The
indispensable virtue, therefore, in a government which establishes
itself over a people of this sort is, that it make itself obeyed. To
enable it to do this, the constitution of the government must be
nearly, or quite, despotic. A constitution in any degree popular,
dependent on the voluntary surrender by the different members of the
community of their individual freedom of action, would fail to enforce
the first lesson which the pupils, in this stage of their progress,
require. Accordingly, the civilisation of such tribes, when not the
result of juxtaposition with others already civilised, is almost
always the work of an absolute ruler, deriving his power either from
religion or military prowess; very often from foreign arms.
Again, uncivilised races, and the bravest and most energetic still
more than the rest, are averse to continuous labour of an unexciting
kind. Yet all real civilisation is at this price; without such labour,
neither can the mind be disciplined into the habits required by
civilised society, nor the material world prepared to receive it.
There needs a rare concurrence of circumstances, and for that reason
often a vast length of time, to reconcile such a people to industry,
unless they are for a while compelled to it. Hence even personal
slavery, by giving a commencement to industrial life, and enforcing it
as the exclusive occupation of the most numerous portion of the
community, may accelerate the transition to a better freedom than that
of fighting and rapine.
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