Reluctantly, and with frequent endeavours to obtain some appointment, he gave himself up to literature as the only means left him to influence the destinies of his country. The great object of his labours was to help in securing the independence of Italy from foreign control. Of true Italian unity he had no expectation and no desire, but he was devoted to the house of Savoy, which he foresaw was destined to change the fate of Italy. A confederation of separate states under the supremacy of the pope was the genuine ideal of Balbo, as it was the ostensible one of Gioberti. But Gioberti, in his Primato, seemed to him to neglect the first essential of independence, which he accordingly inculcated in his Speranze or Hopes of Italy, in which he suggests that Austria should seek compensation in the Balkans for the inevitable loss of her Italian provinces. Preparation, both military and moral, alertness and patience were his constant theme.
He did not desire revolution, but reform; and thus he became the leader of a moderate party, and the steady opponent not only of despotism but of democracy. At last in 1848 his hopes were to some extent satisfied by the constitution granted by the king. He was appointed a member of the commission on the electoral law, and became first constitutional prime-minister of Piedmont, but only held office a few months. With the ministry of d’Azeglio, which soon after got into power, he was on friendly terms, and his pen continued the active defence of his political principles till his death on the 3rd of June 1853. He published Qualtro Novelle in 1829; Storia d’-Italia sotto i Barbari in 1830; Vita di Dante, 1839; Meditazioni Sioriche, 1842—1845; Le Speranze d’Italia, 1844; Pensieri sulla Storia d’Italia, 1858; Della Monarcilia rappresentativa in Italia (Florence, 1857).
See E. Ricotti, Della Vita e degli Scritti di Cesare Balbo (1856); A. Vismara, Bibliografia di Cesare Balbo (Milan, 1882).