The RIGHT CONSTITUTION of a COMMON WEALTH EXAMINED. \Continucd from our Appius who secretly intended t® have liimfelf continued, feeing tliofe great persons, who had palled through all dignities, so eager in pursuit of this, was alarmed. The people,charmed with his pall conduct while decemvir, openly clamour ed to continue him in preference to all others. He affected at firft a reluifhmcc, and even a re pugnance, at the thought of accepting a feebnd time an employment so laborious, and so capable of exciting jealousy and envy against him. To get rid of his colleagues, ami to ltiniulate them tc refufe theoflice, he declared upon all occafious, that as they had discharged their duty with fide lity, by their assiduity and anxious care for a v.hole year, it was but jult to allowthem repose, «nd appoint them fuccefiors. The more aversi on he discovered, the more he was folicitecl. The deiires and willies of the whole city, the u naiiimous and earnest solicitations of the multi tude, were at length, with pain and reluctance, com plied with. He exceeded all his competitors in artifice : He embraced one, took another by the hand, and walked publicly in the forum, in company with the Duillii and Icillii, the two families who were the principals of the people, and the pillars of the tiibunate. His colleagues, who had been hitherto his dupes, knowing these popular condescensions to be contrary to his cha racter, which was naturally arrogant, began to open their eyes : but not daring to oppol'e him openly, they opposed their own address to his management. As he was the youngest amon<> them, they cftofe him president, whole office it was to nominate the candidates to offices, rely ing upon his modelty not to name himfelf; a thing without example, except among the tri bunes. But modesty and decency were found in him but feeble barriers against ambition : he not only caused himfelf to be elected, but excluded all his colleagues of the lall year, and filled up the nine other places with his own tools,threeof whom were plebeians. The senate and whole patrician body, were astonished at this, as it was thought by them contrary to his own glory, and that of his ancestors, as well as to his haughty character. This popular trait entirely gained him the mul titude. It would be tedious to relate the manner in which they continued their power from vear to year, with the moll hardened impudence on their part, the most filly acquiefcencc of the people, and the fears of the senate and patricians. Their tyranny and cruelty became at length intolera ble ; and the blood of Virginia, on a father's dagger, was alone fufficient to arouse a stupid people from their lethargy. Is it not abfuid in Nedham to adduce this ex ample, in support of his government of the peo ple by their fucceflive representatives annually •chosen ? Were not the decemvirs the people's repi efentatives ! And were not their elections annual ? and would not the fame consequences have happened, if the number had been one hun dred, or five hundred, or a thousand, instead of ten "O, but the people of Rome should not Jia\e continued them in power from year to year.'* How will you hinder the people from continuing them in power? If the people have the choice they may continue the fame men and we cer tainly know they will : No bounds can restrain them. Without the liberty of choice, the depu ties would not be the people's representatives If the people make a law, that the fame man fliall never serve two years, the people can and will lepenl that law ; if the people impose up on them selves an oath, they will soon fay and believe they can dispense with that oath : In ffiort the people will have the men whom they love best for the moment, and the men whom they love best will make any law to gratify their present humour. Nay more, the people ought to be represented by the men who hare their hearts and confidence for these alone can ever know their wants and desires : but these men ought to have fonie check to restrain them, and the people too, when those desires are for forbidden fruit—for iniuftice cruelty, and the ruin of the minority -—And that the desires of the majority ofthe people are often tor mjufhee, and inhumanity against the minority, is demonstrated by every pa?e of the history of the whole world. We come next to the examples of continuing power in particular persons. The Romans were 1 wallowed up, by continuing power, too long in the hands of the triumvirates of emperors or generals The firft of these were Csfar, Pompey and Craflus. But who continued the power of Caesar ! If the people continued it, the argument arising from the example is against a simple go vernment of the people, or 'by their fuccefflve representative assemblies. Was it the senate was it the Handing permanent power in the con stitution, that conferred this continuance of pow er 011 Car far ? By no means. It is necefla -1-y to recollect the story, that we may not be im pofedon. No military station cxifted in Italy, left some general might overawe the republic! Italy however, was undftrltoocl to extend onlv from Tar en turn to tlieArnus and the Rubicon • Cisalpine Gaul was not reputed in Italy, and might be held by a military officer and an army. Caesar, from a deliberate and sagacious ambition, procured from the people an unprecedented pro longation of his appointments for five years ; but the dillribution of the provinces was still the prerogative of the senate, by the Sempronian law. Caesar had ever been at variance with a majority of the