ed to another
and still smaller body, which met and exercised its despotic and secret
functions under the name of the Council of Three. The choice of these
temporary rulers was decided by lot, and in a manner that prevented the
result from being known to any but to their own number and to a few of
the most confidential of the more permanent officers of the government.
Thus there existed at all times in the heart of Venice a mysterious and
despotic power that was wielded by men who moved in society unknown, and
apparently surrounded by all the ordinary charities of life; but which,
in truth, was influenced by a set of political maxims that were perhaps
as ruthless, as tyrannic, and as selfish, as ever were invented by the
evil ingenuity of man. It was, in short, a power that could only be
intrusted, without abuse, to infallible virtue and infinite
intelligence, using the terms in a sense limited by human means; and yet
it was here confided to men whose title was founded on the double
accident of birth, and the colors of balls, and by whom it was wielded
without even the check of publicity.

The Council of Three met in secret, ordinarily issued its decrees
without communicating with any other body, and had them enforced with a
fearfulness of mystery, and a suddenness of execution, that resembled
the blows of fate. The Doge himself was not superior to its authority,
nor protected from its decisions, while it has been known that one of
the privileged three has been denounced by his companions. There is
still in existence a long list of the state maxims which this secret
tribunal recognised as its rule of conduct, and it is not saying too
much to affirm, that they set at defiance every other consideration but
expediency,--all the recognised laws of God, and every principle of
justice, which is esteemed among men. The advances of the human
intellect, supported by the means of publicity, may temper the exercise
of a similar irresponsible power, in our own age; but in no country has
this substitution of a soulless corporation for an elective
representation, been made, in which a system of rule has not been
established, that sets at naught the laws of natural justice and the
rights of the citizen. Any pretension to the contrary, by placing
profession in opposition to practice, is only adding hypocrisy to
usurpation.

It appears to be an unavoidable general consequence that abuses should
follow, when power is exercised by a per