Anything in the
nature of incorporation is almost impracticable amongst them. Hope,
fear, alarm, jealousy, the ephemerous tale that does its business and
dies in a day, all these things, which are the reins and spurs by which
leaders check or urge the minds of followers, are not easily employed,
or hardly at all, amongst scattered people. They assemble, they arm,
they act, with the utmost difficulty, and at the greatest charge. Their
efforts, if ever they can be commenced, cannot be sustained. They cannot
proceed systematically. If the country-gentlemen attempt an influence
through the mere income of their property, what is it to that of those
who have ten times their income to sell, and who can ruin their property
by bringing their plunder to meet it at market? If the landed man wishes
to mortgage, he falls the value of his land and raises the value of
assignats. He augments the power of his enemy by the very means he must
take to contend with him. The country-gentleman, therefore, the officer
by sea and land, the man of liberal views and habits, attached to no
profession, will be as completely excluded from the government of his
country as if he were legislatively proscribed. It is obvious, that, in
the towns, all the things which conspire against the country-gentleman
combine in favor of the money manager and director. In towns combination
is natural.
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