Senate. In the office of praetor he had been suspended by them : In his present office of consul he had set them at open defiance, he had 110 hopes of obtaining from them the pro longation of his power, and the command of a province. He knew that the very propolal of giving him the command of Cisalpine Gaul for a number of years would have shocked them. In order to carry his point he mult fetafide the au thority of the senate, and destroy the only check, the only appearance of a balance, remaining in the conilitution. A tool of his, the tribune Va tijiius, moved the people to set aside the law of Sempronius, and by their own unlimitted power name Caefa'as pro-consul of Cisalpine Gaul and Illyricum for five years, with an army of seven legions. The senate were alarmed, and in vain opposed. The people voted it. The senate saw that all was loft, and Cato cried, " You have placed a King, with his guards, in your citadel." Caesar boasted, that he had prevailed both in ob taining the consulate and the command, not by the concession of the Senate, but in direct oppo sition to their will. He was well aware of their malice, he laid. Though he had a consummate command of his temper, and the profoundeft dillimulation, while in purfhit of his point, his exuberant vanity braved the world when he had carried it. He now openly insulted tlite senate, and no longer concealed his connection with Pompey and CraH'us, whom he had over-reached to concur in his appointment. Thus, one of the cleared and strongest examples in history, to shew theneceflity of a balance betwen an independent senate and an independent people, is adduced by Nedliam in favor of his indigested plan, which has no balance at all. The other example of Augustus, Antony, and Lepidus, is not worth considering particularly ; for the trial between them was but aftruggle of arms, by military po licy alone, without any mixture of civil or poli tical debates or negociations. (To be continued.) An ESSAY oh FREE TRADE and FINANCES. [Continued from our last.] I. That the tax be laid "with such judgment and prude/ice, and different "weight on different articles, that the coufumption of no articles {hall be diminijlyed by it, beyond what the good and true interefl oj the nation requires s for 'tis certainly better for the merchant to deal with his customers in such arti cles as are ufeful to them, and in such way that they Hi all derive real benefit from their trade with him, than to supply them with articles that are useless and hurtful to them, and which of :ourfe impoverish them. In the firlt cafe he will make his customers rich, and able to continue trad- Lng with him, and to make him good and punc tual payments : In the other cafe he makes his customers poor, and of course subjects himfelf to I fie danger ot dilatory payments, or perhaps to a final loss of his debts. 11. That the tax be universal and alike on every part oj the country, for if one Hate is taxed and .ts neighbour is not, the state taxed will lol'e its trade. And 111. That the tax be universally collected. Smug ging hurts the fair trader; favour and connivance at collectors, to particular importers, through bri bery, friendfhip or indolence, has the fame effect; he person who avoids the tax can undersell him who pays it, therefore 'tis the great interefl of the merchant, when the duty is laid, to make it a .leaded point, that every importer shall pay the .luty ; and I am of opinion, that when the body □ 1 merchants make it a decided matter to carry my point of this nature, they are very able to iccomplifli it ; they certainly know better than ill the custom house officers and tide waiters 011 sarth, how to prevent 01* detecft Smuggling, and to discover and punifli the indulgence or conni vance of collectors, who may be induced to favour particular importers, and they have the hiofieft mtei eft in doing this, of any set of people in the nation , and therefore I think it good policy to tiuft tlus matter to their prudence, with proper powers to execute it in the molt effectual way. from a pretty extensive acquaintance, I am con vinced, there is a profelfional honor in merchants which may be fafely trusted, and I apprehend 'tis a policy both needless and cruel, to fubjecc the pei ions and fortunes of merc hants, the great ne gociators of the nation's wealth, and a body of men at lealt as refpecftable as any among us, to the insults of cultom house officers and tide wait ers, the rabble of which, I believe, are generally allowed to be as corrupt, unprincipled, intolera ble, andlow lived a set of villains as can be fcraned out of the dregs of any nation ; and to set such fel lows to watch and ? uard the integrity and honesty mast re pet-table order of men, and fubjed hon °rable and ufcful fellow citizens to such mortifying infpedtion, appears to me to be furl, an miult on common sense—such an outrage ' every natural principle of humanity and decent —such a gross corruption of every degree J ( polished manners, that 1 should imagine i- must require ages to give it that degree of practice Ja eftabliflunent which has long taken place in o- e Britain. The quickell way to make men k na «, is to treat them as Inch. 'Tib a common obferva tion, when a woman's character is gone, her cliaf tity soon follows. Few men think thenifel v « much obliged to exhibit inltances of integrity t men, who will return them neither credit 11 ! confidence for their upright nels. Let every m ° have the credit of his own virtues, and be pre" fumed to be virtuous till the contrary appears* Honesty is as eflential and delicate a p- t , t 0 f j merchant's cliaradter, as piety is of a c]eroy,„an's or chaltity of a woman's, and you wound them all alike sensibly, when youfhew by your conduct towards them, that you even fufpeci: that they are wanting in these character!