"Well, by some exploit in mental gymnastics, the Zelanians have chosen the highest possible ideal, Justice--the enthronement of the individual--and with the inherited instincts of the race and a most favorable environment, it was to be expected that, with the ripening of the yearnings of man, humanity should find its highest type in these Romantic Isles.
"In closing, allow me briefly to recall to your minds a few of the more important features of my argument on these most interesting themes.
"I have reminded you, my children, that liberty never gained a victory in an old, well-established, and wealthy nation.
"I have reminded you that with great wealth and population people become conservative, the rulers cling to inherited power, the wealthy fear change, and the mass, by custom becoming loyal, reform is impossible--or at best, progress is slow indeed.
"I have reminded you that commerce is the basis of modern civilisation, but that only people inhabiting the water-front have ever become sufficiently commercial to materially influence any considerable portion of mankind; and I have reminded you that it was only through the colonial enterprise of commercial nations that the great progressive movements have been carried on.
"Further, I have reminded you that only in the colonies, in new and isolated communities, far removed from central authority, where novel conditions required novel methods, is self-reliance nourished, liberty aroused, and social progress made possible.
"And, I have also further reminded you, that of all the tribes, races, or nations that ever loafed about the earth's surface, those of Phoenicia, Greece, and Britain were alone capable of breaking away from inherited customs, and asserting freedom of action, or of so adjusting themselves to the requirements of a new environment as to develop a state of society differing materially from that of the old order of things.
"Then, too, I have shown you the social outposts of all the nations, and how improbable it is that they should advance any further by their own inherent force.
"I have reminded you also, that the total or aggregate of human rights is the same in all states, regardless of form or population, that, like elbow-room, individual rights decrease as the numbers participating increase, and that of all things a great population is least to be desired, and an over-population the most to be dreaded.