unrepresented. This influence is felt in countries
where there is no representative system at all. Indeed, this influence
is nowhere so great as under despotic governments. I need not remind the
Committee that the Caesars, while ruling by the sword, while putting
to death without a trial every senator, every magistrate, who incurred
their displeasure, yet found it necessary to keep the populace of the
imperial city in good humour by distributions of corn and shows of wild
beasts. Every country, from Britain to Egypt, was squeezed for the means
of filling the granaries and adorning the theatres of Rome. On more than
one occasion, long after the Cortes of Castile had become a mere name,
the rabble of Madrid assembled before the royal palace, forced their
King, their absolute King, to appear in the balcony, and exacted from
him a promise that he would dismiss an obnoxious minister. It was in
this way that Charles the Second was forced to part with Oropesa, and
that Charles the Third was forced to part with Squillaci. If there is
any country in the world where pure despotism exists, that country is
Turkey; and yet there is no country in the world where the inhabitants
of the capital are so much dreaded by the government. The Sultan, who
stands in awe of nothing else, stands in awe of the turbulent populace,
which may, at any moment, besiege him in his Seraglio. As soon as
Constantinople is up, everything is conceded. The unpopular edict is
recalled. The unpopular vizier is beheaded. This sort of power has
nothing to do with representation. It depends on physical force and
on vicinity. You do not propose to take this sort of power away from
London. Indeed, you cannot take it away. Nothing can take it away but an
earthquake more terrible than that of Lisbon, or a fire more destructive
than that of 1666. Law can do nothing against this description of power;
for it is a power which is formidable only when law has ceased to exist.
While the reign of law continues, eight votes in a House of six hundred
and fifty-eight Members will hardly do much harm. When the reign of law
is at an end, and the reign of violence commences, the importance of a
million and a half of people, all collected within a walk of the Palace,
of the Parliament House, of the Bank, of the Courts of Justice, will not
be measured by eight or by eighty votes. See, then, what you are doing.
That power which is not dangerous you refuse to London. That power which
is