by revolution and anarchy. He dreads a general
scramble, knowing that he would probably get less than he would lose
by it. He is willing, therefore, to be governed by abstract law. There
is no need of holding up before him a scepter or a crown to induce
obedience. He submits without them. He votes with the rest, and then
abides by the decision of the ballot-box. In other countries, however,
the case is different. If not an actual majority, there is at least a
very large proportion of the community who possess nothing. They get
scanty daily food for hard and long-continued daily labor; and as
change, no matter what, is always a blessing to sufferers, or at least
is always looked forward to as such, they are ready to welcome, at all
times, any thing that promises commotion. A war, a conflagration, a
riot, or a rebellion, is always welcome. They do not know but that
they shall gain some advantage by it, and in the mean time the
excitement of it is some relief to the dead and eternal monotony of
toil and suffering.

It is true that the revolutions by which monarchies are overturned are
not generally effected, in the first instance, by this portion of the
community. The throne is usually overturned at first by a higher class
of men; but the deed being done, the inroad upon the established
course and order of the social state being once made, this lower mass
is aroused and excited by it, and soon becomes unmanageable. When
property is so distributed among the population of a state that all
have an _interest_ in the preservation of order, then, and not till
then, will it be safe to give to all a share in the _power_ necessary
for preserving it; and, in the mean time, revolutions produced by
insurrections and violence will probably only result in establishing
governments unsteady and transient just in proportion to the
suddenness of their origin.

THE END.

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