date

1823. Feb. 23 Greece J.B. to Greek Legislators
1823. Feb. 23 Greece J.B. to Greek Legislators Independence Division of power

But the greatest number © the great body of the people © the four millions ©

what were they the better for it? Not in the least. Nor should they have been:

never were they so much as thought of From their then present compleatly

unsecure state they have been brought to their present so imperfectly secure

state by the influence of other causes: causes of abundantly slow /snails©pace/

operation, too complex to be capable of being here brought to view

In the year 1688 came the Revolution so called by way of distinction

/preeminence/ not to speak of any intermediate Revolutions On this occasion came

the division of absolute power: the division between the Monarch on the one

part, and the House of Lords with the Aristocrats whose wealth by the magnitude

of it, or the form in which it had place gave them the command of the seats in

the other House. Here was the division of power principle of division in all its

glory: and the people © the greatest number what did they get by it? assuredly

not absolutely nothing: what they got was the difference between the state of

the people under the present English government and the state of the people

under the Austrian Government: the difference between a quick pace and a slow

pace in the descent to the abyss of national misery. Not to mention Williams and

Anns wars which were to a considerable degree if not altogether wars of defence,

they got George the first's War and George the 2d's German wars, and George the

thirds American and French liberticide wars, the last of which, because

according to the Englishmans creed /of English bigotry/ the King can do no wrong

is with so much injustice placed to the account of William Pitt: they got

moreover one after another upon their gulled and overloaded backs those

milstones called Colonies: sources of patronage and emolument to the ruling few,

drains on the pockets of the subject many who in return for the money extorted

form them for the maintenance of that grievance /keeping up that ever running

sore/, have the satisfaction of being taught to say in speaking of them © our

Colonies.
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  • Title: [1823. Feb. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators]
    Description: 1823. Feb. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators Independence Division of power

    No such wars, no such distant dependencies, no such drains /running sores/ would

    England have had, had it at the time of the Revolution received a Constitution

    such as that at present enjoyed by the Anglo©American United States have

    succeeded in giving themselves.

    But /Meantime/ if for the people, for the greatest number © the Revolution with

    its independence of King on Lords and of Lords on King, and of both on the great

    body of people has done so little © for the Lords and the proprietors and

    commanders of seats in the House of Commons it has done every thing

    Independence of them all upon the absolute will of the Monarch © division of

    absolute power between the Monarch on the one part and themselves on the other ©

    what could have been more delightful? Under James they would have been the sport

    of the caprice and bigotry of a cruel, a merciless a tyrant, without an atom of

    power, any the least share in the plunderage of the people but on condition of a

    prostrate and unreserved submission to his will. Under William and his

    successors they acquired /enjoyed/ a power independent of the King placed almost

    on a level with that of the King, and putting /placing/ them into a condition to

    bargain with him upon little less than equal terms for a share in the patronage

    and the plunderage.

    the patronage of all the Churches would form the trade of their younger sons

    In vain would their sons have received the Holy Ghost: the loaves and fishes

    would not have come with him.
  • Title: [1823 Feb¼y¼. etc Greece J.B. to Legislators]
    Description: 1823 Feb¼y¼. etc

    Greece J.B. to Legislators

    Nothing of this matter sent in this form. Quere what parts of it employed in the

    matter sent to Greece 4 March 1823 through Blaquiere.
  • Title: [1823. Feb¼y¼. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators]
    Description: 1823. Feb¼y¼. 23 Greece. J.B. to Greek Legislators Independence Division of

    power

    Connected with the idea of independence is the idea of the division of power.

    Connected with the belief if any such there be that independence of every body

    the greatest number of the people not excepted is with reference to the greatest

    happiness of the greatest number a useful quality in a public [...?] /public

    [...?]/ is the persuasion that the division of power as between one functionary

    or set of functionaries in the highest grade © division of power instead of the

    most perfect subjection of the power of both to the wills of the greatest number

    is /has a like tendency to be/ productive of the like benefit.

    A functionary in the exercise of whose power the will of the people depends for

    its accomplishment is he if for the possession of that power independent of the

    will of the people more likely to endeavour to give effect to that will than if

    he were dependent. The affirmative is too grossly /manifestly/ absurd to be

    seriously contended for

    The people © if the only power they are capable of exercising © namely the

    constitutive power as above explained with relation to the hands by which the

    operative power shall be exercised were shared by them with some other

    functionary or set of functionaries, say for example a single functionary © a

    Monarch © would they stand a better chance of having their will on each occasion

    [...?] to their interest better provided for than in the case of their [...?]

    same power the whole of it to themselves? Here we have another question the

    answer to which is not less manifest than that to the preceding one.

    Division of power? Yes ©in a certain sense that state of things must of

    necessity, as you have seen have place it is of necessity: just as in the case

    of the individual, food is necessary to existence. What the [...? ...?] upon

    [...?] © is a division /schism of/ other than that which has been seen to be the

    work of inevitable necessity: and it is as applied to such a /every such/ schism

    that the answer is so clear, and the truth of it so incontrovertible.