There is a species of republicanism which may assume all the odious features of aristocracy; and there is an aristocracy, in the true sense of the word, which may act as a stimulus to liberty and national honour. If there be one truth which the history of modern times has proved beyond the possibility of a doubt, it is this,—that the wealthy bourgeoisie, where it succeeded in obtaining power, has been a ruder tyrant of the lower classes than the hereditary nobility whom it deprived of their political influence. As my friend truly observed,—the more nearly an aristocracy is allied to the people, the more intolerable are its presumptions; the less are these qualities redeemed by refinement, education, and that peculiar sense of honour which, even at the worst stage of corruption, seldom entirely quits those descended from a long line of ancestors. If Michel Chevalier is right in believing that the nature of man is too corrupt to be governed by a pure democracy, then I would, with my Boston cicerone, prefer at once an aristocracy of family and hereditary property, with chivalrous notions of honour and justice, to a cold, calculating preponderance of moneyed men, which, though it may to a certain extent stimulate enterprise and industry, establishes nevertheless a mean numerical scale of worth, the most distressing of all to the lofty aspirations of high-minded men.
The aristocratic super-position of society, as it exists in Europe and in the Southern States of America, has far less tendency to circumscribe the liberty of the people[11] than the democratic juxta-position of different ranks and fortunes, with an incessant struggle for individual distinction. In short, I prefer the white-gloved democrat of the South, with his aristocratic bearing, to the ungloved aristocrat of the North, with his republican humility, and his cravings after popularity and power.
“Ourself and Bushy, Bagot here and Green,
Observed his courtship to the common people,—
How he did seem to dive into their hearts
With humble and familiar courtesy;—
What reverence he did throw away on slaves,
Wooing poor craftsmen with the craft of smiles,
And patient underbearing of his fortune,
As ’twere to banish their effects with him.
Off goes his bonnet to an oyster wench;
A brace of draymen bid—God speed him well!
And has the tribute of his supple knee
With ‘Thanks, my countrymen, my loving friends!’”
As I was thus pondering on the relative merits of the North and South, I observed a gentleman whom I had once met in a stage-coach talking to the master of the house in a manner from which it was easy to infer that I formed the subject of their conversation. Shortly after he rushed up to me, and, seizing both my hands,
“Don’t you remember me?” exclaimed he; “we travelled together in the same coach from Baltimore to Washington.”
I was glad to find some one to converse with freely, without being every third word stopped by such phrases as these: “Why, sir! I don’t exactly know;” “I sometimes think;” “I am half inclined to suppose;” “I rather guess;” “I should swan,” (for, “I should swear,”) &c.; or cross-examined as to my intentions, views, inclinations, tastes, and habits, which I knew would be considered as absurd if they did not entirely correspond with the stereotype patterns of the leading moralists of the city. During my stay in Boston I have often felt gratified with the attention shown me by many of its inhabitants; and there are, perhaps, few cities which, in proportion to their population, can boast of so large a number of educated men and women: but I cannot refrain from alluding to the want of moral independence, not only in their private and public acts, but also in their conversation. I communicated these thoughts to the Carolinian, who, seizing both my hands, exclaimed,
“You have spoken my very heart. I could live twenty years in this city without feeling myself at home in it. There is a degree of ceremoniousness, watchfulness, and prudence, even in the hospitality of these people, which destroys that familiar conviviality to which we are accustomed at the South. The same holds of the women. There is a certain severity—une rigueur poussée trop loin—about the loveliest faces in New England, which acts as a disenchanter on enthusiasm. You gaze, you admire, you respect; but you are almost afraid to love; such a distance does there seem between yourself and the object of your fancy.”
From these topics our conversation turned on literature and the representatives of the press.
“Our editors,” said he, “think themselves competent for the solution of every question, whether it refer to politics or poetry, to the settlement of the Western country or to Greek and Roman archæology. Once armed with a quill, they care not whom they meet in the arena. Fortunately it is their practice to praise indiscriminately every book, pamphlet, or poem, of which a copy is sent them ‘for notice;’ except when the author attacks their favourite doctrines, or pretends to be wiser than themselves. In such cases they exhibit an esprit du corps, and woe to the unfortunate offender that provokes a power so formidable! Not only will judgment be pronounced on him editorially; but also in an infinite number of anonymous articles, furnished by the legion of literary twaddles which surround our ‘independent press,’ and claim the occasional insertion of a squib as a bonus for the amount of their annual subscription. This species of assassination is considered perfectly lawful, and is practised by lawyers, physicians, clergymen, merchants, manufacturers, and tradespeople of all sorts. Whoever subscribes to a paper considers himself the editor’s patron, and obliges the latter to give publicity to his dull lucubrations.
“An editor, in order to reject these voluntary contributions, must be very independent in his circumstances, or possess a fund of wit and sarcasm to make people afraid of him, as is, for instance, the case with our entertainer; but by far the majority are glad to avail themselves of these opportunities of filling their columns without personal exertion or trouble. You know how the democratic tendency of Cooper’s novels was treated in our prints; how the youths of our colleges, and the clerks of our dry-goods-men, exerted themselves to the utmost to counteract their pernicious tendency.”[12]