Evidently then, there has been a mistake here. History and poetry have forgotten to mention a fact supremely important.
The people of Poland are, after all, not free—not equal. The voting is not voting by the people. Freedom and the suffrage are for serf-owners,—equality is between them.
No one can deny that in this governing class were many, very many noble specimens of manhood—yielding ease and life for ideas—readily.
Emperor Henry the Fifth of Germany had tried in vain to overcome them by war. When the Polish ambassador came into his presence, the Emperor pointed to his weapon, and said, "I could not overcome your nobility with these;"—then pointing to an open chest filled with gold, he said, "but I will conquer them with this." The ambassador wore the chains and jewels befitting his rank. Straitway he takes off every ornament, and flings all into the Emperor's chest together.
Yet myriads of such men could not have averted ruin. Polish history proved it day by day.
It was not that these nobles were especially barbarous,—it was not that they were effeminate. It was simply that they maintained one caste above another—allowing a distinction in civil and political rights. The system gave its usual luxuriant fruitage of curses.
First in the material condition. Labor and trade were despised. If, in the useful class, a genius arose, the first exercise of his genius was to get himself out of the useful class. Labor was left to serfs; trade was left to Jews. Cities were contemptible in all that does a city honor. Villages were huddles. The idea thus implanted remains. Of all countries, called civilized, Poland seems to-day, materially, the most hopeless.[32]
It may be said that this results from Russian invasions;—but it was so before Russian invasions. It may be said that it results from Russian oppression,—but the great central districts of Russia are just as much under the Czar, and they are thriving. It may be said that Poland has been wasted by war;—but Belgium and Holland and the Rhine Palatinate have been far more severely wasted, yet their towns are hives, and their country districts gardens.
Next, as to the Political condition.
A man-mastering caste necessarily develops the individual will morbidly and intensely. The most immediate of political consequences is, of course, a clash between the individual will and the general will.