On the Magistrates and Republic of Venice

that the sum of power must be entrusted to laws, not to a man; and that very few things—when they cannot be comprehended by laws—should be left to the judgment of a man. Yet it is necessary that some guardian, as it were a vicar and minister, be appointed for the laws, who may rule the republic on behalf of the authority of the law; and because not all things that come into judgment, nor those that must be consulted upon, can be comprehended by laws, he must be the arbiter of all such things. And again, the same controversy returns which might have seemed solved by the sanction of the laws: namely, whether one person, or a few, or rather the multitude, should be preferred for defending the laws and for adjudicating those matters for which the laws cannot suffice. But although in the opinion of many the royal rule is considered superior to others, I, for my part, would believe that even if the rule of one—who would truly claim for himself royal dignity by right and merit—is the best of all if the matter is considered in itself; nevertheless, because of the human tendency—which more often slips toward the worse—and the brevity of life,