Considerations of a Representative Government | Page 9

society decidedly progressive than
merely to keep it permanent.
What, again, are the particular attributes in human beings which seem
to have a more especial reference to Progress, and do not so directly
suggest the ideas of Order and Preservation? They are chiefly the
qualities of mental activity, enterprise, and courage. But are not all
these qualities fully as much required for preserving the good we have
as for adding to it? If there is any thing certain in human affairs, it is
that valuable acquisitions are only to be retained by the continuation of
the same energies which gained them. Things left to take care of
themselves inevitably decay. Those whom success induces to relax
their habits of care and thoughtfulness, and their willingness to
encounter disagreeables, seldom long retain their good fortune at its
height. The mental attribute which seems exclusively dedicated to
Progress, and is the culmination of the tendencies to it, is Originality,

or Invention. Yet this is no less necessary for Permanence, since, in the
inevitable changes of human affairs, new inconveniences and dangers
continually grow up, which must be encountered by new resources and
contrivances, in order to keep things going on even only as well as they
did before. Whatever qualities, therefore, in a government, tend to
encourage activity, energy, courage, originality, are requisites of
Permanence as well as of Progress, only a somewhat less degree of
them will, on the average, suffice for the former purpose than for the
latter.
To pass now from the mental to the outward and objective requisites of
society: it is impossible to point out any contrivance in politics, or
arrangement of social affairs, which conduces to Order only, or to
Progress only; whatever tends to either promotes both. Take, for
instance, the common institution of a police. Order is the object which
seems most immediately interested in the efficiency of this part of the
social organization. Yet, if it is effectual to promote Order, that is, if it
represses crime, and enables every one to feel his person and property
secure, can any state of things be more conducive to Progress? The
greater security of property is one of the main conditions and causes of
greater production, which is Progress in its most familiar and vulgarest
aspect. The better repression of crime represses the dispositions which
tend to crime, and this is Progress in a somewhat higher sense. The
release of the individual from the cares and anxieties of a state of
imperfect protection sets his faculties free to be employed in any new
effort for improving his own state and that of others, while the same
cause, by attaching him to social existence, and making him no longer
see present or prospective enemies in his fellow creatures, fosters all
those feelings of kindness and fellowship towards others, and interest
in the general well-being of the community, which are such important
parts of social improvement.
Take, again, such a familiar case as that of a good system of taxation
and finance. This would generally be classed as belonging to the
province of Order. Yet what can be more conducive to Progress? A
financial system which promotes the one, conduces, by the very same
excellences, to the other. Economy, for example, equally preserves the

existing stock of national wealth, and favors the creation of more. A
just distribution of burdens, by holding up to every citizen an example
of morality and good conscience applied to difficult adjustments, and
an evidence of the value which the highest authorities attach to them,
tends in an eminent degree to educate the moral sentiments of the
community, both in respect of strength and of discrimination. Such a
mode of levying the taxes as does not impede the industry, or
unnecessarily interfere with the liberty of the citizen, promotes, not the
preservation only, but the increase of the national wealth, and
encourages a more active use of the individual faculties. And _vice
versâ_, all errors in finance and taxation which obstruct the
improvement of the people in wealth and morals, tend also, if of
sufficiently serious amount, positively to impoverish and demoralize
them. It holds, in short, universally, that when Order and Permanence
are taken in their widest sense for the stability of existing advantages,
the requisites of Progress are but the requisites of Order in a greater
degree; those of Permanence merely those of Progress in a somewhat
smaller measure.
In support of the position that Order is intrinsically different from
Progress, and that preservation of existing and acquisition of additional
good are sufficiently distinct to afford the basis of a fundamental
classification, we shall perhaps be reminded that Progress may be at the
expense of Order; that while we are acquiring, or striving to acquire,
good of one kind, we may be