Second Part of the Chapter.

THERE is certainly a very great degree of singularity in all the circumstances we have been describing here: those persons who are acquainted with the history of other countries cannot but remark with surprise that stability of the power of the English crown,-that mysterious solidity, that inward binding strength with which it is able to carry on with certainty its legal operations, amidst the clamorous struggle and uproar with which it is commonly surrounded, and without the medium of any armed threatening force. To give a demonstration of the manner in which all these things are brought to bear and operate, it is not, as I said before, my design to attempt here; the principles from which such demonstration is to be derived, suppose an inquiry into the nature of man, and of human affairs, which rather belongs to philosophy (though to a branch hitherto unexplored) than to politics; at least such an inquiry certainly lies out of the sphere of the common

servations above made; nor do I think that, all circumstances being considered, any other country can produce the like instance.

science of politics*.

However, I had a very material reason for introducing all the abovementioned facts concerning the peculiar stability of the governing authority of England, inasmuch as they lead to an observation of a most important political nature; which is, that this stability allows several essential branches of English liberty to take place, which, without it, could not exist. For there is a very essential consideration to be made in every science, though speculators are sometimes apt to lose sight of it, which is this-in order that things may have existence, they must be possible; in order that political regulations of any kind may obtain their effect, they must imply no direct contradiction, either open or hidden, to the nature of things, or to the other circumstances of the government. In reasoning from this principle, we shall find that the stability of the governing executive authority in England, and the weight it gives to the whole machine of the state, have actually enabled the English nation, considered

-. It may, if the reader pleases, belong to the science of metapolitics; in the same sense as we say metaphysics; that is, the science of those things which lie beyond physical or substantial things. A few more words are bestowed upon the same subject in the advertisement, or preface, at the head of this work.

as a free nation, to enjoy several advantages which would really have been totally unattain able in the other states we have mentioned in former chapters, whatever degree of public virtue we might even suppose to have belonged to the men who acted in those states as the advisers of the people, or, in general, who were intrusted with the business of framing the laws.

One of these advantages resulting from the solidity of the government, is, the extraordinary personal freedom which all ranks of individuals in England enjoy at the expense of the governing authority. In the Roman commonwealth, for instance, we behold the senate invested with a number of powers totally destructive of the liberty of the citizens: and the continuance of these powers was, no doubt, in a great measure, owing to the treacherous remissness of those men to whom the people trusted for repressing them, or even to their determined resolution not to abridge those prerogatives. Yet, if we attentively consider the constant situation of affairs in that republic, we shall find, that though we should suppose those persons to have been ever so truly attached to the cause of the peo ple, it would not really have been possible for them to procure to the people an entire security. The right enjoyed by the senate, of suddenly

naming a dictator with a power unrestrained by any law, or of investing the consuls with an authority of much the same kind, and the power it at times assumed of making formidable examples of arbitrary justice, were resources of which the republic could not, perhaps, with safety have been totally deprived: and though these expedients frequently were used to destroy the just liberty of the people, yet they were also very often the means of preserving the commonwealth.

Upon the same principle we should possibly find that the ostracism, that arbitrary method of banishing citizens, was a necessary resource in the republic of Athens. A Venetian noble would perhaps also confess, that, however terrible the state inquisition, established in his republic, may be even to the nobles themselves, yet it would not be prudent entirely to abolish it. And we do not know but a minister of state in France, though ever so virtuous and moderate a man, would say the same with regard to secret imprisonments, the lettres de cachet, and other arbitrary deviations from the settled course of law, which often take place in that kingdom, and in the other monarchies of Europe. No doubt, if he was the man we suppose, he would confess that the expedients mentioned have in numberless instances been basely prostituted to

gratify the wantonness and private revenge of ministers, or of those who had any interest with them; but still perhaps he would continue to give it as his opinion, that the crown, notwithstanding its apparently immense strength, could not avoid recurring at times to expedients of this kind; much less could it publicly and absolutely renounce them for ever.

It is therefore a most advantageous circumstance in the English government, that its security renders all such expedients unnecessary, and that the representatives of the people have not only been constantly willing to promote the public liberty, but that the general situation of affairs has also enabled them to carry their precautions so far as they have done. And indeed, when we consider what prerogatives the crown, in England, has implicitly renounced;—that, in consequence of the independence conferred on the judges, and of the method of trial by jury, it is deprived of all means of influencing the settled course of the law both in civil and criminal matters-that it has renounced all power of seizing the property of individuals, and even of restraining in any manner whatsoever, and for the shortest time, the liberty of their persons;we do not know which we ought most to admire, whether the public virtue of those who