Walter Bagehot: “It may be summed up--it was government by an UNKNOWN QUANTITY.”

Thirdly, we see why so few nations have made rapid advance, and how many have become stationary.

That a House of Commons may work well it must perform, as we saw, five functions well: it must elect a Ministry well, legislate well, teach the nation well, express the nation's will well, bring matters to the nation's attention well.

And, to the effectual maintenance of such a separation, the exclusion of the President's Ministers from the legislature is essential.

The power of free interchange of ideas being wanting, the ideas themselves were barren.