Thus could the vilest of passions be gratified with impunity.

People were robbed, stolen, murdered, under the pretended idea that these were reputable adventures: every enormity in short was committed, and dressed up in the habiliments of honour.
But as the notions of men in the less barbarous ages, which followed, became more corrected and refined, the practice of piracy began gradually to disappear.

It had hitherto been supported on the grand columns of _emolument_ and _honour_.

When the latter therefore was removed, it received a considerable shock; but, alas! it had still a pillar for its support! _avarice_, which exists in all states, and which is ready to turn every invention to its own ends, strained hard for its preservation.

It had been produced in the ages of barbarism; it had been pointed out in those ages as lucrative, and under this notion it was continued.