THE PRESIDENCY A TRUST, NOT A PLAYTHING AND PERQUISITE.—PERSONAL GOVERNMENT AND PRESIDENTIAL PRETENSIONS.—REFORM AND PURITY IN GOVERNMENT.
Speech in the Senate, May 31, 1872.
Socrates. Then whom do you call the good?
Alcibiades. I mean by the good those who are able to rule in the city.
Socrates. Not, surely, over horses?
Alcibiades. Certainly not.
Socrates. But over men?
Alcibiades. Yes.
Plato, Dialogues: First Alcibiades. Tr. Jowett, Vol. IV. p. 545.
Amongst the foremost purposes ought to be the downfall of this odious, insulting, degrading, aide-de-campish, incapable dictatorship. At such a crisis, is this country to be left at the mercy of barrack councils and mess-room politics?—Letter of Lord Durham to Henry Brougham, August, 1830: Life and Times of Henry Lord Brougham, Vol. III. p. 44.
It is a maxim in politics, which we readily admit as undisputed and universal, that a power, however great, when granted by law to an eminent magistrate, is not so dangerous to Liberty as an authority, however inconsiderable, which he acquires from violence and usurpation.
Hume, Essays, Part II.: Essay X., Of Some Remarkable Customs.