It is like Faith without Works; They take it for a Dispensation from all other Duties, which is the worst kind of dispensing Power.
It groweth to be the Master Thought; the Eagerness against one another at home, being a nearer Object, extinguisheth that which we ought to have against our foreign Enemies; and few Mens Understandings can get above overvaluing the Danger that is nearest, in comparison of that more remote.
It turneth all Thought into talking instead of doing. Men get a habit of being unuseful to the Publick by turning in a Circle of Wrangling and Railing, which they cannot get out of: And it may be remarked, that a speculative Coxcomb is not only unuseful, but mischievous: A practical Coxcomb under discipline may be made use of.
It maketh a Man thrust his Understanding into a Corner, and confine it till by degrees he destroys it.
Party is generally an Effect of Wantonness, Peace, and Plenty, which beget Humour, Pride, &c. and that is called Zeal and publick Spirit.
They forget insensibly that there is any body in the World but themselves, by keeping no other Company; so they miscalculate cruelly. And thus Parties mistake their Strength by the same reason that private Men overvalue themselves; for we by finding fault with others, build up a partial Esteem of ourselves upon the Foundation of their Mistakes: So Men in Parties find faults with those in the Administration, not without reason, but forget that they would be exposed to the same Objections, and perhaps greater, if it was their Adversary’s turn to have the fault-finding part.
There are Men who shine in a Faction, and make a Figure by Opposition, who would stand in a worse light, if they had the Preferments they struggle for.
It looketh so like Courage (but nothing that is like is the same) to go to the Extream, that Men are carried away with it, and blown up out of their Senses by the wind of popular Applause.
That which looketh bold is a great Object that the People can discern; But that which is wise is not so easily seen: It is one part of it that it is not seen, but at the End of a Design. Those who are disposed to be wise too late, are apt to be valiant too early.
Most Men enter into a Party rashly, and retreat from it as shamefully. As they encourage one another at first, so they betray one another at last: And because every Qualification is capable of being corrupted by the Excess, they fall upon the extream, to fix mutual Reproaches upon one another.