political power is weak in moral character or careless of the public
interest; whether that sovereign be a monarch, a chamber, or the mass of
the people.[Footnote: "Quand, dans un royaume, il y a plus d'avantage a
faire sa cour qu'a faire son devoir, tout est perdu." Montesquieu, vii.
176, (_Pensees diverses_.)]

Louis XVI., king of France and of Navarre, was more dull than stupid,
and weaker in will than in intellect. In him the hobbledehoy period had
been unusually prolonged, and strangers at court were astonished to see
a prince of nineteen years of age running after a footman to tickle him
while his hands were full of dirty clothes.[Footnote: Swinburne, i.
11.] The clumsy youth grew up into a shy and awkward man, unable to find
at will those accents of gracious politeness which are most useful to
the great. Yet people who had been struck at first only with his
awkwardness were sometimes astonished to find in him a certain amount of
education, a memory for facts, and a reasonable judgment.[Footnote:
Campan, ii. 231. Bertrand de Moleville, _Histoire_, i. Introd.;
_Memoires_, i. 221.] Among his predecessors he had set himself
Henry IV. as a model, probably without any very accurate idea of the
character of that monarch; and he had fully determined he would do what
in him lay to make his people happy. He was, moreover, thoroughly
conscientious, and had a high sense of the responsibility of his great
calling. He was not indolent, although heavy, and his courage, which was
sorely tested, was never broken. With these virtues he might have made a
good king, had he possessed firmness of will enough to support a good
minister, or to adhere to a good policy. But such strength had not been
given him. Totally incapable of standing by himself, he leant
successively, or simultaneously, on his aunt, his wife, his ministers,
his courtiers, as ready to change his policy as his adviser. Yet it was
part of his weakness to be unwilling to believe himself under the