About the Book
Divine Providence, however, the mysterious power that overrules all the passionsand impulses of men, and brings extended and general good out of local andparticular evil, has made the ambition and the selfishness of princes the greatmeans of preserving order and government among men. These great ancientdespots, for example, would not have been able to collect their revenues, or enlisttheir armies, or procure supplies for their campaigns, unless their dominions wereunder a regular and complete system of social organization, such as should allow allthe industrial pursuits of commerce and of agriculture, throughout the mass of thecommunity, to go regularly on. Thus absolute monarchs, however ambitious, andselfish, and domineering in their characters, have a strong personal interest in theestablishment of order and of justice between man and man throughout all theregions which are under their sway. In fact, the greater their ambition, theirselfishness, and their pride, the stronger will this interest be; for, just in proportionas order, industry, and internal tranquillity prevail in a country, just in thatproportion can revenues be collected from it, and armies raised and maintained.It is a mistake, therefore, to suppose of the great heroes, and sovereigns, andconquerors that have appeared from time to time among mankind, that the usualand ordinary result of their influence and action has been that of disturbance anddisorganization. It is true that a vast amount of disturbance and disorganization hasoften followed from the march of their armies, their sieges, their invasions, and theother local and temporary acts of violence which they commit; but these are theexceptions, not the rule. It must be that such things are exceptions, since, in anyextended and general view of the subject, a much greater amount of socialorganization, industry, and peace is necessary to raise and maintain an army, thanthat army can itself destroy. The deeds of destruction which great conquerorsperform attract more attention and make a greater impression upon mankind thanthe quiet, patient, and long-continued labors by which they perfect and extend thegeneral organization of the social state. But these labors, though less noticed bymen, have really employed the energies of great sovereigns in a far greater degreethan mankind have generally imagined. Thus we should describe the work ofCæsar's life in a single word more truly by saying that he organized Europe, thanthat he conquered it. His bridges, his roads, his systems of jurisprudence, hiscoinage, his calendar, and other similar means and instruments of socialarrangement, and facilities for promoting the pursuits of industry and peace, mark, 5far more properly, the real work which that great conqueror performed amongmankind, than his battles and his victories. Darius was, in the same way, theorganizer of Asia. William the Conqueror completed, or, rather, advanced very fartoward completing, the social organization of England; and even in respect toNapoleon, the true and proper memorial of his career is the successful working ofthe institutions, the systems, and the codes which he perfected and introduced intothe social state, and not the brazen column, formed from captured cannon, whichstands in the Place Vendôme.
