that the same power, which placed them in the command, will have weight enough to screen them from the resentment of an injured people ... their supplies for the extraordinary expenses of the war will be raised with difficulty; ... because, as so great a part of the publick money will be absorbed by the number of pensions and lucrative employments, and diverted to other purposes of corruption, the funds destined for the publick service will be found greatly deficient. If the rich are applied to, in such depraved times, to contribute their superfluous wealth towards the publick expenses, their answer will be the same which Scopas the rich Thessalian made to a friend, who asked him for a piece of furniture, which he judged wholly useless to the possessor, because it was quite superfluous.[175] “You mistake, my friend; the supreme happiness of our lives consists in those things which you call superfluous, not in those things which you call necessaries.” The people, accustomed to sell themselves to the best bidder, will look upon the wages of corruption as their birthright, and will necessarily rise in their demands, in proportion as luxury, like other fashions, descends from the higher to the lower classes. Heavy and unequal taxes must consequently be imposed to make up this deficiency; and the operations of the war must either be retarded by the slowness in collecting the produce, or the money must be borrowed at high interest and excessive premiums, and the publick given up a prey to the extortion of usurers. If a venal and luxurious Demades should be at the head of the ruling party,[176] such an administration would hardly find credit sufficient to support their measures, as the moneyed men would be averse to trusting their property in such rapacious hands;[177] for the chain of self-interest, which links such a set of men together, will reach from the highest quite down to the lowest officer of the state; because the higher officers, for the mutual support of the whole, must connive at the frauds and rapines of the inferior, or screen them if detected. If therefore the united voice of a people, exhausted by the oppressions of a weak and iniquitous administration, should call a truly disinterested patriot to the helm, such a man must be exposed to all the malice of detected villany, backed by the whole weight of disappointed faction. Plutarch has handed down to us a striking instance of this truth in the case of Aristides, which is too remarkable to be omitted.