the circumstance of an irresistible foreign influence, to render their country further services, withdrew themselves from public affairs, to the infinite loss of the nation. Their places were occupied by another description of patriots, men who owed their consequence to the revolution; and supposed it more from personal interest and feeling, than from any settled conviction of its expediency or value: — men of weak understandings, but ardent dispositions, who mistook a desire for innovation[1] for an inclination to do good.
The losses of the Dutch abroad, the capture of their important colony the Cape of Good Hope, and the disgraceful surrender of the fleet sent to its relief', conspired to augment the unpopularity of the new government<references>
- ↑ I wish the English language had a synonyme to the Greek verb νεωτεριζειν which so happily expresses the turbulence of the Grecian commonwealth; and I wonder that the refreshments of the modern language, and the troubles of modern times, have not produced some term by which a love of changes in government could be at once briefly and forcibly expressed.
