12 April 1805

Evidence

Securities

Ch. Procedure Technical

''. Conclusion

What then? To counteract throughout the interests - to frustrate the universal wishes of mankind - could such a work thus arduous[?] to the result in any degree of accident was not design deep design /the deepest/ - was not any thing less than the most consummate and constant /preserving/ artifice any thing less than necessary altogether necessary? necessary, on the part of all persons - in all causes and at all times? what was necessary was power: and this was all.

Not it indeed. Power indeed was necessary, power alone has every where been sufficient. Genius, discernment, probity - every useful every commendable /laudable/ endowment - would have been not superfluous only but obstructive. Stupidity, the grossest stupidity, has not only been fully adequate, but in a superior not to any exclusive degree, serviceable conducive. In addition to such intelligence as was necessary to the [.../] and not less [...?] of the sinister objects, and in default /and or in/ of artifice two things and but two things are necessary - ignorance and negligence. Nonsense[?] in proportion as it is gross, thickness obscurity: obscurity in proportion as it is thick, protects fraud against detection and imposes upon the mind of the suitor - that is of men in all his other forms - the sense of his helplessness and dependence. The more compleat /reacts from sense/ /unintelligible/ the nonsense, the more injurious, the more vulnerable, and when backed with irresistible power the more awful as well as [...?], the science.

To cleanse the stable of Progress[?] required heroic, almost superhuman powers: to fill it was matter of no such difficulty, no beast too dull not to be capable of contributing his share.

The foundations of the technical system were laid everywhere in the gloom of general ignorance: when printing was unknown, and when writing the art which embraces all other arts was practiced scarce by any /by few indeed/ but those who in this way or in some other way, abused it. Stupidity, under the guidance /direction/ of interest was sufficient to rear the /for the rearing of/ the fabrik: prejudice the offspring of sinister interest, prejudice with or without its parent, has been, and would for ever be, sufficient for the preservation /upholding/ of it.