"I do not speak for myself; for though I shall always acknowledge that I got more by one year's sitting in the house than by my three years' travels, it was not of that kind. But I hate that this same Spy, for pretending to have played at billiards with the most serene Commonwealth of Venice, should make such fools of us here, when I know that he must have had his intelligence from some corn-cutter upon the Rialto; for a noble Venetian would be hanged if he should keep such a fellow company. And yet if I do not think he has made you all dote, never trust me, my Lord Archon is sometimes in such strange raptures. Well, good my lord, let me be heard as well as your apple squire. Venice has fresh blood in her cheeks, I must confess, yet she is but an old lady. N or has he picked her cabinet; these he sends you are none of her receipts, I can assure you; he bought them for a Julio at St. Mark's of a mountebank. She has no other wash, upon my knowledge, for that same envied complexion of hers but her marshes, being a little better scented, saving your presence, than a chamber-pot. My lords, I know what I say, but you will never have done with it, that neither the great Turk, nor any of those little Turks her neighbors, have been able to spoil her! Why you may as well wonder that weasels do not suck eggs in swans' nests. Do you think that it has lain in the devotion of her beads; which you that have puked so much at popery, are now at length resolved shall consecrate M. Parson, and be dropped by every one of his congregation, while those same whimsical intelligences your surveyors (you will break my heart) give the turn to your primum mobile! And so I think they will; (for you will find that money is the primum mobile) and they will turn you thus out of some L300,000 or L400,000: a pretty sum for urns and balls, for boxes and pills, which these same quacksalvers are to administer to the parishes; and for what disease I marvel! Or how does it work? Out comes a constable, an overseer, and a churchwarden! Mr. Speaker, I am amazed!"

Never was there goose so stuck with lard as my Lord Epimonus's speech with laughter, the Archon having much ado to recover himself in such a manner as might enable him to return these thanks:

"In your whole lives, my lords, were you never entertained with so much ingenuity, my Lord Epimonus having at once mended all the faults of travellers. For, first, whereas they are abominable liars, he has not told you (except some malicious body has misinformed him concerning poor Spy) one syllable of falsehood. And, secondly, whereas they never fail to give the upper hand in all their discourses to foreign nations, still jostling their own into the kennel, he bears an honor to his country that will not dissolve in Cephalonia, nor be corrupted with figs and melons, which I can assure you is an ordinary obligation; and therefore hold it a matter of public concern that we be to no occasion of quenching my lord's affections, nor is there any such great matter between us, but, in my opinion, might be easily reconciled, for though that which my lord gained by sitting in the house, I steadfastly believe, as he can affirm, was got fairly yet dare I not, nor do I think, that upon consideration he will promise for other gamesters, especially when they were at it so high, as he intimates not only to have been in use, but to be like enough to come about again. Wherefore say I, let them throw with boxes, for unless we will be below the politics of an ordinary, there is no such bar to cogging, it is known to his lordship that our game is most at a throw, and that every cast of our dice is in our suffrages, nor will he deny that partiality in a suffrage is downright cogging.

"If the Venetian boxes be the most sovereign of all remedies against this same cogging, is it not a strange thing that they should be thrown first into the fire by a fair gamester? Men are naturally subject to all kinds of passions; some you have that are not able to withstand the brow of an enemy, and others that make nothing of this, are less proof against that of a friend. So that if your suffrage be barefaced, I dare say you shall not have one fair cast in twenty. But whatever a man's fortune be at the box, he neither knows whom to thank, nor whom to challenge. Wherefore (that my lord may have a charitable opinion of the choice affection which I confess to have, above all other beauties, for that of incomparable Venice) there is in this way of suffrage no less than a demonstration that it is the most pure, and the purity of the suffrage in a popular government is the health, if not the life of it, seeing the soul is not otherwise breathed into the sovereign power than by the suffrage of the people. Wherefore no wonder if Postellus be of opinion that this use of the ball is the very same with that of the bean in Athens, or that others, by the text concerning Eldad and Medad, derive it from the Commonwealth of Israel. There is another thing, though not so material to us, that my lord will excuse me if I be not willing to yield, which is, that Venice subsists only by her situation. It is true that a man in time of war may be more secure from his enemies by being in a citadel, but not from his diseases; wherefore the first cause, if he lives long, is his good constitution, without which his citadel were to little purpose, and it is not otherwise with Venice."

With this speech of the Archon I conclude the proof of the agrarian and the ballot, being the fundamental laws of this commonwealth, and come now from the centre to the circumferences or orbs, whereof some have been already shown; as how the parishes annually pour themselves into the hundreds, the hundreds into the tribes, and the tribes into the galaxies; the annual galaxy of every tribe consisting of two knights and seven deputies, whereof the knights constitute the Senate; the deputies, the prerogative tribe, commonly called the people; and the Senate and people constitute the sovereign power or Parliament of Oceana. Whereof to show what the Parliament is, I must first open the Senate, and then the prerogative tribe.

To begin with the Senate, of which (as a man is differently represented by a picture drawer and by an anatomist) I shall first discover the face or aspect, and then the parts, with the use of them. Every Monday morning in the summer at seven, and in the winter at eight, the great bell in the clock-house at the Pantheon begins, and continues ringing for the space of one hour; in which time the magistrates of the Senate, being attended according to their quality, with a respective number of the ballotins, doorkeepers, and messengers, and having the ensigns of their magistracies borne before them, as the sword before the strategus, the mace before the orator, a mace with the seal before the commissioners of the chancery, the like with the purse before the commissioners of the treasury, and a silver wand, like those in use with the universities, before each of the censors, being chancellors of the same. These, with the knights, in all 300, assemble in the house or hall of the Senate.

The house or hall of the Senate being situated in the Pantheon or palace of justice, is a room consisting of a square and a half. In the middle of the lower end is the door, at the upper end hangs a rich state overshadowing the greater part of a large throne, or half-pace of two stages; the first ascended by two steps from the floor, and the second about the middle rising two steps higher. Upon this stand two chairs, in that on the right hand sits the strategus, in the other the orator adorned with scarlet robes, after the fashion that was used by the dukes in the aristocracy. At the right end of the upper stage stand three chairs, in which the three commissioners of the seal are placed; and at the other end sit the three commissioners of the treasury, every one in a robe or habit like that of the earls. Of these magistrates of this upper stage consists the signory. At either end of the lower stage stands a little table, to which the secretaries of the Senate are set with their tufted sleeves in the habit of civil lawyers. To the four steps, whereby the two stages of the throne are ascended, answer four long benches, which successively deriving from every one of the steps, continue their respective height, and extend themselves by the side walls toward the lower end of the house, every bench being divided by numeral characters into the thirty-seven parts or places. Upon the upper benches sit the censors in the robes of barons; the first in the middle of the right hand bench, and the second directly opposite to him on the other side. Upon the rest of the benches sit the knights, who, if they be called to the urns, distributing themselves by the figures, come in equal files, either by the first seat, which consists of the two upper benches on either side; or by the second seat, consisting of the two lower benches on either side, beginning also at the upper or at the lower ends of the same, according to the lot whereby they are called; for which end the benches are open, and ascended at either end with easy stairs and large passages.

The rest of the ballot is conformable to that of the tribe; the censors of the house sitting at the side urn, and the youngest magistrate of the signory at the middle, the urns being placed before the throne, and prepared according to the number of the magistrates to be at that time chosen by the rules already given to the censors of the tribes. But before the benches of the knights on either side stands one being shorter, and at the upper end of this sit the two tribunes of the horse. At the upper end of the other the two tribunes of the foot in their arms, the rest of the benches being covered by the judges of the land in their robes. But these magistrates have no suffrage, nor the tribunes, though they derive their presence in the Senate from the Romans, nor the judges, though they derive theirs from the ancient Senate of Oceana. Every Monday this assembly sits of course; at other times, if there be occasion, any magistrate of the house, by giving order for the bell, or by his lictor or ensign-bearer, calls a senate. And every magistrate or knight during his session has the title, place, and honor of a duke, earl, baron, or knight respectively And every one that has borne the same magistracy by his third session, has his respective place and title during the term of his life, which is all the honor conferred by this commonwealth, except upon the master of the ceremonies, the master of the horse, and the king of the heralds, who are knights by their places. And thus you have the face of the Senate, in which there is scarce any feature that is not Roman or Venetian; nor do the horns of the crescent extend themselves much unlike those of the Sanhedrim, on either hand of the prince, and of the father of that Senate. But upon beauty, in which every man has his fancy, we will not otherwise philosophize than to remember that there is something more than decency in the robe of a judge, that would not be well spared from the bench; and that the gravest magistrate to whom you can commit the sword of justice, will find a quickness in the spurs of honor, which, if they be not laid to virtue, will lay themselves to that which may rout a commonwealth.

