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Page 43
Aristocracy, one sees, is too apt to regard itself as the spoilt child
of material fortune, instead of humbly and with a sense of deepest
responsibility accepting the heavy duties of moral leadership imposed
upon it by the labours of evolution.
It is to be hoped that the children of the present generation of
aristocracy may grow up with no taste for the betting ring, the card
room, and the night club, or, at any rate, that a certain number of them
may find their highest happiness in knowledge and wisdom rather than in
amateur theatricals and fancy-dress balls. The human mind, after all,
cannot find rest in triviality, and after so long a period of the most
sordid and vulgar self-indulgence it is reasonable to hope that our
aristocracy may experience a reaction.
If men would ask themselves, before they rush out to seek her, What is
Pleasure? and consult the past history of humanity as well as their own
senses and inclinations they could hardly fail, except in the case of
the most degenerate, to discover that the highest happiness is not of
the nursery or the kitchen, but rather of the living spirit.
Observation of nature, love of beautiful things, delight in noble
literature, gratitude for the highest forms of wit and humour, sympathy
with all sorts and conditions of men, reverence for the majesty of the
universe, kindness to all, love of children, and devotion to the home,
these operations of the human spirit bring peace to the heart of man and
continue their ministrations to his happiness with an increasing power
of joy as his personality enlarges itself to receive the highest
revelations of Life.
* * * * *
Something far greater than she is now doing might be done by the Church
to restore the sanctions which once ruled human conduct and gave a
living force to public opinion. Religion in these days is obviously too
complaisant. To watch the Church in the world is to be reminded of a
poor relation from the provinces sitting silent and overawed in the
gilded drawing-room of a parvenu. There is no sound of confidence in her
voice. She whines for the world's notice instead of denouncing its very
obvious sins. She is too much in this world, and too little in the
other. She is too careful not to offend Dives, and too self-conscious to
be seen openly in the company of Lazarus. It is impossible not to think
that a coarse world has shaken her faith in Christian virtue. She clings
to her traditions and her doctrines, but she has lost the vigorous faith
in spiritual life which gave beauty to those traditions and has ceased
to set that example of entire self-sacrifice which rendered her
doctrines less difficult of interpretation by the instructed. She has
ceased to preach, even with the dying embers of conviction, that a man
may gain the whole world and yet lose his soul alive.
* * * * *
A responsibility hardly to be exceeded by that of aristocracy rests upon
the leaders of Labour. Every voice raised to encourage the economic
delusions of Socialism is a voice on the side of vulgarity and
irreligion. Most of the leaders of Labour know perfectly well that
economic Socialism is impossible, but by not saying so with honest
courage they commit a grave sin, a sin not only against society but
against God. For democracy in England, once the most sensible and
kind-hearted democracy in Europe, is placing its faith more and more in
the power of wages to buy happiness, turning away with more and more
impatience from the divine truth that the Kingdom of Heaven is within
us.
It is a grievous thing to corrupt the mind of the simple. Democracy in
England has been the chief representative of veritable Englishness up to
these days. It was never Latinized or Frenchified. The cottage garden
refused to follow the bad example of the "carpet-bedder." The poor have
always been racy of the soil. They have laughed at the absurdities of
fashion and seen through the pretensions of wealth. They have believed
in heartiness and cheerfulness. All their proverbs spring out of a keen
sense of virtue. All their games are of a manly character. To
materialize this glorious people, to commercialize and mammonize it, to
make it think of economics instead of life, to make it bitter,
discontented, and tyrannous, this is to strike at the very heart of
England.
But though the leaders of Labour are guilty of this corruption, there is
no doubt that the ugliness of spirit in democracy is the reflection of
the ugly life led by the privileged classes. There is no reproach for
this democracy when it looks upward. It sees nothing but the reckless
and useless display of wealth, nothing in the full sunshine of
prosperity but a Bacchanalian horde of irresponsible sensualists,
nothing there but a ramp of unashamed hedonism, and a hedonism of the
lowest order.
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