The much-talked-of republican tendency had to be a kind of attempt at separation from the many elements which had come to us simply because we had won. These elements do not please us. These people who always side with the victor, and who are ready to change their flag with a change of fortune, must be looked upon with suspicion and carefully watched by the Fascisti. Is it possible—here is the question—to bring about a profound transformation in our political régime and to create a new Italy without touching the monarchic system? What is the general attitude of the Fascisti as regards political institutions? Our attitude does not commit us in any sense. In truth, perfect régimes are only to be found in books of philosophy. I think that it would have been disastrous for the Greek city if the theories of Plato had been literally applied. A people content under a republic never dreams of having a king. A people not accustomed to a republic longs to return to a monarchy. It was in vain that the Germans tried to make the Phrygian cap fit their square heads. The Germans hate a republic, and the fact that it was imposed by the Entente and that it has been a kind of _ersatz_, is another reason for their hating it. So that, generally speaking, political forms cannot be approved of or condemned for ever, but must be examined from the point of view of their direct relation with the mentality, the economic condition and the spiritual force of any particular people. (A voice cries: “Long live Mazzini!”) Now, I think that the régime can be largely modified without interfering with the monarchy. In reality—and I refer to the cry of my friend—the same Mazzini, republican and advocate of republicanism, did not consider his doctrines incompatible with the monarchic aspect of Italian unity. He resigned himself to it and accepted it. It was not his ideal, but the ideal cannot always be realised. We shall, then, leave the monarchic institution outside our field of action, which will have other great objects, because we think that a great part of Italy would regard with suspicion a change in the régime which was carried thus far. We should have regional separatism, perhaps, because it is always so. To-day there are many indifferent to the monarchy who to-morrow would be its supporters, and who would find highly respectable and sentimental reasons for attacking Fascismo, if it had dared to aim at this target. I do not think that the monarchy has really any object in opposing what must now be called the Fascista revolution. It is not in its interests, because by doing so it would immediately make itself an object of attack, in which case we could not spare it, because it would be a question of life or death for us.