PROFESSIONAL INSTITUTIONS. 847* 



drafted to places where it is most wanted, supplies of commodi- 

 ties balanced in every locality and prices universally adjusted 

 all without official supervision ; yet, being oblivious of the truth 

 that these processes are socially originated without design of any 

 one, they can not believe that society will be bettered by natural 

 agencies. And hence when they see an evil to be cured or a 

 good to be achieved, they ask for legal coercion as the only pos- 

 sible means. 



More than this is true. If, as every parliamentary debate and 

 every political meeting shows, the demands for legislation pay no 

 attention to that beneficent social development which has done so 

 much and may be expected to increase in efficiency, still more do 

 they ignore the laws of that development still less do they 

 recognize a natural order in the changes by which society passes 

 from its lower to its higher stages. Though, as we have seen, the 

 process of evolution exemplified in the genesis of the professions 

 is similar in character to the process exemplified in the genesis of 

 political and ecclesiastical institutions and everywhere else ; and 

 though the first inquiry rationally to be made respecting any 

 proposed measure should be whether or not it falls within the 

 lines of this evolution, and what must be the effects of running 

 counter to the normal course of things ; yet not only is no such 

 question ever entertained, but one who raised it would be 

 laughed down in any popular assemblage and smiled at as a 

 dreamer in the House of Commons : the only course thought wise 

 in either the cultured or the uncultured gathering being that of 

 trying to estimate immediate benefits and evils. 



Nor will any argument or any accumulation of evidence 

 suffice to change this attitude until there has arisen a different 

 type of mind and a different quality of culture. The politician 

 will still spend his energies in rectifying some evils and making 

 more in forming, reforming, and again reforming in passing 

 acts to amend acts that were before amended ; while social 

 schemers will continue to think that they have only to cut up 

 society and re- arrange it after their ideal pattern and its parts 

 will join together again and work as intended ! 



ACCORDING to the account of one of their days given by Mr. S. E. J. 

 Clarke, the women of India lead as busy, useful, and responsible lives as 

 any of those of Anglo-Saxon lands. As soon as a woman awakes, this 

 author says, she recites her prayers, reverently salutes the pictures or 

 sacred images in the room, and then kisses, in honor of Lukhi, the gold 

 bangle on her wrist or the golden amulet on her arm, and, having done this, 

 is ready to leave her bed. Next, she anoints her body with oil specially 

 prepared for the purpose, and often delicately scented. The hair is then 

 dressed and treated with oil, which among respectable people is prepared 



