University of Virginia Library

SPIRIT OF GOVERNMENTS.[52]

No Government is perhaps reducible to a sole principle of
operation. Where the theory approaches nearest to this
character, different and often heterogeneous principles mingle
their influence in the administration. It is useful, nevertheless,
to analyse the several kinds of government, and to characterize
them by the spirit which predominates in each.

Montesquieu has resolved the great operative principles of
government into fear, honor, and virtue, applying the first
to pure despotisms, the second to regular monarchies, and
the third to republics. The portion of truth blended with
the ingenuity of this system sufficiently justifies the admiration
bestowed on its author. Its accuracy however can never
be defended against the criticisms which it has encountered.
Montesquieu was in politics not a Newton or a Locke, who
established immortal systems, the one in matter, the other in
mind. He was in his peculiar science what Bacon was in
universal science. He lifted the veil from the venerable errors
which enslaved opinion, and pointed the way to those luminous
truths of which he had but a glimpse himself.

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May not governments be properly divided, according to
their predominant spirit and principles into three species of
which the following are examples?

First. A government operating by a permanent military
force, which at once maintains the government, and is maintained
by it; which is at once the cause of burdens on the
people, and of submission in the people to their burdens.
Such have been the governments under which human nature
has groaned through every age. Such are the governments
which still oppress it in almost every country of Europe, the
quarter of the globe which calls itself the pattern of civilization,
and the pride of humanity.

Secondly. A government operating by corrupt influence;
substituting the motive of private interest in place of public
duty; converting its pecuniary dispensations into bounties to
favorites, or bribes to opponents; accommodating its measures
to the avidity of a part of the nation instead of the benefit
of the whole; in a word, enlisting an army of interested
partizans, whose tongues, whose pens, whose intrigues, and
whose active combinations, by supplying the terror of the
sword, may support a real domination of the few, under an
apparent liberty of the many. Such a government, wherever
to be found, is an impostor. It is happy for the new world
that it is not on the west side of the Atlantic. It will be
both happy and honorable for the United States, if they never
descend to mimic the costly pageantry of this form, nor
betray themselves into the venal spirit of its administration.

Thirdly. A government deriving its energy from the will
of the society, and operating by the reason of its measures,
on the understanding and interest of the society. Such is
the government for which philosophy has been searching, and
humanity been fighting, from the most remote ages. Such
are republican governments which it is the glory of America
to have invented, and her unrivalled happiness to possess.
May her glory be compleated by every improvement on the
theory which experience may teach; and her happiness be

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