ABSTRACT
Both these were owing, we suppose, to the author’s hurry of business in administring impartial justice to his majesty’s good people; but there is another, and a most unpardonable one, because it seems to be designed, which is his ridicule upon Liberty, in the second chapter of his eighth book; and since his catchpole could not tell him what Liberty1 is, we will tell him what it is not, by boldly affirming, that there can be no liberty in a country where there is not a free and independent senate or parliament, chosen by the general and uncorrupted voice of the people. There may be a shadow of Liberty, there may be a senate or parliament, there may be annual popular elections, nay, there may be a mild and gentle administration of government: All this they had at Rome under Augustus Cæsar; but in the reign of Augustus Cæsar, the Romans had no more Liberty, than they had in the reign of Tiberius, or of Nero.
