1823. March 1

Greece.

Division of power

With the conflict between the King on the one part and the two branches of the Aristocracy on the other ceased all chance of ulterior benefit to the interest and condition of the people. Whatsoever real benefit had ever resulted to the people from that same division of power, became purely nominal, as soon as the contention between the parties sharing in it ceased. No sooner did that contention cease by the establishment of a new succession than a partnership between the formerly contending parties took its place: a partnership, the stock of which was at all times composed of such part of the property of the people as could be extracted from the owners on pretence of making provision for the expences of government. True it is that notwithstanding this bond of strength a sort of comparative weakness remained, in which the people have found a source of comparative advantage. To the single-headed despot by whom as in the Continent, all the powers of government would have been exercised succeeded in these islands a many-headed despot: and in the constitution of this beast of prey there is a sort of weakness which prevents him from driving on in the career of depredation and oppression, at a pace quite so rapid as that which has every where been kept up by a single-headed one. In this retardation consists the only real benefit derived from the above supposed or pretended sole and sufficient security for good government: for, sooner or later, the arrival of the vehicle at the bottom of the abyss is not less certain in the one case than in the other, unless in the mean time a government in the hands of the people should by some means or other be made to take place of a government in the hands of their natural and for ever implacable enemies.