uccess; but meanwhile it is
idle to consider the idea of getting rid of our common evils by adding
them together.

Besides it is a fundamental axiom in politics, approved by the
experience of older countries, as well as of our own, that the sources
of power should never be far removed from those who are to feel its
exercise. It is the violation of this principle which produces chronic
revolution in France, and makes the British rule so obnoxious to the
Irish people. This evil is happily avoided when a natural boundary
circumscribes administration within narrow limits. While, therefore,
we rejoice together at the new bond between New York and Brooklyn, we
ought to rejoice the more, that it destroys none of the conditions
which permit each city to govern itself, but rather urges them to a
generous rivalry in perfecting each its own government, recognizing
the truth, that there is no true liberty without law, and that eternal
vigilance, which is the only safeguard of liberty, can best be
exercised within limited areas.

It would be a most fortunate conclusion, if the completion of this
Bridge should arouse public attention to the absolute necessity of
good municipal government, and recall the only principle upon which it
can ever be successfully founded. There is reason to hope that this
result will follow, because the erection of this structure shows how a
problem, analogous to that which confronts us in regard to the city
government, has been met and solved in the domain of physical science.

The men who controlled this enterprise at the outset were not all of
the best type; some of them, as we have seen, were public jobbers. But
they knew that they could not build a bridge, although they had no
doubt of their ability to govern a city. They thereupon proceeded to
organize the knowledge which existed as to the construction of
bridges; and they held the organization thus created responsible for
results. Now, we know that it is at least as difficult to govern a
city as to build a bridge, and yet, as citizens, we have deliberately
allowed the ignorance of the community to be organized for its
government, and we then complain that it is a failure. Until we
imitate the example of the Ring, and organize the intelligence of the
community for its government, our complaint is childish and
unreasonable. But we shall be told that there is no analogy between
building a bridge and governing a city. Let us examine this objection.
A