PART V - Of the Decline of Nations

Summary

Of supposed National Eminence, and of the Vicissitudes of Human Affairs

No nation is so unfortunate as to think itself inferior to the rest of mankind: few are even willing to put up with the claim to equality. The greater part having chosen themselves, as at once, the judges and the models of what is excellent in their kind, are first in their own opinion, and give to others consideration or eminence, so far only as they approach to their own condition. One nation is vain of the personal character, or of the learning, of a few of its members; another, of its policy, its wealth, its tradesmen, its gardens, and its buildings; and they who have nothing to boast, are vain, because they are ignorant. The Russians, before the reign of Peter the Great, thought themselves possessed of every national honour, and held the Nenei, or dumb nations, (the name which they bestowed on their western neighbours of Europe), in a proportional degree of contempt. The map of the world, in China, was a square plate, the greater part of which was occupied by the provinces of this great empire, leaving on its skirts a few obscure corners, into which the wretched remainder of mankind were supposed to be driven. ‘If you have not the use of our letters, nor the knowledge of our books,’ said the learned Chinese to the European missionary, ‘what literature, or what science, can you have?’