ou may see as you go along a man who walks from house to house
delivering letters. Does he do this of his own accord? You know very
well that he does not; that he is paid to do it: that he does his duty.
What is the whole of his duty? Who gives him his orders?

Or you may see another man going from house to house leaving a paper at
each. He is a rate collector. What is a rate collector? Who gives him
authority to take money from people? What does he do with the money?

Or you may see placards on the walls asking people to vote for this man,
or for that man, for the School Board, the County Council, the House of
Commons, or the Vestry. Why does this man want to get elected to one of
those Councils? What will he do when he is elected? What are all these
Councils for?

Again, the thing has never been otherwise in your recollection and you
therefore do not observe it, but if you listen you will find that men
talk with the greatest freedom as they walk with their friends: no one
interferes with their conversation, no one interferes with their dress,
no one asks them what they want or where they are going. Did this
personal freedom always exist? Certainly not, for personal freedom does
not grow of its own accord.

You will also observe, as you walk along, churches--in every street, a
church--of all denominations: you will find posted on the walls notices
of public meetings for discussion or for lectures and addresses on every
conceivable topic: you will see boys crying newspapers in which all
subjects are treated with the utmost freedom. You suppose, perhaps, that
freedom of thought, of speech, of discussion, of writing comes to a
community like the rain and the wind? Not so. Slavery comes to a
community if you please, but not freedom. That has to be achieved.

You have seen the city growing larger and wealthier: the people getting
into finer houses, wider streets, and more settled ways. Now, there is a
thing which goes with the advance of a people: it is good government.
Unless with advance of wealth there comes improved government, the
people fall into decay. But, which is a remarkable thing, good
government can only continue or advance as the people themselves advance
in wisdom as well as in wealth. Such government as we have now would
have been useless in the time of King Ethelred or King Edward I. Such
government as we have now would be impossible had not the citizens of
London continued to learn the lessons in order