pursue a policy and know how to avail itself of the places,
occasions, and times when action will be profitable? No! certainly
not."

The truth is that the people is a little better fitted to choose a
magistrate than to undertake a policy for the gradual humbling of the
House of Austria. But not very much so, as it is only a little more
difficult to humble the House of Austria, than it is to discover the man
who is able to do it.

The masses are particularly incapable of making initial appointments and
of giving promotion in the early stages of a career to those who deserve
it. Yet in a democracy this is what they are constantly doing.

Again, by what means has the candidate for civil service employment, who
is favoured by the people and its representatives, earned their
approval? By his merit, of which the people and its representatives are
very bad judges? No! By what then? By his conformity to the general
views of the people; that is, by the subserviency of his political
opinions. The political opinions of a candidate for civil service
employment are the only things which mark him out to the popular choice
because they are the only subjects on which the people is a good judge.

Yes, but the subserviency of his political opinions may be combined
with real merit. True, but this is a mere matter of chance. The people
is not, perhaps, in this particular matter consciously hostile to
efficiency, rather it is indifferent, or ignores the qualification
altogether. Indeed, there is no great compliment paid to efficiency in
such transactions.

Here is what inevitably happens. The candidate for a permanent
appointment who is not conscious of possessing any particular merit is
not slow to realise that it is by his political opinions that he will
succeed, and he naturally professes those which are wanted. The
candidate who is conscious of merit, very often knowing very well what
less meritorious competitors are about, and not wishing to be beaten,
also professes the same useful opinions. There we have that "infection
of evil," which M. Renouvier has explained so admirably in his _Science
de la Morale_.

First, then, we see how most of the candidates chosen by the mandatories
of the people are incapable; others who are chosen in spite of their
capacity are men of indifferent character; and character, we must admit,
in all or nearly all public careers is a necessary part of efficiency.

There remains a small number of meri