We may accept without fear principles which seem startling, but which are proved to be rooted in democratic ground, so long as we have faith in the democratic system itself. There is no road open for the doubter and questioner of popular rights but that which leads back to abandoned ground. We may proceed, then, with an attempt to explain the philosophy of the rule of Change. Shall it not be stated thus:
That, due regard being had to the preservation of simplicity and economy—forbidding thus the needless increase of offices and expenses—it is then true that the active participation by the largest number of persons in the practical administration of their own government is an object highly to be desired in every democratic republic.
The government must be the highest school of affairs. Shall it be declared that to study there and to have its diploma is not desirable for all? Is it not perfectly evident that the more who can learn to actually discharge the duties belonging to their own social organization, the better for them and the better for it?
All these propositions necessarily imply the existence of an intelligent and patriotic people, at least of such a majority. So always does every plan of popular government. Whatever of disappointment presents itself to the author of any scheme of "reform," upon finding that he has constructed a system which is ridden down by the political activity of the people, he must blame the plan upon which our fabric is built. If he is chagrined to find that his imperium in imperio is not practicable, and that nothing can make here a power stronger than the source of power, he must solace his hurt feelings with the reflection that the system was never adapted to his contrivance, and that our fathers, when in the beginning they resolved to establish a government by the people, gave consent thereby to all the apparent risks and inconveniences of having the people continually minding their own affairs.
With a just comprehension of the democratic forces that give motion and life to the governmental system of the United States, and of the manner in which they affect the public service in all its departments, the wise advocate of reform must approach his work. His patriotism and thoughtfulness are both necessary. To proceed against the democratic law is not practicable: to establish a new system which is inconsistent with the abundant vitality and conscious strength of that already established is a futile proposition indeed.
THE PRICE OF SAFETY.
Thirty-three years ago—that is, shortly before Christmas, 1847—I went over to Paris to pass a few weeks with my family. The great railway schemes of the two previous years in England had broken down a good many men in our office—draughtsmen, surveyors and so on. I wonder if the present public recollects those days, when the Times brought out double supplements to accommodate the advertisements of railroads, when King Hudson was as much a potentate as Queen Victoria, when Brunel and Stephenson were autocrats, and when everybody saw a sudden chance of getting rich by shares or damages? Those days were the beginning of that period of prosperity of which the recent "hard times" were the reaction. Then twenty guineas a night for office-work was sometimes paid to youngsters not yet out of their teens. In the great offices the young men worked all day and the alternate nights to get plans ready for Parliament, sustained by strong coffee always on the tap, till some of them went mad with the excitement and the strain.
I had worked hard both in the field and office during the closing months of 1847, but I broke down at last, and was sent to recover my health under the care of my family. That family consisted of my father—a half-pay English officer—my mother and three sisters, then living au troisième in the Rue Neuve de Berri, not far from the newly-erected Russian church, and the windows of the appartement commanded a side view down the Champs Élysées. I only needed rest and recreation, both of which my adoring family eagerly provided me. My sisters were three lively, simple-hearted, honest English girls, who had a large acquaintance in Paris, and took great pride and pleasure in introducing to it their only brother. We were not only invited to our embassy and on visiting terms with all the English Colony (that colony whose annals at that period are written in The Adventures of Philip, and to which Thackeray's mother and nearest relatives, like ourselves, belonged), but we were, in virtue of some American connections, admitted to the American embassy on the footing of semi-Americans.
We enjoyed our American friends greatly. I formed the opinion then, which I retain now, that cultivated Americans, the top-skimming of the social cream, are some of the most charming people to be met with in cultivated society. To all that constitutes "nice people" everywhere they join a soupçon of wild flavor which gives them individuality. They are to society what their own wild turkeys and canvasbacks are to the menu.