Page:History of Greece Vol III.djvu/25

LARGE AND SMALL STATES. S with equal privileges and securities to each of the par/s . and it might, perhaps, be a real impossibility among any rude people, with strong local peculiarities, difficult means of communication, and habits of representative government not yet acquired. Hence, throughout all the larger nations of mediaeval and modern Europe, with few exceptions, the prevailing sentiment has been favorable to monarchy ; but wherever any single city, or district, 01 cluster of villages, whether in the plains of Lombardy, or in the mountains of Switzerland, has acquired independence, -.vherever any small fraction has severed itself from the aggre- gate, the opposite sentiment has been found, and the natural tendency has been towards some modification of republican government j 1 out of which, indeed, as in Greece, a despot has often been engendered, but always through some unnatural mix- ture of force and fraud. The feudal system, evolved out of the disordered state of Europe between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, always presumed a permanent suzerain, vested with large rights of a mixed personal and proprietary character over his 1 David Hume, in his Essay xii (vol. i, p. 159, cd. 17GO), after remarking " that all kinds of government, free and despotic, seem to have undergone in modern times (i. e. as compared with ancient) a great change for the better, with regard both to foreign and domestic management," proceeds to say : "But though all kinds of government be improved in modern times, yet monarchical government seems to have made the greatest advances towards perfection. It may now be affirmed of civilized monarchies, what was form- erly said in praise of republics alone, that they are a government of laws, not of men. They are found susceptible of order, method, and constancy to a surprising degree. Property is there secure ; industry encouraged ; the arts flourish ; and the prince lives secure among his subjects, like a father among his children. There are, perhaps, and have been for two centuries, near two hundred absolute princes, great and small, in Europe ; and allow- ing twenty years to each reign, we may suppose that there have been in the whole two thousand monarchs, or tyrants, as the Greeks would have called them ; yet of these there has not been one, not even Philip the Second of Spain, so bad as Tiberius, Caligula, Nero, Domitian, who were four in twelve amongst the Roman emperors. It must, however, be confessed, that though monarchical governments have approached nearer to popular ones in gentleness and stability, they are still much inferior. Our modern education and customs instil more humanity and moderation than the ancient, but have not. as yet been able to overcome entirely the disadvantages of that form of government." 1*