Page:John Adams - A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America Vol. I. (1787).djvu/107

Rh There are four councils: 1. The doge and ix ignoria. 2. The coniglio grande, in which all the nobles have eats and voices. 3. Coniglio de pregadi, of 250, and is the oul of the republic. 4. Coniglio proprio delli dieci—and the tate inquiitors.

were a Stadtholder, an aembly of the States General, a council of tate: the Stadtholder hereditary had the command of armies and navies, and appointment of all officers, &c.

Every province had an aembly beides, and every city, burgomaters, counellors, and chepens or judges, beides an hooft officer, and his dienders, for the police.

The hitory of this country, and its complicated contitutions, affords an inexhautible tore of materials to our purpoe, but, conidering the critical ituation of it, prudence dictates to pas it over: with all the agacity, and more widom than Venice or Berne, it has always had more conideration of the people than either, and has given more authority to the firt magitrate: they have never had any excluive preferences of families or nobles. Offices have, by law at leat, been open to all men of merit.