There is not, nor has there been, nor will there ever be a people, or perhaps an individual, that does not suffer difficulties, cares, and sorrows (and these not few in number or trivial) derived from the nature and intrinsic and innate defects of its government, whatever it has been, is, or may be. (295)

Leopardi, Giacomo, and Michael Caesar. Zibaldone. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013.