The permanent value of this book is that it proceeds out of a truly adequate and philosophical conception of democracy. That the collective human spirit should know itself, καταμαθεῖν τὴν φύσιν καὶ ταύτη ἕπεσθαι, that the state, the communal unit, should be, in Mr. Arnold’s phrase, “the expression of our best self, which is not manifold and vulgar and unstable and contentious and ever varying, but one and noble and secure and peaceful and the same for all mankind”; here we have in outline the operation of democracy. One could not give this volume higher praise than to say, as in justice one must say, that it clearly discerns and abundantly conveys the spirit which works in human nature toward this end. How important it is to maintain this fluid, philosophical and spiritual view of democracy may be seen when we look about us and consider the plight of those--especially the many now concerned in politics, whether professionally or as eager amateurs--who for lack of it confuse various aspects of the political problem of liberty with the social problem of equality. With political liberty or with self-expression of the individual in politics, democracy has, and ever has had, very little to do. It is our turbid thought about democracy that prevents our seeing this. The aristocratic and truculent barons did more for the political freedom of Englishmen than was ever done by democracy; a selfish and sensual king did more to gain the individual Englishman his freedom of self-expression in politics. In our own country it is matter of open and notorious fact that a political party whose every sentiment and tendency is aristocratic has been the one to bring about the largest measures of political enfranchisement. Now, surely, one may heartily welcome every enlargement of political liberty, but if one attributes them to a parentage which is not theirs, if one relates them under _democracy_, the penalty which nature inexorably imposes upon error is sure to follow. If, therefore, in the following pages the author seems occasionally lukewarm toward certain enfranchising measures, I do not understand that he disparages them, but only that he sees--as their advocates, firmly set in the confusion we speak of, cannot see--that their connection with democracy is extremely indistinct and remote. _Equality_--a social problem, not to be worked out by the mechanics of politics, but appealing wholly to the best self, the best reason and spirit of man,--this is democracy’s concern, democracy’s chief interest. It is to our author’s praise, again, that he sees this clearly and expresses it convincingly.