From all the facts before introduced, it is evident that the power of the Crown, in England, bears upon foundations that are quite péculiar to it, and that its fecurity and strength are obtained by means totally different from those by which the fame advantages are fo incompletely procured, and fo deeply paid for, in other Countries,

It is without the affiftance of an armed force that the Crown, in England, is able to manifeft that fearleffnefs of particular individuals, or whole claffes of them, with which it dif charges its legal functions and duties. It is without the affiftance of an armed force, it is

conftitutional laws as he diflikes; ufing as much temper as he can, that he may have the more time to proceed. And when at length things fhould be brought to a crifis, then I would advise him to form another army, out of thofe friends or clafs of the People whom the turn and incidents of the preceding contefts, will have linked and rivetted to his interest: with this army he might now take his chance the reft would depend on his generalfhip: and even in a great measure on his bare reputation in that refpec.

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This advice to the King of England I fuppofe, I would. however conclude with obferving to him, that his fituation is as advantageous, to the full, as that of any King upon earth, and upon the whole, that all the advantages that can poffibly arise from the success of his plan, cannot make it worth his while to undertake it.

able to counterbalance the extenfive and unreftrained freedom of the People, it is able to exert that refifting ftrength which conftantly keeps increafing in a fuperior proportion to the force. by which it is oppofed, that ballasting power by which, in the midft of boisterous winds and gales, it recovers and rights again the Veffel of the State (a).

It is from the Civil branch of its Office, the Crown derives that ftrength by which it fube dues even the Military power, and keeps it in a state of subjection to the Laws unexampled in any other Country. It is from an happy arrangement of things, it derives that uninter, rupted steadiness, that invifible folidity, which procures to the Subject both fo certain a protection, and fo extenfive a freedom. It is from the Nation, it receives the force with which it

(a) There is a number of circumftances in the English Government which those persons who with for fpeculative meliorations, fuch as Parliamentary reform, or other changes of a like kind, do not perhaps think of taking into confideration. If fo, they are, in their proceedings, in danger of meddling with a number of ftrings, the exiftence of which they do not fufpect. While they only mean reformation and improvement, they are in danger of removing the Talisman on which the exiftence of the Fabric depends, or, like King Nifus's daughter, of cutting off the fatal hair with which the fate of the City is connected.

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governs the Nation. Its refources are, accord, and not compulfion,-free action, and not fear, -and it continues to reign through the play, the ftruggle, of the voluntary paffions of those who pay obedience to it (a).

CHA P. XVII.

How far the examples of Nations who have loft their liberty, are applicable to England.

VERY Government, those Writers obferve who have treated thefe fubjects, containing within itself the efficient cause of its ruin, a cause which is effentially connected with those very circumstances that had produced its profperity, the advantages attending the English Government cannot therefore, according to these Writers, exempt it from that hidden defect which is fecretly working its ruin; and M. de Montefquieu, giving his opinion both on the effect and the cause, fays, "the English Conftitution will lofe its liberty, will perish:

(a) Many perfons, fatisfied with feeing the elevation and upper parts of a building, think it immaterial to give a look under ground, and notice the foundation. Those Readers therefore who cheofe, may confider the long Chapter that has just been concluded, as a kind of foreign digreffion or parenthefis, in the course of the Work.

"Have not Rome, Lacedæmon, and Car"thage, perished? It will perish when the "Legislative power fhall have become more "corrupt than the Executive."

Though I do by no means pretend that any human establishment can escape the fate to which we see every thing in Nature is fubject, nor am fo far prejudiced by the sense I entertain of the great advantages of the Englifh Government, as to reckon among them that of eternity, I will however obferve in general, that, as it differs by its ftructure and refources from all thofe with which History makes us acquainted, fo it cannot be faid to be liable to the fame dangers. To judge of the one from the other, is to judge by analogy where no analogy is to be found; and my refpect for the author I have quoted will not hinder me from faying, that his opinion has not the fame weight with me on this occafion, that it has on many others.

Having neglected, as indeed all fyftematic Writers upon Politics have done, very attentively to enquire into the real foundations of Power, and of Government, among Mankind, the principles he lays down are not always fo clear, or even so juft, as we might

have expected from a Man of fo true a genius. When he speaks of England, for inftance, his observations are much too general and though he had frequent opportunities of converfing with Men who had been perfonally concerned in the public affairs of this Country, and he had been himself an eye-witnefs of the operations of the English Government, yet, when he attempts to defcribe it, he rather tells us what he conjectured than what he faw.

The examples he quotes, and the causes of diffolution which he affigns, particularly confirm this obfervation. The Government of Rome, to speak of the one which, having gradually, and as it were of itfelf, fallen to ruin, may afford matter for exact reasoning, had no relation to that of England. The Roman

People were not, in the latter ages of the Com monwealth, a People of Citizens, but of Conquerors. Rome was not a State, but the head of a State. By the immenfity of its conquefts, it came in time to be in a manner only an ac¬ ceffory part of its own Empire. Its power became fo great, that, after having conferred it, it was at length no longer able to resume it: and from that moment it became itself subjected to it, from the fame reason that the Provinces themfelves were fo.