The Revolution, which was brought about ostensibly for the benefit of the lower classes of society, has sunk them to a degree of degradation and misfortune to which they never were reduced under the ancient monarchy. They have been disinherited, stripped and deprived of every resource for existence, except defeats of arms and the fleeting spoil of vanquished nations. In the sententious language of Montesquieu, “With an hundred thousand arms they have overthrown everything, while with an hundred thousand feet they have crawled like insects.” This reversion of social order must destroy sentiments of moral obligation. Boys of fifteen beg for charity while their fathers and mothers toil in the field! Full-grown men are engaged in avocations peculiar to youth. A life of habitual indolence is encouraged in those who should be toiling for those who gave them birth. From this they will shortly be transplanted to the armies, without having been taught one occupation by which they might obtain a livelihood when the period of service has expired. What is to be expected of such young men on their return as citizens? They will be a dead stock on the community--a load on their friends, an incumbrance to themselves, they who have been taught no other trade but to handle a firelock, to parade and plunder--will merely be the terror of peaceful citizens, and the Government will find the only mode of disposing of them to send them back to the army. Thus an immense permanent military establishment will result, and will consist of an army which is the reservoir of the indolent and profligate, who must be supported by the speculations of the merchant and the labours of the farmer. This is in itself far more pernicious than the _corvées_, the abolishment of which was one of the pleas for the extirpation of the aristocracy. To foreign nations the possession by France of such an immense force ready to burst upon them at a single word of command must be an object of terror and alarm. And in self-defence they too must maintain powerful armies in the centre of Europe, in the midst of a profound and general peace. If an estimate is made of the many hundred thousand hands thus withdrawn from the pursuits of agriculture, manufactures, and commerce, some idea may be formed of the loss which huge standing armies cause to the community at large. Such arguments are, however, vain while the vast military establishment of France is upheld. Necessity compels every nation in Europe to provide for its own security. The military force of France is justly pleaded as a reason for maintaining a strong standing army in our island. How much more reason have continental nations to adopt a similar precaution, for they do not possess our advantage of being separated from France by a ditch? A man who proposed the reduction of the English army at the present time would be esteemed a madman. The continental powers are only pursuing a system forced upon them by imperious necessity.