But a school
supposes teachers as well as scholars; the utility of the
instruction greatly depends on its bringing inferior minds into
contact with superior, a contact which in the ordinary course of
life is altogether exceptional, and the want of which contributes more
than anything else to keep the generality of mankind on one level of
contented ignorance. The school, moreover, is worthless, and a
school of evil instead of good, if through the want of due
surveillance, and of the presence within itself of a higher order of
characters, the action of the body is allowed, as it so often is, to
degenerate into an equally unscrupulous and stupid pursuit of the
self-interest of its members. Now it is quite hopeless to induce
persons of a high class, either socially or intellectually, to take
a share of local administration in a corner by piece-meal, as
members of a Paving Board or a Drainage Commission. The entire local
business of their town is not more than a sufficient object to
induce men whose tastes incline them and whose knowledge qualifies
them for national affairs to become members of a mere local body,
and devote to it the time and study which are necessary to render
their presence anything more than a screen for the jobbing of inferior
persons under the shelter of their responsibility. A mere Board of
Works, though it comprehend the entire metropolis, is sure to be
composed of the same class of persons as the vestries of the London
parishes; nor is it practicable, or even desirable, that such should
not form the majority; but it is important for every purpose which
local bodies are designed to serve, whether it be the enlightened
and honest performance of their special duties, or the cultivation
of the political intelligence of the nation, that every such body
should contain a portion of the very best minds of the locality: who
are thus brought into perpetual contact, of the most useful kind, with
minds of a lower grade, receiving from them what local or professional
knowledge they have to give, and in return inspiring them with a
portion of their own more enlarged ideas, and higher and more
enlightened purposes.
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