To come from the face of the Senate to the constitution and use of the parts: it is contained in the peculiar orders. And the orders which are peculiar to the Senate, are either of election or instruction.

Elections in the Senate are of three sorts: annual, biennial, and extraordinary.

Annual elections are performed by the schedule called the tropic; and the tropic consists of two parts: the one containing the magistrates, and the other the councils to be yearly elected. The schedule or tropic of the magistrates is as follows in—

The fifteenth order requiring, "That upon every Monday next ensuing the last of March, the knights of the annual galaxies taking their places in the Senate, be called the third region of the same; and that the house having dismissed the first region, and received the third, proceed to election of the magistrates contained in the first part of the tropic, by the ensuing schedule:

The lord strategus, The lord orator, the first censor, The second censor,

Annual magistrates,

The third commissioner of the seal, The third commissioner of the Treasury,

Triennal magistrates.

"The annual magistrates (provided that no one man bears above one of those honors during the term of one session) may be elected out of any region. But the triennial magistrates may not be elected out of any other than the third region only, lest the term of their session expire before that of their honor; and (it being unlawful for a man to bear magistracy any longer than he is thereto qualified by the election of the people) cause a fraction in the rotation of this commonwealth.

"The strategus is first president of the Senate, and general of the army, if it be commanded to march; in which case there shall be a second strategus elected to be first president of the Senate, and general of the second army, and if this also be commanded to march, a third strategus shill be chosen, and so on, as long as the commonwealth sends forth armies.

"The lord orator is the second and more peculiar president of the Senate to whom it appertains to keep the house to orders.

"The censors, whereof the first, by consequence of his election, is chancellor of the University of Clio, and the second of that of Calliope, are presidents of the Council for Religion and magistrates, to whom it belongs to keep the house to the order of the ballot. They are also inquisitors into the ways and means of acquiring magistracy, and have power to punish indirect proceedings in the same, by removing a knight or magistrate out of the house, under appeal to the Senate.

"The commissioners of the seal being three, whereof the third is annually chosen out of the third region, are judges in chancery.

"The commissioners of the Treasury being three, whereof the third is annually chosen out of the third region, are judges in the exchequer, and every magistrate of this schedule has right to propose to the Senate.

"But the strategus with the six commissioners is the signory of this commonwealth, having right of session and suffrage in every council of the Senate, and power either jointly or severally to propose in all or any of them."

I have little in this order to observe and prove but that the strategus is the same honor both in name and thing that was borne, among others, by Philopemen and Aratus in the Commonwealth of the Achaeans; the like having been in use also with the AEtolians. The orator, called otherwise the speaker, is, with small alteration, the same that had been of former use in this nation. These two, if you will, may be compared to the consuls in Rome, or the suffetes in Carthage, for their magistracy is scarce different.

The censors derive their power of removing a senator from those of Rome, the government of the ballot from those of Venice, and that of animadversion upon the ambitious, or canvass for magistracy, from both.

The signory, with the whole right and use of that magistracy to be hereafter more fully explained, is almost purely Venetian.

The second part of the tropic is directed by—

The sixteenth order" Whereby the constitution of the councils being four; that is to say, the Council of State, the Council of War, the Council of Religion, and the Council of Trade, is rendered conformable in their revolutions to that of the Senate. As: First, by the annual election of five knights out of the first region of the Senate into the Council of State, consisting of fifteen knights, five in every region. Secondly, by the annual election of three knights out of the third region of the Council of State, to be proposed by the provosts, and elected by that council, into the Council of War, consisting of nine knights, three in every region, not excluded by this election from remaining members also of the Council of State. The four tribunes of the people have right of session and suffrage in the Council of War. Thirdly, by the annual election of four knights out of the third region of the Senate into the Council of Religion, consisting of twelve knights, four in every region; of this council the censors are presidents. Fourthly, by the annual election of four knights out of the third region of the Senate into the Council of Trade, consisting of twelve knights, four in every region. And each region, in every one of these councils thus constituted, shall weekly and interchangeably elect one provost whose magistracy shall continue for one week; nor shall he be re-elected into the same till every knight of that region in the same council has once borne the same magistracy. And the provosts being one in every region, three in every council, and twelve in all, beside their other capacities, shall assemble and be a council, or rather an Academy apart, to certain ends and purposes to be hereafter further explained with those of the rest of the councils."

This order is of no other use than the frame and turn of the councils, and yet of no small one; for in motion consists life, and the motion of a commonwealth will never be current unless it be circular. Men that, like my Lord Epimonus, not enduring the resemblance of this kind of government to orbs and spheres, fall on physicking and purging it, do no more than is necessary; for if it be not in rotation both as to persons and things, it will be very sick. The people of Rome, as to persons, if they had not been taken up by the wheel of magistracy, had overturned the chariot of the Senate. And those of Lacedaemon, as to things, had not been so quiet when the Senate trashed their business, by encroaching upon the result, if by the institution of the ephors they had not brought it about again. So that if you allow not a commonwealth her rotation, in which consists her equality, you reduce her to a party, and then it is necessary that you be physicians indeed, or rather farriers; for you will have strong patients, and such as must be haltered and cast, or yourselves may need bone-setters. Wherefore the councils of this commonwealth, both in regard of their elections, and, as will be shown, of their affairs, are uniform with the Senate in their revolutions; not as whirlpits to swallow, but to bite, and with the screws of their rotation to hold and turn a business (like the vice of a smith) to the hand of the workman. Without engines of which nature it is not possible for the Senate, much less for the people, to be perfect artificers in a political capacity. But I shall not hold you longer from—

The seventeenth order, "Directing biennial elections, or the constitution of the orb of ambassador-in-ordinary, consisting of four residences, the revolution whereof is performed in eight years, and preserved through the election of one ambassador in two years by the ballot of the Senate to repair to the Court of France, and reside there for the term of two years; and the term of two years being expired, to remove from thence to the Court of Spain, there to continue for the space of two years, and thence to remove to the State of Venice, and after two years' residence in that city to conclude with his residence at Constantinople for a like term of time, and so to return. A knight of the Senate, or a deputy of the prerogative, may not be elected ambassador-in-ordinary, because a knight or deputy so chosen must either lose his session, which would cause an unevenness in the motion of this commonwealth, or accumulate magistracy, which agrees not with equality of the same. Nor may any man be elected into this capacity that is above five-and-thirty years of age, lest the commonwealth lose the charge of his education, by being deprived at his return of the fruit of it, or else enjoy it not long through the defects of nature."

This order is the perspective of the commonwealth, whereby she foresees danger; or the traffic, whereby she receives every two years the return of a statesman enriched with eight years' experience from the prime marts of negotiation in Europe. And so much for the elections in the Senate that are ordinary; such as are extraordinary follow in—

The eighteenth order, "Appointing all elections upon emergent occasions, except that of the dictator, to be made by the scrutiny, or that kind of election whereby a council comes to be a fifth order of electors. For example, if there be occasion of an ambassador-extraordinary, the provosts of the Council of State, or any two of them, shall propose to the same, till one competitor be chosen by that council; and the council having chosen a competitor, shall bring his name into the Senate, which in the usual way shall choose four more competitors to the same magistracy; and put them, with the competitor of the council, to the ballot of the house, by which he of the five that is chosen is said to be elected by the scrutiny of the Council of State. A vice-admiral, a polemarch, or field officer, shall be elected after the same manner, by the scrutiny of the Council of War. A judge or sergeant-at-law, by the scrutiny of the commissioners of the seal. A baron, or considerable officer of the Exchequer, by the scrutiny of the commissioners of the Treasury: Men in magistracy, or out of it, are equally capable of election by the scrutiny; but a magistrate or officer elected by the scrutiny to a military employment, if he be neither a knight of the Senate nor a deputy of the prerogative, ought to have his office confirmed by the prerogative, because the militia in a commonwealth, where the people are sovereign, is not lawful to be touched injussu populi.

