The great must submit to
the dominion of prudence and of virtue, or none will long submit to
the dominion of the great.
"Dis te minorem quod geris imperas."
This is the feudal tenure which they cannot alter.
THE STATE, ITS OWN REVENUE.
The revenue of the state is the state. In effect all depends upon it,
whether for support or for reformation. The dignity of every occupation
wholly depends upon the quantity and the kind of virtue that may be
exerted in it. As all great qualities of the mind which operate in
public, and are not merely suffering and passive, require force for
their display, I had almost said for their unequivocal existence, the
revenue, which is the spring of all power, becomes in its administration
the sphere of every active virtue. Public virtue, being of a nature
magnificent and splendid, instituted for great things, and conversant
about great concerns, requires abundant scope and room, and cannot
spread and grow under confinement, and in circumstances straitened,
narrow, and sordid. Through the revenue alone the body politic can act
in its true genius and character, and therefore it will display just as
much of its collective virtue, and as much of that virtue which may
characterize those who move it, and are, as it were, its life and
guiding principle, as it is possessed of a just revenue.
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