Page:Letters to a friend on votes for women.djvu/45

 that an English woman has a right to take part by her vote in the government of the 300,000,000 of men and women who are natives of British India.

The more the difference between civil and political rights is considered, the more instructive it becomes. The deprivation of civil rights may amount to slavery. The non-possession of political rights may, to an individual man, be of the most trifling consequence. There are countries, and free countries (such, I believe, is Belgium), where the State is forced to impose penalties upon electors who do not give their votes. In no civilized country is it necessary to compel men to make use of and enjoy their private rights. Men of the very highest public spirit have felt again and again that, while civil rights—that is, personal freedom in its widest sense—are to every man of vital importance, the possession of political rights may be, if civil freedom is secured, of comparatively little value. One of the most eminent of English democratic leaders wrote in 1838: 'I very much suspect that at present, for the great mass of the people, Prussia possesses