Guizot died before Thiers had won his greatest fame as the restorer of law and order after the communistic riots which followed the siege of Paris in 1871, when, as President of the Republic, he rendered inestimable services to France.  The great personal defect of Thiers was vanity; that of Guizot was austerity:  but both were men of transcendent ability and unimpeached patriotism.  With these two men began the mighty power of the French Press in the formation of public opinion.  With them the reign of Louis Philippe was identified as much as that of Queen Victoria for twenty years has been with Gladstone and Disraeli.  Between them the king “reigned” rather than “governed.”  This was the period when statesmen began to monopolize the power of kings in Prussia and Austria as well as in France and England.  Russia alone of the great Powers was ruled by the will of a royal autocrat.  In constitutional monarchies ministers enjoy the powers which were once given to the favorites of royalty; they rise and fall with majorities in legislative assemblies.  In such a country as America the President is king, but only for a limited period.  He descends from a position of transcendent dignity to the obscurity of private life.  His ministers are his secretaries, without influence, comparatively, in the halls of Congress,—­neither made nor unmade by the legislature, although dependent on the Senate for confirmation, but once appointed, independent of both houses, and responsible only to the irremovable Executive, who can defy even public opinion, unless he aims at re-election, a unique government in the political history of the world.

The year 1841 opened auspiciously for Louis Philippe.  He was at the summit of his power, and his throne seemed to be solidly cemented.  All the insurrections which had given him so much trouble were suppressed, and the country was unusually prosperous.  The enormous sum of L85,000,000 had been expended in six years on railways, one quarter more than England had spent.  Population had increased over a million in ten years, and the exports were L7,000,000 more than they were in 1830.  Paris was a city of shops and attractive boulevards.

The fortification of the capital continued to be an engrossing matter with the ministry and legislature, and it was a question whether there should be built a wall around the city, or a series of strong detached forts.  The latter found the most favor with military men, but the Press denounced it as nothing less than a series of Bastiles to overawe the city.  The result was the adoption of both systems,—­detached forts, each capable of sustaining a siege and preventing an enemy from effectually bombarding the city; and the enceinte continuee, which proved an expensive muraille d’octroi.  Had it not been for the detached forts, with their two thousand pieces of cannon, Paris would have been unable to sustain a siege in the Franco-Prussian war.  The city must have surrendered immediately when once invested, or have been destroyed; but the distant forts prevented the Prussians from advancing near enough to bombard the centre of the city.