The Romans were so curious that, though their consuls were elected in the centuriate assemblies, they might not touch the militia, except they were confirmed in the parochial assemblies; for a magistrate not receiving his power from the people, takes it from them, and to take away their power is to take away their liberty. As to the election by the scrutiny, it is easily perceived to be Venetian, there being no such way to take in the knowledge; which in all reason must be best in every council of such men as are most fit for their turns, and yet to keep them from the bias of particular affection or interest under that pretence; for the cause why the great Council in Venice scarce ever elects any other than the name that is brought in by the scrutiny, is very probable to be, that they may... This election is the last of those appertaining to the Senate. The councils being chosen by the orders already shown, it remains that we come to those whereby they are instructed and the orders of instruction to the councils are two: the first for the matter whereupon they are to proceed, and the second for the manner of their proceeding. The matter of the councils is distributed to them by—

The nineteenth order "Distributing to every council such businesses as are properly to belong to their cognizance, whereof some they shall receive and determine, and others they shall receive, prepare, and introduce into the house: as, first,

"The Council of State is to receive all addresses, intelligences, and letters of negotiation; to give audience to ambassadors sent to, and to draw up instructions for such as shall be sent by, this commonwealth; to receive propositions from, and hold intelligence with, the provincial councils; to consider upon all laws to be enacted, amended, or repealed, and upon all levies of men or money, war or peace, leagues or associations to be made by this commonwealth, so far forth as is conducible to the orderly preparation of the same to be introduced by them into the Senate; provided, that all such affairs, as otherwise appertaining to the Council of State, are, for the good of the commonwealth, to be carried with greater secrecy, be managed by the Council of War, with power to receive and send forth agents, spies, emissaries, intelligencers, frigots, and to manage affairs of that nature, if it be necessary without communication to the Senate, till such time as it may be had without detriment to the business. But they shall have no power to engage the commonwealth in a war without the consent of the Senate and the people. It appertains also to this council to take charge of the fleet as admiral, and of all storehouses, armories, arsenals, and magazines appertaining to this commonwealth. They shall keep a diligent record of the military expeditions from time to time reported by him that was strategus or general, or one of the polemarchs in that action; or at least so far as the experience of such commanders may tend to the improvement of the military discipline, which they shall digest and introduce into the Senate; and if the Senate shall thereupon frame any article, they shall see that it be observed, in the musters or education of the youth. And whereas the Council of War is the sentinel or scout of this commonwealth, if any person or persons shall go about to introduce debate into any popular assembly of the same, or otherwise to alter the present government, or strike at the root of it, they shall apprehend, or cause to be apprehended, seized, imprisoned, and examine, arraign, acquit, or condemn, and cause to be executed any such person or persons, by their proper power and authority and without appeal.

"The Council of Religion, as the arbiter of this commonwealth in cases of conscience more peculiarly appertaining to religion, Christian charity, and a pious life, shall have the care of the national religion, and the protection of the liberty of conscience with the cognizance of all causes relating to either of them. And first as to the national religion: they shall cause all places or preferments of the best revenue in either of the universities to be conferred upon no other than such of the most learned and pious men as have dedicated themselves to the study of theology. They shall also take a special care that, by such augmentations as be or shall hereafter be appointed by the Senate, every benefice in this nation be improved at least to the value of L100 a year. And to the end that there be no interest at all, whereby the divines or teachers of the national religion may be corrupted, or corrupt religion, they shall be capable of no other kind of employment or preferment in this commonwealth. And whereas a directory for the administration of the national religion is to be prepared by this council, they shall in this and other debates of this nature proceed in manner following: a question arising in matter of religion shall be put and stated by the council in writing, which writing the censors shall send by their beadles (being proctors chosen to attend them) each to the university whereof he is chancellor, and the vice-chancellor of the same receiving the writing, shall call a convocation of all the divines of that university being above forty years of age. And the universities, upon a point so proposed, shall have no manner of intelligence or correspondence one with another, till their debates be ended, and they have made return of their answers to the Council of Religion by two or three of their own members, that they may clear their sense, if any doubt should arise, to the council, which done, they shall return, and the council, having received such information, shall proceed according to their own judgments, in the preparation of the whole matter for the Senate: that so the interest of the learned being removed, there may be a right application of reason to Scripture, which is the foundation of the national religion.

"Secondly, this council, as to the protection of the liberty of conscience, shall suffer no coercive power in the matter of religion to be exercised in this nation; the teachers of the natural religion being no other than such as voluntarily undertake that calling, and their auditors or hearers no other than are also voluntary. Nor shall any gathered congregation be molested or interrupted in their way of worship (being neither Jewish nor idolatrous), but vigilantly and vigorously protected and defended in the enjoyment, practice, and profession of the same. And if there be officers or auditors appointed by any such congregation for the introduction of causes into the Council of Religion, all such causes so introduced shall be received, heard, and determined by the same, with recourse had, if need be, to the Senate.

"Thirdly, every petition addressed to the Senate, except that of a tribe, shall be received, examined, and debated by this council; and such only as they, upon such examination and debate had, shall think fit, may be introduced into the Senate.

"The Council of Trade being the vena porta of this nation, shall hereafter receive instructions more at large. For the present, their experience, attaining to a right understanding of those trades and mysteries that feed the veins of this commonwealth, and a true distinction of them from those that suck or exhaust the same, they shall acquaint the Senate with the conveniences and inconveniences, to the end that encouragement may be applied to the one, and remedy to the other.

"The Academy of the provosts, being the affability of the commonwealth, shall assemble every day toward the evening in a fair room, having certain withdrawing-rooms thereto belonging; and all sorts of company that will repair thither for conversation or discourse, so it be upon matters of government, news, or intelligence, or to propose anything to the councils, shall be freely and affably received in the outer chamber, and heard in the way of civil conversation, which is to be managed without any other awe or ceremony than is thereto usually appertaining, to the end that every man may be free, and that what is proposed by one, may be argued or discoursed by the rest, except the matter be of secrecy; in which case the provosts, or some of them, shall take such as desire audience into one of the withdrawing-rooms. And the provosts are to give their minds that this academy be so governed, adorned, and preserved, as may be most attractive to men of parts and good affections to the commonwealth, for the excellency of the conversation.

"Furthermore, if any man, not being able or willing to come in person, has any advice to give which he judges may be for the good of the commonwealth, he may write his mind to the Academy of the provosts, in a letter signed or not signed, which letter shall be left with the doorkeeper of the Academy. Nor shall any person delivering such a letter be seized, molested, or detained, though it should prove to be a libel. But the letters so delivered shall be presented to the provosts; and in case they be so many that they cannot well be perused by the provosts themselves, they shall distribute them as they please to be read by the gentlemen of the Academy, who, finding anything in them material, will find matter of discourse; or if they happen upon a business that requires privacy, return it with a note upon it to a provost. And the provosts by the secretaries attending shall cause such notes out of discourses or letters to be taken as they please, to the end that they may propose, as occasion serves, what any two of them shall think fit out of their notes so taken to their respective councils; to the end that not only the ear of the commonwealth be open to all, but that men of such education being in her eve, she may upon emergent elections or occasions be always provided of her choice of fit persons.

"Every council being adorned with a state for the signory, shall be attended by two secretaries, two doorkeepers, and two messengers-in-ordinary, and have power to command more upon emergencies, as occasion requires. And the Academy shall be attended with two secretaries, two messengers, and two doorkeepers; this with the other councils being provided with their further conveniences at the charge of the State.

