8.10. 10. Of the Corruption of the Principle of despotic Government.
The principle of despotic government is subject to a continual
corruption, because it is even in its nature corrupt. Other governments
are destroyed by particular accidents, which do violence to the
principles of each constitution; this is ruined by its own intrinsic
imperfections, when some accidental causes do not prevent the corrupting
of its principles. It maintains itself therefore only when
circumstances, drawn from the climate, religion, situation, or genius of
the people, oblige it to conform to order, and to admit of some rule. By
these things its nature is forced without being changed; its ferocity
remains; and it is made tame and tractable only for a time.
