Like a stout buffer-spring,
it receives all shocks, and within it their opposing elements neutralize
one another. This is the function of the British Cabinet. It is perhaps
the most curious formation in the political world of modern times, not
for its dignity, but for its subtlety, its elasticity, and its
many-sided diversity of power. It is the complement of the entire
system; a system which appears to want nothing but a thorough loyalty in
the persons composing its several parts, with a reasonable intelligence,
to insure its bearing, without fatal damage, the wear and tear of ages
yet to come.
It has taken more than a couple of centuries to bring the British
Cabinet to its present accuracy and fulness of development; for the
first rudiments of it may sufficiently be discerned in the reign of
Charles I. Under Charles II it had fairly started from its embryo; and
the name is found both in Clarendon and in the Diary of Pepys.[16] It
was for a long time without a Ministerial head; the King was the head.
While this arrangement subsisted, constitutional government could be but
half established.
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