418 POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS. 



blies. But, little as is known of them, the inference 13 

 tolerably safe that these were but distantly allied in genesis 

 and position to the bodies we now distinguish as representa 

 tive. Nor are we concerned with those senates and councils 

 elected by different divisions of a town-population (such as 

 were variously formed in the Italian republics) which served 

 simply as agents whose doings were subject to the directly - 

 expressed approval or disapproval of the assembled citizens. 

 Here we must limit ourselves to that kind of representative 

 body which arises in communities occupying areas so largo 

 that their members are obliged to exercise by deputy such 

 powers as they possess ; and, further, we have to deal exclu 

 sively with cases in which the assembled deputies do not 

 replace pre-existing political agencies but cooperate with 

 them. 



It will be well to set out by observing, more distinctly 

 than we have hitherto done, what part of the primitive 

 political structure it is from which the representative body, 

 as thus conceived, originates. 



497. Broadly, this question is tacitly answered by the 

 contents of preceding chapters. For if, on occasions of public- 

 deliberation, the primitive horde spontaneously divides into 

 the inferior many and the superior few, among whom some one 

 is most influential; and if, in the course of that compounding 

 and re-compounding of groups which war brings about, the 

 recognized war-chief develops into the king, while the superior 

 few become the consultative body formed of minor military 

 leaders ; it follows that any third co-ordinate political power 

 must be either the mass of the inferior itself, or else some 

 agency acting on its behalf. Truism though this may be 

 called, it is needful here to set it down ; since, before 

 inquiring under what circumstances the growth of a repre 

 sentative system follows the growth of popular power, we 

 have to recognize the relation between the two. 



The undistinguished mass, retaining a latent supremacy in 



