THE LATE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND. T HE late Duke of Northumberland
was one of those men, of whom there are now not so very many, whose career enables one to decide whether or no the aristocratic idea is still powerful in England. He was not a man of marked ability, he never did anything of the smallest historic importance, and be never made a speech which greatly influenced affairs, but the grandeur of his pedigree, the immense extent of his possessions, and what Lord Beaconsfield described as " the sustained splendour of his stately life" made him for more than half a century one of the great personages of Great Britain. Unless we accept the absurd opinion that pedigree cannot descend through women —a ludicrously illogical idea when it is only through women that a pedigree can be absolutely certain—he was the lineal heir of a Percy who came in with the Conqueror, head of a family which had seven times staked its position on success- ful resistance to a foreign invader. He possessed, besides great personal wealth and a large income from mines, 186,000 fertile acres within the county which gave him its name, and he lived always as a great noble should, spending his surplus liberally in improving his estates, treating all tenants with a kind of lenient exactness, and steadily giving, especially for religious and philanthropic purposes, with unostentatious munificence. He was not, as we have said, a man of genius, but he had all the culture of his time, he understood the management of large affairs, and he was a man of sense, and for these qualities, thrown as they were into relief by the brilliant background, Tories were pleased when he was admitted into Cabinets, Liberals were not in reality offended, and his opinion, in or out of office, always had weight with those among whom he lived. Even after successive reductions of the suffrage had nearly destroyed his power over elections, both parties thought it natural and fitting that he should be " considered " as no man of his type who was not the head of a historic house and the inheritor of a mighty fortune would have been
considered. Whether that consideration is good or had for society may be doubtful, for, while reverence for almost any- thing helps to civilise the character, and reverence for pedigree reveals an imaginative consciousness of the value of historic continuity, the English reverence for mere rank when it stands alone has in it something of inherent base- ness, or at least indicates, like the slave's inability even to feel insult from his owner, a degrading want of self- respect. Some of the better qualities, and among them personal dignity, would, we conceive, be sure to be more developed in a society like that of Massachusetts as it was than in a society like that of England as it is, women especially being lowered in tone by the perpetual effort at imitation which always exists where distinctions of rank run deep. The ideal, too, is apt to become a false one, and differ- ent laws of morality are gradually recognised for different castes, a grievous impediment to the full recognition of a divine law. Lord Verisopht is only accounted " wild" when Mr. Verisopbt would be boycotted as a profligate,—a differ- ence which, though most marked in sexual affairs, extends, oddly enough, even to pecuniary obligations, as you may see in any record of the robber-Barons of long ago, or any report of proceedings in the Bankruptcy Courts of to-day. On the whole, and with one great reserve, we should say that the feeling of reverence for position worked more evil than good, and that its disappearance would leave the world a little better, as well as happier, than its continuance. We are bound to add, however, that the opinion is an abstract one, for the world has no sufficient experience of a society in which position is not, as apart from character, very greatly respected. No such society really exists in America to-day ; and in Europe there is no trace of it, society in the Republics being just as aristocratic in temper as in the old Monarchies.
On the other hand, institutions, it is true, are not so unchangeable ; and the fact, which is a very curious one, that society and politics do not keep step, leads us at once to the reflection we most desire to express. We think it quite possible, if not probable, that modern social tendencies and modern political tendencies may take opposite directions, and that the equivalent of a dukedom of Northumberland may exist in England a thousand years hence, and receive great social reverence without retaining one particle of political power,—nay, with the drawback of a certain political disability. That has certainly happened in France, where " plain men " are ruling, yet socially an old noble who happens also to be wealthy and a man of character towers high above the millions around him, and towers in great measure by their consent, the wish to send him to the guillotine when it breaks out being only a bad method of recognising superi- ority. You cannot feel envious hate for a man unless you see in him something which you value but do not possess. We think we see the same feeling at work in Scotland, where an old noble, if he possesses wealth, is treated socially as if he were Royal, but the tenantry regard a landlord's political opinion as something to be suspected, and the bourgeoisie incline to follow men of their own order, too often men remark- able for nothing but the faculty of accumulation. Even in America society tends to hunger after an aristocracy, and to roll itself together into castes, while to be distinctively a great gentleman is to be in a measure disqualified for the Presidency. We could quite imagine a highly democratic society in which, from a jealousy lest the great should not sympathise with the majority, only the undistinguished could rise to power, yet in which, from a great increase of historic knowledge and an acute perception of the freedom conferred by wealth, men of birth plus wealth—Dukes of Northumberland in fact — would be socially adored, would find most of their faults condoned, would have the pick of the fairest women, and would be consulted and" considered" for reasons quite irrespective either of intelligence or character. That happens now in municipal life, and it is towards municipal life as an ideal life that the nations, with their increasing vitality, their low bat diffused standard of knowledge, and their passion for prosperity, seem to be hastening. We do not see the big men of our cities greatly interested in municipal government, or the masses greatly desirous of forcing them to take their share, and we do see them objects of great social worship. Brit, we shall be told, the Duke of 2900 will not have the manners or the character of the Duke of Northumberland. Why not? We have not yet seen the millionaires of the fourth generation, and when we do see them may find that the " consideration" of those generations has given them the " grand " manner, and that they are divided into two castes,—those who are restlessly seeking for unattainable enjoyment, and those who look out on the world quietly, and, seeing how little it has to offer, content them- selves with a slightly lazy and slightly cynical habit of reflection upon the drama perpetually going on around them. That is too pessimist a prediction? Let us hope so; but this writer is unable to see in history or revelation any sign that this world is intended to be a paradise even for the good, and consequently believes in progress rather as some Christians believe in eternity, 'faintly trusting the larger hope.'
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