§. 215. Secondly, when the prince hinders the legislative from assembling in
its due time, or from acting freely, pursuant to those ends for which it was
constituted, the legislative is altered. For it is not a certain number of men
— no, nor their meeting, unless they have also freedom of debating and
leisure of perfecting what is for the good of the society, wherein the
legislative consists; when these are taken away, or altered, so as to deprive
the society of the due exercise of their power, the legislative is truly
altered. For it is not names that constitute governments, but the use and
exercise of those powers that were intended to accompany them; so that he who
takes away the freedom, or hinders the acting of the legislative in its due
seasons, in effect takes away the legislative, and puts an end to the
government.
