Page:Essays, Moral and Political - David Hume (1741).djvu/43

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Politics a Science.
31

look for, was the despotic Power of the Cæsars. Such are the Effects of Democracy without a Representative.

A Nobility may possess the whole or any Part of the legislative Power of a State after two different Ways. Either every Nobleman shares the Power as part of the whole Body, or the whole Body enjoys the Power as composed of Parts; which have each a distinct Power and Authority. The Venetian Nobility are an Instance of the first kind of Government: The Polish of the second. In the Venetian Government the whole Body of Nobility possesses the whole Power, and no Nobleman has any Authority, which he receives not from the Whole. In the Polish Government every Nobleman, by Means of his Fiefs, has a peculiar hereditary Authority over his Vassals, and the whole Body has no Authority but what it receives from the Concurrence of its Parts. The distinct Operations and Tendencies of these two Species of Government might be made most apparent even a priori. A Venetian Nobility is infinitely preferable to a Polish, let the Humours and Education of Men be ever so much vary'd. ANobi-