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I have often been astonished, that there is no law in France, to prevent the unbounded accumulation of landed property. The Romans had censors, who limited, in the first instance, the extent of a man's possession to seven acres, as being sufficient for the subsistence of one family. p. 285.

The district of Caux is the most fertile country which I know in the world. Agriculture on the great scale, is there carried on to the height of perfection.---But as the laws have assigned, in that province, in every family two thirds of the landed property, to the first born, you find there unbounded affluence on the one hand, and extreme indigence on the other. I happened one day to be walking through this fine country; it was early in the morning, and blew extremely cold from the northeast; I met with two little girls in red jackets and wooden shoes: the tallest, who might be about 6 or 7 years old, was crying bitterly. "Child," said I to her, "what makes you cry? Whither are you going, at so early

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an hour? She replied, "my poor mother is very ill. There is not a mess of broth to be had in all our parish. We are going to that church in the bottom, to try if the Curè can find us some. I am crying because my little sister is not able to walk any farther." As she spake, she wiped her eyes with a bit of old canvass, which served as a part of her clothing. The abject misery of these children, so poor in the midst of plains so fruitful, wrung my heart. The relief which I could administer to them was small indeed. I myself was then on my way to see misery in other forms. p. 290.

Why do we force the African tribes to cultivate our lands in America, while our own peasantry is starving for want of employment at home? p. 293.

When I imagined I had some influence with men in power, I endeavoured to exert it in projects of this nature; but I have never had the felicity of falling in with a single one, who took a warm interest in

the happiness of mankind.....The clouds of calamity have spread a gloom over my own life; and the possibility of enjoying happiness, even in a dream, is no longer my portion. p. 294.

Early habits have an influence even on animals, to such a degree, as to extinguish their natural instinct. Lycurgus exhibited a striking example of this to the Lacedemonians, in the case of two hounds taken from the same litter, in one of which education had completely triumphed over nature. But I could produce still stronger instances in the human species, in which early habit is found triumphant. History furnishes innumerable examples to this purpose. p. 300.

Ambition never rises except at the expense of another. Give it whatever specious name you please, it is ever the enemy of all virtue. It is the source of vices the most dangerous and detestable; of jealousy, of hatred, of intolerance, and cruelty; for

every one is disposed to gratify it in his own way. It is forbidden to all men by nature and religion, and to the greatest part of subjects by government. In our colleges, a lad is brought up to empire, who must be doomed for life to sell pepper. The young people, the hope of a great nation, are there employed for at least seven years, in learning to be the first in the art of declamation, of versification, of prattling. For one who succeeds in these trivial pursuits, how many thousands lose at once their health and their Latin! p. 306.

Admitting that talents are formed in colleges, they would not for that be less prejudicial to the nation; for it is of inconceivably more importance that a country should possess virtue rather than talents, and men happy, rather than men renowned. While depravity is thus taking possession of the hearts of children, some branches of education go directly to the perversion of their reason. The gospel recommends to the young man to be the last; his college urges

him by all means to be the first: virtue commands him to descend; education bids him rise. And what renders the contradiction still more glaring to the poor lad, it frequently proceeds, especially in the country, from one and the same mouth for the same good ecclesiastic, in many places, teaches the classics in the morning, and the catechism at night. p. 307.

The case is much worse when subjects of terror are employed. When their tender organs are shocked by certain monstrous images, so common in our churches. I knew a young man, who, in his infancy, was so terrified with the dragon of St. Marguerite, with which his preceptor had threatened him in the village church, that he actually fell sick of horror, believing that he saw the monster constantly at his pillow, ready to devour him. His father, in order to quiet his disturbed imagination, was under the necessity of appearing sword in hand to attack the dragon, and of pretending that he had killed him. Thus, as our

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