249. A solitary Character in ancient Times 250. What is necessary to a successful Traitor THE BOOK OF HUMAN CHARACTER. I. WHO ACT UPON THE PRINCIPLE-DIVIDE ET IMPERA. MONTESQUIEU, in his dissertation on the Grandeur and Fall of the Roman Empire,' ascribes its power chiefly to the habit of adopting the customs of the enemies, which they considered useful or preferable to their own; to their triumphs; to the interest which the consuls had in distinguishing their consulships; to the distribution of the spoils to the soldiers and the conquered lands to the citizens; and to the almost perpetual continuance of war. He does not lay, I think, sufficient strength on their constant attention to the maxim-' Divide et impera.' When Sir Robert Walpole retired from the ministry, his friends, as well as himself, were agitated with the fear of the vengeance with which his enemies might attempt to load him. How did he ward off the danger? It is stated by his son by disuniting the parties coalesced against him; and rendering them not only odious to the public, but odious to each other. * *See Mem. Geo. ii. Pref. xvi. VOL. II. B Sir Robert has been accused of having been the grand corrupter of public principle. No! The grand corrupter of public principle is the education which inculcates, that money and station are the only legitimate objects of ambition. Walpole only succeeded with those, whom want or vanity induced to continue travelling in a road they had but too long been travelling. I respect Walpole for his intelligence, his prudence, his vigilance, and, above all, for his truly statesmanlike regard for peace. Lord Shelburne was a slippery person; what he said, therefore, is not to be implicitly relied upon; but Nicholls tells us in his 'Recollections *,' that his lordship informed a friend of his, that no one ever possessed the art of dividing more than George the Third. By the familiarity of his intercourse,' said he, 'he ob'tained your confidence, procured from you your opinion ' of different public characters, and then availed himself ' of this knowledge to sow dissensions.' It was the policy of the Medici family † to secure the independence of the Florentines by exciting jealousies, and equalizing the populace with the people. William the Norman had pursued an analogous system, when employed in consolidating his power. His chief reliance, however, was on the castles and other strong holds he erected on the domains he had reserved for himself. 'Divide,' it seems, has been a very successful policy * Vol. i. P. 389. + Galuzzi, Storia de' Gran. Duchi, tom. i. Introd. p. 46. Balzac has a chapter on Ministers who have refined too much in their policy.-Discours Politique, c. 3. in Europe. The Austrians were indebted to it for the subjugation of Bohemia; our Henry V., in a great measure, gained France by it; and Queen Elizabeth acted a similar part in Scotland. By fomenting the rage of the two factions, which then divided that kingdom against each other, by giving aid to some and hopes to others, she balanced both so equally, that, while neither could conquer their opponents, both administered to her hopes, wishes, and interests. When the Dutch first arrived in the ports of Ceylon, they found the Portuguese actively engaged in dividing the native princes from each other, and taking advantage of their feuds to raise themselves upon their ruin. A similar policy guided Cortez and Pizarro, in the western world; and that we are, in some degree, indebted to an imitation, in our acquirement of the Indian peninsula, is but too obvious to all who search the records of that hemisphere. Indeed, Lord Wellesley, when Earl of Mornington, expressly acknowledged, that the security for British interests in India depended on an establishment of a controlling power, or on the art of exciting quarrels and contentions among the native princes. This was, also, Philip of Macedon's policy. His maxims were these caress those whom you hate; excite quarrels and jealousies among those by whom you are beloved; and flatter all you despise and detest. Tyrants keep their subjects in divisions, that those subjects may fear to rebel; and when they war upon each other, they favour the weakest, that the strongest may afterwards, if necessary, the more easily be de |