more sacred one of Israel's people, the great lessons which they inculcate upon this point. He shows you that the contests of patricians and plebeians, the forcible establishment of the power of the tribunes in ancient Rome, and the division of a modern parliament into the lords and commons, or the fearful disputes between the _tiers état_ and the nobles and clergy in France, all prove the same great truth and teach the same great lesson, _that every great interest to be safe, must have the means of defending itself_. Such a mind as this when it fails, fails (if I may use the language of the logician) from not attending to specific and individual differences in the application of general principles: it fails because while leaping from the Appenines to the Alps, and from the Alps to the Pyrennees, it does not perceive the rivulets, the flowers, the little hills and dales which lie beneath. Such a mind is the very opposite of that of woman. But it may be said there are women who have reigned with glory and lustre, and merited well of their country and mankind. Christina, for example, in Sweden, Isabella in Castile, and Elizabeth in England, have merited the esteem of their age and posterity. The two Catharines in Russia, and Maria Theresa, during the long wars about the pragmatic sanction, have each manifested the abilities of statesmen. To this however, I would remark in the first place, that we are concerned here with general rules and not with particular exceptions. Now the general rule is what I have stated; women make bad politicians, unsafe depositaries of power, and most partial and unequal administrators of justice. In the second place, you will find that the weakness and errors of the good female sovereigns have almost always arisen from their feminine foibles or womanly judgments. Take, for example, Queen Elizabeth, whom Mr. Hume has pronounced to have been perhaps the greatest female sovereign who ever sat upon a throne. It was said of her that her inclinations and the coquetries of her sex, stole beneath the cares of her throne and the grandeur of her character. And it has been said, with perhaps too much truth, that if Mary Queen of Scotland had been less beautiful, Elizabeth had been less cruel; she always believed too readily, that the mere power of pleasing implied genius. The exaggerated but well-timed gallantries of Raleigh,[4] and the personal beauty and accomplishments of the earl of Leicester, made the fortunes of those individuals. [Footnote 4: Raleigh threw a new plush cloak into the mud over which the queen was passing; she stepped cautiously on it, and shot forth a smile upon the young captain. This cunning gallantry introduced him to the queen for the first time; his advancement was rapid, and the title of captain was soon changed for that of Sir Walter.]