"If omnipotence," he writes, "can with any sense be ascribed to a legislature, it must be lodged where all legislative authority originates; that is, in the People." Such a system is alone compatible with the ends of government, since it cannot be supposed that men "combine into communities and institute government" for self-enslavement.

Nor is any other political system "consistent with the natural equality of mankind"; by which Price means that no man "is constituted by the author of nature the vassal or subject of another, or has any right to give law to him, or, without his consent, to take away any part of his property or to abridge him of his liberty." From all of which it is concluded that liberty is inalienable; and a people which has lost it "must have a right to emancipate themselves as soon as they can." The aptness of the argument to the American situation is obvious enough; and nowhere is Price more happy or more formidable than when he applies his precepts to phrases like "the unity of the empire" and the "honor of the kingdom" which were so freely used to cover up the inevitable results of George's obstinacy.
The _Essay on the Right of Property in Land_ (1781) of William Ogilvie deserves at least a passing notice.

The author, who published his book anonymously, was a Professor of Latin in the University of Aberdeen and an agriculturist of some success.

His own career was distinctly honorable.

The teacher of Sir James Mackintosh, he had a high reputation as a classical scholar and deserves to be remembered for his effort to reform a college which had practically ceased to perform its proper academic functions.