CONSULTATIVE BODIES. 351 



descended, open opposition to his will by his advisers is out of the 

 question ; and members of his council, singly or in combination, dare 

 do no more than tender humble advice. Moreover, if the line of suc- 

 cession is so settled that there rarely or never occur occasions on 

 which the king has to be elected by the chief men, so that they have 

 no opportunity of choosing one who will conform to their wishes, they 

 are further debarred from maintaining any authority. Hence, habitu- 

 ally; we do not find consultative bodies having an independent status 

 in the despotically governed countries of the East, ancient or modern. 

 Though we read of the Egyptian king that " he appears to have been 

 attended in war by the council of the thirty, composed apparently of 

 privy councilors, scribes, and high officers of state," the implication is 

 that the members of this council were functionaries, having such 

 powers only as the king deputed to them. Similarly in Babylonia and 

 Assyria, attendants and others who performed the duties of ministers 

 and advisers to the god-descended rulers did not form established as- 

 semblies for deliberative purposes. In ancient Persia, too, there was 

 a like condition. The hereditary king, almost sacred and bearing ex- 

 travagant titles, though subject to some check from princes and nobles 

 of royal blood who were leaders of the army, and who tendered advice, 

 was not under the restraint of a constituted body of them. Through- 

 out the history of Japan down to our own time a kindred state of 

 things existed. The Daimios were required to be present at the capi- 

 tal during prescribed intervals, as a precaution against insubordina- 

 tion ; but they were never, while there, called together to take any 

 share in the government. And hereditary divine kingship, having 

 this as its concomitant in Japan, has it likewise in China. We read 

 that, "although there is nominally no deliberative or advisatory body 

 in the Chinese Government, and nothing really analogous to a con- 

 gress, parliament, or tiers-etat, still necessity compels the Emperor to 

 consult and advise with some of his officers." Nor does Europe fail 

 to yield us evidence of like meaning. I do not refer only to the case 

 of Russia, but more especially to the case of France during the time 

 when monarchv had assumed its most absolute form. In the as^e 

 when divines like Bossuet tausrht that "the Kinsc is accountable to no 

 one, . . . the whole state is in him, and the will of the whole people 

 is contained in his" in the age when the King (Louis XIY), "im- 

 bued with the idea of his omnipotence and divine mission," " was 

 regarded by his subjects with adoration " he " had extinguished and 

 absorbed even the minutest trace, idea, and recollection of all other 

 authority except that which emanated from himself alone." Along 

 with establishment of hereditary succession and acquirement of divine 

 prestige, such power of the other estates as existed in early days had 

 disappeared. 



Conversely, there are cases showing that where the king has never 

 had, or does not preserve, the prestige of supposed descent from a 



