the superior ranks, while government by the representatives of those
ranks would probably rivet the degradation of the multitude, and leave
them no hope of decent treatment except by ridding themselves of one
of the most valuable elements of future advancement. The best prospect
of improvement for a people thus composed lies in the existence of a
constitutionally unlimited, or at least a practically preponderant
authority in the chief ruler of the dominant class. He alone has by
his position an interest in raising and improving the mass, of whom he
is not jealous, as a counterpoise to his associates, of whom he is;
and if fortunate circumstances place beside him, not as controllers
but as subordinates, a body representative of the superior caste,
which, by its objections and questionings, and by its occasional
outbreaks of spirit, keeps alive habits of collective resistance, and
may admit of being, in time and by degrees, expanded into a really
national representation (which is in substance the history of the
English Parliament), the nation has then the most favorable prospects
of improvement which can well occur to a community thus circumstanced
and constituted.

Among the tendencies which, without absolutely rendering a people
unfit for representative government, seriously incapacitate them from
reaping the full benefit of it, one deserves particular notice. There
are two states of the inclinations, intrinsically very different, but
which have something in common, by virtue of which they often coincide
in the direction they give to the efforts of individuals and of
nations; one is, the desire to exercise power over others; the other
is disinclination to have power exercised over themselves. The
difference between different portions of mankind in the relative
strength of these two dispositions is one of the most important
elements in their history. There are nations in whom the passion for