A Joy For Ever; (And Its Price in the Market) | Page 7

an individual who conducts
himself wisely must make laws for himself which at some time or other
may appear irksome or injurious, but which, precisely at the time they
appear most irksome, it is most necessary he should obey, so a nation
which means to conduct itself wisely, must establish authority over
itself, vested either in kings, councils, or laws, which it must resolve to
obey, even at times when the law or authority appears irksome to the
body of the people, or injurious to certain masses of it. And this kind of
national law has hitherto been only judicial; contented, that is, with an
endeavour to prevent and punish violence and crime: but, as we
advance in our social knowledge, we shall endeavour to make our
government paternal as well as judicial; that is, to establish such laws
and authorities as may at once direct us in our occupations, protect us
against our follies, and visit us in our distresses: a government which

shall repress dishonesty, as now it punishes theft; which shall show
how the discipline of the masses may be brought to aid the toils of
peace, as discipline of the masses has hitherto knit the sinews of battle;
a government which shall have its soldiers of the ploughshare as well
as its soldiers of the sword, and which shall distribute more proudly its
golden crosses of industry--golden as the glow of the harvest, than now
it grants its bronze crosses of honour--bronzed with the crimson of
blood.
16. I have not, of course, time to insist on the nature or details of
government of this kind; only I wish to plead for your several and
future consideration of this one truth, that the notion of Discipline and
Interference lies at the very root of all human progress or power; that
the "Let-alone" principle is, in all things which man has to do with, the
principle of death; that it is ruin to him, certain and total, if he lets his
land alone--if he lets his fellow-men alone--if he lets his own soul alone.
That his whole life, on the contrary, must, if it is healthy life, be
continually one of ploughing and pruning, rebuking and helping,
governing and punishing; and that therefore it is only in the concession
of some great principle of restraint and interference in national action
that he can ever hope to find the secret of protection against national
degradation. I believe that the masses have a right to claim education
from their government; but only so far as they acknowledge the duty of
yielding obedience to their government. I believe they have a right to
claim employment from their governors; but only so far as they yield to
the governor the direction and discipline of their labour; and it is only
so far as they grant to the men whom they may set over them the
father's authority to check the childishnesses of national fancy, and
direct the waywardnesses of national energy, that they have a right to
ask that none of their distresses should be unrelieved, none of their
weaknesses unwatched; and that no grief, nor nakedness, nor peril,
should exist for them, against which the father's hand was not
outstretched, or the father's shield uplifted.[3]
[Note 3: Compare Wordsworth's Essay on the Poor Law Amendment
Bill. I quote one important passage: "But, if it be not safe to touch the
abstract question of man's right in a social state to help himself even in

the last extremity, may we not still contend for the duty of a Christian
government, standing in loco parentis towards all its subjects, to make
such effectual provision that no one shall be in danger of perishing
either through the neglect or harshness of its legislation? Or, waiving
this, is it not indisputable that the claim of the State to the allegiance,
involves the protection of the subject? And, as all rights in one party
impose a correlative duty upon another, it follows that the right of the
State to require the services of its members, even to the jeopardizing of
their lives in the common defence, establishes a right in the people (not
to be gainsaid by utilitarians and economists) to public support when,
from any cause, they may be unable to support themselves."--(See note
2nd, in Addenda.)]
17. Now, I have pressed this upon you at more length than is needful or
proportioned to our present purposes of inquiry, because I would not
for the first time speak to you on this subject of political economy
without clearly stating what I believe to be its first grand principle. But
its bearing on the matter in hand is chiefly to prevent you from at once
too violently dissenting from me when what I may state to you