Notwithstanding
the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are
carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are
afraid to trust the people with arms. And it is not certain, that with
this aid alone they would not be able to shake off their yokes. But were
the people to possess the additional advantages of local governments
chosen by themselves, who could collect the national will and direct the
national force, and of officers appointed out of the militia, by these
governments, and attached both to them and to the militia, it may be
affirmed with the greatest assurance, that the throne of every tyranny
in Europe would be speedily overturned in spite of the legions which
surround it. Let us not insult the free and gallant citizens of America
with the suspicion, that they would be less able to defend the rights of
which they would be in actual possession, than the debased subjects of
arbitrary power would be to rescue theirs from the hands of their
oppressors. Let us rather no longer insult them with the supposition
that they can ever reduce themselves to the necessity of making the
experiment, by a blind and tame submission to the long train of
insidious measures which must precede and produce it.
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