of facilitating legislation.  All administration does so.  In England, on a vital occasion, the Cabinet can compel legislation by the threat of resignation, and the threat of dissolution; but neither of these can be used in a Presidential State.  There the legislature cannot be dissolved by the executive Government; and it does not heed a resignation, for it has not to find the successor.  Accordingly, when a difference of opinion arises, the legislature is forced to fight the executive, and the executive is forced to fight the legislative; and so very likely they contend to the conclusion of their respective terms. [Footnote:  I leave this passage to stand as it was written, just after the assassination of Mr. Lincoln, and when every one said Mr. Johnson would be very hostile to the South.] There is, indeed, one condition of things in which this description, though still approximately true, is, nevertheless, not exactly true; and that is, when there is nothing to fight about.  Before the rebellion in America, owing to the vast distance of other States, and the favourable economic condition of the country, there were very few considerable objects of contention; but if that government had been tried by English legislation of the last thirty years, the discordant action of the two powers, whose constant cooperation is essential to the best government, would have shown itself much more distinctly.  Nor is this the worst.  Cabinet government educates the nation; the Presidential does not educate it, and may corrupt it.  It has been said that England invented the phrase, “Her Majesty’s Opposition”; that it was the first Government which made a criticism of administration as much a part of the polity as administration itself.  This critical opposition is the consequence of Cabinet government.  The great scene of debate, the great engine of popular instruction and political controversy, is the legislative assembly.  A speech there by an eminent statesman, a party movement by a great political combination, are the best means yet known for arousing, enlivening, and teaching a people.  The Cabinet system ensures such debates, for it makes them the means by which statesmen advertise themselves for future and confirm themselves in present Governments.  It brings forward men eager to speak, and gives them occasions to speak.  The deciding catastrophes of Cabinet governments are critical divisions preceded by fine discussions.  Everything which is worth saying, everything which ought to be said, most certainly will be said.  Conscientious men think they ought to persuade others; selfish men think they would like to obtrude themselves.  The nation is forced to hear two sides—­all the sides, perhaps, of that which most concerns it.  And it likes to hear—­it is eager to know.  Human nature despises long arguments which come to nothing—­heavy speeches which precede no motion—­abstract disquisitions which leave visible things where they were.  But all men heed great results, and a change