The great use of government is as a restraint; and there is no restraint
which it ought to put upon others, and upon itself too, rather than
that which is imposed on the fury of speculating under circumstances of
irritation. The number of idle tales, spread about by the industry
of faction, and by the zeal of foolish good-intention, and greedily
devoured by the malignant credulity of mankind, tends infinitely to
aggravate prejudices, which, in themselves, are more than sufficiently
strong. In that state of affairs, and of the public with relation
to them, the first thing that government owes to us, the people,
is INFORMATION; the next is timely coercion:--the one to guide our
judgment; the other to regulate our tempers.