Eustace Marchmont: A friend of the people

by Evelyn Everett-Green

“Well, sir, you shall. I am, as you truly say, a man of the people, and I think I may lay claim to understand my people as well as gentlefolks can do; and I’m very sure of one thing, that I’d be very sorry to live in a country where they were the rulers; for they haven’t either the patience, or the knowledge, or the faculty of government; and things will go badly for England if the day comes when the voice of the people shall prevail as the voice of God.”

“Ah! but the people have to be elevated and educated to be fit to rule,” said Eustace. “They are not fit now, I admit, but we are to seek to raise them, body, soul, and spirit, and then a vastly different state of affairs will be brought about.”

But Abner’s face was very grave, and anything but acquiescent.

“Sir,” he said, “I can’t see that as you do. I’ve read a bit of history here and there, and I’ve seen too in my own lifetime something of what comes when the voice of the people prevails.”

“It is not fair to charge upon the people the horrors of the French Revolution,” interposed Eustace quickly. “The tyrants who provoked it were the people really to blame. They had made brutes and devils of the people, and they only reaped what they had sown.”

“Very well, sir, I know in part at least you are right. We will say no more about history that may be open to such arguments as yours. But we always have our Bibles to go to when in doubt and perplexity, and we have it there in black and white that the powers that be are ordained of God, that riders and men of estate are to be reverenced, obeyed, and feared, that we are to submit ourselves to them as the ordinance of God.”

“Yes, yes, Tresithny, in moderation; and if they do their duty on their side, that would be all right enough,” answered Eustace, who began to feel that Abner was taking an unconsciously unfair advantage of him in adducing arguments drawn from Holy Writ, which had no value for him whatsoever. “But when kings and men of estate abuse their powers and become tyrannical and oppressive, then the compact on both sides is broken, and the people must stand up for themselves and their rights, or they will only fall into absolute slavery.”

“Well, sir, I can’t quite see that,” answered Abner thoughtfully. “When St. Paul wrote by the power of the Holy Ghost about the reverence due to the great men and rulers of the earth, he was speaking in the main of heathen tyrants, of whom he stood in peril of his own life; but he still recognised them as the ordinance of God, as our Lord Himself did when He stood at the judgment-seat of Pilate. It isn’t that I deny the wrongdoing of kings and nobles, but that I don’t think you’ve got hold of the right way of making things better. I said it was like putting the cart before the horse, and that’s just how it appears to me.”

“But you have not explained how.”

“Well, sir, that’s soon done. My way of thinking is this. God meant first of all, in the early dispensations, to rule the world directly Himself, through His prophets and faithful servants; but the hardness and perverseness of man stood in His way, and so He gave them rulers and governors of their own to be their natural heads; and before the Christian dispensation had come, this was the ordered method, and He Himself gave it His sanction and blessing in many ways when He lived on earth: ‘Render unto Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s,’ and so forth. Now, knowing that God has ordained kings and rulers, it seems plain to me that we should continue to give them reverence and honour; and if the world is going wrong through those evils which you speak of as abuses, that instead of the wise, and earnest, and good men (such as yourself, sir) coming to the people and trying to stir up in their hearts hatred and ill-will towards those above them—which your doctrine will and does do, sir, whether you mean it or not—you should go to the kings and the nobles. Why not strive to stir them up to do their duty by the people, to be just and merciful and liberal, to cease from oppression where it exists, and give them such things as are good for them to have by free and willing pleasure, instead of teaching the people to wring them from them little by little grudgingly and unwillingly? If men like you, sir, and those you have told me of, born to wealth and all that is great in the world, can feel for the wrongs and distresses of the poor of the land, surely others can be brought to do the same, the more so when they learn that mercy and liberality and justice are enjoined by God Himself. Then the people would learn to love and trust those above them, and would rejoice in their rulers as the Lord means them to; but teach them discontent and hatred and rebellion, and indeed, sir, I know not where it will end.”