Every campaign has added to their loss, and every year to their disgrace; till unable to go on, and ashamed to go back, their politics have come to a halt, and all their fine prospects to a halter.
Paine vividly describes the accumulating failures of the British military campaigns, leading to a political stalemate and ruin.
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The Aristocracy had hitherto opposed the despotism of the Court, and affected the language of patriotism; but it opposed it as its rival (as the English Barons opposed King John) and it now opposed the nation from the same motives.
In fine, society performs for itself almost everything which is ascribed to government.
The American constitutions were to liberty what a grammar is to language: they define its parts of speech, and practically construct them into syntax.
Man cannot, properly speaking, make circumstances for his purpose, but he always has it in his power to improve them when they occur, and this was the case in France.