compelled to, and it is not easy to put a government under compulsion.  Still it gives you something; it does not ask you to part with your property for nothing.  Now in the case of taxation, the government takes your money and seems to make no return to you individually; but it is supposed to return to you the value of it in the shape of well-paved streets, good schools, efficient protection against criminals, and so forth.

[Sidenote:  What is government?] In giving this brief preliminary definition of taxes and taxation, we have already begun to speak of “the government” of the town or city in which you live.  We shall presently have to speak of other “governments,”—­as the government of your state and the government of the United States; and we shall now and then have occasion to allude to the governments of other countries in which the people are free, as, for example, England; and of some countries in which the people are not free, as, for example, Russia.  It is desirable, therefore, that we should here at the start make sure what we mean by “government,” in order that we may have a clear idea of what we are talking about.

[Sidenote:  The “ship of state.”] Our verb “to govern” is an Old French word, one of the great host of French words which became a part of the English language between the eleventh and fourteenth centuries, when so much French was spoken in England.  The French word was gouverner, and its oldest form was the Latin gubernare, a word which the Romans borrowed from the Greek, and meant originally “to steer the ship.”  Hence it very naturally came to mean “to guide,” “to direct,” “to command.”  The comparison between governing and steering was a happy one.  To govern is not to command as a master commands a slave, but it is to issue orders and give directions for the common good; for the interests of the man at the helm are the same as those of the people in the ship.  All must float or sink together.  Hence we sometimes speak of the “ship of state,” and we often call the state a “commonwealth,” or something in the weal or welfare of which all the people are alike interested.

Government, then, is the directing or managing of such affairs as concern all the people alike,—­as, for example, the punishment of criminals, the enforcement of contracts, the defence against foreign enemies, the maintenance of roads and bridges, and so on.  To the directing or managing of such affairs all the people are expected to contribute, each according to his ability, in the shape of taxes.  Government is something which is supported by the people and kept alive by taxation.  There is no other way of keeping it alive.