ſubject, without having well weighed it. Mr. Turgot, it is plain, had not the leaſt idea of it.
"Tillage," ſays Harrington, "bringing up a good ſoldiery, brings up a good commonwealth: for where the owner of the plow comes to have the ſword too, he will uſe it in defence of his own. Whence it has happened, that the people of England, in proportion to their property, have been always free, and the genius of this nation has ever had ſome reſemblance with that of ancient Italy, which was wholly addicted to commonwealths, and where Rome came to make the greateſt account of her ruſtic tribes, and to call her conſuls from the plow: for in the way of parliaments, which was the government of this realm, men of country lives have been ſtill intruſted with the greateſt affairs, and the people have conſtantly had an averſion to the ways of the court. Ambition loving to be gay and to fawn, has been a gallantry looked upon as having ſomething in it of the livery; and huſbandry, or the country way of life, though of a groſſer ſpinning, as the beſt ſtuff of a commonwealth, according to Ariſtotle; ſuch a one, being the moſt obſtinate aſſertreſs of her liberty, and the leaſt ſubject to innovation or turbulency. Commonwealths, upon which the city life has had the greateſt influence, as Athens, have ſeldom or never been quiet: but at beſt are found to have injured their own buſineſs by over-doing it. Whence the Urban tribes of Rome, conſiſting of the turba forenſis and libertinus, that had received their freedom by manumiſſion, were of no reputation in compariſon of the ruſtics. A commonwealth, conſiſting but of one city, would doubtleſs be ſtormy, in regard that ambition would be every man's trade: but where it conſiſts of a country, the plow in the hands of the owner finds