"But whereas it is incident to commonwealths, upon emergencies requiring extraordinary speed or secrecy, either through their natural delays or unnatural haste, to incur equal danger, while holding to the slow pace of their orders, they come not in time to defend themselves from some sudden blow; or breaking them for the greater speed, they but haste to their own destruction; if the Senate shall at any time make election of nine knights-extraordinary, to be added to the Council of War, as a juncta for the term of three months, the Council of War with the juncta so added, is for the term of the same Dictator of Oceana, having power to levy men and money, to make war and peace, as also to enact laws, which shall be good for the space of one year (if they be not sooner repealed by the Senate and the people) and for no longer time, except they be confirmed by the Senate and the people. And the whole administration of the commonwealth for the term of the said three months shall be in the Dictator, provided that the Dictator shall have no power to do anything that tends not to his proper end and institution, but all to the preservation of the commonwealth as it is established, and for the sudden restitution of the same to the natural channel and common course of government. And all acts, orders, decrees, or laws of the Council of War with the junota being thus created, shall be signed,

"DICTATOR OCEANAE."

This order of instructions to the councils being (as in a matter of that nature is requisite) very large, I have used my best skill to abbreviate it in such manner as might show no more of it than is necessary to the understanding of the whole, though as to the parts, or further duties of the councils, I have omitted many things of singular use in a commonwealth. But it was discoursed at the council by the Archon in this manner:

"MY LORDS, THE LEGISLATORS:

"Your councils, except the Dictator only, are proper and native springs and sources, you see, which (hanging a few sticks and straws, that, as less considerable, would otherwise be more troublesome, upon the banks of their peculiar channels) derive the full stream of business into the Senate, so pure, and so far from the possibility of being troubled or stained (as will Undeniably appear by the course contained in the ensuing order) with any kind of private interest or partiality, that it shall never be possible for any assembly hearkening to the advice or information of this or that worthy member (either instructed upon his pillow, or while he was making himself ready, or by the petition or ticket which he received at the door) to have half the security in his faith, or advantage by his wisdom; such a Senate or council being, through the uncertainty of the winds, like a wave of the sea. Nor shall it otherwise mend the matter by flowing up into dry ditches, or referring businesses to be better examined by committees, than to go further about with it to less purpose; if it does not ebb back again with the more mud in it. For in a case referred to an occasional committee, of which any member that is desirous may get himself named, and to which nobody will come but either for the sake of his friend or his own interest; it fares little better as to the information of the Senate, than if it had been referred to the parties. Wherefore the Athenians being distributed into four tribes, out of which by equal numbers they annually chose 400 men, called the Senate of the Bean, because the ballot at their election was performed by the use of beans, divided them by fifties into eight parts. And every fifty in their turn, for one-eighth part of the year, was a council apart called the Prytans.

"The Prytans in their distinct council receiving all comers, and giving ear to every man that had anything to propose concerning the commonwealth, had power to debate and prepare all the businesses that were to be introduced into the Senate. The Achaeans had ten selected magistrates called the demiurgs, constituting a council apart called the synarchy, which, with the strategus, prepared all the business that was introduced into their Senate. But both the Senate of the Athenians, and that of the Achaeans, would have wondered if a man had told them that they were to receive all comers and discourses, to the end that they might refer them afterward to the Prytans or the synarchy, much less to an occasional committee, exposed to the catch that catch may of the parties interested. And yet Venice in this, as in most of her orders, excels them all by the constitution of her councils, that of the College, and the other of the Dieci, or Council of Ten. The course of the College is exactly described in the ensuing order: and for that of the Dieci, it so little differs from what it has bestowed upon Our Dictator, that I need not make any particular description of it. But to dictatorian power in general, and the use of it (because it must needs be of difficult digestion to such as, puking still at ancient prudence, show themselves to be in the nursery of mother-wit); it is no less than necessary to say something. And, first, in a commonwealth that is not wrought up, or perfected, this power will be of very frequent, if not continual, use; wherefore it is said more than once, upon defects of the government, in the book of Judges, 'that in those days there was no king in Israel.' Nor has the translator, though for 'no king, he should have said 'no judge,' abused you so much; seeing that the Dictator (and such was the Judge of Israel) or the dictatorian power being in a single person, so little differs from monarchy, which followed in that, that from the same cause there has been no other effect in any commonwealth: as in Rome was manifest by Sylla and Caesar, who to make themselves absolute or sovereign, had no more to do than to prolong their magistracy, for the dictatorian power was reputed divine, and therefore irresistible.

"Nevertheless, so it is, that without this power, which is so dangerous, and subject to introduce monarchy, a commonwealth cannot be safe from falling into the like dissolution; unless you have an expedient in this case of your own, and bound up by your providence from recoiling. Expedients in some cases you must not only have, but be beholden for them to such whom you must trust at a pinch, when you have not leisure to stand with them for security; which will be a thousand times more dangerous. And there can never be a commonwealth otherwise than by the order in debate wrought up to that perfection; but this necessity must sometimes happen in regard of her natural slowness and openness, and the suddenness of assaults that may be made upon her, as also the secrecy which in some cases may be of absolute necessity to her affairs. Whence Machiavel concludes it positively, that a commonwealth unprovided of such a refuge, must fall to ruin; for her course is either broken by the blow in one of those cases, or by herself, while it startles her out of her orders. And indeed a commonwealth is like a greyhound, which, having once coasted, will never after run fair, but grow slothful; and when it comes to make a common practice of taking nearer ways than its orders, it is dissolved: for the being of a commonwealth consists in its orders. Wherefore at this list you will be exposed to danger, if you have not provided beforehand for the safety of your resort in the like cases: nor is it sufficient that your resort be safe, unless it be as secret and quick; for if it be slow or open, your former inconveniences are not remedied.

"Now for our imitation in this part, there is nothing in experience like that of the Council of Ten in Venice; the benefit whereof would be too long to be shown in the whole piece, and therefore I shall take but a pattern out of Janotti. In the war, says he, which the Venetians had with Florence in Casentin, the Florentines, finding a necessity in their affairs far from any other inclination in themselves to ask their peace, sent ambassadors about it to Venice, where they were no sooner heard, than the bargain was struck up by the Council of Ten: and everybody admiring (seeing this commonwealth stood upon the higher ground) what should be the reason of such haste, the council upon the return of the ambassadors imparted letters to the Senate, whereby it appeared that the Turks had newly launched a formidable fleet against their State, which, had it been understood by the Florentines, it was well enough known they would have made no peace. Wherefore the service of the Ten was highly applauded by the Senate, and celebrated by the Venetians. Whereby may appear not only in part what use there is of dictatorian power in that government, but that it is assumed at the discretion of that Council; whereas in this of Oceana it is not otherwise intrusted than when the Senate, in the election of nine knights-extraordinary, gives at once the commission, and takes security in a balance, added to the Council of War, though securer before by the tribunes of the people than that of Venice, which yet never incurred jealousy; for if the younger nobility have been often girding at it, that happened not so much through the apprehension of danger in it to the commonwealth, as through the awe of it upon themselves. Wherefore the graver have doubtlessly shown their prudence in the law whereby the magistracy of these councillors being to last till' their successors be created, the council is established."

The instructions of the councils for their matter being shown, it remains that I show the instructions for the manner of their proceeding, as they follow in—

The twentieth order, "Containing the method of debates to be observed by the magistrates and the councils successively in order to a decree of the Senate.

"The magistrates of the signory, as councillors of this commonwealth, shall take into their consideration all matters of state or of government; and, having right to propose in any council, may, any one or more of them, propose what business he or they please in that council to which it most properly belongs. And, that the councils may be held to their duty, the said magistrates are superintendents and inspectors of the same, with right to propose to the Senate.

"The censors have equal power with these magistrates, but in relation to the Council of Religion only.

"Any two of the three provosts in every council may propose to, and are the more peculiar proposers of, the same council; to the end that there be not only an inspection and superintendency of business in general, but that every work be also committed to a peculiar hand.

"Any one or more of the magistrates, or any two of the provosts respectively having proposed, the council shall debate the business so proposed, to which they of the third region that are willing shall speak first in their order; they of the second, next; and they of the first, last; and the opinions of those that proposed or spoke, as they shall be thought the most considerable by the council, shall be taken by the secretary of the same in writing, and each of them signed with the name of the author.

