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EXPERIMENTAL LEGZSLATZOiV. 269
hd all the possible evils of a great legislative leap in tho dark,
with fow of tho corresponding possible advantages. Four
ywrs ago, in a paper read to the Msnchoster Statistical
Society, I gave reasons for believing that the long-continued
and costly proceedings of the Alliauce were simply thrown
away, except so far as they might be a warning againat
similar unwise attempts at legislation. I showed thnt tho
Allitxuce were striving against triple ‘improbabilities: first,ly,
the illprobability (as manifested by the decreasing ratio of
the ages to tho noes in the House of Commons’ diviaiuuu)
that I’arlittment would ever pass the Hill ; secondly, tllc improbability
that, if passed, tho Permissive Act would be largely
ndopt.ed by local authorities ; thirdly, tho improbability that,
if adopted, it would succeed in lesscuing intemperance.
According to the nmtl~ematical principle of tho composition
of probabilities by multiplication, the probabiliby that any
good would ever result from an agitation costing more than a
quarter of a million pounds, and extending alrcady beyond a
quarter of a century in duration, was practically ?til. Tho only
effcctive ntlxwers given to my argurnents wcro tlltrt of tho
Rev. Mr. Stcinthnl and one or two others, who held that tho
probabilities in question me not rtltogcthcr indopendent,
beclruso Parliament could hardly be forced to pass tho Bill
unless there were extensivo localities wishing to adopt it.
There is a certain amount of truth in this objection, but it
docs not to any great degree strengthon the position of the
Alliance. ‘I’heir proposals in their original form seem to me
to have the character of a vest experiment, so vast that it was
intended to involve the extirlction of tho trade of publicnne
and liquor dealers generally in all parts of the country. Nom,
that is an experiment, because it is exceedingly doubtful
whether the population would tolerate such an interference
with their habits, when the meaning of the Act came home to
them. The information which we can draw from Maine, or
other places where prohibition of the traffic has existed, is
most conflicting in itself, and remote in analogy. Accordingly,
I should much like to see the prohibition of the public sale of
liquor tried in several large English boroughs and districts,