1 ADVANTAGES OF THE GOVERNMENT. 175
2 Another incakailable advantage of the present, syvtem is, that
3 .tiMUgb it mBOangjBB attie diaofrden, it idBbids m effectual security
4 agnost the general revoliitioni and calamities to which despotic
5 . oountries in Asia are so frequently wrti^ect. In Persia or India, the
6 passions of a bad king are felt through every part of his dominioiu}
7 And the civil wars which ooair almost as often as a Kuig dies, never
8 fail to throw the kingdom into a state of misery md disorder : part
9 of the inhabitants are exposed to the licence and cruelty of the am-
10 tending armies, and the rest suffers, nearly in an equal degree, from
11 the anarchy that follows a dissolution of the government which has
12 hithprfo maiTttain^ the pubhc tran(|uillity. The consequence is,
13 that a tyrant, or a disputed succession, reduces the natiou to a state
14 of weakness and decav, from which it cannot wholly be retrieved,
15 before its recovery is checked by tlie recurrence of a sinular calaniitv.
16 In Afghaunistaun, on the contrary, the interiiel government ol the
17 tribes answer-; its oiul so well, that the utmost disorders of the royal
18 goveniiiieiit never derange its operations, nor. disturb tiie lives of the
19 -people. A uumber of organised and high-spirited republics are
20 readv to defend their rugged country against a tyrant; uikI are able
21 to defv the feeble.efforts of a party in a civil war. Accordingly, if we
22 compare the condition of tlie two kingdoms, we find Persia in a state
23 of decay, after twenty yean ci entire tranquillity j whUe A%hauni*
24 staun omtinaes the progressiye impiovement* wludi it haa kept up
25 during twdve yeaia of civil warfare^ New aqiiedncta aie constantly
26 made, and new lands bibii|^ into cnltiTation: llie towns and the
27 oowrtry roond theni» indeed^ as well as that on the great roads* are
28 declining ; bat the cause u obvious* in tiheir being immedistd^ ex*
29 posed to the power of the competitois &r the oown^ and to the pil-
30 lage of their annies.
31 But even if we admit the infericmly of die A^^iaun institations
32 todmae of the moreyigoious governments of other Attatic oouiilries,
33 wis cannot hut be struck with the vast superiority of the materials
34 Ifafij aiford fiir the constmction of a national oonstitotioiu ' The olji^
35 tt