"A country is good or bad, as it offers or withholds opportunity for earning a livelihood, and for the development of the mental faculties by the application of reasonable efforts; and a government is good or bad, as it withholds or encourages such opportunities and aspirations. 'When the wise rule, the people rejoice'--even in the barren districts. It is a matter--well, it is a matter--largely of 'grey matter.' As a rule, Nature has not been niggard in the distribution of her blessings. And, as a rule, the term good or bad, when applied to a country, applies less to the soil than to the society. It is college _versus_ cannon, or inquiry _versus_ credulity. Under a reign of benign justice, from a barren soil may arise an earthly paradise, while bigotry, war, and oppression will make a hell of the fairest valley. 'The gods wondered, and Viehnu said to Bel, "With seven wise men shalt thou enter hell, Or with five fools, pass into paradise." "Give me," said Bel, "hell with the wise, For that is heaven, where they do dwell, While fools would make of Heaven itself a hell."' "The subject, my children, always bears the image of the law, the expression of custom, and customs are established by cunning for the rule of credulity. By custom, one is born the owner of many broad acres; and by custom, ten thousand toil without enjoying, that one may enjoy without toil. But Nature usually lends herself freely to man's designs. In a vast monotonous country, despotism is a usual system of government, Nature suggesting no change; the leader becomes the chief, the chief becomes the monarch, the monarch becomes a despot, and the despot a god. "On the contrary, in a smaller country with diversified aspects, indented shore-lines and water-front, scaleable mountains and erratic climate, Nature suggests--change. A holy discontent appears, the despot becomes a constitutional monarch, a parliament serves the people, a cabinet advises the king; and then, as mountains suggest liberty and seas adventure, distant colonies, in which custom and precedent are ignored, are established on lines in harmony with environing conditions. "Human liberty, my children, rarely gains a victory in an old, wealthy, populous and well-established country or government. Society, under such conditions, becomes conservative; the rulers love power, the cunning want no change, the wealthy are satisfied, and the people, being adjusted to the changeless conditions, are 'loyal' and contented. "Further, every defeat of despotism, every entrenchment upon the 'divine' territory, every victory of human liberty, has been due to the restless inhabitants of the water-front; and remember, for all the progressive movements of all the ages, and for what the centuries call modern civilisation, the world is indebted to colonial enterprise, conspicuously led by Phoenicia, Greece, and modern Britain." BACK TO ZELANIA.