There is no difficulty for men in college to understand elections and government.  They have all had experience in it.  The same motives that operate in the choice of class officers operate in choosing officers for the Commonwealth.  Here men are soon estimated at their true worth.  Here places of trust are conferred and administered as they will be in later years.  The scale is smaller, the opportunities are less, conditions are more artificial, but the principles are the same.  Of course the present estimate is not the ultimate.  There are men here who appear important that will not appear so in years to come.  There are men who seem insignificant now who will develop at a later day.  But the motive which leads to elections here leads to elections in the State.

Is there any especial obligation on the part of college-bred men to be candidates for public office?  I do not think so.  It is said that although college graduates constitute but one per cent of the population, they hold about fifty per cent of the public offices, so that this question seems to take care of itself.  But I do not feel that there is any more obligation to run for office than there is to become a banker, a merchant, a teacher, or enter any other special occupation.  As indicated some men have a particular aptitude in this direction and some have none.  Of course experience counts here as in any other human activity, and all experience worth the name is the result of application, of time and thought and study and practice.  If the individual finds he has liking and capacity for this work, he will involuntarily find himself engaged in it.  There is no catalogue of such capacity.  One man gets results in one way, another in another.  But in general only the man of broad sympathy and deep understanding of his fellow men can meet with much success.

What I have said relates to the somewhat narrow field of office-holding.  This is really a small part of the American system or of any system.  James Bryce tells us that we have a government of public opinion.  That is growing to be more and more true of the governments of the entire world.  The first care of despotism seems to be to control the school and the press.  Where the mind is free it turns not to force but to reason for the source of authority.  Men submit to a government of force as we are doing now when they believe it is necessary for their security, necessary to protect them from the imposition of force from without.  This is probably the main motive of the German people.  They have been taught that their only protection lay in the support of a military despotism.  Rightly or wrongly they have believed this and believing have submitted to what they suppose their only means of security.  They have been governed accordingly.  Germany is still feudal.