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munity is like a changing coloured silk — the eye can perceive that there arc different colours, but cannot distinctly trace where any one of them ends or another begins. — But this is not all — if the imperial sway of this small island were circumscribed, as in old times, by the sea which surrounds it, even all those multitudes might form one society without the crowds you complain of; but you have not considered, nor perhaps even know, the almost boundless ex- tent of our dominion : — the remotest and most populous nations are our subjects — they all gra- vitate towards Armata — and, when brought within our vortex, a new gravitation commences, and our capital becomes the centre of attrac- tion. — A society so widely extended must al- ways have been rapidly increasing, and could not in the end be conveniently brought together — but greater inconvenience would attend separa- tions. — Our numerous classes, long accustomed to associate with good humour and kindness, might view each other with malignity and envy — the bundle of arrows, an ancient em- blem ¬
