This is the common-sense view of the subject. If the constitution contained the necessary guarantees of political freedom and security of life and property; if it was to be looked to as the permanent settlement and bulwark of the liberties of France, and considered as a final and decided arrangement, liable indeed to be improved by the joint consent of the sovereign, and the legal representatives of the subject, but not to be destroyed by any or all of these authorities, it was a matter of utter unimportance, whether the system was constructed in the form of a charter granted by the King, or that of conditions dictated to him by the subject. But if there was to be a retrospect to the ephemeral existence of all the French constitutions hitherto, excepting that under which Buonaparte had enthralled the people, then perhaps the question might be entertained, whether the feudal or the revolutionary form was most likely to be innovated; or, in other words, whether the conditions attached to the plan of government now adopted, was most likely to be innovated upon by the King, or by the body who represented the people. Assuming the fatal doctrine, that the party in whose name the conditions of the constitution are expressed, is entitled to suspend, alter, or recall them, sound policy dictated, that the apparent power of granting should be ascribed to the party least able and willing to recall or innovate upon the grant which he had made. In this view of the case, it might be reckoned upon that the King, unsupported, unless by the Royalists, who were few in number, unpopular from circumstances, and for the present divested, excepting nominally, of the great instrument of achieving despotic power, the undisputed command, namely, of the army, would be naturally unwilling to risk the continuance of his authority by any attempt to innovate upon those conditions, which he had by his own charter assured to the people. On the contrary, conditions formed and decreed by the Senate of Buonaparte, might on the popular party's resuming the ascendency, be altered or recalled by the chambers with the same levity and fickleness which the people of France, or at least those acting as their representatives, had so often displayed. To give permanence to the constitution, therefore, it was best it should emanate from the party most interested in preserving it, and least able to infringe it; and that undoubtedly, as France stood at the time, was the sovereign. In Great Britain, the constitution is accounted more secure, because the King is the source of law, of honour, and of all ministerial and executive power; whilst he is responsible to the nation through his ministers, for the manner in which that power is exercised. An arrangement of a different kind would expose the branches of the legislature to a discordant struggle, which ought never to be contemplated as possible.