urst not trust themselves without a standing army, nor a standing
army in any man's hands but those of his highness.

The Archon made answer, that he ever expected this would be the sense
of the Senate and the people; and this being their sense, he should have
been sorry they had made choice of any other than himself for a standing
general; first, because it could not have been more to their own safety,
and secondly because so long as they should have need of a standing
army, 'his work was, not done, that he would not dispute against
the judgment of the Senate and the people, nor ought that to be.
Nevertheless, he made little doubt but experience would show every party
their own interest in this government, and that better improved
than they could expect from any other; that men's animosities should
overbalance their interest for any time was impossible, that humor could
never be lasting, nor through the constitution of the government of any
effect at the first charge. For supposing the worst, and that the people
had chosen no other into the Senate and the prerogative than royalists,
a matter of 1,400 men must have taken their oaths at their election,
with an intention to go quite contrary not only to their oaths so taken,
but to their own interest; for being estated in the sovereign power,
they must have decreed it from themselves (such an example for which
there was never any experience, nor can there be any reason), or holding
it, it must have done in their hands as well every wit as in any other.
Furthermore, they must have removed the government from a foundation
that apparently would hold, to set it upon another which apparently
would not hold; which things if they could not come to pass, the Senate
and the people consisting wholly of royalists, much less by a parcel of
them elected. But if the fear of the Senate and of the people derived
from a party without, such a one as would not be elected, nor engage
themselves to the commonwealth by an oath; this again must be so large,
as would go quite contrary to their own interest, they being as free and
as fully estated in their liberty as any other, or so narrow that they
could do no hurt, while the people being in arms, and at the beck of the
strategus, every tribe would at any time make a better army than such
a party; and there being no parties at home, fears from abroad would
vanish. But seeing it was otherwise determined by the Senate and the
people, the best cour