They cannot even happen twice to the same people, for it can make itself free as long as it remains barbarous, but not when the civic impulse has lost its vigour.Then disturbances may destroy it, but revolutions cannot mend it: it needs a master, and not a liberator.Free peoples, be mindful of this maxim: "Liberty may be gained, but can never be recovered."Youth is not infancy.There is for nations, as for men, a period of youth, or, shall we say, maturity, before which they should not be made subject to laws; but the maturity of a people is not always easily recognisable, and, if it is anticipated, the work is spoilt.One people is amenable to discipline from the beginning; another, not after ten centuries.Russia will never be really civilised, because it was civilised too soon.Peter had a genius for imitation; but he lacked true genius, which is creative and makes all from nothing.He did some good things, but most of what he did was out of place.He saw that his people was barbarous, but did not see that it was not ripe for civilisation: he wanted to civilise it when it needed only hardening.His first wish was to make Germans or Englishmen, when he ought to have been making Russians; and he prevented his subjects from ever becoming what they might have been by persuading them that they were what they are not.In this fashion too a French teacher turns out his pupil to be an infant prodigy, and for the rest of his life to be nothing whatsoever.The empire of Russia will aspire to conquer Europe, and will itself be conquered.The Tartars, its subjects or neighbours, will become its masters and ours, by a revolution which I regard as inevitable.Indeed, all the kings of Europe are working in concert to hasten its coming.9.THE PEOPLE ( continued ) As nature has set bounds to the stature of a well-made man, and, outside those limits, makes nothing but giants or dwarfs, similarly, for the constitution of a State to be at its best, it is possible to fix limits that will make it neither too large for good government, nor too small for self-maintenance.
In every body politic there is a maximum strength which it cannot exceed and which it only loses by increasing in size.Every extension of the social tie means its relaxation; and, generally speaking, a small State is stronger in proportion than a great one.
A thousand arguments could be advanced in favour of this principle.
First, long distances make administration more difficult, just as a weight becomes heavier at the end of a longer lever.Administration therefore becomes more and more burdensome as the distance grows greater; for, in the first place, each city has its own, which is paid for by the people:
each district its own, still paid for by the people: then comes each province, and then the great governments, satrapies, and vice-royalties, always costing more the higher you go, and always at the expense of the unfortunate people.
Last of all comes the supreme administration, which eclipses all the rest.
All these over charges are a continual drain upon the subjects; so far from being better governed by all these different orders, they are worse governed than if there were only a single authority over them.In the meantime, there scarce remain resources enough to meet emergencies; and, when recourse must be had to these, the State is always on the eve of destruction.
This is not all; not only has the government less vigour and promptitude for securing the observance of the laws, preventing nuisances, correcting abuses, and guarding against seditious undertakings begun in distant places;the people has less affection for its rulers, whom it never sees, for its country, which, to its eyes, seems like the world, and for its fellow-citizens, most of whom are unknown to it.The same laws cannot suit so many diverse provinces with different customs, situated in the most various climates, and incapable of enduring a uniform government.Different laws lead only to trouble and confusion among peoples which, living under the same rulers and in constant communication one with another, intermingle and intermarry, and, coming under the sway of new customs, never know if they can call their very patrimony their own.Talent is buried, virtue unknown and vice unpunished, among such a multitude of men who do not know one another, gathered together in one place at the seat of the central administration.
The leaders, overwhelmed with business, see nothing for themselves; the State is governed by clerks.Finally, the measures which have to be taken to maintain the general authority, which all these distant officials wish to escape or to impose upon, absorb all the energy of the public, so that there is none left for the happiness of the people.There is hardly enough to defend it when need arises, and thus a body which is too big for its constitution gives way and falls crushed under its own weight.
Again, the State must assure itself a safe foundation, if it is to have stability, and to be able to resist the shocks it cannot help experiencing, as well as the efforts it will be forced to make for its maintenance; for all peoples have a kind of centrifugal force that makes them continually act one against another, and tend to aggrandise themselves at their neighbours'
expense, like the vortices of Descartes.Thus the weak run the risk of being soon swallowed up; and it is almost impossible for any one to preserve itself except by putting itself in a state of equilibrium with all, so that the pressure is on all sides practically equal.