of the average man is on a higher plane, it will be well for the surplus wealth to be in the safer hands of those who have proved their capacity for avoiding waste. The evolution of society is not fitted at present for a wealthy middle-class, or a proletariat domination. We have now seen in many directions how great are the changes in the constitution of society, which are brought about by a succession of small movements, each of which imperceptibly bears its share in the change. We see thus how carefully small tendencies should be watched; and we learn how needless and often how futile is a violent uprooting of institutions instead of a gradual growth. Another lesson to note is that every attempt to interfere by legislation in the natural working of causes is more likely to do harm than good. The long lesson, which it took all the middle ages to teach, was that legislative interference with trade always did harm; we have come to believe that in a half-hearted way, but we are still perpetually longing to tinker society by interfering with natural cause and effect. CHAPTER V. THE NEED OF DIVERSITY. A large part of the aims of government in all ages has been the securing of uniformity, and much of the misery of mankind has been caused by the enforcing of it. But when we look at nature we see that a highly uniform species is the least likely to advance; and a seedsman or a breeder will try to break up too uniform a strain by exciting conditions which may lead to beneficial new varieties. It is only in a fluctuating species in which new "sports" easily arise, or are quickly developed by conditions, that we can expect to acquire new qualities or beneficial advance. It is therefore one of the essentials for an advancing species that it should have full scope for diversity, so that any new varieties may not be crushed out by a uniformity of conditions. Too uniform a type of government is a deadly thing. Compulsory orthodoxy killed the vitality of Spain, and—so far as it succeeded—that of France also. No state was more brilliant or vigorous than the Norman rule in Sicily, which equally patronised Muhammedan and Christian. Diversity may be secured in two ways, either by large varieties within a single great state, or by differences between homogeneous small states. The diversity within a large state may be seen in England or America; diversity between small states was attained between the cities of ancient Greece or mediaeval Italy. But we meet with limiting conditions in the necessity of combination for mutual support; and in small states that can be carried out by a vigorous intolerance which weeds out those who are not conformable, and drives them into more congenial communities. Intolerance, therefore, is a gain to a small community, though detrimental to a large state where it excludes the neighbourhood of variety.