"The opinions being thus prepared, any magistrate of the signory, the censors, or any two of the provosts of that council, upon this occasion may assemble the Senate.

"The Senate being assembled, the opinions (for example, if they be four) shall be read in their order, that is, according to the order or dignity of the magistrates or councillors by which they were signed. And being read, if any of the council introducing them will speak, they, as best acquainted with the business, shall have precedence; and after them the senators shall speak according to their regions, beginning by the third first, and so continuing till every man that will has spoken; and when the opinions have been sufficiently debated, they shall be put all together to the ballot after this manner:

"Four secretaries, carrying each of them one of the opinions in one hand, with a white box in the other, and each following the other, according to the order of the opinions, shall present his box, naming the author of his opinion to every senator; and one secretary or ballotin with a green box shall follow the four white ones; and one secretary or ballotin with a red box shall follow the green one; and every senator shall put one ball into some one of these six boxes. The suffrage being gathered and opened before the signory, if the red box or non-sincere had above half the suffrages, the opinions shall be all cast out, for the major part of the house is not clear in the business. If no one of the four opinions had above half the suffrages in the affirmative, that which had fewest shall be cast out, and the other three shall be balloted again. If no one of the three had above half, that which had fewest shall be cast out, and the other two shall ballot again. If neither of the two had above half, that which had fewest shall be cast out, and the remaining opinion shall be balloted again. And if the remaining opinion has not above half, it shall also be cast out. But the first of the opinions that arrives at most above half in the affirmative, is the decree of the Senate. The opinions being all of them cast out by the non-sincere, may be reviewed, if occasion permits, by the council, and brought in again. If they be cast out by the negative, the case being of advice only; the house approves not, and there is an end of it: the case being necessary, and admitting delay, the council is to think again upon the business, and to bring in new opinions; but the case being necessary, and not admitting delay, the Senate immediately electing the juncta shall create the Dictator. 'And let the Dictator,' as the Roman saying is, 'take care that the commonwealth receives no harm.'"

This in case the debate concludes not in a decree. But if a decree be passed, it is either in matter of state or government according to law enacted already, and then it is good without going any further, or it is in matter of law to be enacted, repealed, or amended; and then the decree of the Senate, especially if it be for a war, or for a levy of men or money, is invalid, without the result of the commonwealth, which is in the prerogative tribe, or representative of the people.

"The Senate having prepared a decree to be proposed to the people, shall appoint their proposers; and no other may propose for the Senate to the people but the magistrates of the house; that is to say, the three commissioners of the seal, or any two of them; the three of the Treasury, or any two of them; or the two censors.

"The Senate having appointed their proposers, shall require of the tribunes a muster of the people at a set time and place: and the tribunes or any two of them having mustered the people accordingly, the proposers shall propose the sense or decree of the Senate by clauses to the people. And that which is proposed by the authority of the Senate, and resolved by the command of the people, is the law of Oceana." To this order, implicitly containing the sum very near of the whole civil part of the commonwealth, my Lord Archon spoke thus in council:

"MY DEAR LORDS:

"There is a saying, that a man must cut his coat according to his cloth. When I consider what God has allowed or furnished to our present work, I am amazed. You would have a popular government; he has weighed it to you in the present balance, as I may say, to a drachm; you have no more to do but to fix it. For the superstructures of such a government they require a good aristocracy: and you have, or have had a nobility or gentry the best studied, and the best writers, at least next that of Italy, in the whole world; nor have they been inferior, when so exercised, in the leading of armies. But the people are the main body of a commonwealth; show me from the treasuries of the snow (as it is in Job) to the burning zone a people whose shoulder so universally and so exactly fits the corselet. Nevertheless, it were convenient to be well provided with auxiliaries. There is Marpesia, through her fruitfulness, inexhaustible of men, and men through her barrenness not only enured to hardship, but in your arms. It may be said that Venice, excepting only that she takes not in the people, is the most incomparable situation of a commonwealth. You are Venice, taking in your people and your auxiliaries too. My lords, the children of Israel were makers of brick before they were builders of a commonwealth; but our brick is made, our mortar tempered, the cedars of Lebanon are hewed and squared to our hands. Has this been the work of man? Or is it in man to withstand this work? 'Shall he that contends with the Almighty instruct him? He that reproves God, let him answer it.' For our parts, everything is so laid that when we come to have use of it, it is the next at hand; and unless we can conceive that God and nature do anything in vain, there is no more for us to do but to despatch. The piece which we have reached to us in the foregoing orders, is the aristocracy. Athens, as has been shown, was plainly lost through the want of a good aristocracy.

"But the sufficiency of an aristocracy goes demonstrably upon the hand of the nobility or gentry; for that the politics can be mastered without study, or that the people can have leisure to study, is a vain imagination; and what kind of aristocracy divines and lawyers would make, let their incurable running upon their own narrow bias and their perpetual invectives against Machiavel (though in some places justly reprovable, yet the only politician, and incomparable patron of the people) serve for instruction. I will stand no more to the judgment of lawyers and divines in this work, than to that of so many other tradesmen; but if this model chances to wander abroad, I recommend it to the Roman speculativi (the most complete gentlemen of this age) for their censure; or with my Lord Epimonus his leave, send 300 or 400 copies to your agent at Venice to be presented to the magistrates there; and when they have considered them, to be proposed to the debate of the Senate, the most competent judges under heaven, who, though they have great affairs, will not refuse to return you the oracle of their ballot. The councillors of princes I will not trust; they are but journeymen. The wisdom of these later times in princes' affairs (says Verulamius) is rather fine deliveries and shiftings of dangers when they be near, than solid and grounded courses to keep them off. Their councillors do not derive their proceedings from any sound root of government that may contain the demonstration, and assure the success of them, but are expedient-mongers, givers of themselves to help a lame dog over a stile; else how comes it to pass that the fame of Cardinal Richelieu has been like thunder, whereof we hear the noise, but can make no demonstration of the reason? But to return: if neither the people, nor divines and lawyers, can be the aristocracy of a nation, there remains only the nobility; in which style, to avoid further repetition, I shall understand the gentry also, as the French do by the word noblesse.

"Now to treat of the nobility in such sort as may be less obnoxious to mistake, it will be convenient, and answerable to the present occasion, that I divide my discourse into four parts:

"The first, treating of nobility, and the kinds of it;

"The second, of their capacity of the Senate;

"The third, of the divers kinds of senates;

"The fourth, of the Senate, according to the foregoing orders.

"Nobility may be defined divers ways; for it is either ancient riches, or ancient virtue, or a title conferred by a prince or a commonwealth.

"Nobility of the first kind may be subdivided into two others, such as hold an overbalance in dominion or property to the whole people, or such as hold not an overbalance, in the former case, a nobility (such was the Gothic, of which sufficient has been spoken) is incompatible with popular government; for to popular government it is essential that power should be in the people, but the overbalance of a nobility in dominion draws the power to themselves. Wherefore in this sense it is that Machiavel is to be understood, where he says, that these are pernicious in a commonwealth; and of France, Spain, and Italy, that they are nations which for this cause are the corruption of the world: for otherwise nobility may, according to his definition (which is, 'that they are such as live upon their own revenues in plenty, without engagement either to the tilling of their lands, or other work for their livelihood '), hold an underbalance to the people; in which case they are not only safe, but necessary to the natural mixture of a well-ordered commonwealth.

