and their constituents that the pleasures of peace are always preferable to the more statesmanlike preparations for war?
I am far from advising that states should always have the hand upon the sword and always be established on a war-footing: such a condition of things would be a scourge for the human race, and would not be possible, except under conditions not existing in all countries. I simply mean that civilized governments ought always to be ready to carry on a war in a short time,—that they should never be found unprepared. And the wisdom of their institutions may do as much in this work of preparation as foresight in their administration and the perfection of their system of military policy.
If, in ordinary times, under the rule of constitutional forms, governments subjected to all the changes of an elective legislature are less suitable than others for the creation or preparation of a formidable military power, nevertheless, in great crises these deliberative bodies have sometimes attained very different results, and have concurred in developing to the full extent the national strength. Still, the small number of such instances in history makes rather a list of exceptional cases, in which a tumultuous and violent assembly, placed under the necessity of conquering or perishing, has profited by the extraordinary enthusiasm of the nation to save the country and themselves at the same time by resorting to the most terrible measures and by calling to its aid an unlimited dictatorial power, which overthrew both liberty and law under the pretext of defending them. Here it is the dictatorship, or the absolute and monstrous usurpation of power, rather than the form of the deliberative assembly, which is the true cause of the display of energy. What happened in the Convention after the fall of Robespierre and the terrible Committee of Public Safety proves this, as well as the Chambers of 1815. Now, if the dictatorial power, placed in the hands of a few, has always been a plank of safety in great crises, it seems natural to draw the conclusion that countries controlled by elective assemblies must be