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ESSAYS ON LIBERTY
aptus ad regendum id munus iudicio hOlninuln existima- bitur." The main principle of Machiavelli is asserted by his most eminent English disciple: "It is the solecism of power to think, to command the end, and yet not to endure the means." And Bacon leads up to the familiar Jesuit: "Cui licet finis, illi et media permissa sunt." The austere Pascal has said: "On ne voit rien de juste ou d'injuste qui ne change de qualité en changeant de climat " (the reading presque rien was the precaution of an editor). The same underlying scepticism is found not only in philosophers of the Titanic sort, to whom remorse is a prejudice of education, and the moral virtues are" the political offspring which flattery begat upon pride," but among the masters of living thought. Locke, according to Mr. Bain, holds that \ve shall scarcely find any rule of morality, excepting such as are necessary to hold society together, and these too with great limitations, but \vhat is some\vhere or other set aside, and an opposite established by whole societies of men. Maine de Biran extracts this conclusion from the Esprz.t des Lois: "II n'y a rien d'absolu ni dans la religion, ni dans la morale, ni, à plus forte raison, dans la politique." In the mercantile economists Turgot detects the very doctrine of Helvetius: "II établit qu'il n'y a pas lieu à la probité entre les nations, d'où suivroit que la monde doit être éternellement un coupe- gorge. En quoi il est bien d'accord avec les panégyristes de Colbert." These things survive, transmuted, in the edifying and popular epigram: "Die W eltgeschichte ist das Weltgericht." Lacordaire, though he spoke so well of" L'empire et les ruses de la durée," recorded his experience in these \vords : "J'ai toujours vu Dieu se justifier à la longue." Reuss, a teacher of opposite tendency and greater name, is equally consoling: "Les destinées de l'homme s'accomplissent ici-bas; la justice de Dieu s'exerce et se manifeste sur cette terre." In the infancy of exact observation Massillon could safely preach that wickedness ends in ignominy: "Dieu aura son tour." The indecisive Providentialism of Bossuet's countrymen is shared by English divines.
