Page:Thomas Hare - The Election of Representatives, parliamentary and municipal.djvu/62

opinions are in harmony with the victorious party elsewhere, is to set up one great evil as a compensation for another. “Can it,” inquires the writer last quoted, “be seriously argued that to balance one great mischief against another, is as well and as safe a mode of proceeding as an endeavour to avert both ?” Political action, instead of being the result of a steady and legitimate adaptation of means to an end, is converted into a game of chance, a speculation in which the failure upon one card is to be compensated by success upon another, and, by the sacrifice of the active and cordial assistance and adherence of two-thirds of the people, we even profess to gain no more than the same relative power for each of two or more parties, which they may have obtained without such sacrifice. Assuming, however, that the equivalent result, as a matter of party warfare, were in this manner obtained, the purpose of constitutional and representative government would be as far off as ever. The purpose of such a government is not satisfied by dividing the nation into two parties, and converting the area of legislation into a battle-field. It is not necessary here to discuss the merits of party government, it is enough to say, that in the vast field of modern legislation, in the adaptation of our ancient institutions to a new state of society, and in providing for new emergencies, a multitude of political and social problems come to be solved with which party has nothing to do, and into which the introduction of party elements and considerations is not only useless, but is absolutely pernicious. It is obvious that the tendency of a system of government founded on numerical majorities alone, is to absorb all differences into one issue—a contest for power. The extension of knowledge and the progress of civilization open the door of inquiry, prompt activity of thought, encourage diversities of opinion, and thus lead the way to social improvement ; but the benefit of this progress in the composition of a representative assembly is excluded when every variety of opinion and shadow of thought is expurgated—thrown aside