"For how else can you have a commonwealth that is not altogether mechanic? or what comparison is there of such commonwealths as are, or come nearest to mechanic—for example, Athens, Switzerland, Holland, to Lacedaemon, Rome, and Venice, plumed with their aristocracies? Your mechanics, till they have first feathered their nests, like the fowls of the air whose whole employment is to seek their food, are so busied in their private concernments that they have neither leisure to study the public, nor are safely to be trusted with it, because a man is not faithfully embarked in this kind of ship, if he has no share in the freight. But if his share be such as gives him leisure by his private advantage to reflect upon that of the public, what other name is there for this sort of men, being a leur aise, but (as Machiavel you see calls them) nobility? Especially when their families come to be such as are noted for their services done to the commonwealth, and so take into their ancient riches ancient virtue, which is the second definition of nobility, but such a one as is scarce possible in nature without the former. 'For as the baggage,' says Verulamius, 'is to an army, so are riches to virtue; they cannot be spared nor left behind, though they be impediments, such as not only hinder the march, but sometimes through the care of them lose or disturb the victory.' Of this latter sort is the nobility of Oceana; the best of all others because they, having no stamp whence to derive their price, can have it no otherwise than by their intrinsic value. The third definition of nobility, is a title, honor, or distinction from the people, conferred or allowed by the prince or the commonwealth. And this may be two ways, either without any stamp or privilege, as in Oceana; or with such privileges as are inconsiderable, as in Athens after the battle of Plataea, whence the nobility had no right, as such, but to religious offices, or inspection of the public games, to which they were also to be elected by the people; or with privileges, and those considerable ones, as the nobility in Athens before the battle of Plataea, and the patricians in Rome each of which had right, or claimed it, to the Senate and all the magistracies; wherein for some time they only by their stamp were current.

"But to begin higher, and to speak more at large of nobility in their several capacities of the Senate. The phylarchs, or princes of the tribes of Israel, were the most renowned, or, as the Latin, the most noble of the congregation, whereof by hereditary right they had the leading and judging. The patriarchs, or princes of families, according as they declared their pedigrees, had the like right as to their families; but neither in these nor the former was there any hereditary right to the Sanhedrim: though there be little question but the wise men and understanding, and known among their tribes, which the people took or elected into those or other magistracies, and whom Moses made rulers over them, must have been of these, seeing they could not choose but be the most known among the tribes, and were likeliest by the advantages of education to be the most wise and understanding.

"Solon having found the Athenians neither locally nor genealogically, but by their different ways of life, divided into four tribes—that is, into the soldiery, the tradesmen, the husbandmen, and the goatherds—instituted a new distribution of them, according to the sense or valuation of their estates, into four classes: the first, second, and third consisting of such as were proprietors in land, distinguished by the rate of their freeholds, with that stamp upon them, which making them capable of adding honor to their riches, that is to say, of the Senate, and all the magistracies, excluded the fourth, being the body of the people, and far greater in number than the former three, from all other right, as to those capacities, except the election of these, who by this means became an hereditary aristocracy or senatorian order of nobility. This was that course which came afterward to be the destruction of Rome, and had now ruined Athens. The nobility, according to the inevitable nature of such a one, having laid the plot how to divest the people of the result, and so to draw the whole power of the commonwealth to themselves; which in all likelihood they had done, if the people, coming by mere chance to be victorious in the battle of Plataea, and famous for defending Greece against the Persians, had not returned with such courage as irresistibly broke the classes, to which of old they had borne a white tooth, brought the nobility to equal terms, and the Senate with the magistracies to be common to both; the magistracies by suffrage, and the Senate (which was the mischief of it, as I shall show anon in that constitution) by lot only." The Lacedaemonians were in the manner, and for the same cause with the Venetians at this day, no other than a nobility even according to the definition given of nobility by Machiavel; for they neither exercised any trade, nor labored their lands or lots, which was done by their helots: wherefore some nobility may be far from pernicious in a commonwealth by Machiavel's own testimony, who is an admirer of this, though the servants thereof were more in number than the citizens. To these servants I hold the answer of Lycurgus—when he bade him who asked why he did not admit the people to the government of his commonwealth, to go home and admit his servants to the government of his family-to relate: for neither were the Lacedaemonians servants, nor, further, capable of the government, unless, whereas the congregation had the result, he should have given them the debate also; every one of these that attained to sixty years of age, and the major vote of the congregation, being equally capable of the Senate.

"The nobility of Rome, and their capacity of the Senate, I have already described by that of Athens before the battle of Plataea, saving only that the Athenian was never eligible into the Senate without the suffrage of the people till the introduction of the lot, but the Roman nobility ever: for the patricians were elected into the Senate by the kings; by the consuls, or the censors, or if a plebeian happened to be conscribed, he and his posterity became patricians. Nor, though the people had many disputes with the nobility, did this ever come in controversy, which, if there had been nothing else, might in my judgment have been enough to overturn that commonwealth.

"The Venetian nobility, but that they are richer, and not military, resemble at all other points the Lacedaemonian, as I have already shown. These Machiavel excepts from his rule, by saying that their estates are rather personal than real, or of any great revenue in land, which comes to our account, and shows that a nobility or party of the nobility, not overbalancing in dominion, is not dangerous, but of necessary use in every commonwealth, provided it be rightly ordered; for if it be so ordered as was that of Rome, though they do not overbalance at the beginning, as they did not there, it will not be long ere they do, as is clear both in reason and experience toward the latter end. That the nobility only be capable of the Senate is there only not dangerous, where there be no other citizens, as in this government and that of Lacedaemon.

"The nobility of Holland and Switzerland, though but few, have privileges not only distinct from the people, but so great that in some sovereignties they have a negative voice; an example which I am far from commending, being such as (if those governments were not cantonized, divided, and subdivided into many petty sovereignties that balance one another, and in which the nobility, except they had a prince at the head of them, can never join to make work) would be the most dangerous that ever was, but the Gothic, of which it favors. For in ancient commonwealths you shall never find a nobility to have had a negative but by the poll, which, the people being far more in number, came to nothing; whereas these have it, be they never so few by their stamp or order.

"Ours of Oceana have nothing else but their education and their leisure for the public, furnished by their ease and competent riches: and their intrinsic value, which, according as it comes to hold weight in the judgment or suffrage of the people, is their only way to honor and preferment. Wherefore I would have your lordships to look upon your children as such, who, if they come to shake off some part of their baggage, shall make the more quick and glorious march; for it was nothing else but the baggage, sordidly plundered by the nobility of Rome, that lost the victory of the whole world in the midst of her triumph.

"Having followed the nobility thus close, they bring us, according to their natural course and divers kinds, to the divers constitutions of the Senate.

"That of Israel (as was shown by my right noble Lord Phosphorus de Auge, in the opening of the commonwealth) consisted of seventy elders, elected at first by the people. But whereas they were for life, they ever after (though without any divine precept for it) substituted their successors by ordination, which ceremony was most usually performed by imposition of hands; and by this means a commonwealth of as popular institution as can be found became, as it is accounted by Josephus, aristocratical. From this ordination derives that which was introduced by the Apostles into the Christian Church; for which cause I think it is that the Presbyterians would have the government of the Church to be aristocratical, though the Apostles, to the end, as I conceive, that they might give no occasion to such a mistake, but show that they intended the government of the Church to be popular, ordained elders, as has been shown, by the holding up of hands (or free suffrage of the people) in every congregation or ecclesia: for that is the word in the original, being borrowed from the civil congregations of the people in Athens and Lacedaemon, which were so called; and the word for holding up of hands in the text is also the very same, which signified the suffrage of the people in Athens, chirotonante; for the suffrage of the Athenians was given per chirotonian, says Emmius.

"The Council of the Bean (as was shown by my Lord Navarchus de Paralo in his full discourse), being the proposing Senate of Athens (for that of the Areopagites was a judicatory), consisted of 400, some say 500 senators, elected annually, all at once, and by a mere lot without suffrage. Wherefore though the Senate, to correct the temerity of the lot, had power to cast out such as they should judge unworthy of that honor, this related to manners only, and was not sufficient to repair the commonwealth, which by such means became impotent; and forasmuch as her Senate consisted not of the natural aristocracy, which in a commonwealth is the only spur and rein of the people, it was cast headlong by the rashness of her demagogues or grandees into ruin; while her Senate, like the Roman tribunes (who almost always, instead of governing, were rather governed by the multitude), proposed not to the result only, but to the debate also of the people, who were therefore called to the pulpits, where some vomited, and others drank, poison.

