these. Education ought to
be one, provided a certain minimum standard is attained. Military
service clearly ought to be one. Wherever divergent action by
different groups is possible without anarchy, it ought to be
permitted. In such cases it will be found by those who consider past
history that, whenever any new fundamental issue arises, the majority
are in the wrong, because they are guided by prejudice and habit.
Progress comes through the gradual effect of a minority in converting
opinion and altering custom. At one time--not so very long ago--it
was considered monstrous wickedness to maintain that old women ought
not to be burnt as witches. If those who held this opinion had been
forcibly suppressed, we should still be steeped in medieval
superstition. For such reasons, it is of the utmost importance that
the majority should refrain from imposing its will as regards matters
in which uniformity is not absolutely necessary.

IV

The cure for the evils and dangers which we have been considering is a
very great extension of devolution and federal government. Wherever
there is a national consciousness, as in Wales and Ireland, the area
in which it exists ought to be allowed to decide all purely local
affairs without external interference. But there are many matters
which ought to be left to the management, not of local groups, but of
trade groups, or of organizations embodying some set of opinions. In
the East, men are subject to different laws according to the religion
they profess. Something of this kind is necessary if any semblance of
liberty is to exist where there is great divergence in beliefs.

Some matters are essentially geographical; for instance, gas and
water, roads, tariffs, armies and navies. These must be decided by an
authority representing an area. How large the area ought to be,
depends upon accidents of topography and sentiment, and also upon the
nature of the matter involved. Gas and water require a small area,
roads a somewhat larger one, while the only satisfactory area for an
army or a navy is the whole planet, since no smaller area will prevent
war.

But the proper unit in most economic questions, and also in most
questions that are intimately concerned with personal opinions, is not
geographical at all. The internal management of railways ought not to
be in the hands of the geographical state, for reasons which we have
already considered. Still less ought it to be in the