National Gazette

As rivers run toward the sea (says Aristotle in his treatise on government) so does every government naturally verge towards tyranny.—Do the members of any governmental body act justly and uprightly? These have done their duty; they have answered the end of their creation, and are entitled to our esteem. The public, too, has made them an honorable, a generous compensation for their labours. Excessive praise of government, therefore, seems at least superfluous; and, from the general experience of time, may be pronounced pernicious, and ought always to be suspected. Praise (from their nature) are only due where benefits are conferred by a superior on an inferior; that is, where an act or choice is implied. But, with regard to the transactions of governments, every individual elected to a participation in that honor, can have no choice in the process of good and evil he is inviolably bound to the order, and the moment he transgresses that sacred obligation, he becomes a tyrant.