DILEMMAS OF PRIDE.

FOR 'mine years the tide of popularity set strongly in favour of the Aristocracy. A fashionable novel was, till very lately, a pretty sure card in the speculations of " the trader if it were written by a fashionable, its success was surer; did a lord. own the soft im- peachment of its authorship, then a "sale was undoubted. Fools- 'the-majority—aimed at exclusiveness; wits and adventurers took advantage of folly: the great, or the supposed great in the world of ton, were pursued into their penetralia; their dress, their gait,

their bearing—the manner in which they ate and drank—the pe- culiarities of nature, of modes, or of foppery—all that would most forcibly strike the minds of valets, butlers, penny-a-liners, and un- derbred " fashionablesi" or all which their minds could most readily comprehend—was described, with varying ability, but with never-varying minuteness; and countless minds of a kindred calibre admired, envied, and imitated the descriptions. But when the flood is at the highest, the ebb soon follows. Various causes contributed prematurely to hasten the turn of the tide.

Among the chief of these may be mentioned the economical one of a low rate of profit, which rendered men too " uneasy " about their own seria to waste much time on the jocosa of other people. Much may also be attributed to the fashionable scribes. The Aristocracy were in a measure written down by themselves and their admirers. Like the sermons whose defence of Christianity shook the faith of FRANKLIN, the worship of Fashion was overthrown by the minis- trants, or the would-be ministrants of her shrine. Great events spring from very trivial causes, and the author of Almacks may have shaken the Peerage of England.

But, leaving the investigation of causes, the effects are un- doubted. Grave treatises are written to prove the evils of an aris- tocracy. Steady and solvent citizens calmly talk of abolishing an hereditary peerage. And—unkindest cut of all —the lighter branches of the belles lettres are turning against their former di- vinities. Mr. COOPER, in his Bravo, endeavoured to show the evils of a government vested in an aristocracy. Mr. BENTLEY, within. a little month, has launched Gale Middleton, devoted to the expo- sure of the follies of fashion. The Dilemmas of Pride would cut still deeper even into the laws of primogeniture and entail. These, however, are desultory -attacks : the next step will be a formal in- vestment. If Mr. B MAYER be capable of the steady and regular labour of a monthly issue, he will. shortly be engaged. upon Illus- trations of the Aristocracy; or Miss MARTINE ku, having dismissed Political Economy, may take the Peers to herself. But to come to the work before us. As a novel—as a sketch of society of a.picture of life, Dilemmas of Pride is but indifferent. As an illustration, the design is better than the execution. The author has selected several aristocratical families, and exhibited the direct evils of primogeniture and entails, in the miseries they in- flict upon sisters and younger brothers, dooming them to celibacy, money-matches, and wretchedness in blighted affections—love- matches, and wretehedness in pecuniary matters—or hopeless though requited love in youth, to soured temper, and a hankering after splendour without the means of supporting it, in age. The family of a bourgeois, whose head is bitten by a love of aristo- cracy, forms a sort of secondary group; the son aping the man of fashion—the father determined to enrich his boy at the expense of his daughters—and thosedaughters, aware of his intention, becom- ing first determined marriage-hunters, and, failing in their pursuit of a husband, penurious old maids on a scanty annuity. Here were excellent materials, but the writer was unequal to the task of working them up. Then, the political science which is pressed into the service, is not clear enough to guide, though it may, in some instances, be dazzling enough to mislead. To "repeal every tax, direct and indirect, which nowexists, and substitute for all a graduated property-tax on inde- pendent property only,* trifling in amou nt—say one per cent. where the property was small, and doubling, trebling, nay, quadrupling, if necessary, as it rises "—is a startling proposal, even though coming from the mouth of a younger brother in love, and who kindly leaves " the details and calculations to Mr. Hume or some of the multiplication-table people." It is more especially so when we look closely, not into the multiplication-table only, but all the. first four rules of arithmetic and such statistical tables as we have.

• The income arising from "independent property only," is not much more-than double the amount of our taxation. Of this income, not above forty millions, perhaps, arises from the rent of land; and it is chiefly from• landed property that the bulk of very large in- comes are derived. To levy a non-graduated property-tax suffi- cient-to meet the demands of the State, would require not one but My percent Con.siderinrthat incomes derivable from the -Funds, -* The-Italics are the anthrez • - rail-roads,. and other joint-stock companies, though late in the aggregate, are not individually very great, the. higher scales: of graduation would convert the owners of large unencumbered pro- perties into a sort of national trustees. Mr. Henry Lindsey, in- deed, truly observes, that " if a man with thirty thousand a year

pay twenty thousand, can he not live on ten? or if the man with two hundred thousand pay one hundred and fifty thousand, can he not live on fifty ? " But though the fact of capability is un- doubted, yet, as those who possess the thirty thousands and the two hundred thousands per annum, possess also the power of making the laws, we despair of seeing the "principle of the tax established. Rather than this, they would vote the abolition of the Debt and the Deadweight, even including that most sacred amongst the sacred rights of property, the Pension-list.

