and Themistocles were so unlike those of the time of Constantine." Volney observes that "the moral character of nations, taken from that of individuals, chiefly depends on the social state in which they live; since it is true that our actions are governed by our civil and religious laws, and since our habits are no more than a repetition of those actions, and our character only the disposition to act in such a manner under such circumstances, it evidently follows that these must essentially depend on the nature of the government and religion." Says Addison, "In all despotic governments, though a particular prince may favor arts and letters, there is a natural degeneracy of mankind, as you may observe from Augustus's reign, how the Romans lost themselves by degrees, until they fell to an equality with the most barbarous nations that surrounded them. Look upon Greece under its free states, and you would think its inhabitants lived in different climates and under different heavens from those at present, so different are the geniuses which are formed under Turkish slavery and Grecian liberty. "Besides poverty and want, there are other reasons that debase the minds of men who live under Slavery, though I look on this as the principal. The natural tendency of despotic powers to ignorance and barbarity, though not insisted upon by others, is, I think, an unanswerable argument against that form of government, as it shows how repugnant it is to the good of mankind and the perfection of human nature, which ought to be the great end of all civil institutions." "Liberty should reach every individual of a people, as they all share one common nature; if it only spreads among particular branches there had better be none at all, since such a liberty only aggravates the misfortune of those who are deprived of it, by setting before them a disagreeable subject of comparison." "The pride of Athens," writes Mirabeau, "and the jealousy of the Greeks, banished forever the liberty of those countries, so long fortunate." Such is and always was our world, covered from time to time with conquerors and slaves, because the conquering, in forging the irons of the unhappy, with which they bound them, sharpen those which must bind them in turn. Such is and always will be man, from time to time despot and slave, for man, denaturalized by servitude, becomes readily the most ferocious of animals if he escapes an instant from oppression. There is but one step from the despot to the slave, from the slave to the despot, and the chain becomes them alike. XXVIII. There are strange forces constantly at work: civilizations spring up, disappear, and sometimes, but rarely, return again after a sleep of ages: it seems as though genius laid fallow for a period, like the golden grains.