"I should think not," answered Henry; "recollect there would be the same property in the kingdom, only in more general and more equal circulation. The servants dismissed, and the luxuries foregone by the few, would in all probability be more than compensated by the increased establishments and more numerous comforts of the many, though each only in a small degree. The standard of splendour might be lowered, but that of comfort would be raised. The change, too, is likely to be in favour of home productions: the overflow of inordinate wealth, the too much of the few, is frequently squandered on luxuries obtained from abroad; while the fertilizing sufficiency, the enough of the many, would probably be expended on comforts produced at home.
"I do not, however," he added, "mean to assume the character of a prophet, or even to argue the point of future consequences; I take higher ground, and end every such discussion with the same appeal to duty:
"Let each generation do what is clearly justice in their own day, and leave the future to the All-wise Disposer of events.
"If there were, indeed, a theory through the mazes of which moral rectitude knew no path, we might be excusable in taking calculation for our guide; but when our road lies before us, indicated by duty's steadily pointing finger, we are not entitled to balance ere we proceed, even though it should be where four frequented highways meet."
Mrs. Dorothea, the sisters, and Sir James, had got tired of politics, and wandered into the garden. Henry, perceiving that Sir James was still in attendance on Louisa, became impatient, broke off the conversation abruptly, and following them, joined her, saying, "Lord Darlingford is too prudent a politician for me. I hate prudence and calculation, and worldly mindedness," he added, with impetuosity, and a provoked and mortified tone of voice, which Louisa was at no loss to comprehend. "The present artificial state of society," he proceeded, "has banished into the poet's dream every thing worth living for!—there alone all things deserving the ambition of an intellectual being now hold their unreal existence! Beauty has become a snare—feeling a folly, or a curse!—love a farce, and lovely woman, nature's most cunning workmanship, a toy, a trinket, which the rich man may draw out his purse and purchase!!!—heart and all!" he subjoined, in an under and somewhat softened voice, for Louisa had looked round, and their eyes had met for a moment. "Is it so?" he continued; "or are the beautiful looking deceptions now made to suit the market for which they are intended, without hearts?"
CHAPTER XIII.
Whether Alfred's study was pamphlet, newspaper, or magazine, he could never contrive to discern the print by any light but that of the window, or rather glass door, at which we left him standing on the morning on which he first discerned the fleeting semblance of a fair vision in the adjoining garden. The glass door was generally half open, a muslin blind drawn half down across it, and the eyes of the student, like those of the naughty child in the pictures of bold Harry, just visible over the top of his book.
On such occasions one of his sisters would often glide behind him, and startling him with a loud burlesque sigh, exclaim, "She is not there to-day." "Nonsense!" Alfred would say, rising. "This is a very well written thing," he added one morning, throwing his book on a table.
"What is it about, Alfred?" asked Madeline archly. He took up the book again to examine it before he could answer the question; "I declare he can't tell," she cried, "without looking at the top of the page;" a general burst of laughter followed, from which Alfred escaped into the garden. He had long since made it his business to ascertain that Lady Palliser and her daughter inhabited the next villa; but few, very few indeed, and "far between," had been the glimpses of his beauteous enslaver which his late studious habits and love of good light had procured for him.