possession of power over the less wicked, and retained it by cruelties and deceptions, ruling over the good under the pretense of guarding the right and protecting the good from the wicked. All the revolutions in history are only examples of the more wicked seizing power and oppressing the good. In declaring that if their authority did not exist the more wicked would oppress the good, the ruling authorities only show their disinclination to let other oppressors come to power who would like to snatch it from them.

But in asserting this they only accuse themselves, say that their power, i. e., violence, is needed to defend men from other possible oppressors in the present or the future [see footnote].

[Footnote: I may quote in this connection the amazingly naive and comic