Mox erat hoc ipsum exitio; furiisque refecti
    Ardebant; ipsique suos, jam morte sub aegra,
    Discissos nudis laniabant dentibus artus.

Thus the potion which was given to strengthen the Constitution, to heal divisions, and to compose the minds of men, became the source of debility, frenzy, discord, and utter dissolution.

In this, perhaps, I have answered, I think, another of your questions,—­Whether the British Constitution is adapted to your circumstances?  When I praised the British Constitution, and wished it to be well studied, I did not mean that its exterior form and positive arrangement should become a model for you or for any people servilely to copy.  I meant to recommend the principles from which it has grown, and the policy on which it has been progressively improved out of elements common to you and to us.  I am sure it is no visionary theory of mine.  It is not an advice that subjects you to the hazard of any experiment.  I believed the ancient principles to be wise in all cases of a large empire that would be free.  I thought you possessed our principles in your old forms in as great a perfection as we did originally.  If your States agreed (as I think they did) with your circumstances, they were best for you.  As you had a Constitution formed upon principles similar to ours, my idea was, that you might have improved them as we have done, conforming them to the state and exigencies of the times, and the condition of property in your country,—­having the conservation of that property, and the substantial basis of your monarchy, as principal objects in all your reforms.

I do not advise an House of Lords to you.  Your ancient course by representatives of the noblesse (in your circumstances) appears to me rather a better institution.  I know, that, with you, a set of men of rank have betrayed their constituents, their honor, their trust, their king, and their country, and levelled themselves with their footmen, that through this degradation they might afterwards put themselves above their natural equals.  Some of these persons have entertained a project, that, in reward of this their black perfidy and corruption, they may be chosen to give rise to a new order, and to establish themselves into an House of Lords.  Do you think, that, under the name of a British Constitution, I mean to recommend to you such Lords, made of such kind of stuff?  I do not, however, include in this description all of those who are fond of this scheme.

If you were now to form such an House of Peers, it would bear, in my opinion, but little resemblance to ours, in its origin, character, or the purposes which it might answer, at the same time that it would destroy your true natural nobility.  But if you are not in a condition to frame a House of Lords, still less are you capable, in my opinion, of framing anything which virtually and substantially could be answerable (for the purposes of a stable, regular