For it cannot be
presumed that the same degree of sound policy, prudence, and foresight
would uniformly be observed by each of these confederacies for a long
succession of years.
Whenever, and from whatever causes, it might happen, and happen it
would, that any one of these nations or confederacies should rise on the
scale of political importance much above the degree of her neighbors,
that moment would those neighbors behold her with envy and with fear.
Both those passions would lead them to countenance, if not to promote,
whatever might promise to diminish her importance; and would also
restrain them from measures calculated to advance or even to secure her
prosperity. Much time would not be necessary to enable her to discern
these unfriendly dispositions. She would soon begin, not only to lose
confidence in her neighbors, but also to feel a disposition equally
unfavorable to them. Distrust naturally creates distrust, and by nothing
is good-will and kind conduct more speedily changed than by invidious
jealousies and uncandid imputations, whether expressed or implied.
The North is generally the region of strength, and many local
circumstances render it probable that the most Northern of the proposed
confederacies would, at a period not very distant, be unquestionably
more formidable than any of the others.
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