"The Senate of Lacedaemon, most truly discovered by my Lord Laco de Scytale, consisted but of thirty for life, whereof the two kings, having but single votes, were hereditary, the rest elected by the free suffrage of the people, but out of such as were sixty years of age. These had the whole debate of the commonwealth in themselves, and proposed to the result only of the people. And now the riddle which I have heretofore found troublesome to unfold, is out; that is to say, why Athens and Lacedaemon, consisting each of the Senate and the people, the one should be held a democracy, and the other an aristocracy, or laudable oligarchy, as it is termed by Isocrates; for that word is not, wherever you meet it, to be branded, Seeing it is used also by Aristotle, Plutarch, and others, sometimes in a good sense. The main difference was that the people in this had the result only, and in that the debate and result, too. But for my part, where the people have the election of the Senate, not bound to a distinct order, and the result, which is the sovereign power, I hold them to have that share in the government (the Senate being not for life) whereof, with the safety of the commonwealth, they are capable in nature, and such a government, for that cause, to be democracy; though I do not deny but in Lacedaemon, the paucity of the senators considered, it might be called oligarchy, in comparison of Athens; or, if we look on their continuance for life, though they had been more, aristocracy.

"The Senate of Rome (whose fame has been heard to thunder in the eloquence of my Lord Dolabella d'Enyo) consisting of 300, was, in regard of the number, less oligarchical than that of Lacedaemon; but more in regard of the patricians, who, having an hereditary capacity of the same, were not elected to that honor by the people; but, being conscribed by the censors, enjoyed it for life. Wherefore these, if they had their wills, would have resolved as well as debated; which set the people at such variance with them as dissolved the commonwealth; whereas if the people had enjoyed the result, that about the agrarian, as well as all other strife, must of necessity have ceased.

"The Senates of Switzerland and Holland (as I have learnt of my Lords Alpester and Glaucus), being bound up (like the sheaf of arrows which the latter gives) by leagues, lie like those in their quivers; but arrows, when they come to be drawn, fly from this way and from that; and I am contented that these concerned us not.

"That of Venice (by the faithful testimony of my most excellent Lord Linceus de Stella) has obliged a world, sufficiently punished by its own blindness and ingratitude, to repent and be wiser: for whereas a commonwealth in which there is no senate, or where the senate is corrupt, cannot stand, the great Council of Venice, like the statue of Nilus, leans upon an urn or waterpot, which pours forth the Senate in so pure and perpetual a stream, as being unable to stagnate, is forever incapable of corruption. The fuller description of this Senate is contained in that of Oceana; and that of Oceana in the foregoing orders. To every one of which, because something has been already said, I shall not speak in particular. But in general, your Senate, and the other assembly, or the prerogative, as I shall show in due place, are perpetual, not as lakes or puddles, but as the rivers of Eden; and are beds made, as you have seen, to receive the whole people, by a due and faithful vicissitude, into their current. They are not, as in the late way, alternate. Alternate life in government is the alternate death of it.

"This was the Gothic work, whereby the former government (which was not only a ship, but a gust, too) could never open her sails, but in danger to overset herself, neither could make any voyage nor lie safe in her own harbor. The wars of later ages, says Verulamius, seem to be made in the dark, in respect of the glory and honor which reflected on men from the wars in ancient times. Their shipping of this sort Was for voyages; ours dare not launch, nor lies it safe at home. Your Gothic politicians seem to me rather to have invented some new ammunition or gunpowder, in their King and Parliament, than government. For what is become of the princes (a kind of people) in Germany?—blown up. Where are the estates, or the power of the people in France?—blown up. Where is that of the people in Arragon, and the rest of the Spanish kingdoms?—blown up. On the other side, where is the King of Spain's power in Holland?—blown up. Where is that of the Austrian princes in Switzerland?—blown up. This perpetual peevishness and jealousy, under the alternate empire of the prince and of the people, are obnoxious to every spark. Nor shall any man show a reason that will be holding in prudence, why the people of Oceana have blown up their King, but that their kings did not first blow up them. The rest is discourse for ladies. Wherefore your parliaments are not henceforth to come out of the bag of AEolus, but by your galaxies, to be the perpetual food of the fire of Vesta.

"Your galaxies, which divide the house into so many regions, are three; one of which constituting the third region is annually chosen, but for the term of three years; which causes the house (having at once blossoms, fruit half ripe, and others dropping off in full maturity) to resemble an orange tree, such as is at the same time an education or spring, and a harvest, too; for the people have made a very ill-choice in the man, who is not easily capable of the perfect knowledge in one year of the senatorian orders; which knowledge, allowing him for the first to have been a novice, brings him the second year to practise, and time enough. For at this rate you must always have 200 knowing men in the government. And thus the vicissitude of your senators is not perceivable in the steadiness and perpetuity of your Senate; which, like that of Venice, being always changing, is forever the same. And though other politicians have not so well imitated their patter, there is nothing more obvious in nature, seeing a man who wears the same flesh but a short time, is nevertheless the same man, and of the same genius; and whence is this but from the constancy of nature, in holding a man to her orders? Wherefore keep also to your orders. But this is a mean request; your orders will be worth little if they do not hold you to them, wherefore embark. They are like a ship, if you be once aboard, you do not carry them, but they you; and see how Venice stands to her tackling: you will no more forsake them than you will leap into the sea.

"But they are very many and difficult. O my Lords, what seaman casts away his card because it has four-and-twenty points of the compass? and yet those are very near as many and as difficult as the orders in the whole circumference of your commonwealth. Consider, how have we been tossed with every wind of doctrine, lost by the glib tongues of your demagogues and grandees in our own havens? A company of fiddlers that have disturbed your rest for your groat; L2,000 to one, L3,000 a year to another, has been nothing. And for what? Is there one of them that yet knows what a commonwealth is? And are you yet afraid of such a government in which these shall not dare to scrape for fear of the statute? Themistocles could not fiddle, but could make of a small city a great commonwealth: these have fiddled, and for your money, till they have brought a great commonwealth to a small city.

"It grieves me, while I consider how, and from what causes, imaginary difficulties will be aggravated, that the foregoing orders are not capable of any greater clearness in discourse or writing; but if a man should make a book, describing every trick and passage, it would fare no otherwise with a game at cards; and this is no more, if a man plays upon the square. 'There is a great difference,' says Verulamius, 'between a cunning man and a wise man (between a demagogue and a legislator), not only in point of honesty, but in point of ability as there be that can pack the cards, and yet cannot play well; so there be some that are good in canvasses and fractions, that are otherwise weak men.' Allow me but these orders, and let them come with their cards in their sleeves, or pack if they can. 'Again,' says he, 'it is one thing to understand persons, and another to understand matters; for many are perfect in men's humors that are not greatly capable of the real part of business, which is the constitution of one that has studied men more than books. But there is nothing more hurtful in a State than that cunning men should pass for wise.' His words are an oracle. As Dionysius, when he could no longer exercise his tyranny among men, turned schoolmaster, that he might exercise it among boys. Allow me but these orders, and your grandees, so well skilled in the baits and palates of men, shall turn rat-catchers.

"And whereas 'councils (as is discreetly observed by the same author in his time) are at this day, in most places, but familiar meetings (somewhat like the Academy of our provosts), where matters are rather talked on than debated, and run too swift to order an act of council,' give me my orders, and see if I have not puzzled your demagogues.

"It is not so much my desire to return upon haunts, as theirs that will not be satisfied; wherefore if, notwithstanding what was said of dividing and choosing in our preliminary discourses, men will yet be returning to the question, Why the Senate must be a council apart (though even in Athens, where it was of no other constitution than the popular assembly, the distinction of it from the other was never held less than necessary) this may be added to the former reasons, that if the aristocracy be not for the debate, it is for nothing; but if it be for debate, it must have convenience for it; and what convenience is there for debate in a crowd, where there is nothing but jostling, treading upon one another, and stirring of blood, than which in this case there is nothing more dangerous? Truly, it was not ill said of my Lord Epimonus, that Venice plays her game, as it were, at billiards or nine-holes; and so may your lordships, unless your ribs be so strong that you think better of football: for such sport is debate in a popular assembly as, notwithstanding the distinction of the Senate, was the destruction of Athens."

This speech concluded the debate which happened at the institution of the Senate. The next assembly is that of the people or prerogative tribe.

