But you
may object- "A process of this kind is slow. It is not fit for an
assembly which glories in performing in a few months the work of ages.
Such a mode of reforming, possibly, might take up many years". Without
question it might; and it ought. It is one of the excellences of a
method in which time is amongst the assistants, that its operation
is slow and in some cases almost imperceptible. If circumspection
and caution are a part of wisdom when we work only upon inanimate
matter, surely they become a part of duty, too, when the subject of
our demolition and construction is not brick and timber but sentient
beings, by the sudden alteration of whose state, condition, and habits
multitudes may be rendered miserable. But it seems as if it were the
prevalent opinion in Paris that an unfeeling heart and an undoubting
confidence are the sole qualifications for a perfect legislator. Far
different are my ideas of that high office. The true lawgiver ought to
have a heart full of sensibility. He ought to love and respect his
kind, and to fear himself. It may be allowed to his temperament to
catch his ultimate object with an intuitive glance, but his
movements toward it ought to be deliberate. Political arrangement,
as it is a work for social ends, is to be only wrought by social
means. There mind must conspire with mind. Time is required to produce
that union of minds which alone can produce all the good we aim at.
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