Page:Thomas Hare - The Election of Representatives, parliamentary and municipal.djvu/26

 but gradually and impartially, as education bears its fruit and intellect is matured. The nation is but a greater family.

If the choice be wide and free, the examination of the list of candidates, by an intelligent elector, with the practical object of placing on his voting paper the names of the most worthy of a seat in Parliament, would be an intellectual exercise of no mean value, bringing home to him important truths and noble aims. The thoughts it is calculated to awaken in his mind, and the discussion among his family and friends to which it is likely to give rise, would be sources of more than transitory benefit. He may give effectual support to the local candidate, and at the same time render a moral tribute to others. Few exercises would be more instructive than that of gathering information and forming an estimate of the character of candidate after candidate,—weighing their labours,—their public claims from achieved service, or the hopes inspired by youthful promise,—with the looked for pleasure of being able to offer an unsolicited testimony to merit and an unexpected homage to worth. This is no visionary expectation. Experience teaches us that it is an ordinary impulse, when the mind is not distorted by prejudice. “The judgment and criticism we pass freely upon our fellow-creatures, and their ways and performances, are a common gratification, partaking of the freedom of thought itself whatever good qualities strike our minds, or impress the community we live in, are sure to be sought after with especial ardour, whilst those that are in bad odour are kept in subjection. The contemplation of superior greatness is a fund of delight.” Aspiration is generally higher than knowledge, and multitudes of less education and narrower intelligence will gladly associate their votes with those of the more eminent and distinguished of their age.

It would probably become habitual with intelligent voters, to preserve a copy of the voting paper, making in it, from