The influence of
defects of intelligence in obstructing all the elements of good
government requires no illustration. Government consists of acts
done by human beings; and if the agents, or those who choose the
agents, or those to whom the agents are responsible, or the lookers-on
whose opinion ought to influence and check all these, are mere
masses of ignorance, stupidity, and baleful prejudice, every operation
of government will go wrong; while, in proportion as the men rise
above this standard, so will the government improve in quality; up
to the point of excellence, attainable but nowhere attained, where the
officers of government, themselves persons of superior virtue and
intellect, are surrounded by the atmosphere of a virtuous and
enlightened public opinion.
The first element of good government, therefore, being the virtue
and intelligence of the human beings composing the community, the most
important point of excellence which any form of government can possess
is to promote the virtue and intelligence of the people themselves.
The first question in respect to any political institutions is, how
far they tend to foster in the members of the community the various
desirable qualities, moral and intellectual; or rather (following
Bentham's more complete classification) moral, intellectual, and
active. The government which does this the best has every likelihood
of being the best in all other respects, since it is on these
qualities, so far as they exist in the people, that all possibility of
goodness in the practical operations of the government depends.
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