all fear, he has the most perfect enjoyment of himself, and of all the blessings of life; and his sentiments and enjoyments, being raised, his very being is exalted, and the man makes nearer approaches to superior natures.
Without a spirit of liberty, and a feeling of security and independence, no great improvements in agriculture, or any thing else, will ever be made by men. A man has but poor encouragement to bestow labour and expence upon a piece of ground, in which he has no secure property; and when neither himself, nor his posterity, will, probably, ever derive any permanent advantage from it. In confirmation of this, I cannot help quoting a few instructive passages from Mr. Du Poivre's Travels of a Philosopher.
It is his general observation, that "a country poorly cultivated is always inhabited by men barbarous, or oppressed." p. 5.
"In a terrestrial paradise, the Siamese
