the ambition of private men;, who thus become, indeed, the great inftruments for deciding of fuch quarrels, and at last are sure to seize on the prize. But, no man that fees a flock of vultures hovering over two armies ready to engage, can justly charge the blood drawn in the battle to them, though the carcafes fall to their fhare. For, while the balance of power is equally held, the ambition of private men, whether orators or great commanders, gives neither danger nor fear, nor can poffibly enslave their country; but, that once broken, the divided parties are forced to unite each to its head; under whofe conduct or fortune, one fide is at first victorious, and at last both are flaves. And, to put it paft difpute, that this entire fubverfion of the Roman liberty and conftitution was altogether owing to thofe measures, which had broke the balance between the patricians and plebeians, whereof the ambition of particular men was but an effect and confequence; we need only confider, that, when the uncorrupted part of the fenate had, by the death of Cæfar, made one great effort to restore their former ftate and liberty, the fuccefs did not anfwer their hopes; but that whole affembly was fo funk in its authority, that thofe patriots were forced to fly, and give way to the madness of the people, who, by their own dispositions, stirred up with the harangues of their orators, were now wholly bent upon fingle and defpotic flavery. Elfe, how could fuch a profligate as Antony, boy of eighteen, like Octavius, ever dare to dream

or a

of

of giving the law to fuch an empire and people? wherein the latter fucceeded, and entailed the vileft tyranny, that heaven, in its anger, ever inflicted on a corrupt and poifoned people. And this, with fo little appearance, at Cafar's death, that, when Cicero wrote to Brutus, how he had prevailed, by his credit with Octavius, to promife him [Brutus] pardon and fecurity for his perfon, that great Roman received the notice with the utmost indignity, and returned Cicero an anfwer, yet upon record, full of the higheft refentment and contempt for fuch an offer, and from fuch a hand.

Here ended all fhew or fhadow of liberty in Rome. Here was the repofitory of all the wife contentions and struggles for power between the nobles and commons, lapped up fafely in the bofom of a Nero and a Caligula, a Tiberius and a Domitian.

Let us now fee, from this deduction of particular impeachments, and general diffenfions in Greece and Rome, what conclufions may naturally be formed for the inftruction of any other ftate, that may, haply, upon many points, labour under the like circumftances.

UPON

CHAP. IV.

PON the subject of impeachments, we may obferve, that the cuftom of accufing the nobles to the people, either by themfelves or their orators, (now styled an impeachment in the name of the commons) hath been very ancient, both in Greece and Rome, as well as Carthage; and VOL. II. therefore,

Z

therefore, may seem to be the inherent right of a free people, nay, perhaps it is really fo: but then, it is to be confidered, first, that this cuftom was peculiar to republics, or such states where the administration lay principally in the hands of the commons, and ever raged more or lefs, according to their encroachments upon abfolute power; having been always looked upon, by the wisest men and best authors of those times, as an effect of licentiousness, and not of liberty; a distinction, which no multitude, either represented or collective, hath been, at any time, very nice in obferving. However, perhaps this cuftom, in popular states, of impeaching particular men, may feem to be nothing else but the peoples chufing, upon occafion, to exercife their own jurifdiction in perfon; as if a king of England fhould fit as chief juftice in his court of King's Bench; which, they fay, in former times, he fometimes did. But in Sparta, which was called a kingly government, though the people were perfectly free, yet, because the adminiftration was in the two kings and the ephori, with the affiftance of the fenate, we read of no impeachments by the people; nor was the process against great men, either upon account of ambition or ill conduct, though it reached fometimes to kings themfelves, ever formed that way, as I can recollect; but only paffed through thofe hands, where the administration lay. So likewife, during the regal government in Rome, though it was inftituted a mixed monarchy, and the people made great advances in power, yet, I

do

do not remember to have read of one impeachment from the commons against a patrician, until the confular state began, and the people had made great encroachments upon the adminiftration.

Another thing to be confidered, is, that, allowing this right of impeachment to be as inherent as they pleafe, yet, if the commons have been perpetually mistaken in the merits of the causes and the perfons, as well as in the confequences of fuch impeachments upon the peace of the state, we cannot conclude lefs, than that the commons in Greece and Rome (whatever they may be in other ftates) were by no means qualified, either as profecutors or judges in fuch matters; and therefore, that it would have been prudent, to have referved thefe privileges dormant, never to be produced but upon very great and urging occafions, where the ftate is in apparent danger, the universal body of the people in clamours against the adminiftration, and no other remedy in view. But, for a few popular orators or tribunes, upon the fcore of perfonal piques; or to employ the pride they conceive in feeing themselves at the head of a party; or as a method for advancement; or moved by certain powerful arguments that could make Demofthenes philippize: for fuck men, I fay, when the ftate would, of itself, gladly be quiet, and hath, befides, affairs of the last importance upon the anvil, to impeach Miltiades*, after

Z 2

Though, in other paffages, Lord Orford's character is fuppofed to be drawn under the name of Themistocles, yet he

feems

after a great naval victory, for not pursuing the Perfian fleet; to impeach Ariftides, the perfon most verfed among them in the knowledge and practice of their laws, for a blind fufpicion of his acting in an arbitrary way (that is, as they expound it, not in concert with the people;) to impeach Pericles, after all his fervices, for a few inconfiderable accounts, or to impeach Phocion, who had been guilty of no other crime but negotiating a treaty for the peace and fecurity of his country: what could the continuance of fuch proceedings end in, but the utter discouragement of all virtuous actions and perfons, and confequently, in the ruin of a ftate? Therefore, the hiftorians of those ages feldom fail to fet this -matter in all its lights, leaving us the highest and moft honourable ideas of thofe perfons, who fuffered by the perfecution of the people, together with the fatal confequences they had, and how the perfecutors feldom failed to repent, when it

was too late.

Thefe impeachments, perpetually falling upon many of the beft men, both in Greece and Rome, are a cloud of witneffes, and examples enow, to difcourage men of virtue and abilities from engaging in the fervice of the public; and help, on the other fide, to introduce the ambitious, the covetous, the fuperficial, and the ill-defigning; who are as apt to be bold, and forward, and meddling, as the former are to be cautious, and modeft, and referved. This was fo well known'

feems to be reprefented by Miltiades here; for Themiftocles was not impeached at all. See p. 242. Hawkef