It may easily be observed that though free governments have been commonly the most happy for those who partake of their freedom, yet are they the most ruinous and oppressive to their provinces; and this observation may, I believe, be fixed as a maxim of the kind we are here speaking of. When a monarch extends his dominions by conquest he soon learns to consider his old and his new subjects as on the same footing, because, in reality, all his subjects are to him the same, except the few friends and favourites with whom he is personally acquainted. He does not, therefore, make any distinction between them in his general laws, and at the same time is no less careful to prevent all particular acts of oppression on the one as on the other. But a free state necessarily makes a great distinction, and must always do so, till men learn to love their neighbours as well as themselves. The conquerors, in such a government, are all legislators, and will be sure so to contrive matters, by restrictions of trade and by taxes, as to draw some private, as well as public advantage from their conquests. Provincial governors have also a better chance in a republic to escape with their plunder by means of bribery and interest; and their fellow-citizens, who find their own state to be enriched by the spoils of the subject-provinces, will be the more inclined to tolerate such abuses. Not to mention that it is a necessary precaution in a free state to change the governors frequently, which obliges these temporary tyrants to be more expeditious and rapacious, that they may accumulate sufficient wealth before they give place to their successors. What cruel tyrants were the Romans over the world during the time of their commonwealth! It is true they had laws to prevent oppression in their provincial magistrates, but Cicero informs us that the Romans could not better consult the interest of the provinces than by repealing these very laws. “For in that case,” says he, “our magistrates, having entire impunity, would plunder no more than would satisfy their own rapaciousness; whereas at present they must also satisfy that of their judges, and of all the great men of Rome whose protection they stand in need of.” Who can read of the cruelties and oppressions of Verres without horror and astonishment? And who is not touched with indignation to hear that after Cicero had exhausted on that abandoned criminal all the thunders of his eloquence, and had prevailed so far as to get him condemned to the utmost extent of the laws, yet that cruel tyrant lived peaceably to old age in opulence and ease, and thirty years afterwards was put into the proscription by Mark Anthony on account of his exorbitant wealth, where he fell, with Cicero himself, and all the most virtuous men of Rome? After the dissolution of the commonwealth the Roman yoke became easier upon the provinces, as Tacitus informs us; and it may be observed that many of