Page:Thomas Hare - The Election of Representatives, parliamentary and municipal.djvu/23

 ary value of every vote, and reduces it to its minimum. Three fourths of the temptation is thus swept away, and, what is even far better, no man can sell more than his own vote: he cannot at the same time, by turning the scale, sell his town, or affect the representation of the rest of his constituency. Nor would any candidate thenceforward be driven to call evil good, and praise conduct as virtuous and patriotic which he knows to have been selfish and corrupt.

Personal representation encourages every man to do the best that is in him, and leaves him without excuse if he does not; and it therefore in the highest degree tends to promote individual effort. “The general public opinion is formed and modified by what the mind of each individual contributes towards it: it represents the sum or balance of the abstract moral principles of the persons forming the community. The state can only hear advice, or yield to suasion, or imbibe the spirit of genuine improvement through the medium of the individuals of whom it is composed.” It was a remark of De Tocqueville that the rulers of our time sought only how to use men in order to effect great things. “I wish,” he said, “they would try a little more to make great men,—that they would set less value upon the work, and more upon the workman." Every detail of this scheme converges to one central point,—that of making the exercise of the suffrage a step in the elevation of the individual character, whether it be found in a majority or a minority. I disclaim for it, therefore, the title of a representation of minorities. M. Morin, to whose labours in Geneva I refer elsewhere, has better comprehended its object, and I presume to quote his description of it. “II est vrai que M. Hare poursuit un but plus élevé que la representation des minorités et que si celle-ci est obtenue, dans son système, ce n'est qu'indirectement. En conséquence, ce qui parait une défectuosité, considéré au point de vue des minorités, peut n'en être pas une, lorsqu'on se place à celui de l'auteur. M. Hare se propose avant tout