I shall only observe, that the insufficiency of political morality would appear still more obvious, in a country where the nation, subject to the authority of an absolute prince, would have no share in the government; for personal interest no longer having an habitual communication with the general interest, there would be just ground to fear, that in wishing to hold out the union of these two interests as the essential motive of virtue, the greater number would retain only this idea, that personality was admitted for the first principle; and consequently every one ought to reserve to himself the right of judging of the times and circumstances when self-love and patriotism are to be separated, or united. And how many errors would not this produce? Public good, like all abstract ideas, has not a precise definition; it is for the greater part of mankind a sea without bounds, and it requires not much address or shrewdness to confound all our analogies. We may know how we would form, according to our taste, the alliance of all the moral ideas, in considering with what facility men know how to reconcile with one quality the habitual infirmities of their character; he who wounds without discretion, prides himself in his frankness and courage; he who is cowardly and timid in his sentiments and in his words, boasts of his caution and circumspection; and by a new refinement of which I have seen singular examples, he who asks of the sovereign pecuniary favours, endeavours to persuade him that he is impelled to this solicitation, only by a noble love of honourable distinction; every one is ingenious in fixing the point of union which connects his passions with some virtue: would they then be less expert at finding some conformity between their own interest and that of the public?