Page:John Adams - A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America Vol. I. (1787).djvu/243

of them, he leads a life neither illiberal nor licentious, becoming a democratic man from an ariſtocratic. His ſon is educated in his manners, but the ſame things happening to him as to his father, he is drawn into all kinds of licentiouſneſs, which is termed, however, by thoſe who draw him off, the moſt complete liberty. His father, the domeſtics, and others, are aiding to thoſe deſires which are in the middle: but when the tyrant-makers have no hopes of retaining the youth in their power any other way, they contrive to excite in him a certain love, which preſides over the indolent deſires, and ſuch as miniſter readily to their pleaſures; and when other deſires make a noiſe about him, full of their odours and perfumes, and crowns and wines, and the pleaſures of the moſt diſſolute kind, then truly he is ſurrounded with madneſs as a life guard, and that preſident of the ſoul rages with phrenzy, till he kills all modeſty, is cleanſed of temperance, and filled with additional madneſs. This is the formation of a tyrannical man. After this there are feaſtings among them, and revellings, banquetting, and miſtreſſes, and all ſuch things as may be expected where the tyrants love, drunkenneſs, and madneſs, govern ail in the ſoul. After this there is borrowing and pillaging of ſubſtance, and ſearching for every thing which they are able, by rage and phrenzy, deceit and violence, to carry off; pillfering and beguiling parents. When the ſubſtance of father and mother fails, he will break into houſes, rob in the ſtreets, rifle temples. Thoſe deſires which heretofore were only looſe from their ſlavery in ſleep, when he was yet under the laws and his father, when under democratic government, now when he is tyrannized over by his paſſions, ſhall be equally as looſe when he is awake, and

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