40/174 A country where the individual had become unaccustomed to injustice, simply by the force of an enlightened public opinion, might, indeed, be pitiable; but it seems to me it would be well prepared to receive an education more elevated and more pure. To be disaccustomed to evil is a great step towards becoming good. Turned aside from the paths of vice which would lead only to infamy, they appreciate better the attractions of virtue. Possibly it may be necessary for society to pass through this prosaic state, where men practice virtue by calculation, to be thence elevated to that more poetic region where they will no longer have need of such an exercise. |