JB/538/141/001

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Hon:d Sir

I am to thank you for your favour of the 13th: and
if you had any particular wish or expectation of hearing from me
at the time you intimated to me in your last but one, am very
sorry I disappointed you. You mentioned no particular reason for any
such wish; and therefore all that I understood from the intimation
was that if any occasion for writing to you should occur, then it
was that a letter would have the most chance of reaching you directly.
I hope sincerely your late rambles will answer to you
as well in point of health as they seem to have done in point of
pleasure. The book which you mention as the subject of your literary
amusement I have been long ago acquainted with. I read it
in the original as soon as it came out, which was about 2 or 3
years ago. For amusement, I imagine, you could hardly have made
choice of a happier subject: it is a very beautiful and brilliant
piece of declamation, and as such universally admired: but for
exactness, I believe, no great store is set by it. You will not
like the author much, I believe, when he comes to touch upon
our American affairs: he takes the side of all male-contents, as the
most popular. The approbation given to the Chinese institution of Thinkers, did
not come first from him: it is favourably noticed by Helvetus, and
if I am not mistaken by Voltaire. What belongs to the Chinese Government
and Constitution has two great titles to popular admiration; the coming
from a great distance, and the being very little imperfectly known. One thing
however all accounts agree in; that the Government is despotic, or at
least that the body of the people have no sort of share in it: How fit
a subject it is for such warm encomiums from one who is an advocate
for Liberty a outrance, I leave you to imagine.

Identifier: | JB/538/141/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 538.
Date_1	1777-10-08	Marginal Summary Numbering
Box	538	Main Headings
Folio number	141	Info in main headings field
Image	001	Titles
Category	Correspondence	Number of Pages
Recto/Verso		Page Numbering
Penner	Jeremy Bentham	Watermarks
Marginals		Paper Producer
Corrections		Paper Produced in Year
Notes public		ID Number
Box Contents