I will put a single question. The interests of society are twofold; those of stability and conservation on the one hand, and those of activity and progress on the other. If you wanted to secure the interests of activity and progress, would you seek this security among the social elements in which the interests of stability and conservation are peculiarly strong? Undoubtedly not: you would commit the interests of activity and progress to the care of their natural and willing protectors, and you would do well. But all these various interests have equal wants and equal claims. There is no safety for any of them but in its appropriate power; that is to say, in a power analogous to it in its nature and in its relations to other powers. If the interests of stability and conservation are committed wholly to the chances of the composition of a single elective assembly, invested with the sole and final decision of all questions, and to the chances of the discussions in that assembly, be assured that sooner or later, after numerous oscillations between tyrannies of different kinds, those interests will be sacrificed or lost. It is absurd to seek the principle of the political stability of government in the mobile elements of society. The permanent elements of society must find in the government itself, powers corresponding to them, and offering a pledge for their security. A diversity of powers is equally indispensable to conservation and to liberty. It is matter of amazement that this truth should be disputed, for the very men who dispute it have made a great step towards its admission and application. After establishing unity of power at the head of the state, they have admitted a division of powers lower down, on account of the diversity of functions. They have carefully separated the legislative, executive, administrative, and judicial powers; thus practically acknowledging the necessity of giving guarantees to different interests, by the separation and the different constitution of these powers. How is it that they do not see that this necessity has a higher application, and that the diversity of the general interests of society and of the duties of the supreme power, imperatively requires a diversity of powers in the highest as well as in the subordinate spheres of government? But to constitute a real and efficient diversity of powers, it is not enough that each should have a distinct place and name in the government; it is also necessary that all should be strongly organized, all fully competent to fill and to maintain the place they occupy. It is the fashion of the day to think that harmony among the powers of the state, and security against their excess, is to be found in their weakness. People are afraid of every kind of authority; and in order to prevent their destroying each other, or encroaching upon liberty, they ingeniously endeavour to undermine them all in turn.