Every degree of power necessary to the
state, and not destructive to the rational and moral freedom of
individuals, to that personal liberty and personal security which
contribute so much to the vigor, the prosperity, the happiness, and the
dignity of a nation,--every degree of power which does not suppose the
total absence of all control and all responsibility on the part of
ministers,--a king of France, in common sense, ought to possess. But
whether the exact measure of authority assigned by the letter of the law
to the king of Great Britain can answer to the exterior or interior
purposes of the French monarchy is a point which I cannot venture to
judge upon. Here, both in the power given, and its limitations, we have
always cautiously felt our way. The parts of our Constitution have
gradually, and almost insensibly, in a long course of time, accommodated
themselves to each other, and to their common as well as to their
separate purposes. But this adaptation of contending parts, as it has
not been in ours, so it can never be in yours, or in any country, the
effect of a single instantaneous regulation, and no sound heads could
ever think of doing it in that manner.
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