The criminal classes, at this time, had an organization far superior to any that Society could oppose to it; in fact, if a committee of pickpockets and burglars had been entrusted with the task of creating and arranging a system of police, they could hardly have devised any scheme under which they would have secured to themselves greater freedom from molestation. Colquhoun pointed out how all this might be changed: he would have a register prepared of all the known offenders, containing a complete history of their connexions and haunts, together with a list of all property stolen; he would establish such a correspondence between the town and country magistrates that the movements of suspected persons might be effectually watched, and finally would "interpose those embarrassments which a vigilant and active police may place in the way of every class of offenders, so as to diminish crimes by increasing the risk of detection." He also collected a mass of evidence bearing on the causes that were responsible for the prevalence of crime, and proposed that a scientific campaign against the enemies of Society should be inaugurated, under the direction of experts, who should be free to devote the whole of their time and energies to the task. His proposition, in fact, amounted to the creation, if possible, of a centralized police, related to the general government through the Home Office, and officered both in the superior and subordinate grades, by men specially trained for the purpose. It was on these lines, of course, that Peel set to work twenty years later, but there is little doubt that he would have failed to carry his measure, in the face of the opposition which it aroused, if men's minds had not been to some extent prepared beforehand by the convincing arguments brought forward in "The Police of the Metropolis."