It is evident that
government must be the best which is so established, that every one
therein may have it in his power to act virtuously and live happily:
but some, who admit that a life o! virtue is most eligible, still
doubt which is preferable a public life of active virtue, or one
entirely disengaged from what is without and spent in contemplation;
which some say is the only one worthy of a philosopher; and one of
these two different modes of life both now and formerly seem to have
been chosen by all those who were the most virtuous men; I mean the
public or philosophic. And yet it is of no little consequence on which
side the truth lies; for a man of sense must naturally incline to the
better choice; both as an individual and a citizen. Some think that a
tyrannic government over those near us is the greatest injustice; but
that a political one is not unjust: but that still is a restraint on
the pleasures and tranquillity of life. Others hold the quite
contrary opinion, and think that a public and active life is the only
life for man: for that private persons have no opportunity of
practising any one virtue, more than they have who are engaged in
public life the management of the [1324b] state. These are their
sentiments; others say, that a tyrannical and despotical mode of
government is the only happy one; for even amongst some free states
the object of their laws seems to be to tyrannise over their
neighbours: so that the generality of political institutions,
wheresoever dispersed, if they have any one common object in view,
have all of them this, to conquer and govern.
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