第59章 Letter XIV(4)

The nation was sacrificed to a faction,and an excellent constitution destroyed,in favour of a profligate government.This destruction however would not have been so easily accomplished,nor would Castilians alone have enslaved Castile to a foreign race,after asserting their liberty so often,and so boldly,against princes of their own country,if two other circumstances had not concurred.Ferdinand had conquered Navarre,and a regular,disciplined army defended that conquest against the French.This army,which was at hand,marched into Castile,defeated the commons,and extinguished liberty in a country where it had been long declining.The nobility was detached from the commons by grants of land,amongst other considerations,as I said above;and the commons renewed their contest on this head,perhaps unjustly,to be sure very unseasonably.The commons however were justified for taking arms,in the opinion of the nobility,and even in that of Adrian,who governed during the absence of Charles,whose preceptor he had been;for this honest man,too honest to be long endured on the papal throne,where he was afterwards placed,affirmed that all the troubles of Castile were caused by the King,and by his covetous and tyrannical ministers.The conduct of the commons upon this great occasion,was in many instances rash and violent,as well as ill advised and weak.But they were tumultuous assemblies driven into despair;and the nobility,who might have had great sway amongst them,and might have helped to regulate their fire,and to keep them sober,helped on the contrary to make them mad,either by neglecting them,or by taking part against them,till it was too late;and then complained of their being mad,with as ill a grace as the principal men of Rome,who helped to corrupt that people,complained of their corruption,and assigned it as a reason for depriving them of their liberty.

There cannot be a greater solecism in politics than that of a nobility,under monarchical government,who suffer the liberty of the commons to be taken away.In aristocracies,the nobility get whatever the commons lose;but in monarchies,the crown alone is the gainer,and the certain consequence of their helping to enslave the commons,must be that of being enslaved themselves at last.How,indeed,should it be otherwise,since the liberty of the commons cannot be taken away,unless the constitution be first broken;and since neither the peers,nor any one else,can hold their privileges or their properties,by a better tenure than that of arbitrary will,when the constitution is once broken?Was it possible to doubt of this truth,we might find the proof of it,without going out of the country where we are;I mean Spain.Amongst all the surprising phenomena which have appeared in the world of late years,there are none that have struck mankind with more astonishment,than those instances of persons raised to the highest posts of power,authority and command,nay to empire,who had not,either from their obscure birth,or their low talents,or their still lower habits,the least occasion even to dream of such elevation.Among other countries Spain hath had her share of them;and the grandees,as they are pompously styled,the successors of those men,who thought to rise on the ruin of the commons of Castile;they,who have the vain honour of cocking their hats in the presence of their prince,have been seen to stand at awful distance,or approach with respectful cringe,in the presence of a parasite and buffoon.

I know full well that in such governments as we speak of here,it is both the duty and interest of the nobility to oppose the excesses of the commons;but I know too that they have another duty,which they are not to leave undone;another point of interest,which they are not to neglect:and therefore Ihave spoken of this second estate in our government as of a middle order,that are properly mediators between the other two,in the eye of our constitution.