despotism, sycophancy of the electors, the habit of regarding politics as a trade*, and of struggling for infamous honours instead of true glory.†

Because universal licence has produced a complete disorganisation of civil government, and the organisation of military life, which is based upon centralisation, is the only organisation remaining in the state.

Because the exhausted plutocracy (if one exists) hopes to have the best offices under an autocrat, and is glad to have his assistance in expelling or at least silencing the sycophants of the populace, forgetful that, like the Soderini, the Strozzi, the Rodolfi of Florence, they will soon sink into the condition of unknown and servile functionaries; and even when a plutocracy are hostile to a prince, they make but a poor stand against him, if he is otherwise supported, for no order of men are so given to fear as those who have their property in the shape of money.

Because in the last stage of disorganisation the party of order desires quiet and security for property at any price, and the party of progress identifies itself with numbers and intelligence. The triumph of the latter produces a republican anarchy, from which the national reaction, accompanied by the influence of the party of order, leads to the only form of government that can secure order. Despotism is that only form of government ; and despotism the friends of order support, as their only security, although before the anarchy they may have been monarchists, aristocrats, or constitutionalists. Anarchy, therefore, transforms its antagonists into the supporters of despotism.

* Οἱ γὰρ ἐν ταῖς πόλεσι προστάντες μετ ̓ ὀνόματος ἑκάτεροι εὐπρεποῦς πλήθους τε ἰσονομίας πολιτικῆς καὶ ἀριστοκρατίας σώφρονος προτιμήσει, τὰ μὲν κοινὰ λόγῳ θεραπεύοντες ἆθλα ἐποιοῦντο.—Thucyd. iii. 82.

Montesquieu remarks pointedly, that after the plebeian knights became judges at Rome, there was no virtue, no police, no law, or magistrates.

See Niebuhr, Hist. Rom. iv. 352.

Because, even if so disposed, the turbulent rabble have not strength or condensation enough to resist an incoming despot supported by the army, who make them fear for their condition in this world, and the priests, who make them fear for their condition in the next.

Because the tyranny of the opinion of the majority which admits no dissent, a tyranny like that established during the first French revolution, and which now prevails in America, implants in the minds of the people a sentiment of political fear; and fear is the principle of despotism. Thought is crushed by absolutism of any kind; by absolutism of democracy, as in America and France; by absolutism of plutocracy, as in Venice; and the operation of crushing thought has not therefore to be commenced but only continued by an incoming despot.

Because the nation under a plutocracy or democracy has been derided for its love of peace, and its sole addic tion to commerce; and hopes in the military glory of its despot to recover its wounded vanity.

Because utility, the principle of democracies, leads to luxury, and luxury tends to its own augmentation, till at last material interests are the only interests regarded in such a society; and one who aspires to a principate seldom fails to express his devoted attachment to the material interests of those who are to elect or to accept him. He responds to their cry of Panem et Circenses, and they are satisfied. For the sagacious despot is one who, not content with professing, acts on the principle that the greatest sensual happiness of the greatest number is the true object of government. An autocrat has the power to overrule petty vested interests, which in free countries impede vast and uniform undertakings, for promoting material interests. In short, he can make straight roads.

Because an autocrat gratifies the love of novelty by making new laws and institutions; gratifies the love of equality, by assuming as the basis of these laws and

institutions, that all his subjects are equal, and excites admiration and fear by the grandeur, universality, and immobility of his code.+

Because the nobility having perished, and the state being governed by a civic mercantile plutocracy, the generals as well as the troops are in the main sought from the class of neighbouring petty princes and soldiers of fortune, tutelary geniuses, who, entering a state to defend, sometimes remain to govern.

These are some of the reasons that explain the sequence from democracy or plutocracy, or a combination of both, to a centralised despotism. There is probably no one nation in which they all operate together in producing the change; but the change, I venture to think, has never been produced without the operation of some two or more of them. And as plutocracy and democracy, when in fair conflict together, temper each other and check, in some measure, the faults to which they are separately liable; so when they meet in conflict with aristocracy and a constitutional monarchy, they not only are themselves much purged of their own faults, but they become useful in purging those other elements of theirs; yet the despotism into which they merge combines not the merits but the faults of each. The contest of the social elements is ended. Each is indulged; but he may not strive, he may not discuss.

And so the sun goes down upon the battle: class against class, element against element, theorist against theorist, all in one undistinguished mass, striving for the prize of

* Few things are more destructive of respect for a legislation than constant change of laws, for it betokens feebleness and want of foresight.

† Cf. the advice of Machiavel (The Prince, ch. xxvi.), and the practice of Napoleon.

‡ Machiavel, Hist. Flor. bk. i. fin. So Xanthippus, the Spartan, was chosen general by the democracy of Carthage, because the Punic generals were totally incapable to conduct an army. Niebuhr, Hist. Rom. iii. 589.

valour and of industry-all left in one blank night. The cries and the clangour of the combatants grow fainter, and soon cease to trouble the still darkness; and when the morn breaks, their standards are plucked down, their badges torn from their breasts, and their arms borne by the despot's soldiery. All are like one another, and no one can tell to which faction they had belonged, what hopes they cherished, what principles supported. No more turmoil of tongues, no more clash of steel, no more rough shouldering onward for truth or ambition's sake; all is still, save that I hear a slight clink as each man walks, the clink of the chain upon his ankle.

bow, bow, kaw!

CHAP. XXII.

NATIONS GOVERNED BY A DESPOT.

"Quid vanæ sine moribus leges proficient?"

DOES it please you best, reader, to travel through an unequal country, now charming with sudden bursts of beautiful scenery, now wooing to stay by the homely happy air of its green valleys, now harassing you by rugged and dangerous passes, now detaining you almost hopelessly in pestilent morasses, to find yourself on one side of the hill in a garden of Eden, and on the other in a slough of despond; or do you like better to roll along an equal plain where you are neither troubled with difficulties and dangers, nor diverted by the beauty of prospect or romance of adventure; but where you pass mechanically on with undeviating precision from one equidistant station to another, surrounded with scientific appliance for travelling, but without change, without incident, without anything to break monotony? If the former, you will have sympathy with the vital principles of aristocracy; if the latter, with those of a centralised despotism.

every

For the sake of brevity the word despotism is used in these pages as a synonym for a centralised aristocracy governed by the functionary system. If there is an offensive meaning usually attached to the use of the word despot, I beg to disclaim all intention of implying it here. As an Englishman, I would oppose the establishment of a

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