Page:History of Greece Vol IV.djvu/172

 154 HISTORY OF GREECE. reads the sad narrative of the Korkyrsean sedition, in the third book of Thucydides, together with the reflections of the historian upon it, 1 will trace the gradual exasperation of these party feuds, beginning even under democratical forms, until at length they break down the barriers of public as well as of private morality. Against this chance of internal assailants Kleisthenes had to protect the democratical constitution, first, by throwing impedi- ments in their way and rendering it difficult for them to procure the requisite support ; next, by eliminating them before any vio- lent projects were ripe for execution. To do either the one or the other, it was necessary to provide such a constitution as would not only conciliate the good-will, but kindle the passionate attach- ment, of the mass of citizens, insomuch that not even any consid- erable minority should be deliberately inclined to alter it by force. It was necessary to create in the multitude, and through them to force upon the leading ambitious men, that rare and difficult sen- timent which we may term a constitutional morality ; a para- mount reverence for the forms of the constitution, enforcing obedience to the authorities acting under and within those forms, yet combined with the habit of open speech, of action subject only to definite legal control, and unrestrained censure of those very authorities as to all their public acts, combined too with a perfect confidence in the bosom of every citizen, amidst the bitterness of party contest, that the forms of the constitution will be not less sacred in the eyes of his opponents than in his own. This coexistence of freedom and self-imposed restraint, of obedi- ence to authority with unmeasured censure of the persons exer- cising it, may be found in the aristocracy of England (since about 1688) as well as in the democracy of the American United States : and because we are familiar with it, we are apt to sup- pose it a natural sentiment ; though there seem to be few senti- ments more difficult to establish and diffuse among a community, judging by the experience of history. "We may see how imper- fectly it exists at this day in the Swiss cantons ; and the many violences of the first French revolution illustrate, among various other lessons, the fatal effects arising from its absence, even among a people high in the scale of intelligence. Yet the dif- 1 Thucyd. Hi, 70, 81, 82.