the will of the
people has by tacit agreement prescribed to them. But what this program
consists in these historians do not say, or if they do they continually
contradict one another.

Each historian, according to his view of what constitutes a nation's
progress, looks for these conditions in the greatness, wealth, freedom,
or enlightenment of citizens of France or some other country. But not
to mention the historians' contradictions as to the nature of this
program--or even admitting that some one general program of these
conditions exists--the facts of history almost always contradict that
theory. If the conditions under which power is entrusted consist in the
wealth, freedom, and enlightenment of the people, how is it that Louis
XIV and Ivan the Terrible end their reigns tranquilly, while Louis XVI
and Charles I are executed by their people? To this question historians
reply that Louis XIV's activity, contrary to the program, reacted on
Louis XVI. But why did it not react on Louis XIV or on Louis XV--why
should it react just on Louis XVI? And what is the time limit for such
reactions? To these questions there are and can be no answers. Equally
little does this view explain why for several centuries the collective
will is not withdrawn from certain rulers and their heirs, and
then suddenly during a period of fifty years is transferred to the
Convention, to the Directory, to Napoleon, to Alexander, to Louis XVIII,
to Napoleon again, to Charles X, to Louis Philippe, to a Republican
government, and to Napoleon III. When explaining these rapid transfers
of the people's will from one individual to another, especially in view
of international relations, conquests, and alliances, the historians are
obliged to admit that some of these transfers are not normal delegations
of the people's will but are accidents dependent on cunning, on
mistakes, on craft, or on the weakness of a diplomatist, a ruler, or a
party leader. So that the greater part of the events of history--civil
wars, revolutions, and conquests--are presented by these historians
not as the results of free transferences of the people's will, but as
results of the ill-directed will of one or more individuals, that is,
once again, as usurpations of power. And so these historians also see
and admit historical events which are exceptions to the theory.

These historians resemble a botanist who, having noticed that some
plants grow from seeds producing two cotyledons, s