“That is the first time I ever heard you croak, except in a public speech where you had a point to gain,” said Livingston.  “Do you mean that?”

“What of it?” asked Clinton.  “Under Mr. Hamilton’s constitution—­for if it be not quite so monarchical as the one he wanted, it has been saddled upon the United States through his agency more than through any other influence or group of influences—­I say, that under Mr. Hamilton’s constitution all individualism is lost.  We are to be but the component parts of a great machine which will grind us as it lists.  Had we remained thirteen independent and sovereign States, with a tribunal for what little common legislation might be necessary, then we might have built up a great and a unique nation; but under what is little better than an absolute monarchy all but a small group of men are bound to live and die nonentities.”

“But think of the excited competition for a place in that group,” said Hamilton, laughing.  The disappointed Governor’s propositions were not worthy of serious argument.

“I do not think it is as bad as that, your Excellency,” said Dr. Franklin, mildly.  “I should have favoured a somewhat loose Confederation, as you know, but the changes and the development of this country will be so great that there will be plenty of room for individualism; indeed, it could not be suppressed.  And after a careful study of this instrument that you are to live under—­my own time is so short that my only role now is that of the prophet—­I fail to see anything of essential danger to the liberties of the American people.  I may say that the essays of “The Federalist” would have reassured me on this point, had I still doubted.  I read them again the other week.  The proof is there, I think, that the Constitution, if rigidly interpreted and lived up to, must prove a beneficent if stern parent to those who dwell under it.”

Clinton shrugged his shoulders.  “I would I could share your optimism,” he said.  “What a picture have we!  The most venerable statesman in the country finding some hope for individual liberty in this Constitution; the youngest, an optimist by nature and habit, sanguine by youth and temperament, trembling for the powers it may confer upon a people too democratically inclined.  This is true, sir—­is it not?”

“Yes,” said Hamilton.  “Democracy is a poison, just as Republicanism is the ideal of all self-respecting men.  I would do all I could to vitalize the one and nullify the other.  The spirit of democracy exists already, no doubt of it.  If we could suppress it in time, we should also suppress the aspirations of encouraged plebianism,—­a dangerous factor in any republic.  It means the mixing of ignoble blood with good, a gradual lowering of ideals until a general level of sordidness, individualism in its most selfish and self-seeking form, and political corruption, are the inevitable results.  You, your Excellency, are an autocrat.  It is odd that your principles should coincide so closely with the despotism of democracy.”