Rousseau_contrat-social

Instead, the senate contented itself with entrusting its whole power to
the consuls, so that Cicero, in order to take effective action, was
compelled on a capital point to exceed his powers; and if, in the first
transports of joy, his conduct was approved, he was justly called, later
on, to account for the blood of citizens spilt in violation of the laws.
Such a reproach could never have been levelled at a dictator. But the
consul’s eloquence carried the day; and he himself, Roman though he was,
loved his own glory better than his country, and sought, not so much the
most lawful and secure means of saving the State, as to get for himself
the whole honour of having done so.[39] He was therefore justly honoured
as the liberator of Rome, and also justly punished as a law-breaker.
However brilliant his recall may have been, it was undoubtedly an act of
pardon.
However this important trust be conferred, it is important that its
duration should be fixed at a very brief period, incapable of being ever
prolonged. In the crises which lead to its adoption, the State is either
soon lost, or soon saved; and, the present need passed, the dictatorship
becomes either tyrannical or idle. At Rome, where dictators held office
for six months only, most of them abdicated before their time was up. If
their term had been longer, they might well have tried to prolong it
still further, as the decemvirs did when chosen for a year. The dictator
had only time to provide against the need that had caused him to be
chosen; he had none to think of further projects.
7. THE CENSORSHIP
AS the law is the declaration of the general will, the censorship is the
declaration of the public judgment: public opinion is the form of law
which the censor administers, and, like the prince, only applies to
particular cases.
The censorial tribunal, so far from being the arbiter of the people’s
opinion, only declares it, and, as soon as the two part company, its
decisions are null and void.
It is useless to distinguish the morality of a nation from the objects
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