ADVERTISEMENT
1. For the better understanding of the first four books of this
work, it is to be observed that what I distinguish by the name of
virtue, in a republic, is the love of one's country, that is, the love
of equality. It is not a moral, nor a Christian, but a political
virtue; and it is the spring which sets the republican government in
motion, as honour is the spring which gives motion to monarchy. Hence it
is that I have distinguished the love of one's country, and of equality,
by the appellation of political virtue. My ideas are new, and therefore
I have been obliged to find new words, or to give new acceptations to
old terms, in order to convey my meaning. They, who are unacquainted
with this particular, have made me say most strange absurdities, such as
would be shocking in any part of the world, because in all countries and
governments morality is requisite.
2. The reader is also to notice that there is a vast difference
between saying that a certain quality, modification of the mind, or virtue, is
not the spring by which government is actuated, and affirming that it is
not to be found in that government. Were I to say such a wheel or such a
pinion is not the spring which sets the watch going, can you infer
thence that they are not to be found in the watch? So far is it from
being true that the moral and Christian virtues are excluded from
monarchy, that even political virtue is not excluded. In a word, honour
is found in a republic, though its spring be political virtue; and
political virtue is found in a monarchical government, though it be
actuated by honour.
To conclude, the honest man of whom we treat in the third book,
chapter 5, is not the Christian, but the political honest man, who is
possessed of the political virtue there mentioned. He is the man who
loves the laws of his country, and who is actuated by the love of those
laws. I have set these matters in a clearer light in the present
edition, by giving a more precise meaning to my expression: and in most
places where I have made use of the word virtue I have taken care to add
the term political.
