People, once upon a time, clamorously voted by overwhelming
majority, "Not _he_; Barabbas, not he! _Him_, and what he is, and
what be deserves, we know well enough: a reviler of the Chief
Priests and sacred Chancery wigs; a seditious Heretic,
physical-force Chartist, and enemy of his country and mankind:
To the gallows and the cross with him! Barabbas is our man;
Barabbas, we are for Barabbas!" They got Barabbas:--have you
well considered what a fund of purblind obduracy, of opaque
_flunkyism_ grown truculent and transcendent; what an eye for the
phylacteries, and want of eye for the eternal noblenesses; sordid
loyalty to the prosperous Semblances, and high-treason against
the Supreme Fact, such a vote betokens in these natures? For it
was the consummation of a long series of such; they and their
fathers had long kept voting so. A singular People; who could
both produce such divine men, and then could so stone and crucify
them; a People terrible from the beginning!--Well, they got
Barabbas; and they got, of course, such guidance as Barabbas and
the like of him could give them; and, of course, they stumbled
ever downwards and devilwards, in their truculent stiffnecked
way; and--and, at this hour, after eighteen centuries of sad
fortune, they prophetically sing "Ou' clo!" in all the cities of
the world. Might the world, at this late hour, but take note of
them, and understand their song a little!

Yes, there are some things the universal suffrage can
decide,--and about these it will be exceedingly useful to consult
the universal suffrage: but in regard to most things of
importance, and in regard to the choice of men especially, there
is (astonishing as it may seem) next to no capability on the part
of universal suffrage.--I request all candid persons, who have