Page:A View of the Constitution.djvu/17

Rh laws. If this be the result of general consent, such countries possess a constitution. The same may be said of an aristocracy—if the people agree to deposit all power in the hands of a select number; and of a democracy, in which they retain, in such manner as they hold most conducive to their own safety, all sovereignty within their own control. The difficulty in either case is to regulate the divisions of the authority granted, so that no portion of it, vested in one branch or one body of men, shall bear an undue relation to the others. Each must be sufficient to support itself, yet all must be made to harmonize and co-operate.

A constitution may combine two of the foregoing principles, like those of ancient Bome, some of the Grecian Republics, and in modern times, Geneva and some of the small communities of Italy: or, like the present government of England, it may combine the three principles.

The high authority which has been often quoted* in favour of the last mentioned form, may be allowed its full weight, without impugning the obvious position, that the whole power which is conceded to an hereditary monarch, may be vested by a democratic republic in an elective magistrate, and all the benefits derived from it, enjoyed without the dangers attending hereditary succession.

If an hereditary monarch abuses his power, the people seldom obtain relief without insurrection; and thus, between the ambition of princes on the one side, and the sense of injury on the other, the peace of the country is constantly endangered. If the monarch be elected for life, a young aspiring prince may