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It is this which gives interest to the plans and operation of human
governments. Governments can, in fact, do little by actual force. Nearly
all the power that is held, even by the most despotic executive, must be
based on an adroit management of the principles of human nature, so as
to lead men voluntarily to co-operate with the leader in his plans. Even
an army could not be got into battle, in many cases, without a most
ingenious arrangement, by means of which half a dozen men can drive,
literally drive, as many thousands into the very face of danger and
death. The difficulty of leading men to battle must have been, for a
long time, a very perplexing one to generals. It was at last removed by
the very simple expedient of creating a greater danger behind than there
is before. Without ingenuity of contrivance like this, turning one
principle of human nature against another, and making it for the
momentary interest of men to act in a given way, no government could
stand.

I know of nothing which illustrates more perfectly the way by which a
knowledge of human nature is to be turned to account in managing human
minds than a plan which was adopted for clearing the galleries of the
British House of Commons many years ago, before the present Houses of
Parliament were built. There was then, as now, a gallery appropriated to


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