first of the well-born and then of the rich in keeping the offices in their own hands all through is one of the most remarkable features of Roman history. But they were corrupt and reckless in the bestowal of power, and had really ceased to care for the freedom and welfare of the State. The ruling classes, on the other hand, were tempted by the demoralization of the masses to be their corrupters, and lost their old respect for legality. Even a conscientious philosopher like Cicero did not scruple to put prisoners to death without trial, and to justify himself by citing an act of lawless violence done four centuries before. The leading Romans of that day were as fit as ever to work the system, so far as skill and knowledge went, but they had not the old regard for its principles, nor the old sense of public duty; and the prizes which office offered now that Rome was mistress of the world were too huge for average virtue to resist. The moral forces which had enabled the Roman Constitution to work in spite of its extraordinary complexity, and to live, in spite of the risks to which its own nature exposed it, were now fatally enfeebled. These abuses of power on the one hand, and on the other hand the deadlocks which the system of checks caused, grew more frequent and serious. Each successive wrench which the machine received became more violent, because neither faction had patriotism enough to try to ease them off, and so break the force of the shock. From the beginning of the Republic the chief danger had lain in the immense powers vested in the magistrates. These powers had been necessary, because the State was constantly exposed to attacks from without; and nothing but the sense of devotion to the interests of the State had controlled the party spirit which rages more fiercely within the walls of a city than it does in a large and scattered community. Now that Rome had vast dominions to rule, and now that her frontiers extended to the very verge of civilization, involving her in long wars with great monarchies or groups of tribes on those frontiers, large powers had to be entrusted to military chiefs, and entrusted for long periods. Thus the Republican constitution fell through the very faults which had always lain deep in its bosom, though an over-mastering patriotism had in earlier days kept them harmless. It is never easy, in studying the history of an institution, to determine how much of its success or its failure is due to its own character, how much to the conditions, external and domestic, in the midst of which it has to work. The fortunes of the Roman Constitution would doubtless have been different had Rome been less pressed by foreign enemies in her earlier days, or had she been less of a conquering power in her later. So too it is hard to compare States so different as Romewhose Constitution was always that of a City, and failed to widen itself so as to become a Constitution for Italyand England, whose Constitution has always since the days of Ecghbert and Alfred been that of a large and originally a rural and scattered community. If, however, the comparison is attempted, we may observe that England never, after the fourteenth century, recognized such vast powers in the Crown (whether in the Crown personally or as exercised by its Ministers) as Rome granted to her magistrates. In the sphere of public law England has applied more successfully than Rome did the conception of the inviolability of the rights of the citizen as against the organs of the State, although that conception is itself Roman. With all their legal genius the Romans were too much penetrated by the idea of the necessary amplitude of State power to fix just limits to the action of the Executive. When it was necessary to provide for checking a magistrate, they set up another magistrate to do it, instead of limiting magisterial powers by statute. Nor did they ever succeed as the English have done in disengaging the judicial from the executive department of government. In both these respects part of the merits of the English Constitution may be ascribed to Norman feudalism, whose precise definition of the respective rights of lord and vassal - all the lords but one being also vassals, and the greater vassals being also lords-helped to form and imprint deep the idea that powers, however strong within a definite sphere, may be strictly confined to that sphere, and that the limits of the sphere are fit matter for judicial determination. Perhaps the existence in the clergy of a large class of men enjoying specific immunities the exact range of which had to be settled, and, where possible, judicially settled, may have also contributed to train this habit of mind. The extent to which England, favoured no doubt by her insular position, was able to secure domestic freedom while leaving a large discretionary authority to the Crown, is usually credited to the rise of the House of Commons and the vigilance of its control. But much is also to be ascribed to that precise definition of the rights of the individual which has made life and property secure from injury on the : part of the State, to the habit of holding officials liable for acts done in excess of their functions, and to that ultimate detachment of the judiciary from the influence of the Crown which has enabled the individual to secure by legal process the enforcement of his rights. These principles have sunk deep into the mind of the nation, and have been of the utmost service in forming the habits of thought and action by which free constitutions have to be worked. They are just as strong as if they were embodied in a Rigid Constitution, instead of being legally at the mercy of Parliament. But that is because they have centuries of tradition behind them, and because the English are a people who respect tradition and have been trained to appreciate the value of the principles which their ancestors established. VIII. CAPACITY OF CONSTITUTIONS FOR TERRITORIAL One point more remains to be mentioned before we quit constitutions of the Flexible type, viz. their suitability to a State which is expanding its territory and taking in other communities whether by conquest or by treaty. Such constitutions seem especially well suited to countries which are passing through periods of change, whether internal or external. When new classes of the population have to be admitted to share in political power, or when the inhabitants of newly-acquired territories have to be taken in as citizens, this is most quickly and easily effected by the action of the ordinary legis lature. Both Rome and England availed themselves of this flexibility in the earlier stages of their growth. England, itself created as a State by the expansion of the West Saxons, enlarged herself to include Wales with no disturbance of her former Constitution, and similarly fused herself with Scotland in 1707 and with Ireland in 1800, in both cases altering the Constitution of the enlarged State no further than by the admission of additional members to the two Houses of Parliament, and by the suppression of certain offices in the smaller kingdoms. The ease with which the earlier expansions were effected may be attributed to the fact that in mediaeval times the prominence of the king made the submission of any tribe or territory to him carry with it the incorporation of that tribe or territory into his former dominions. The popular assembly of a community, such as were the South Saxons, for instance, sank into a secondary place as soon as the king was head of the South Saxons as well as of the West Saxons, for the council of the united people which he summoned and over which he presided became the national assembly for all his subjects. In later times, though Scotland and Ireland had their separate Parliaments, these could be readily united with that of England, because in all three countries the popular House was representative. Here, however, England has stopped. The vast dominions which she possesses beyond the oceans, while legally subject to her Crown and Parliament, have not been brought into the constitutional scheme of the motherland. Indeed they could hardly be brought in without a reconstruction of the present frame of government, which would probably have to be effected by the establishment of a Rigid Constitution. Similarly the Roman State had its first beginnings in |