obtain for himself and by his own unaided efforts. I would therefore lay down as the first positive principle—a principle to be more carefully defined and limited in the subsequent course of inquiry—that the maintenance of security, as well with regard to the attacks of foreign enemies as to the danger of internal discord, constitutes the true end of the State, and must especially occupy its activity.
Hitherto I have attempted only to define this true end of the State in a negative way, by showing that the latter should not, at least, extend the sphere of its solicitude any further.
If we refer to the pages of history we only find additional confirmation of the position we would establish, in the fact that the kings in all earlier nations were in reality nothing more than leaders in war, and judges in times of peace. I says, kings. For (if I may be pardoned this digression), in those very periods in which men most fondly cherish the feeling of freedom—possessing, as they do, but little property, and only knowing and prizing personal force, and placing the highest enjoyment in its exercise—in those very periods, however strange it may seem, history shows us nothing but kings and monarchies. We observe this in all the Asiatic political unions, in those of the earliest ages of Greece, of Italy, and of those tribes who loved freedom more devotedly than all—the German.[1] If we examine into the reasons for this seeming contradiction, we are struck with the truth, that the very choice of a monarchy is a proof that those who select that form of government are in the enjoyment of the highest freedom. The idea of a chief ruler arises only, as was before observed, from the deep-felt
- ↑ "Reges (nam in terris nomen imperii id primum fuit)," etc.—Sallust in Catilina, c. 2. (Kings—for that was the first title of earthly authority, etc.) Κατ’ ἀρχὰς ἅπασα πόλις Ἑλλὰς ἐβασιλεύετο.—Dion. Halicarn. Antiquit. Rom. lib. 5. (All the Grecian States were at first governed by kings, etc.)
