The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• To the Right Honourable Charles James Fox.
• Preface.
• Personal Nobility Or , Letters to a Young Noble Man
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• The Spirit of Despotism.
• Preface.
• Section I.: Introductory.
• Section II. Oriental Manners, and the Ideas Imbibed In Youth, Both In the West and East Indies, Favourable to the Spirit of Despotism.
• Section III. Certain Circumstances In Education Which Promote the Spirit of Despotism.
• Section IV. Corruption of Manners Has a Natural Tendency to Promote the Spirit of Despotism.
• Section V. An Abhorrence of Despotism and an Ardent Love of Liberty Perfectly Consistent With Order and Tranquillity; and the Natural Consequence of Well-informed Understandings and Benevolent Dispositions.
• Section VI. On the Venality of the Press Under the Influence of the Despotic Spirit, and Its Effects In Diffusing That Spirit.
• Section VII. The Fashionable Invectives Against Philosophy and Reason, a Proof of the Spirit of Despotism.
• Section VIII. Of Loyalty, and Certain Mistaken Ideas of It.
• Section IX. On Taking Advantage of Popular Commotions, Accidental Excesses, and Foreign Revolutions, to Extend Prerogative and Power, and Encroach On the Liberties of the People.
• Section X. When Human Life Is Held Cheap, It Is a Symptom of a Prevailing Spirit of Despotism.
• Section XI. Indifference of the Middle and Lower Classes of the People to Public Affairs, Highly Favourable to the Encroachments of the Tory Principle, and Therefore to the Spirit of Despotism.
• Section XII. The Despotic Spirit Is Inclined to Discourage Commerce, As Unfavourable to Its Purposes.
• Section XIII. The Spirit of Despotism Displaying Itself In Private Life, and Proceeding Thence to Avail Itself of the Church and the Military.
• Section XIV. The Despotic Spirit Inclined to Avail Itself of Spies, Informers, False Witnesses, Pretended Conspiracies, and Self-interested Associations Affecting Patriotism.
• Section XV. The Manners of Tory Courtiers, and of Those Who Ape Them, As People of Fashion, Inconsistent With Manliness, Truth, and Honesty; and Their Prevalence Injurious to a Free Constitution, and the Happiness of Human Nature.
• Section XVI. The Spirit of Truth, Liberty, and Virtue, Public As Well As Private, Chiefly to Be Found In the Middle Ranks of the People.
• Section XVII. On Debauching the Minds of the Rising Generation and a Whole People, By Giving Them Military Notions In a Frée and Commercial Country.
• Section XVII. Levity, Effeminacy, Ignorance, and Want of Principle In Private Life, Inimical to All Public Virtue, and Favourable to the Spirit of Despotism.
• Section XIX. Certain Passages In Dr. Brown’s “estimate” Which Deserve the Serious Consideration of All Who Would Oppose the Subversion of a Free Constitution By Corruption of Manners and Principles, and By Undue Influence.
• Section XX. On Several Subjects Suggested By Lord Melcombe’s Diary; Particularly the Practice of Bartering the Cure of Souls For the Corruption of Parliament.
• Section XXI. On Choosing Rich Men, Without Parts, Spirit, Or Liberality, As Representatives In the National Council.
• Section XXII. Of the Despotic Influence of Great Merchants Over Their Subalterns, of Customers Over Their Tradesmen, and Rich Trading Companies Over Their Various Dependents, In Compelling Them to Vote For Court Candidates For Seats In Parliment, Merely T
• Section XXIII. Of the Pageantry of Life; That It Originates In the Spirit of Despotism; and Contributes to It, Without Advancing Private Any More Than Public Felicity.
• Section XXIV. Insolence of the Higher Orders to the Middle Ranks and the Poor; With Their Affected Condescension, In Certain Circumstances, to the Lowest of the People.
• Section XXV. Of a Natural Aristocracy.
• Section XXVI. The Excessive Love of Distinction and Power Which Prevails Wherever the Spirit of Despotism Exists, Deadens Some of the Finest Feelings of the Heart, and Counteracts the Laws of Nature.
• Section XXVII. On the Opinion That the People Are Annihilated Or Absorbed In Parliament; That the Voice of the People Is No Where to Be Heard But In Parliament; and On Similar Doctrines, Tending to Depreciate the People.
• Section XXVIII. The Fashionable Contempt Thrown On Mr. Locke, and His Writings In Favour of Liberty; and On Other Authors and Books Espousing the Same Cause.
• Section XXIX. Of the Despotism of Influence; While the Forms of a Free Constitution Are Preserved.
• Section XXX. The Spirit of Despotism Delights In War Or Systematic Murder.
• Section XXXI. On the Idea That We Have Arrived At Perfection In Politics, Though All Other Sciences Are In a Progressive State.
• Section XXXII. On Political Ethics; Their Chief Object Is to Throw Power Into the Hands of the Worst Part of Mankind, and to Render Government an Institution Calculated to Enrich and Aggrandize a Few, At the Expense of the Liberty, Property, and Lives of
• Section XXXIII. On Trafficking With the Cure of Souls, (cura Animarum,) For the Purposes of Political, I. E. Moral, Corruption.
• Section XXXIV. Of Mr. Hume’s Idea, That Absolute Monarchy Is the Easiest Death, the True Euthanasia of the British Constitution.
• Section XXXV. The Permission of Lawyers By Profession, Aspiring to Honours In the Gift of the Crown, to Have the Greatest Influence In the Legislature, a Circumstance Unfavourable to Liberty.
• Section XXXVI. Poverty, When Not Extreme, Favourable to All Virtue, Public and Private, and Consequently to the Happiness of Human Nature; and Enormous Riches, Without Virtue, the General Bane.
• Section XXXVII. On the Natural Tendency of Making Judges and Crown Lawyers, Peers; of Translating Bishops and Annexing Preferments to Bishoprics, In, What Is Called Commendam.
• Section XXXVIII. That All Opposition to the Spirit of Despotism Should Be Conducted With the Most Scrupulous Regard to the Existing Laws, and to the Preservation of Public Peace and Good Order.
• Section XXXIX. The Christian Religion Favourable to Civil Liberty, and Likewise to Equality Rightly Understood.
• Section Xl. the Pride Which Produces the Spirit of Despotism Conspicuous Even On the Tombstone. It Might Be Treated With Total Neglect, If It Did Not Tend to the Oppression of the Poor, and to Bloodshed and Plunder.
• Section Xli.: Conclusion.
• Antipolemus; Or, the Plea of Reason, Religion, and Humanity, Against War. a Fragment; Translated From the Latin of Erasmus.
• Preface. By the Translator.
• Antipolemus; Or, the Plea of Reason, Religion, and Humanity, Against War.

