[1095] Hoc tamen singulare videri possit, quod, quæ leges populi rogatione ac principis jussu feruntur, non aliter quam populi comitiis abrogari possunt. Id enim Dellus Anglorum in Gallia legatus mihi confirmavit; idem tamen confitetur legem probari aut respui consuevisse contra populi voluntatem utcunque principi placuerit. He is evidently perplexed by the case of England; and having been in this country before the publication of his Latin edition, he might have satisfied himself on the subject.
[1096] c. 9 and 10.
Forms of government. 51. The second book of the Republic treats of the different species of civil government. These, according to Bodin, are but three, no mixed form being possible, since sovereignty or the legislative power is indivisible. A democracy he defines to be a government where the majority of the citizens possess the sovereignty. Rome he holds to have been a democratic republic, in which, however, he is not exactly right; and he is certainly mistaken in his general theory, by arguing as if the separate definition of each of the three forms must be applicable after their combination.[1097] |Despotism and monarchy.| In this chapter on despotic monarchy, he again denies that governments were founded on original contract. The power of one man, in the origin of political society, was absolute; and Aristotle was wrong in supposing a fabulous golden age, in which kings were chosen by suffrage.[1098] Despotism is distinguished from monarchy by the subjects being truly slaves, without a right over their properties; but as the despot may use them well, even this is not necessarily a tyranny.[1099] Monarchy, on the other hand, is the rule of one man according to the law of nature, who maintains the liberties and properties of others as much as his own.[1100] As this definition does not imply any other restraint than the will of the prince imposes on himself, Bodin labours under the same difficulty as Montesquieu. Every English reader of the Esprit des Loix has been struck by the want of a precise distinction between despotism and monarchy. Tyranny differs, Bodin says, from despotism, merely by the personal character of the prince; but severity towards a seditious populace is not tyranny; and here he censures the lax government of Henry II. Tyrannicide he justifies in respect of an usurper who has no title except force, but not as to lawful princes, or such as have become so by prescription.[1101]
[1097] lib. ii. c. 1.
[1098] In the beginning of states, quo societas hominum coalescere cœpit, ac reipublicæ forma quædam constitui, unius imperio ac dominatu omnia tenebantur. Fallit enim Aristoteles, qui aureum illud genus hominum fabulis poeticis quam reipsa illustrius, reges heroas suffragio creasse prodidit; cum omnibus persuasum sit ac perspicuum monarchiam omnium primam in Assyria fuisse constitutam Nimrodo principe, &c.
[1099] c. 2.
[1100] c. 3.
[1101] c. 4.
Aristocracy. 52. An aristocracy he conceives always to exist where a smaller body of the citizens governs the greater.[1102] This definition, which has been adopted by some late writers, appears to lead to consequences hardly compatible with the common use of language. The electors of the House of Commons in England are not a majority of the people. Are they, therefore, an aristocratical body? The same is still more strongly the case in France, and in most representative governments of Europe. We might better say, that the distinguishing characteristic of an aristocracy is the enjoyment of privileges, which are not communicable to other citizens simply by anything they can themselves do to obtain them. Thus no government would be properly aristocratical where a pecuniary qualification is alone sufficient to confer political power; nor did the ancients ever use the word in such a sense. Yet the question might be asked, under what category we would place the timocracy, or government of the rich.
[1102] Ego statum semper aristocraticum esse, judico, si minor pars civium cæteris imperat. c. 1.