, the most
benevolent character of people, and every earthly advantage combined,
insufficient to prevent this scourge from rendering existence a curse to
twenty-four out of twenty-five parts of the inhabitants of this country.
With us, the branches of this institution cover all the states. The
southern ones, at this time, are aristocratical in their dispositions:
and that that spirit should grow and extend itself, is within the
natural order of things. I do not flatter myself with the immortality
of our governments: but I shall think little also of their longevity,
unless this germ of destruction be taken out.
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