est infinita aut libera Potestas.  Their Kings have not an Arbitrary or Unlimited Power.”  Now ’tis manifest, that no Form of Government is more remote from Tyranny, than this:  for not one of the three distinguishing Marks, or Characteristicks of Tyranny, which the old Philosophers make mention of, can be found in the Form and Constitution of our Government.  First, as to a forced Obedience; i. e. that a King shou’d rule over a People against their Wills; we have shewn you already, that the Supreme Power, both of Electing and Abdicating their Kings, was in the People.  Secondly, as to a Life-guard composed of Foreigners, (which they reckon the Second Mark of Tyranny); so far were our Francogallian Kings from making use of Mercenary Strangers for their Guards, that they had not so much as their own Countrymen and Citizens, for that Purpose; but placed their whole Trust and Confidence in the Love and Fidelity of their Subjects; which they thought a sufficient Guard.

As an Argument of this, we may observe what Gregory of Tours writes, lib. 7. cap. 18. and Aimoinus, lib. 3. cap. 63.—­“King Gontrannus being inform’d by an ordinary Fellow at Paris, that Faraulphus lay in Wait for him, presently began to secure his Person by Guards and Weapons; so that he went no whither (not even to the Holy Places) without being surrounded with armed Men and Soldiers.”  We have at present a very famous History extant of St. Lewis, written by that excellent Person Joannes Jonvillaeus, who lived very familiarly with that King for many Years; in which whole History there is not the least Mention made of Guards or Garisons, but only of Porters or Doorkeepers; which in his native Tongue, he calls Ushers.

Now as to the third Mark of Tyranny, which is when Matters are so carried, that what is done tends more to the Profit and Will of the Person governing, than to that of the governed, or the Good of the Commonwealth; we shall hereafter prove, that the Supreme Administration of the Francogallican Kingdom was lodged in the Publick Annual Council of the Nation, which in After-Ages was called the Convention of the Three Estates.  For the Frame of this Government was the very same which the Ancient Philosophers, and among them Plato and Aristotle (whom Polybius imitates) judged to be the best and most excellent in the World, as being made up and constituted of a Mixture and just Temperament of the three Kinds of Government, viz. the Regal, Noble, and Popular.  Which Form of a Commonwealth, Cicero (in his Books de Republica) prefers to all other whatsoever.  For since a Kingly and a Popular Government do in their Natures differ widely from each other, it was necessary to add a third and middle State participating