tempers; and, what is more than all the rest, the prince was absolute; so that, when he went to war, he put himself at the head of the whole people; as we find Semiramis leading her three millions to the field, and yet overpowered by the number of her enemies. It is no wonder, therefore, when she was at peace, and turned her thoughts on building, that she could accomplish such great works, with such a prodigious multitude of labourers: besides that in her climate there was small interruption of frosts and winters, which make the northern workmen lie half a year idle.

LXXIX.

A man who uses his best endeavours to live according to the dictates of virtue and right reason, has two perpetual sources of cheerfulness, in the consideration of his own nature, and of that Being on whom he has a dependance. If he looks into himself, he cannot but rejoice in that existence which is so lately bestowed upon him, and which, after millions of ages, will be still new, and still in its beginning. How many self-congratulations naturally arise in the mind, when it reflects on this its entrance into eternity, when it takes a view of those improvable faculties, which in a few years, and even at its first setting out, have made so considerable a progress, and which will still be receiving an increase of perfection, and consequently an increase of happiness! The consciousness of such a being spreads a perpetual diffusion of joy through the soul of a virtuous man, and makes him look upon himself every moment as more happy than he knows how to conceive.

The second source of cheerfulness to a good mind is the consideration of that Being on whom we have our dependance, and in whom, though we behold him as yet but in the first faint discoveries of his perfections, we see every thing that we can imagine as great, glorious, or amiable. We find ourselves every where upheld by his goodness, and surrounded with an immensity of love and mercy. In short, we depend

upon a Being, whose power qualifies him to make us happy by an infinity of means, whose goodness and truth engage him to make those happy who desire it of him, and whose unchangeableness will secure us in this happiness to all eternity.

Such considerations, which every one should perpetually cherish in his thoughts, will banish from us all that secret heaviness of heart which unthinking men are subject to when they lie under no real affliction; all that anguish which we may feel from any evil that actually oppresses us, to which I may likewise add those little cracklings of mirth and folly that are apter to betray virtue than support it; and establish in us such an even and cheerful temper, as makes us pleasing to ourselves, to those with whom we converse, and to Him whom we were made to please.

LXXX.

Liberty is best preserved, where the legislative power is lodged in several persons, especially if those persons are of different ranks and interests, for where they are of the same rank, and consequently have an interest to manage peculiar to that rank, it differs but little from a despotical government in a single person. But the greatest security a people can have for their liberty is, when the legislative power is in the hands of persons so happily distinguished, that by providing for the particular interests of their several ranks, they are providing for the whole body of the people; or, in other words, when there is no part of the people that has not a common interest with at least one part of the legislators.

If there be but one body of legislators, it is no better than a tyranny; if there are only two, there will want a casting voice, and one of them must at length be swallowed up by the disputes and contentions that will necessarily arise between them. Four would have the same inconvenience as two, and a greater number would cause too much confusion. Iould never read a passage in Polybius and another in

Cicero to this purpose without a secret pleasure in applying it to the English constitution, which it suits much better than the Roman. Both these great authors give the pre-eminence to a mixed government, consisting of three branches, the regal, the noble, and the popular. They had doubtless in their thoughts the constitution of the Roman commonwealth, in which the consul represented the king, the senate the nobles, and the tribunes the people. This division of the three powers in the Roman constitution was by no means so distinct and natural as it is in the English form of government. Among several objections that might be made to it, I think the chief are those that affect the consular power, which had only the ornaments without the force of the regal authority. Their number had not a casting voice in it; for which reason, if one did not chance to be employed abroad, while the other sat at home, the public business was sometimes at a stand, while the consuls pulled two different ways in it. Besides, I do not find that the consuls had ever a negative voice in the passing of a law, or decree of the senate; so that indeed they were rather the chief body of the nobility, or the first ministers of state, than a distinct branch of the sovereignty, in which none can be looked upon as a part, who are not a part of the legislature. Had the consuls been invested with the regal authority to as great a degree as our monarchs, there would never have been any occasions for a dictatorship, which had in it the power of all the three orders, and ended in the subversion of the whole constitution.

PHRASES CICERONIANE.

PART IV.

1. SENECTUS est naturâ loquacior.

Qui si eruditius videbitur disputare, quam consuevit ipse in suis libris, attribuito Græcis literis.

2. Nihil habet, Cæsar, nec fortuna tua majus, quàm ut possis, nec natura melius, quàm ut velis servare quàm plurimos.

3. P. Nigidio uni omnium doctissimo et sanctissimo, ne benignè quidem polliceri possum.

Ego mehercule, Antoni, semper is fui qui de te oratore sic prædicarem, unum te in dicendo mihi videri lectissimum.

4. Illum fructum ex tuis libris vel maximum cepi, quòd te

præclarè res humanas contemnentem cognovi.

5. Quod si ita esset; ut quisque minimum in se esse arbitraretur, ita ad amicitiam esset aptissimus.

Ut quisque sibi plurimum confidit, ita in amicitiis expetendis colendisque maximè excellit.

6. Sapientissimus quisque æquissimo animo moritur. Optimum quodque rarissimum est.

7. Negligere quid de se quisque sentiat, arrogantis est. Sua cuique virtuti laus propria debetur.

8. Ita enim senectus honesta est, si se ipsa defendit, si jus suum retinet.