A discussion as regards the laws of Entail and of Primogeniture,. would open up a large field of controversy. In England, as an entail can always be broken through, its general effectsare slight; though its abolition would doubtless assist in breaking up the aristocracy. It is perhaps chiefly retained by the prejudices of our legislators, fostered by the self-interest of lawyers, whose gains are increased by the complex modes though which it must be destroyed. To direct by law—as the author of Dilemmas of Pride seems toad- vocate—an equal division of property amongst all the children, is fraught with evils both moral and economical. When a child is sure of succeeding to a legacy, which good conduct cannot in- crease and ill behaviour cannot diminish, the motives to exertion, as well as to filial duty, are lessened; parental authority is in a measure abrogated. Perhaps even the disposition to accumulate is checked ; as men may not feel inclined to save property which they cannot control in its destination. The minute subdivision of land which such a law leads to, is also a considerable evil, not only throwing back agricultural science, but diminishing the raw produce and the wealth of the country. How far a certain por- tion of the property should be equally divided, is another and an important question.

Such a law, however—it is useless to blink the fact—strikes at the root of an Hereditary Peerage. A title and the privileges it bestows, not being divisible, must descend entire to somebody ; and habit, perhaps nature, points to the eldest son. But property continually clipped, will sadly diminish in a few generations; and before many ages from the establishment of such a law, we should see the unhappy and unhonoured heads of noble and large families introducing a bill to legalize the resignation of titles of honour and the privileges of the Upper House. Some, indeed, hold that the Second Estate has already received its death-blow. An aris- tocracy, the sagacious editor of the Chronicle says, cannot exist long without that corruption which enables it to maintain its scions at the public expense; and he intimates that the time has arrived. Captain MARRYAT maintains a somewhat similar opi- nion. A liberal expenditure, a number of places with large pay and little duty, are necessary, says the inimitable Peter Simple, to preserve the family estate for the head of the family. Ifta nation cannot, or if a-nation will not be taxed for this purpose, it is quite justifiable, continues he, to cut off the supplies ; but you cut off your nobility at the same time. The theory, may be true, but we doubt its present applicability. Looking at the appoint- ment of Mr. MACAULAY and the places of all the. GREYS, we can- not deem that the,Age of Patronage-is gone. . In making our extracts from Dilemmas of Pride, we shall select a passage which tends. to bring out the- theories of the author, rather than to convey an idea of the novel. Take the following scene; where a young girl, having attracted the atten- tion of an old East Indian, very rich, very well connected; and, by a series of deaths, the next-heir to a-title, is spirited by her family to tolerate his address.

The performance ended, Madeline took his erm and walked towards aunt Dorothea, with a strange, conscious, half-pcming expression of countenance, evidently not knowing whether she ought to be flattered or annoyed by the conspicuous assiduities of her old beau. Cameron was sent in pursuit of a passing tray to procure an ice. With an air of- infinite triumph, Mrs. Dorothea patted the dimpled cheek of her niece, and whispered, " I wish you joy, my dear, of your brilliant conquest, for Ho think Mr. Cameron seems to be quite smitten already."

" Oh, but aunt, such an old man !"

" Nonsense, my dear, we were all young once, and you won't be young always recollect; so mind what you're about."

The return of Cameron put an end to the lecture ; which was only, however, postponed to a more convenient opportunity. This occurred on the dispersion of the company, when the family party collected at one end of a lung deserted supper-table, to talk over the events of the evening.

" I only hope, Madeline," commenced Mrs. Dorothea, " that this affair may go on as prosperously as it has commenced, and you will be quite an Eastern queen:" - " If be were a nice young man," said Madeline.

"He is quite young enough," retorted Mts. Dorothea "a girl should always marry a man somewhat older than herself."

" Somewhat ; yes, but not twice or three times."

" It is impossible, my dear child, to combine every advantage," observed Lady Arden, with a sigh ; " and the establishment, as your aunt says, would undoubtedly be a very brilliant one." Willoughby, Jane, and Louisa, all in- quired eagerly about the fortune and connexions of the gentleman ; and on being informed of every particular, confessed that it would certainly be a most desi- rable match.

" When we consider, too," said Lady. Arden " the great difficulty, the next to impossibility, of.meaing with suitable establishments for girls. of good family and small fortunes. They cannot marry wealthy men of low connexions—that would be disgracing their families; they cannot marry the younger sons of good families—as they.too are, of course, poor ; and the elder sons-cannot marry them —for they want money to pay off their incumbrances. So that when a girl so 'Situated chances to make a conquest of a man who can afford to marry her,