ars every day from educated people some addition to the number of
things which "governments" ought to do, but for which any government we
have at present is totally unfit. One listens to them with amazement,
when looking at the material of which our government is composed,--for
the matter of that, of which all governments are composed; for I suppose
there is no question that all legislative bodies in the world have in
twenty years run down in quality. The parliamentary system is apparently
failing to meet the demands of modern democratic society, and is falling
into some disrepute; but it would seem as if there was at present just
as little chance of a substitute of any kind as of the dethronement of
universal suffrage. It will probably last indefinitely, and be as good
or as bad as its constituents make it. But this probable extension of
the powers and functions of government makes more necessary than ever a
free expression of opinion, and especially of educated opinion. We may
rail at "mere talk" as much as we please, but the probability is that
the affairs of nations and of men will be more and more regulated by
talk. The amount of talk which is now expended on all subjects of human
interest--and in "talk" I include contributions to periodical
literature--is something of which no previous age has had the smallest
conception. Of course it varies infinitely in quality. A very large
proportion of it does no good beyond relieving the feelings of the
talker. Political philosophers maintain, and with good reason, that one
of its greatest uses is keeping down discontent under popular
government. It is undoubtedly true that it is an immense relief to a man
with a grievance to express his feelings about it in words, even if he
knows that his words will have no immediate effect. Self-love is apt to
prevent most men from thinking that anything they say with passion or
earnestness will utterly and finally fail. But still it is safe to
suppose that one half of the talk of the world on subjects of general
interest is waste. But the other half certainly tells. We know this from
the change in ideas from generation to generation. We see that opinions
which at one time everybody held became absurd in the course of half a
century--opinions about religion and morals and manners and government.
Nearly every man of my age can recall old opinions of his own on
subjects of general interest, which he once thought highly respectable,
and which