They pass from hand to hand with a more rapid circulation
than any other. No excess is good; and, therefore, too great a
proportion of landed property may be held officially for life; but
it does not seem to me of material injury to any commonwealth that
there should exist some estates that have a chance of being acquired
by other means than the previous acquisition of money.
THIS LETTER HAS GROWN to a great length, though it is, indeed,
short with regard to the infinite extent of the subject. Various
avocations have from time to time called my mind from the subject. I
was not sorry to give myself leisure to observe whether, in the
proceedings of the National Assembly, I might not find reasons to
change or to qualify some of my first sentiments. Everything has
confirmed me more strongly in my first opinions. It was my original
purpose to take a view of the principles of the National Assembly with
regard to the great and fundamental establishments, and to compare the
whole of what you have substituted in the place of what you have
destroyed with the several members of our British constitution. But
this plan is of a greater extent than at first I computed, and I
find that you have little desire to take the advantage of any
examples. At present I must content myself with some remarks upon your
establishments, reserving for another time what I proposed to say
concerning the spirit of our British monarchy, aristocracy, and
democracy, as practically they exist.
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