Page:John Adams - A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America Vol. I. (1787).djvu/185

ment conſiſted of no more than two of the three eſtates, which we have ſpoken of before, that is, of royalty and ariſtocracy: it remained, therefore, ſtill neceſſary to admit the people into ſome ſhare of the government: and the patricians growing ſo inſolent in time (as I ſhall ſhew hereafter), that the plebeians could no longer endure it, the latter took arms, and obliged them to relinquiſh part of their authority, leſt they ſhould loſe the whole: on the other hand, the conſuls and ſenators ſtill retained ſo much power in the commonwealth, as enabled them to ſupport their rank and dignity with honour. This ſtruggle gave birth to certain officers, called tribunes of the people; after the creation of whom, that ſtate became more firm and compact, every one of the three degrees abovementioned having its proper ſhare in the government; and ſo propitious was fortune to it, that although it was changed from a monarchy into an ariſtocracy, and afterwards into a democracy, by the ſteps and for the reaſons already aſſigned, yet the royal power was never entirely aboliſhed and given to the patricians, nor that of the patricians wholly to the plebeians: on the contrary, the authority of the three eſtates being duly proportioned and mixed together, gave it the higheſt degree of perfection that any commonwealth is capable of attaining to;—and this was owing in a great meaſure, if not altogether, to the diſſentions that happened betwixt the patricians and plebeians, as ſhall be ſhewn more at large in the following chapters.

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