LETTER XIII.

My Lord,

So numerous have been the writers on the art of speaking, that, I dare say, a thousand books of rhetoric, of various kinds, and in various languages, might be recommended to your notice. If you can find time, you will receive much improvement from Schellerus's Prœcepta Styli benè Latini. But I have pointed out a shorter way; and am sure you will think it a pleasanter. Whether it will be equally or more successful, depends upon your own ardour and perseverance.

But I recommended Quintilian; he is indeed a most excellent writer, and worthy of your study, for his goodness of heart, and his general good sense, independently of his instruction as a master of rhetoric.

As a master of rhetoric, he is the best qualified of any I know, to introduce you to a knowledge of the excellencies of Cicero and Demosthenes.

Always fearful of requiring too much, I do not recommend the whole of Quintilian's work, as it appears in the elaborate edition of Capperonnerius. That excellent didactic author, Rollin, has published a most agreeable abridgement. Procure a small Paris edition, to carry in your pocket. Contract an intimacy with Quintilian, and I will engage that you will love him as a friend, while you respect him as an instructor. From a frequent conversation with him, you will improve in good sense and sound reasoning, in taste, and in the art of just criticism.

He is sometimes a little difficult; but Rollin generally removes the difficulty, by short well-chosen notes, which afford much light, without consuming much time.

If I should tell you how greatly I admire Quintilian, you would attribute my praises to the prejudice of an unreasonable partiality. I have long made him my companion; and I know no author in didactics that equals the merit of Quintilian. If you anxiously desire improvement, read Quintilian repeatedly. I am sure I cannot give you better advice for the conduct of your studies in eloquence, after having endeavoured to secure your first attention to the great models, Cicero and Demosthenes. However paradoxical it may seem, I wish you to contemplate the great works of genius, before you study the minute rules of art; and to feel as nature dictates, before your ardour is cooled by technical theory.

You may wonder, perhaps, that I do not recommend the rhetoric of Aristotle. I leave it to your future studies, and to your own option. Aristotle wrote in a manner so dry and jejune, as disgusts and deters a young reader. I am far from meaning to detract from him; for I consider him as one who understood human nature better than most of the sons of Adam; and who derives the instructions he gives, from the study of man, and the anatomy of the heart. But he requires a reader of mature judgment, and that degree of improvement already obtained, which it is the business of a didactic author to produce.

The rhetorical books of Cicero are also, like those of Aristotle, better adapted to the manly than the juvenile age; because they are in subtle dialogues; where erroneous opinions are maintained by some of the interlocutors with such ingenuity, as may deceive and mislead a young student, whose judgment is not confirmed by experience and reflection. They are however polite conferences; and well worthy of your perusal, for the elegance of their language, the urbanity of their manners, and the generosity of their sentiments. But the rhetorical instruction in them is too widely diffused, to be easily reduced to a clear and systematic form. It is justly observed by Rollin, that Quintilian unites the beauties of Cicero and Aristotle, without their abstruseness. He adorns the subtlety of the stagyrite, by introducing the flowers of Ciceronian eloquence; and while he entertains the young student with the charms of his style, he exercises the abilities of the profoundest scholar, by the solidity of his sense.

Quintilian and Cicero mutually reflect lights on each other.

Let Cicero, therefore, be your master, in style; and Quintilian, in the rules of rhetoric. Aristotle may remain on your shelves, till your own inclination shall prompt you to take him down.

I am, &c.