necessity for organization.

In many respects the French Revolution parallels the English Revolution.
In each case the King was beheaded; in each case the anarchy of a
disorganized representative body was succeeded by a military despotism;
and in each case the monarchy was restored.

It was after the restoration that the English system of party government
was developed. Why did this system not now take root in France? Partly
because France was not blessed with a king like William of Orange, and
partly because the new _systeme de bascule_, the balance system, in
which the king allows each faction in turn to hold the reins of power,
was discovered. So, instead of the gradual growth of constitutional
liberty which took place in England, the tendency in France was back to
absolutism. In 1830 Charles X., finding that he could not manage the
Chamber of Deputies, issued the ordinances of St. Cloud, suspending the
liberty of the press and dissolving the Legislature. Paris immediately
broke out into insurrection, and the King was forced to abdicate. The
crown was offered to Louis Philippe, and a second attempt at
constitutional monarchy was made. But France was too divided by her
unfortunate legacy of faction to maintain a continuous policy. The
Legitimists, the Republicans, and the Bonapartists were all awaiting
their opportunity. In 1848 the second revolution broke out in Paris; the
king fled to England, and a republic was again tried. But the
imperialist idea revived when Louis Napoleon was elected President. In
1851 he carried out his famous _coup d'etat,_ and again the Constitution
was swept away. In the following year he was accepted as Emperor by an
almost unanimous vote. Thus France again elected to be ruled by an
irresponsible head. The Third Empire ended with the capture of Napoleon
III. at Sedan in 1870, and since then France has carried on her third