Such examples may excite and alarm the
jealousy and caution of states; the presence of similar dangers may
exercise the talents of politicians and statesmen; but mere reverses of
fortune are the common materials of history, and must long since have
ceased to create our surprise.
Did we find, that nations advancing from small beginnings, and arrived at
the possession of arts which lead to dominion, became secure of their
advantages, in proportion as they were qualified to gain them; that they
proceeded in a course of uninterrupted felicity, till they were broke by
external calamities; and that they retained their force, till a more
fortunate or vigorous power arose to depress them; the subject in
speculation could not be attended with many difficulties, nor give rise to
many reflections. But when we observe, among many nations, a kind of
spontaneous return to obscurity and weakness; when, in spite of perpetual
admonitions of the danger they run, they suffer themselves to be subdued,
in one period, by powers which could not have entered into competition with
them in a former, and by forces which they had often baffled and despised,
the subject becomes more curious, and its explanation more difficult.
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