The senator's trespass
was in a matter of decorum; but the law would have trespassed on the first
principles of justice. Here, then, was a case within the proper
jurisdiction of the censor; he took notice, in his public report, of the
senator's error; or probably, before coming to that extremity, he
admonished him privately on the subject. Just as, in England, had there
been such an officer, he would have reproved those men of rank who mounted
the coach-box, who extended a public patronage to the "fancy," or who rode
their own horses at a race. Such a reproof, however, unless it were made
practically operative, and were powerfully supported by the whole body of
the aristocracy, would recoil upon its author as a piece of impertinence,
and would soon be resented as an unwarrantable liberty taken with private
rights; the censor would be kicked, or challenged to private combat,
according to the taste of the parties aggrieved. The office is clearly in
this dilemma: if the censor is supported by the state, then he combines in
his own person both legislative and executive functions, and possesses a
power which is frightfully irresponsible; if, on the other hand, he is
left to such support as he can find in the prevailing spirit of manners,
and the old traditionary veneration for his sacred character, he stands
very much in the situation of a priesthood, which has great power or none
at all, according to the condition of a country in moral and religious
feeling, coupled with the more or less primitive state of manners.
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