activity, the information, and the spirit of enterprise which keeps
society in perpetual labor, in these American townships, whose
budgets are drawn up with small method and with still less
uniformity,--I am struck by the spectacle; _for, to my mind, the end
of a good government is to insure the welfare of a people_, and not
to establish order and regularity in the midst of its misery and its
distress."[1]

The italics are my own; but it will be seen that he uses a phrase almost
identical with Mr. Parkman's, and that he uses it to show that there is
something to be looked at beyond good laws,--namely, the beneficial effect
of self-government. In another place he comes back to the subject again:--

"It is incontestable that the people frequently conducts public
business very ill; but it is impossible that the lower order should
take a part in public business without extending the circle of their
ideas, and without quitting the ordinary routine of their mental
acquirements; the humblest individual who is called upon to
cooperate in the government of society acquires a certain degree of
self-respect; and, as he possesses authority, he can command the
services of minds much more enlightened than his own. He is
canvassed by a multitude of applicants, who seek to deceive him in a
thousand different ways, but who instruct him by their deceit....
Democracy does not confer the most skilful kind of government upon
the people; but it produces that which the most skilful governments
are frequently unable to awaken, namely, an all-pervading and
restless activity, a superabundant force, and an energy which is
inseparable from it, and which may, under favorable circumstances,
beget the most amazing benefits. These are the true advantages of
democracy."[2]