CHAPTER VIII.

OF REVOLUTIONS IN MIXED GOVERNMENTS.

Polybius remarks,[360] that the best form of government is that which is composed of a due admixture of monarchy, aristocracy and democracy. He affirms that his assertion may not only be proved from reason, but from the evidence of fact, and cites the Spartan constitution in proof, which was modelled upon that very plan by Lycurgus. He adds too, that to perpetuate the duration of his government,[361] he united the peculiar excellencies of all the best governments in one form, that neither of the three parts, by swelling beyond its just bounds, might ever be able to deviate into its original inborn defects: but that whilst each power was mutually drawn back by the opposite attraction of the other two, neither power might ever preponderate, but the balance of government continue suspended in its true æquipoise.

From the observance of this nice adjustment of the balance of government, he foretells the duration or fall of all mixed governments in general. He adds, that as all government arises originally from the people; so all mutations in government proceed primarily from the people also. For when once a state has struggled through many and great difficulties, and emerged at last to freedom and wealth, men begin to sink gradually into luxury, and to grow more dissolute in their morals. The seeds of ambition will spring up, and prompt them to be more fond of contending for superiority in the magistracy, and carrying their point, in whatever they had set their hearts upon, than is consistent with the welfare of the community: when once these evils are got to a head in a country so circumstanced, the change must necessarily be for the worse; because the principle of such change will rise from the gratification, or disappointment of the ambition of the chief citizens, with respect to honours and preferments; and from that insolence and luxury arising from wealth, by which the morals of the private people will be totally corrupted. Thus the change in government will be primarily effected by the people. For when the people are galled by the rapine and oppression of those in power, arising from a principle of avarice; and corrupted, and elated with an undue opinion of their own weight, by the flatteries of the disappointed, which proceed from a principle of ambition, they raise those furious commotions in the state, which unhinge all government. These commotions first reduce it to a state of anarchy, which at last terminates in absolute monarchy and tyranny.

I have here given the sentiments of Polybius (and almost in his own words) from that excellent dissertation on government, preserved to us in the sixth book of his history, which I would recommend to the perusal of my countrymen. He there traces government up to its first origin. He explains the principles, by which different governments arose to the summit of their power and grandeur, and proves, that they sunk to ruin by a more or less rapid progress, in proportion as they receded more or less from the first principles on which they were originally founded. He survived the ruin of all the Grecian republicks, as well as Carthage, and lived (as he more than once tells us) to see the Romans masters of the known world. Blest with parts and learning superior to most men of his time, joined to the most solid judgment, and the experience of eighty-two years; no man better understood the intrinsick nature of government in general. No man could with more certainty foretel the various mutations, which so frequently happen in different forms of government, which must be ever in a fluctuating state, from the complicated variety of the human passions. Nor can any man give us better hints, than he has done, for guarding against the effects of those dangerous passions, and preserving the constitution of a free people in its full force and vigour. Of all the legislators (which he knew of) he prefers Lycurgus, whom he looks upon rather as divinely inspired, than as a mere man. He esteems the plan of government, which he established at Sparta, the most perfect, and proposes it as a general model worthy the imitation of every other community; and he remarks, that the Spartans, by adhering to that plan, preserved their liberty longer than any other nation of the known world.

