Tolstoi was right when he said that when an individual rises in this way he simply brings another recruit to the rulers from the ruled, and that the fact that this passage from one class to another does occasionally take place, and is not absolutely forbidden by law and custom as in India, does not mean that we have no castes.[88] Even in ancient Egypt, it was quite usual, as in the case of Joseph, to elevate slaves to the highest positions.
This singling out and promotion of the very ablest among the lower classes may indeed be called the basis of every lasting caste system.
All those societies that depended on a purely hereditary system have either degenerated or were quickly destroyed.

If then a ruling class promotes from below a number sufficient only to provide for its own need of new abilities and new blood, its power to oppress, to protect its privileges, and to keep progress at the pace and in the direction that suits it will only be augmented--and universal equality of opportunity will be farther off than before.

Doubtless the numbers "State Socialism" will take up from the masses and equip for higher positions will constantly increase.

But neither will the opportunities of these few have been in any way equal to those of the higher classes, nor will even such opportunities be extended to any but an insignificant minority.
Nor does President Eliot's advocacy of class schools stand as an isolated phenomenon.

Already in America the development of free secondary schools has been checked by the far more rapid growth of private institutions.