Page:Letters to a friend on votes for women.djvu/44

 with his own wish or interest, but primarily, at least, with a view to the interest of the State, and therefore may, even according to Mill's doctrine, be limited or extended in any way which conduces to the welfare of the community.

This difference between civil and political rights is, for the present argument, essential. Civil rights ought, according to Mill, to be governed by his law of liberty. To political rights this law has hardly any application. No art of logic, even when aided by rhetoric, can convert a precept intended to determine the limits of an individual's freedom, in matters which primarily concern himself, into the dogma that a given individual, or a given class, has necessarily a right to the determination of matters which primarily concern the public or the State. A person's claim, in short, to govern himself is a totally different thing from his claim to govern others. Prove that an Englishwoman has, speaking generally, a rightful claim to the exercise of her natural talents and powers, or even to the education which makes that exercise possible, yet you have not advanced a step towards showing