I cannot help observing upon this occasion, that our own constitution as settled at the revolution, so nearly coincides with Lycurgus’s general plan of government (as laid down by Polybius) where the monarchy was for life, and hereditary, that it seems, at first sight, to have been formed by that very model. For our plan of government intended to fix and preserve so just a proportion of the monarchick, aristocratick, and democratick powers, by their representatives, king, lords, and commons; that any two of those powers might be able jointly to give a check to the other, but not to destroy it, as the destruction of any one power must necessarily induce a different form of government. This is the true basis of the British constitution, the duration of which must absolutely depend upon the just equilibrium preserved between these three powers. This consequently is the unerring test, by which every unbiassed and attentive considerer may judge, whether we are in an improving state, or whether, and by what degrees, we are verging towards ruin. But as I aim at reformation not satire; as I mean no invidious reflections, but only to give my sentiments with that honest freedom, to which every Briton is entitled by birthright, I shall just state from Polybius, the means by which all mixed governments have originally deviated from those first principles, which were the basis of their rise and grandeur: how by this deviation they tended towards their decline, and that those means acquiring additional force from that very decline, necessarily produced those evils, which accelerated the destruction of every free people. As the remarks of this most judicious historian, are founded upon long experience, drawn from undeniable facts, to many of which he himself was eyewitness,[362] they will not only carry greater weight, but will enable us to form a right judgment of our own situation, as it is at present circumstanced.

Polybius observes, that of all the mixed governments ever known to him, that of Lycurgus alone was the result of cool reason and long study. The form of the Roman republick, on the contrary, was the production of necessity. For the Romans came at the knowledge of the most proper remedies for all their political evils, not by dint of reasoning, but by the deep felt experience of the many and dangerous calamities, with which they had so long and so often struggled. I do not in the least doubt, but that excellent form of government established by our rude Gothick ancestors, wherever their arms prevailed, arose from the same cause, necessity founded upon experience. Every mixed government therefore, where the three powers are duly balanced, has a _resource_ within itself against all those political evils to which it is liable. By this _resource_, I mean, that joint coercive force, which any two of these powers are able to exercise over the other. But as nothing but necessity can authorize the exercise of this power, so it must be strictly regulated by those principles, on which the government was founded. For if by an undue exercise of this power, any one of the three should be diminished, or annihilated, the balance would be destroyed, and the constitution alter proportionally for the worse. Thus in Denmark, where the monarchy was limited and elective, the people, exasperated by the oppressions of the nobility, who had assumed an almost despotick power, out of a principle of revenge threw their whole weight into the regal scale. Frederick the third, (the then reigning monarch) strengthened by this accession of power and the assistance of the people, compelled the nobility to surrender their power and privileges. In consequence of this fatal step taken by the people, the monarchy, in the year 1660, became absolute and hereditary. Lord Molesworth observes upon this occasion, in his account of Denmark, that the people of Denmark have since felt by sad experience, that the little finger of an absolute prince is heavier than the loins of a hundred nobles.