The face, or mien, of the prerogative tribe for the arms, the horses, and the discipline, but more especially for the select men, is that of a very noble regiment, or rather of two; the one of horse, divided into three troops (besides that of the provinces, which will be shown hereafter), with their captains, cornets, and two tribunes of the horse at the head of them; the other of foot in three companies (beside that of the provinces), with their captains, ensigns, and two tribunes of the foot at the head of them. The first troop is called the Phoenix, the second the Pelican, and the third the Swallow. The first company the Cypress, the second the Myrtle, and the third the Spray. Of these again (not without a near resemblance of the Roman division of a tribe) the Phoenix and the Cypress constitute the first class, the Pelican and the Myrtle the second, and the Swallow with the Spray the third, renewed every spring by—

The one-and-twentieth order, "Directing, that upon every Monday next ensuing the last of March, the deputies of the annual galaxy arriving at the pavilion in the halo, and electing one captain and one cornet of the Swallow (triennial officers) by and out of the cavalry at the horse urn, according to the rules contained in the ballot of the hundred; and one captain with one ensign of the Spray (triennial officers) by and out of the infantry at the foot urn, after the same way of balloting, constitute and become the third classes of the prerogative tribe."

Seven deputies are annually returned by every tribe, whereof three are horse and four are foot; and there be fifty tribes: so the Swallow must consist of 150 horse, the Spray of 200 foot. And the rest of the classes being two, each of them in number equal, the whole prerogative (beside the provinces, that is, the knights and deputies of Marpesia and Panopea) must consist of 1,050 deputies. And these troops and companies may as well be called centuries as those of the Romans; for the Romans related not, in so naming theirs, to the number. And whereas they were distributed according to the valuation of their estates, so are these; which, by virtue of the last order, are now accommodated with their triennial officers. But there be others appertaining to this tribe whose election, being of far greater importance, is annual, as follows in

The twenty-second order, "Whereby the first class having elected their triennial officers, and made oath to the old tribunes, that they will neither introduce, cause, nor to their power suffer debate to be introduced into any popular assembly of this government, but to their utmost be aiding and assisting to seize and deliver any person or persons in that way offending, and striking at the root of this commonwealth, to the Council of War, are to proceed with the other two classes of the prerogative tribe to election of the new tribunes, being four annual magistrates, whereof two are to be elected out of the cavalry at the horse urn, and two out of the infantry at the foot urn, according to the common ballot of the tribes. And they may be promiscuously chosen out of any classes, provided that the same person shall not be capable of bearing the tribunitian honor twice in the term of one galaxy. The tribunes thus chosen shall receive the tribe (in reference to the power of mustering and disciplining the same) as commanders-in-chief, and for the rest as magistrates, whose proper function is prescribed by the next order. The tribunes may give leave to any number of the prerogative, not exceeding 100 at a time, to be absent, so they be not magistrates nor officers, and return within three months. If a magistrate or officer has a necessary occasion, he may also be absent for the space of one month, provided that there be not above three cornets or ensigns, two captains, or one tribune so absent at one time."

To this the Archon spoke at the institution after this manner:

"MY LORDS:

"It is affirmed by Cicero, in his oration for Flaccus, that the commonwealths of Greece were all shaken or ruined by the intemperance of their Comitia, or assemblies of the people. The truth is, if good heed in this point be not taken, a commonwealth will have bad legs. But all the world knows he should have excepted Lacedaemon, where the people, as has been shown by the oracle, had no power at all of debate, nor (till after Lysander, whose avarice opened a gulf that was not long ere it swallowed up his country) came it ever to be exercised by them. Whence that commonwealth stood longest and firmest of any other but this, in our days, of Venice; which, having underlaid herself with the like institution, owes a great, if not the greater, part of her steadiness to the same principle; the great Council, which is with her the people, by the authority of my Lord Epimonus, never speaking a word. Nor shall any commonwealth, where the people in their political capacity is talkative, ever see half the days of one of these, but, being carried away by vainglorious men (that, as Overbury says, void more than they drink), swim down the stream, as did Athens, the most prating of these dames, when that same ranting fellow Alcibiades fell a-demagoguing for the Silician War.

"But whereas debate, by the authority and experience of Lacedaemon and Venice, is not to be committed to the people in a well-ordered government, it may be said that the order specified is but a slight bar in a matter of like danger; for so much as an oath, if there be no recourse upon the breach of it, is a weak tie for such hands as have the sword in them, wherefore what should hinder the people of Oceana, if they happen not to regard an oath from assuming debate, and making themselves as much an anarchy as those of Athens? To which I answer, Take the common sort in a private capacity, and, except they be injured, you shall find them to have a bashfulness in the presence of the better sort, or wiser men, acknowledging their abilities by attention, and accounting it no mean honor to receive respect from them; but if they be injured by them, they hate them, and the more for being wise or great, because that makes it the greater injury. Nor refrain they in this case from any kind of intemperance of speech, if of action. It is no otherwise with a people in their political capacity; you shall never find that they have assumed debate for itself, but for something else. Wherefore in Lacedaemon where there was, and in Venice where there is, nothing else for which they should assume it, they have never shown so much as an inclination to it.

"Nor was there any appearance of such a desire in the people of Rome (who from the time of Romulus had been very well contented with the power of result either in the parochial assemblies, as it was settled upon them by him, or in the meetings of the hundreds, as it was altered in their regard for the worse by Servius Tullius) till news was brought, some fifteen years after the exile of Tarquin, their late King (during which time the Senate had governed pretty well), that he was dead at the Court of Aristodemus the tyrant of Cumae. Whereupon the patricians, or nobility, began to let out the hitherto dissembled venom which is inherent in the root of oligarchy and fell immediately upon injuring the people beyond all moderation. For whereas the people had served both gallantly and contentedly in arms upon their own charges, and, though joint purchasers by their swords of the conquered lands, had not participated in the same to above two acres a man (the rest being secretly usurped by the patricians), they, through the meanness of their support and the greatness of their expense, being generally indebted, no sooner returned home with victory to lay down their arms, than they were snatched up by their creditors, the nobility, to cram jails. Whereupon, but with the greatest modesty that was ever known in the like case, they first fell upon debate, affirming 'That they were oppressed and captivated at home, while abroad they fought for liberty and empire, and that the freedom of the common people was safer in time of war than peace, among their enemies than their fellow-citizens.' It is true that when they could not get the Senate, through fear, as was pretended by the patricians, to assemble and take their grievances into consideration, they grew so much the warmer, that it was glad to meet; where Appius Claudius, a fierce spirit, was of opinion that recourse should be had to consular power, whereby some of the brands of sedition being taken off, the flame might be extinguished. Servilius, being of another temper, thought it better and safer to try if the people might be bowed than broken.

"But this debate was interrupted by tumultuous news of the near approach of the Volsci, a case in which the Senate had no recourse but to the people, who, contrary to their former custom upon the like occasions, would not stir a foot, but fell a-laughing, and saying, 'Let them fight that have something to fight for.' The Senate that had purses, and could not sing so well before the thief, being in a great perplexity, found no possible way out of it but to beseech Servilius, one of a genius well known to be popular, that he would accept of the consulship, and make some such use of it as might be helpful to the patrician interest. Servilius, accepting of the offer, and making use of his interest with the people, persuaded them to hope well of the good intention of the fathers, whom it would little beseem to be forced to those things which would lose their grace, and that in view of the enemy, if they came not freely; and withal published an edict, that no man should withhold a citizen of Rome by imprisonment from giving his name (for that was the way, as I shall have opportunity hereafter to show more at large, whereby they drew out their armies), nor to seize or sell any man's goods or children that were in the camp. Whereupon the people with a mighty concourse immediately took arms, marched forth, and (which to them was as easy as to be put into the humor, and that, as appears in this place, was not hard) totally defeated the Volsci first, then the Sabines (for the neighboring nations, hoping to have had a good bargain of the discord in Rome, were up in arms on all sides), and after the Sabines the Aurunci. Whence returning, victorious in three battles they expected no less than that the Senate would have made good their words, when Appius Claudius, the other Consul, of his innate pride, and that he might frustrate the faith of his colleague, caused the soldiers (who being set at liberty, had behaved themselves with such valor) to be restored at their return to their creditors and their jails.