Family feeling

TL;DRAbstract

Such lamentable but authorised injustices were sanctioned by the most enlightened men and implemented by the freest republics, as a result of regarding society as a union of families rather than as a union of persons. Say there are one hundred thousand people, divided into twenty thousand families, each comprising five people including the head of the family who represents it: then if the association is regarded as consisting of families, there will be twenty thousand persons and eighty thousand slaves; if it is regarded as consisting of individuals there will be one hundred thousand citizens and no slaves. In the former case, there will be one republic and twenty thousand little monarchies which make it up; in the latter, the republican spirit will be breathed not only in the squares and in public meetings, but also within the home, where much of a man's happiness or misery is to be found. In the first case, since laws and customs are the product of the habitual sentiments of the memb

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