ECHOES OF THE REVOLUTION 245

pursuit ^ of happiness being closely,, analogous
to Luther's doctrine of the right of every man
to be his own priest—the principle being the
same and the difference only in the application.
As the one aimed at making the individual his
own master in things spiritual so the other
aimed at making him his own master in things
temporal. Henceforward the law-maker, or the
law-making power however named, was to be
deposed from its place as the ruler of the people
and reduced to the quality of a useful servant
under the control of the people themselves,
while government, instead of practising the
maximum of interference with the doings of
the individual, was to practise the minimum,
leaving him alone, except in so far as he got in
the way of his neighbours, and free to make
good his right to life, liberty and happiness in
his own way. Henceforward, so to speak, the
" law " was to be spelt with a small letter instead
of a capital and the law-maker enjoined not
to think of himself more highly than he ought
to think. The object, in other words, was
not to create a machine for the easy multiplication
of laws, a conception of democracy entirely
foreign to the spirit of the Revolution, but, on
the contrary, to protect the citizen from the
encroachments of the law-maker and to restrict
the powers of the latter within the narrow limits
compatible with the public safety* la this
way " government" was reduced from the place