A second and very rare condition of an elective government is a calm national mind—­a tone of mind sufficiently staple to bear the necessary excitement of conspicuous revolutions.  No barbarous, no semi-civilised nation has ever possessed this.  The mass of uneducated men could not now in England be told “go to, choose your rulers;” they would go wild; their imaginations would fancy unreal dangers, and the attempt at election would issue in some forcible usurpation.  The incalculable advantage of august institutions in a free state is, that they prevent this collapse.  The excitement of choosing our rulers is prevented by the apparent existence of an unchosen ruler.  The poorer and more ignorant classes—­those who would most feel excitement, who would most be misled by excitement—­ really believe that the Queen governs.  You could not explain to them the recondite difference between “reigning” and “governing”; the words necessary to express it do not exist in their dialect; the ideas necessary to comprehend it do not exist in their minds.  The separation of principal power from principal station is a refinement which they could not even conceive.  They fancy they are governed by an hereditary Queen, a Queen by the grace of God, when they are really governed by a Cabinet and a Parliament—­men like themselves, chosen by themselves.  The conspicuous dignity awakens the sentiment of reverence, and men, often very undignified, seize the occasion to govern by means of it.

Lastly.  The third condition of all elective government is what I may call rationality, by which I mean a power involving intelligence, but yet distinct from it.  A whole people electing its rulers must be able to form a distinct conception of distant objects.  Mostly, the “divinity” that surrounds a king altogether prevents anything like a steady conception of him.  You fancy that the object of your loyalty is as much elevated above you by intrinsic nature as he is by extrinsic position; you deify him in sentiment, as once men deified him in doctrine.  This illusion has been and still is of incalculable benefit to the human race.  It prevents, indeed, men from choosing their rulers; you cannot invest with that loyal illusion a man who was yesterday what you are, who to-morrow may be so again, whom you chose to be what he is.  But though this superstition prevents the election of rulers, it renders possible the existence of unelected rulers.  Untaught people fancy that their king, crowned with the holy crown, anointed with the oil of Rheims, descended of the House of Plantagenet, is a different sort of being from any one not descended of the Royal House—­not crowned—­not anointed.  They believe that there is one man whom by mystic right they should obey; and therefore they do obey him.  It is only in later times, when the world is wider, its experience larger, and its thought colder, that the plain rule of a palpably chosen ruler is even possible.