Whenever we improve, it is right to leave room for a further
improvement. It is right to consider, to look about us, to examine
the effect of what we have done. Then we can proceed with confidence,
because we can proceed with intelligence. Whereas in hot reformations,
in what men, more zealous than considerate, call MAKING CLEAR WORK, the
whole is generally so crude, so harsh, so indigested; mixed with so much
imprudence, and so much injustice; so contrary to the whole course of
human nature and human institutions, that the very people who are most
eager for it are among the first to grow disgusted at what they have
done. Then some part of the abdicated grievance is recalled from its
exile in order to become a corrective of the correction. Then the abuse
assumes all the credit and popularity of a reform. The very idea of
purity and disinterestedness in politics falls into disrepute, and is
considered as a vision of hot and inexperienced men; and thus disorders
become incurable, not by the virulence of their own quality, but by the
unapt and violent nature of the remedies. A great part, therefore, of my
idea of reform is meant to operate gradually; some benefits will come at
a nearer, some at a more remote period. We must no more make haste to be
rich by parsimony, than by intemperate acquisition.