The political constitution is, in the first place: the organization of the state and the process of its organic life in relation to itself, in which it differentiates its moments within itself and develops them into subsistence.
Secondly, the state is, as an individuality, an exclusive unit, which thereby relates itself to others, and thus turns its differentiation outward, positing, in accordance with this determination, its subsisting internal differences in their ideality.
Just as irritability in the living organism is, on one side, something inward, belonging to the organism as such, so too here the relation outward is a direction toward inwardness. The inward state as such is civil power; the direction outward is military power, which, however, within the state is a determinate side of the state itself. That these two sides stand in equilibrium constitutes a principal matter in the disposition of the state. At times civil power is entirely extinguished and rests solely upon military power, as in the time of the Roman emperors and the praetorians; at times, as in modern periods, military power arises only out of civil power, when all citizens are liable to bear arms.
Addition: »The internal state as such is the civil power, the direction outward the military power, which, however, within the state is a determinate aspect within it itself.«
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