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Mr. Isaacs
The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mr. Isaacs, by F. Marion Crawford This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: Mr. Isaacs
Author: F. Marion Crawford
Release Date: August 31, 2004 [EBook #13340]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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MR. ISAACS A TALE OF MODERN INDIA
BY F. MARION CRAWFORD
1882
CHAPTER I.
In spite of Jean-Jacques and his school, men are not everywhere born free, any more than they are everywhere in chains, unless these be of their own individual making. Especially in countries where excessive liberty or excessive tyranny favours the growth of that class most usually designated as adventurers, it is true that man, by his own dominant will, or by a still more potent servility, may rise to any grade of elevation; as by the absence of these qualities he may fall to any depth in the social scale.
Wherever freedom degenerates into license, the ruthless predatory instinct of certain bold and unscrupulous persons may, and almost certainly will, place at their disposal the goods, the honours, and the preferment justly the due of others; and in those more numerous and certainly more unhappy countries, where the rule of the tyrant is substituted for th