But though such a party might not select the very best leader, they have the strongest motives to select a very good leader.

If they elect a man of weak judgment, he will reign his stated term; even though he show the best judgment, at the end of that term there will be by constitutional destiny another election.

The Government is a removable Government, its tenure depends upon its conduct.

If a party in power were so foolish as to choose a weak man for its head, it would cease to be in power.

Suppose in 1859 that the Whig party had determined to set aside both Earl Russell and Lord Palmerston and to choose for its head an incapable nonentity, the Whig party would probably have been exiled from office at the Schleswig-Holstein…

A President may be a weak man; yet if he keep good Ministers to the end of his administration, he may not be found out--it may still be a dubious controversy whether he is wise or foolish.

He must meet the House of Commons in debate; he must be able to guide that assembly in the management of its business, to gain its ear in every emergency, to rule it in its hours of excitement.

A choice based on such self-denial can never be a firm choice--it is a choice at any moment liable to be revoked.

But it is obvious that a union of opposites so marked could not be durable.

The Radicals bought it by choosing the men whose principles were most adverse to them; the Conservatives bought it by agreeing to measures whose scope was most adverse to them.

I say that if we imagine this sort of action greatly exaggerated and greatly prolonged Parliamentary government becomes impossible.

If there are three parties, no two of which will steadily combine for mutual action, but of which the weakest gives a rapidly oscillating preference to the two others, the primary condition of a Cabinet polity is not satisfied.

We have not a Parliament fit to choose; we cannot rely on the selection of a sufficiently permanent executive, because there is no fixity in the thoughts and feelings of the choosers.

This is the mode in which Lord Palmerston's administration has been lately maintained; a Ministry in many ways defective, but more beneficially vigorous abroad, and more beneficially active at home, than the vast majority of English…

The moderate Conservatives and the moderate Radicals have maintained a steady Government by a sufficiently coherent union with the moderate Whigs.

Whether there is a king or no king, this perservative self-denial is the main force on which we must rely for the satisfactory continuance of a Parliamentary Government at this its period of greatest trial.

It should be observed, too, in fairness to the unroyal species of Cabinet government, that it is exempt from one of the greatest and most characteristic defects of the royal species.

Where there is no Court there can be no evil influence from a Court.

What these influences are every one knows; though no one, hardly the best and closest observer, can say with confidence and precision how great their effect is.

These sinister agencies are likely to be most effective just when everything else is troubled, and when, therefore, they are particularly dangerous.

The wildest and wickedest king's mistress would not plot against an invulnerable administration.

It is very important to see that a good administration can be started without a sovereign, because some colonial statesmen have doubted it.

The most dignified post in the State must be an object of contest to the great sections into which every active political community is divided.

These parties mix in everything and meddle in everything; and they neither would nor could permit the most honoured and conspicuous of all stations to be filled, except at their pleasure.

They know, too, that the grand elector, the great chooser of Ministries, might be, at a sharp crisis, either a good friend or a bad enemy.