The intimacy which is contracted in infancy, and the friendship which is formed in misfortune, are, of all others, the most lasting and alterable. The present time, likewise, is that peculiar time, which never happens to a nation but once, viz the time of forming itself into a government. Most nations have let slip the opportunity, and by that means have been compelled to receive laws from their conquerors, instead of making laws for themselves. As to religion, I hold it to be the indispensable duty of all government, to protect all conscientious professors thereof, and I know of no other business which government hath to do therewith. Let a man throw aside that narrowness of soul, that selfishness of principle, which the niggards of all professions are so unwilling to part with, and he will be at once delivered of his fears on that head.
Suspicion is the companion of mean souls, and the bane of all good society.
A firm bargain and a right reckoning make long friends. A small number of elecors, or a small number of representatives, are equally dangerous. But if the number of the representatives be not only small, but unequal, the danger is increased. The unwarrantable stretch likewise, which that house made in their last sitting, to gain an undue authority over the Delegates of that province, ought to warn the people at large, how they trust power out of their own hands. Expedience and right are different things.