The late revolution of government in Sweden, though arising from the same principles, took a very different turn. Charles the twelfth, brave even to enthusiasm, and as insatiably fond of glory as the ambitious Alexander, had quite tired out and exhausted his people, by his destructive expeditions. But when that fortunate shot from the town of Frederickshal gave repose to his own country as well as to a great part of Europe, the states of Sweden, no longer awed by a warlike monarch (who had usurped a despotick power) and a veteran army, again resumed the exercise of their own inherent powers. Stimulated by a desire of vengeance for the evils they had already suffered, and the fear of smarting again under the same evils, they beheaded Gortz, the minister of their late monarch’s oppressions, and left the crown no more than the bare shadow of authority. For though they continued the monarchy for life and hereditary, yet they imposed such rigid terms upon their succeeding kings, as reduced them to a state of dependance and impotence nearly equal to a doge of Genoa or Venice. We see, in both these instances, the revolution in government effected by the union of two powers of the government against the third. The catastrophe indeed in both nations was different, because that third power which was obnoxious to the other two, was different in each nation. In the former of these instances, the people, fired with resentment against the nobility, and instigated by secret emissaries of the crown, blindly gave up their whole power to the king, which enabled him to deprive the nobility (the second estate) of their share of power, and bring the whole to centre in the crown. Thus the government in Denmark was changed into absolute monarchy. In the latter, the senate took the lead during the _interregnum_, which followed the death of Charles, and changed the government into aristocracy. For though the outward form of government indeed is preserved, yet the essence no longer remains. The monarchy is merely titular, but the whole power is absorbed by the senate, consequently the government is strictly aristocratick. For the people were by no means gainers by the change, but remain in the same state of servitude, which they so much complained of before. Thus in all revolutions in mixed governments, where the union of two injured powers is animated by the spirit of patriotism, and directed by that salutary rule before laid down, which forbids us to destroy, and only enjoins us to reduce the third offending power within its proper bounds, the balance of government will be restored upon its first principles, and the change will be for the better. Thus when the arbitrary and insupportable encroachments of the crown under James the second, aimed so visibly at the subversion of our constitution, and the introduction of absolute monarchy; necessity authorized the lords and commons (the other two powers) to have _recourse_ to the joint exercise of that restraining power, which is the inherent _resource_ of all mixed governments. But as the exercise of this power was conducted by patriotism, and regulated by the above-mentioned rule, the event was the late happy revolution; by which the power of the crown was restrained within its proper limits, and the government resettled upon its true basis, as nearly as the genius of the times would admit of. But if the passions prevail, and ambition lurks beneath the mask of patriotism, the change will inevitably be for the worse. Because the restitution of the balance of government, which alone can authorize the exercise of the two joint powers against the third, will be only the pretext, whilst the whole weight and fury of the incensed people will be directed solely to the ends of ambition. Thus if the regal power should be enabled to take the lead by gaining over the whole weight of the people, the change will terminate in absolute monarchy; which so lately happened in Denmark, as it had happened before in almost all the old Gothick governments. If the aristocratick power, actuated by that ambition, which (an extreme few instances excepted) seems inseparable from the regal, should be able to direct the joint force of the people against the crown, the change will be to an aristocratick government, like the present state of Sweden, or the government of Holland, from the death of William the third, to the late revolution in favour of the stadtholder. If the power of the people impelled to action by any cause, either real or imaginary, should be able to subvert the other two, the consequence will be, that anarchy, which Polybius terms, the ferine and savage dominion of the people.[363] This will continue until some able and daring spirit, whose low birth or fortune precluded him from rising to the chief dignities of the state by any other means, puts himself at the head of the populace inured to live by plunder and rapine, and drawing the whole power to himself, erects a tyranny upon the ruins of the former government; or until the community, tired out and impatient under their distracted situation, bring back the government into its old channel. This is what Polybius terms the circumvolution of governments;[364] or the rotation of governments within themselves until they return to the same point. The fate of the Grecian and Roman republicks terminated in the former of these events. The distracted state of government in this nation, from 1648, to the restoration of Charles the second, ended happily in the latter, though the nation for some years experienced the former of these catastrophes under the government of Cromwell.

I have here given a short, but plain general analysis of government, founded upon experience drawn from historical truths, and adapted to the general capacity of my countrymen. But if any one desires to be acquainted with the philosophy of government, and to investigate the ratio and series of all these mutations, or revolutions of governments within themselves, I must (with Polybius) refer him to Plato’s republick.

The plan of a good and happy government, which Plato lays down, by the mouth of Socrates, in the former part of that work, is wholly ideal, and impossible to be executed, unless mankind could be new moulded. But the various revolutions of government (described above) which he treats of in the latter part, was founded upon facts, facts which he himself had been eyewitness to in the numerous republicks of Greece and Sicily, and had fatally experienced in his own country Athens. The divine philosopher, in that part of his admirable treatise, traces all these mutations up to their first source, “the intemperance of the human passions,” and accounts for their various progress, effects and consequences, from the various combinations of the same perpetually conflicting passions. His maxims are founded solely upon the sublimest truths, his allusions beautiful and apposite, and his instructions alike applicable to publick or private life, equally capable of forming the statesman or the man.

[360] Polyb. Hist. lib. 6. p. 628.

[361] Id. ibid. p. 638-9.

[362] Polyb. lib. 3. p. 223.

[363] Δημοκρατία θηριώδης. Polyb. p. 638.

[364] Πολιτειῶν ἀνακύκλωσις. Polyb. p. 637.