Page:Armatafragment00ersk.djvu/257

This page needs to be proofread.

( 29 )

¬government, and not errors in ourselves, there would be an*end at once of all government and law — If the subject, indeed, had never been presented to the notice of our councils, there might be matter to pause upon, as your opinions might, perhaps, have been adopted if duly con- sidered ; but the whole subject was brought very lately under their most serious consideration, when all your fanciful notions were rejected and put down. ¬" Our government is divided into two delibera- tive assemblies, which must agree upon any law before it can be submitted for adoption to the third estate, which may annul their united deci- sions — The highest of these assemblies frst voted on this very subjects if you yourself had given the rule to them; — they voted unani- mously that animals had rights — They declared that it had pleased Almighty God to endue them with many valuable faculties for the use of man, and they enacted punishments for the abuse ; — but the other branch of our councils refused to ¬concur ¬

/n