The event, however, has not corresponded to this expectation. The virtues
of men have shone most during their struggles, not after the attainment of
their ends. Those ends themselves, though attained by virtue, are
frequently the causes of corruption and vice. Mankind, in aspiring to
national felicity, have substituted arts which increase their riches,
instead of those which improve their nature. They have entertained
admiration of themselves, under the titles of _civilized_ and of
_polished_, where they should have been affected with shame; and even
where they have, for a while, acted on maxims tending to raise, to
invigorate, and to preserve the national character, they have, sooner or
later, been diverted from their object, and fallen a prey to misfortune, or
to the neglects which prosperity itself had encouraged.
War, which furnishes mankind with a principal occupation of their restless
spirit, serves, by the variety of its events, to diversify their fortunes.
While it opens to one tribe or society, the way to eminence, and leads to
dominion, it brings another to subjection, and closes the scene of their
national efforts.
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