As democracies are subverted when the people despoil the senate, the
magistrates, the judges of their functions, so monarchies are corrupted
when the prince insensibly deprives societies or cities of their
privileges. In the former case the multitude usurp the power, in the
latter it is usurped by a single person.
"The destruction of the dynasties of Tsin and Soui," says a Chinese
author, "was owing to this: the princes, instead of confining
themselves, like their ancestors, to a general inspection, the only one
worthy of a sovereign, wanted to govern everything immediately by
themselves."
[9]
The Chinese author gives us in this instance the cause
of the corruption of almost all monarchies.
Monarchy is destroyed when a prince thinks he shows a greater
exertion of power in changing than in conforming to the order of things;
when he deprives some of his subjects of their hereditary employments to
bestow them arbitrarily upon others; and when he is fonder of being
guided by fancy than judgment.
Again, it is destroyed when the prince, directing everything
entirely to himself, calls the state to his capital, the capital to his
court, and the court to his own person.
It is destroyed, in fine, when the prince mistakes his authority,
his situation and the love of his people, and when he is not fully
persuaded that a monarch ought to think himself secure, as a despotic
prince ought to think himself in danger.
