They could pardon, but they could assign no punishments, nor make laws inflicting any.
Now such a plan as this may succeed for a short time, and under very favorable circumstances; and the circumstance which it is chiefly important should be favorable is, that the man who is called to preside over such an association should possess such talents of _generalship_ that he can really manage the institution _himself_, while the power is _nominally_ and _apparently_ in the hands of the boys.

Should this not be the case, or should the teacher, from any cause, lose his personal influence in the school, so that the institution should really be surrendered into the hands of the pupils, things must be on a very unstable footing.

And, accordingly, where such a plan has been adopted, it has, I believe, in every instance, been ultimately abandoned.
_Real self-government_ is an experiment sufficiently hazardous among men, though Providence, in making a daily supply of food necessary for every human being, has imposed a most powerful check upon the tendency to anarchy and confusion.

Let the populace of Paris or of London materially interrupt the order and break in upon the arrangements of the community, and in eight-and-forty hours nearly the whole of the mighty mass will be in the hands of the devourer, hunger, and they will be soon brought to submission.

On the other hand, a month's anarchy and confusion in a college or an academy would be delight to half the students, or else times have greatly changed since I was within college walls.
Although it is thus evident that the important concerns of a literary institution can not be safely committed into the hands of the students, very great benefits will result from calling upon them to act upon and to decide questions relative to the school within such limits and under such restrictions as are safe and proper.