A demand of the nature which is here controverted is similar to the demand upon me to be a Christian because I am an Englishman, or a Mahometan because I am a native of Turkey. Instead of being an expression of respect, it argues contempt of all religion and government, and everything sacred among men. If government be an institution conducive to the public welfare, it deserves my attention and investigation. I am bound, in proportion as I desire the happiness of others, to consider it with all the accuracy my circumstances will allow, and employ my talents, and every honest influence I am able to exert, to render it such as justice and reason may require.
This general view of the duties of a citizen in relation to the government under which he lives being premised, we may now proceed with advantage to the particular points which are calculated to influence our judgement as to the conduct we ought to hold with respect to revolutions.
There is one extensive view upon the subject of revolutions which will be of great consequence in determining the sentiments and conduct we ought to maintain respecting them. The wise man is satisfied with nothing. It is scarcely possible there should be any institution in which impartial disquisition will not find defects. The wise man is not satisfied with his own attainments, or even with his principles and opinions. He is continually detecting errors in them; he suspects more; there is no end to his revisals and enquiries. Government is in its nature an expedient, a recourse to something ill to prevent an impending mischief; it affords therefore no ground of complete satisfaction. Finite things must be perpetually capable of increase and advancement; it would argue therefore extreme folly to rest in any given state of improvement, and imagine we had attained our summit. The true politician confines neither his expectations nor desires within any specific limits; he has undertaken a labour without end. He does not say, "Let me attain thus much, and I will be contented; I will demand no more; I will no longer counteract the established order of things;I will set those who support them at rest from further importunity." On the contrary, the whole period of his existence is devoted to the promotion of innovation and reform.