And this reminds me of the wise and salutary regulation which obliges me here to abstain from topics which may supply the occasion of discord. In order to estimate in its nature and its causes the subject which is before us, we must be guided by the light of that political science which resides in serene regions, remote from the conflicts of party opinion; a science whose principles are clear, definite, and certain, and not more difficult to apply than the principles of the moral code. It is in this spirit I wish to speak of the exemplary value of events in America. Example is of the first importance in politics, because political calculations are so complex that we cannot trust theory, if we cannot support it by experience.
Now the experience of the Americans is necessarily an impressive lesson to England. Our institutions as well as our national character spring from the same roots, and the fortunes they encounter must serve as a beacon to guide us, or as a warning to repel. Now the world had never yet beheld a Democracy combining a very advanced civilisation with a very extensive territory. Democracies have coexisted with the highest social and intellectual refinement, but then they had not to overcome the difficulty of space. Those which extended their dominion perished between the cognate perils of anarchy and despotism. Above all, a Democracy has never even attempted to adopt the system of representative government which is the supreme and characteristic invention of the British monarchy. Therefore it had become almost an axiom in political science that that which ancient Rome and modern France attempted and failed to accomplish is really impossible; that Democracy, to be consistent with liberty, must subsist in solution and combination with other qualifying principles, and that complete equality is the ruin of liberty, and very prejudicial to the most valued interests of society, civilisation, and religion. That was, until a generation ago, the verdict of history; whose decision the Americans have undertaken to reverse. No more memorable attempt was ever made by men. If they succeeded in their momentous pleading—if they proved by
