balancing power among orders. Europe cannot be formed
into one quiet government, because the different nations,
having different interests, cannot form one political being.
The supposed project of Henry IV. of France, for moulding Europe into such a being, was therefore chimerical.
Political orders, are as distinct and as inimical nations, as
those of Europe. Of course they have never been compressed into one nation, having one interest, one will, and
one self, all indispensible to self government; but like the
scheme of balancing power among the European nations,
that of balancing it among privileged orders, produces plots
or wars without end, until they end in a conquest and tyranay by one.
A nation cut up into separate factitious moral beings, is compelled to use the means for enforcing municipal law, used by France and England to enforce European law. The contest for predominance among privileged orders, can only be restrained by standing armies, and these at length determine it, by declaring for one. Constitutions are only treaties between orders, where they exist; and these treaties, like those between nations, are broken or evaded, whenever it is the interest of any party to break or evade them. Accordingly, the history given by Mr. Adams, and by all others, of these orders or artificial nations, proves, that they are constantly making and breaking treaties, and that they have universally been more treacherous, cruel and malicious towards each other, than natural nations.
Mechanical or habitual applause, cannot preserve the policy of the United States. It can only be saved by thoroughly understanding wherein its excellency consists. If it does not consist of a common interest, let any other eulogist point out its distinction from the policy under which men have hitherto groaned. If it does, and if its capacity for preserving free and national self government, is thence derived, it follows, that laws for cutting up the nation into distinct interests, will essentially destroy, without changing
