iquity that grew great by democratic institutions.
But the possession of unlimited power, which corrodes the conscience,
hardens the heart, and confounds the understanding of monarchs,
exercised its demoralising influence on the illustrious democracy of
Athens. It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be
oppressed by a majority. For there is a reserve of latent power in the
masses which, if it is called into play, the minority can seldom resist.
But from the absolute will of an entire people there is no appeal, no
redemption, no refuge but treason. The humblest and most numerous class
of the Athenians united the legislative, the judicial, and, in part, the
executive power. The philosophy that was then in the ascendant taught
them that there is no law superior to that of the State--the lawgiver is
above the law.

It followed that the sovereign people had a right to do whatever was
within its power, and was bound by no rule of right or wrong but its own
judgment of expediency. On a memorable occasion the assembled Athenians
declared it monstrous that they should be prevented from doing whatever
they chose. No force that existed could restrain them; and they resolved
that no duty should restrain them, and that they would be bound by no
laws that were not of their own making. In this way the emancipated
people of Athens became a tyrant; and their Government, the pioneer of
European freedom, stands condemned with a terrible unanimity by all the
wisest of the ancients. They ruined their city by attempting to conduct
war by debate in the marketplace. Like the French Republic, they put
their unsuccessful commanders to death. They treated their dependencies
with such injustice that they lost their maritime Empire. They plundered
the rich until the rich conspired with the public enemy, and they
crowned their guilt by the martyrdom of Socrates.

When the absolute sway of numbers had endured for near a quarter of a
century, nothing but bare existence was left for the State to lose; and
the Athenians, wearied and despondent, confessed the true cause of their
ruin. They understood that for liberty, justice, and equal laws, it is
as necessary that Democracy should restrain itself as it had been that
it should restrain the Oligarchy. They resolved to take their stand once
more upon the ancient ways, and to restore the order of things which had
subsisted when the monopoly of power had been taken from the rich and
had