(tic virtues. I conceive nothing more is neceflary to make the collection of this tax easy, than to convince the merchants and indeed the whole community that the tax is neceflary for the public service —f or the eflential purposes of govemment ; and that every one who pays it, receives a full competi tion in the benefits he derives from the union - and that the management of the affair be com mitted to the merchants, to which, from the nature of their profeffion and business, thay are more adequate and qualified, than any other men • and as it falls diretftly within the sphere of their business, it fcemsto bean honour, a mark of con fidence to which they are entitled, indeed let the community at large "be convinced, that the money proceeding from that tax is neceflary for the public service, and that it can be collected with more ease to the people in this way, than in the mode hitherto proposed, and the colledion will be easy and natural. The tax will ceafetobe considered, like the tax formerly imposed onus by the British parliament, unconstitutional in their afleflinent, and useless in their expenditure, (for they plagued us ,with taxes only to fatisfy their harpies, little or none of the money ever reached the British treasury) this tax is imposed by our own people,—by our own representatives: It must be imposed by Congrrfs indeed. As the authority of any particular aflembly cannot be adequate to it, in as much as it inuft operate alike in all the states ; be alike universal in its efFedts, and uniform in its mode of afleflinent and collec tion ; and must therefore proceed from the gene ral authority which presides over the whole union, i. e. from the Congress, but 'tis a Congress of our own appointment : For the members of Congress areas much our representatives, andchofenby our people, as the members of the several slate aflemblies ; and the end and the life of the tax is our own public service, to secure the benefits of our union, without which 'tis impossible we Ihould obtain res peJtability abroad,auniform adminiftra. tion of civil police at home, an established public credit, or full protection against. domestic or foreign insult. I never knew any measure of government opposed in its execution by the people when a general conviction took place among the people, that the measure was properly planned, md was neceflary to the public good. We have had full proof through the war, what great bur dens our people will very cheerfully and even without complaint, bear, when they are convinc ed that the exigencies of the slate and the public fafety make them neceflary. (To he continued.) THE NATIONAL MONITOR. No. XIV. " The interests of men are various, but not incompatible with each other." THE wife and benevolent Creator of the world effrfts the iejl god of mankind, by the variety of his operations : The dijfcrenccs of ch mate—foil) and produce, of the fever al parts of the diver}- °j genius—habits, and objects, which diflinguifh the inhabitants of one country, from those of another, are circumflances which conduce to this great design. Wc could scarcely conceive of any necessity for the ex* iflente of enterprize, a&ivity and ingenuity, from which mankind it me their mofl rejtned enjoyments, did nature exhibit a perpetual, and perfctt uniformity in all quarters of the globe_ This wouldfupercede the commercial interccrurfe of diflant nations ; and prove an ejfeflual preveittative of improvements in trade, aits, and navigation. It would repress the ardour of the human mind in all those pursuits which fprwg f'°m afpmt of efnulation, and laudable ambition—it would " chill the genial current of the foul"—confine to narrow limits the sphere of ac tion, and extinguish the p-rofpefts of human life. The American traveller, whose object is to acquire an adequate know* ledge of the various parts of this continent, will oe flruck with the boun tiful provision which the Author of Nature has here made for the founda tion, and completion of the mofl independent empire that the world hath ever beheld. America in herjef contains the feeds of her own greatness, all that isneceflmy to conflitute flrength, confer power, and give digni ty and huppinefs to an indepenent empire ; and fhouldthe time arrive, when her travfatlavt'c cVnneffions shall become of trifling importance to ier, as will vety probably be the cafe, fie will then pojje fs exhaufelfi rejources for an extensive, and flour fhing commerce. There will cxifl certain local circumflances to jorm a line of diflinftion between tie inhabitants of the different parts of the Union: These diJtinß ions will be f> far from volitating with the befl inter ef! of the whole, that tnci will mofl efjvnUally contribute to promote it: Under the aufpiceiof ONz GOl F RNMENT, which shall be conflituted by the genius, abilities, an pah )otfm of the union, a filutary direction will be given to the //*''" rtt of cofn petit ion, and rivaljhip in thejiveral States ; by which, their resources nil/ le brought forth,' their growth and improvements greatly accelerated, and their wealth individually promoted. Pufelifhed by JOHN FENNO, No. 9, Maide^" Lane, near the I)JiQCgQ-Mir%.et. New-York. —-[Qdol.Jdfl
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