A country governed by a
despot is an inverted cone. Government there cannot be so firm, as when
it rests upon a broad basis gradually contracted, as the government of
Great Britain, which is founded on the parliament, then is in the privy
council, then in the King.' BOSWELL. 'Power, when contracted into the
person of a despot, may be easily destroyed, as the prince may be cut
off. So Caligula wished that the people of Rome had but one neck, that
he might cut them off at a blow.' OGLETHORPE. 'It was of the Senate he
wished that[825]. The Senate by its usurpation controlled both the
Emperour and the people. And don't you think that we see too much of
that in our own Parliament?'
Dr. Johnson endeavoured to trace the etymology of Maccaronick verses,
which he thought were of Italian invention from Maccaroni; but on being
informed that this would infer that they were the most common and easy
verses, maccaroni being the most ordinary and simple food, he was at a
loss; for he said, 'He rather should have supposed it to import in its
primitive signification, a composition of several things; for
Maccaronick verses are verses made out of a mixture of different
languages, that is, of one language with the termination of another[826].
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