No. XLV. Tuesday April 10. 1753 Nulla fides regni fociis, omnifque poteftas No faith of partnership dominion owns : LUCAN Ir is well known, that many things appear plaufible in fpeculation, which can never be reduced to practice; and that of the numberless projects that have flattered mankind with theoretical speciousness, few have served any other purpofe than to fhew the ingenuity of their contrivers. A voyage to the moon, however romantic and abfurd the scheme may now appear, fince the properties of air have been better understood, feemed highly probable to many of the afpiring wits in the laft. century, who began to doat upon their gloffy plumes, and fluttered with impatience for the hour of their de parture: Pereant veftigia mille Ante fugam, abfentemque ferit gravis ungula: campum. Hills, vales, and floods appear already croft; Por Among Among the fallacies which only experience can detect, there are some, of which scarcely experience itself can destroy the influence: fome which, by a captivating fhew of indubitable certainty, are perpetually gaining upon the human mind; and which, though every trial ends in disappointment, obtain new credit as the sense of miscarriage wears gradually away, perfuade us to try again what we have tried already, and expofe us by the fame failure to double vexation. Of this tempting, this delufive kind, is the expecpectation of great performances by confederated ftrength. The fpeculatist, when he has carefully obferved how much may be performed by a fingle hand, calculates by a very eafy operation the force of thoufands, and goes on accumulating power till refistance vanishes before it; then rejoices in the fuccefs of his new scheme, and wonders at the folly or idleness of former ages, who have lived in want of what might fo readily be procured, and fuffered themfelves to be debarred from happiness by obftacles which one united effort would have fo eafily furmounted. But this gigantic phantom of collective power vanishes at once into air and emptiness, at the first attempt to put it into action. The different apprehenfions, the difcordant paffions, the jarring interests of men, will fcarcely permit that many should unite in one undertaking. Of a great and complicated defign, fome will never be brought to difcern the end; and of the feveral means by which it may be accomplished, the choice will be a perpetual fubject of debate, as every man is fwayed in his determination by his own knowledge or conveni ence. ence. In a long feries of action, fome will languish with fatigue, and fome be drawn off by prefent gratifications; fome will loiter because others labour, and fome will cease to labour because others loiter: and if once they come within profpect of fuccefs and profit, fome will be greedy and others envious: fome will undertake more than they can perform, to enlarge their claims of advantage; fome will perform less than they undertake, left their labours fhould chiefly turn to the benefit of others. The hiftory of mankind informs us that a fingle power is very feldom broken by a confederacy. States of different interefts, and aspects malevolent to each other, may be united for a time by common distress; and in the ardour of felf-prefervation fall unanimoufly upon an enemy, by whom they are all equally endangered. But if their first attack can be withstood, time will never fail to diffolve their union: fuccefs and mifcarriage will be equally destructive: after the conqueft of a province, they will quarrel in the divifion; after the loss of a battle, all will be endeavouring to fecure themselves by abandoning the rest. From the impoffibility of confining humbers to the conftant and uniform profecution of a common interest, arifes the difficulty of fecuring fubjects against the encroachment of governors. Power is always gradually ftealing away from the many to the few, because the few are more vigilant and confiftent; it ftill contracts to a smaller number, till in time it centers in a fingle perfon. Thus all the forms of government instituted among mankind, perpetually tend towards monarchy; and power, however diffused through the whole communi. ty, ty, is by negligence or corruption, commotion or difirefs, repofed at laft in the chief magistrate. "There never appear," fays Swift, 66 more than "five or fix men of genius in an age; but if they were. "united, the world could not ftand before them." It is happy, therefore, for mankind, that of this union there is no probability. As men take in a wider compafs of intellectual furvey, they are more likely to chufe different objects of purfuit; as they fee more ways to the fame end, they will be less eafily perfuaded to travel together; as each is better qualified to form an independent fcheme of private greatnefs, he will reject with greater obftinacy the project of another; as each is more able to distinguish himself as the head of a party, he will lefs readily be made a follower or an affociate. The reigning philofophy informs, us, that the vaft bodies which conftitute the univerfe, are regulated in their progress through the etherial spaces, by the perpetual agency of contrary forces; by one of which they are restrained from deserting their orbits, and lofing themselves in the immenfity of heaven; and held off by the other from rufhing together, and clustering round their center with everlafting cohesion. The fame contrariety of impulse may be perhaps difcovered in the motions of men: we are formed for fociety, not for combination; we are equally unqualified. to live in a close connection with our fellow-beings, and in total feparation from them; we are attracted towards each other by general fympathy, but kept back from contact by private interefts. Some philofophers have been foolish enough to imagine, that improvements might be made in the fyftem of of the universe, by a different arrangement of the orbs of heaven; and politicians equally ignorant and equally - prefumptuous, may eafily be led to fuppofe, that the happiness of our world would be promoted by a different tendency of the human mind. It appears, indeed, to a flight and fuperficial obferver, that many things. impracticable in our prefent state, might be eafily effected, if mankind were better disposed to union and co-operation: but a little reflection will difcover, that if confederacies were easily formed, they would lose their efficacy, fince numbers would be opposed to numbers, and unanimity to unanimity; and inftead of the prefent petty competitions of individuals or fingle families, multitudes would be fupplanting multitudes, and. thousands plotting against thousands : There is no clafs of the human fpecies, of which the union feems to have been more expected, than of the learned the rest of the world have almost always agreed, to fhut fcholars up together in colleges and. cloifters; surely not without hope, that they would look for that happiness in concord, which they were debarred from finding in variety; and that such conjunctions of intellect wonld recompenfe the munificence of founders and patrons, by performances above the reach of any fingle mind. But difcord, who found means to roll her apple into the banqueting chamber of the Goddeffes, has had the address to scatter her laurels in the feminaries of learning. The friendship of ftudents and of beauties is for the most part equally fincere, and equally durable: as both depend for happiness on the regard of others, on that of which the value arifes merely from comparifon, they are both expofed to perpetual jealoufies, and hoth |