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THE NATURE AND CAUSES OK

lias served for several successive campaigns in the field, be-comes in every respect a standing army. The soldiers areevery day exercised in the use of their arms, and, being con-stantly under the command of their officers, are habituated tothe same prompt obedience which takes place in standingarmies. What they were before they took the field, is of littleimportance. They necessarily become in every respect astanding army, after they have passed a few campaigns in it.Should the war in America drag out through another cam-paign, the American militia may become in every respect amatch for that standing army of which the valour appeared,in the last war, at least not inferior to that of the hardiest ve-terans of France and Spain .

This distinction being well understood, the history of allages, it will be found, bears testimony to the irresistible su-periority which a well-regulated standing army has over amilitia.

One of the first standing armies of which we have any dis-tinct account, in any well-authenticated history, is that ofPhilip of Macedon . His frequent wars with the Thracians, Il-lyrians, Thessalians, and some of the Greek cities in the neigh-bourhood of Macedon, gradually formed his troops, whichin the beginning were probably militia, to the exact disciplineof a standing army. When he was at peace, which he wasvery seldom, and never for any long time together, lie wascareful not to disband that army. It vanquished and sub-dued, after a long and violent struggle, indeed, the gallantand well-exercised militias of the principal republics of an-cient Greece; and afterward, with very little struggle, theeffeminate and ill-exercised militia of the great Persian em-pire. The fall of the Greek republics and of the Persian em-pire, was the effect of the irresistible superiority which astanding army has over every sort of militia. It is the firstgreat revolution in the affairs of mankind, of which historyhas preserved any distinct or circumstantial account.

The fall of Carthage , and the consequent elevation ofHome, is the second. All the varieties in the fortune of thosetwo famous republics may very well be accounted for fromthe same cause.

From the end of the fust to the beginning of the secondCarthaginian war, the armies of Carthage were continuallyin the field, and employed under three great generals, whosucceeded one another in the command ; Amilcar, his son-in-