chap, xvii.] A PATERNAL DESPOTISM. 399 



Children would never grow up into well-behaved and 

 well-educated men, if the same absolute freedom of action 

 that is allowed to men were allowed to them. Under the 

 best aspect of education, children are subjected to a mild 

 despotism for the good of themselves and of society ; and 

 their confidence in the wisdom and goodness of those 

 who ordain and apply this despotism, neutralizes the bad 

 passions and degrading feelings, which under less favour- 

 able conditions are its general results. 



Now, there is not merely an analogy, — there is in many 

 respects an identity of relation, between master and pupil 

 or parent and child on the one hand, and an uncivilized 

 race and its civilized rulers on the other. We know (or 

 think we know) that the education and industry, and the 

 common usages of civilized man, are superior to those of 

 savage life ; and, as he becomes acquainted with them, the 

 savage himself admits this. He admires the superior 

 acquirements of the civilized man, and it is with pride 

 that he will adopt such usages as do not interfere too much 

 with his sloth, his passions, or his prejudices. But as the 

 wilful child or the idle schoolboy, who was never taught 

 obedience, and never made to do anything which of his 

 own free will he was not inclined to do, would in most 

 cases obtain neither education nor manners ; so it is much 

 more unlikely that the savage, with all the confirmed 

 habits of manhood and the traditional prejudices of race, 



