leads to disorder, commotions, and evils far more insufferable than those which they pretend to remedy."[5] Now, Sir, this principle would carry Europe back again, at once, into the middle of the Dark Ages.  It is the old doctrine of the Divine right of kings, advanced now by new advocates, and sustained by a formidable array of power.  That the people hold their fundamental privileges as matter of concession or indulgence from the sovereign power, is a sentiment not easy to be diffused in this age, any farther than it is enforced by the direct operation of military means.  It is true, certainly, that some six centuries ago the early founders of English liberty called the instrument which secured their rights a charter.  It was, indeed, a concession; they had obtained it sword in hand from the king; and in many other cases, whatever was obtained, favorable to human rights, from the tyranny and despotism of the feudal sovereigns, was called by the names of privileges and liberties, as being matter of special favor.  Though we retain this language at the present time, the principle itself belongs to ages that have long passed by us.  The civilized world has done with “the enormous faith, of many made for one.”  Society asserts its own rights, and alleges them to be original, sacred, and unalienable.  It is not satisfied with having kind masters; it demands a participation in its own government; and in states much advanced in civilization, it urges this demand with a constancy and an energy that cannot well nor long be resisted.  There are, happily, enough of regulated governments in the world, and those among the most distinguished, to operate as constant examples, and to keep alive an unceasing panting in the bosoms of men for the enjoyment of similar free institutions.

When the English Revolution of 1688 took place, the English people did not content themselves with the example of Runnymede; they did not build their hopes upon royal charters; they did not, like the authors of the Laybach circular, suppose that all useful changes in constitutions and laws must proceed from those only whom God has rendered responsible for power.  They were somewhat better instructed in the principles of civil liberty, or at least they were better lovers of those principles than the sovereigns of Laybach.  Instead of petitioning for charters, they declared their rights, and while they offered to the Prince of Orange the crown with one hand, they held in the other an enumeration of those privileges which they did not profess to hold as favors, but which they demanded and insisted upon as their undoubted rights.

I need not stop to observe, Mr. Chairman, how totally hostile are these doctrines of Laybach to the fundamental principles of our government.  They are in direct contradiction; the principles of good and evil are hardly more opposite.  If these principles of the sovereigns be true, we are but in a state of rebellion or of anarchy, and are only tolerated among civilized states because it has not yet been convenient to reduce us to the true standard.