Page:Armatafragment00ersk.djvu/245

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

( 17 )

¬tion, above all, when coming immediately and publicly from their tribunals, should have some suitable distinctions to point out their stations, and to continue, by habits of association, the reverence inspired by their dignified appearance when administering the government or the laws. If the robes of justice inspire the multitude with no additional respect for magistrates, why are they worn at all? and if they have that effect, why should the illusion be so abruptly overthrown, by exhibiting to the populace the very same men looking perhaps, from careless habits, more meanly than thousands who had but a moment before beheld them with salutary fear? This cannot be politic : but the true touch- stone to be applied to it is, to ask hoxv Engla?ul considers it ? n ¬I was so much struck with this strange med- ley of wise policy, and the total disregard of it, and so set a-thinking on the strange differences between our worlds and nations, that I was un- able, in the instant, to answer him, but I could ¬c not ¬

/n