Page:Henry Stephens Salt - A Plea for Vegetarianism and Other Essays.pdf/54

Rh accepted his opinion on the wider question of appropriate national costumes. 50, too, in intellectual matters. One would scarcely look to a schoolmaster who has devoted a lifetime to one particular system for an unprejudiced opinion on the general question of education; or to a sectarian preacher for liberal views on theology. In fact, it seems as if all special professions have to some extent a narrowing inﬂuence on the mind, which in ordinary cases prevents specialists forming an unbiassed judgment on any question which extends beyond the precise limits of their actual professional practice. This principle is recognised in many of our institutions. The jurymen, for instance, who decide lawsuits; the governing bodies who rule our public schools; even the ministers chosen to superintend the various departments of our government, are not trained oﬁicials whose minds have long been moulded in the professional groove, but private individuals who may bring to their duties the advantage of clear unprejudiced judgment and sound common-sense. Of course it is not to be denied that it would be still better if professional knowledge could always go hand in hand, as it sometimes