The rule of the road means that in order that the liberties of all may be preserved, the liberties of everybody must be curtailed. When the policemen, say, at a road-crossing steps into the middle of the road and puts out his hand, he is the symbol not of tyranny but of liberty. You have submitted to a curtailment of private liberty in order that you may enjoy a social order which makes your liberty a reality.
We have both liberties to preserve, our individual liberty and our social liberty. That is, we must have a judicious mixture of both.
I shall not permit any authority to say that my child must go to this school or that, shall specialise in science or arts. These things are personal. But if I say that my child shall have no education at all, then society will firmly tell me that my child must have education whether I like it or not.
The author intends to tell that the rule of the road stands for
The writer calls the policeman at the crossing a symbol not of tyranny but of liberty, showing that the rule of the road actually upholds freedom. So it stands for liberty understood in its true sense rather than any narrow private or public form.
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