Page:Armatafragment00ersk.djvu/83

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¬common bond of union, and with minds en- thralled by priestcraft, or subdued by despotism, to suffer without a murmur, and even to glory in the fetters which bound them. — On this base condition, no light had been let in, as in Armata, by an early commerce encircling a world; by the influences of a purer religion, bursting from the chains of superstition, nor by the combi- nation, as with us, of all classes of the people, with the same interest to resist injustice when it pressed equally upon the whole: — but by an uni- versal law of nature, all violent inequalities have their periods. — The air under its rough dominion is brought to its equipoise by tempests, and civil life by revolutions. — As Capetia grew in power and greatness, these inequalities be- came* more odious; the simplicity of her ancient government, which I before described to you, as the general system of the robuster nations, had lost its character of freedom, and had given way to a dominion in which the people had no share, whilst the nobles and great landholders, instead of standing in their places, as in Armata, ¬became ¬