although it is the germ of that sentiment which is hateful to democracy. The opposite sentiment of equality is indeed more fully gratified when generation after generation passes to the grave, undistinguished and unremembered, in one uniform level of insignificance. CHAPTER XIV. ENVY THE ANIMATING SPIRIT OF DEMOCRACY. "Il ne faut pas se dissimuler que les institutions démocratiques développent à un très haut degré le sentiment de l'envie dans le cœur humain.”—Tocqueville. THE French revolution of 1789, in vindictive hatred of the gross injustice of "l'ancien régime," rushed into the opposite extreme, and denounced all superiority of rank, of authority, of wealth, and of genius. When the revolutionary tribunal condemned to death Lavoisier, the most distinguished chemist in Europe, the judge accompanied the sentence with this emphatic declaration, "Nous n'avons plus besoin de savants." The same sentiment may be traced in the later writings of the French Socialists. They permitted in their scheme of society, literature, science, and art to be studied, stipulating that the study should not confer distinction. 66 Sera artiste qui voudra, à la condition de redevenir laboureur, et de laisser le pinceau ou le ciseau pour retourner à la charrue." According to the same principle of levelling all inequalities, they condemned property as a pregnant source of injustice. "Celui qui osera prononcer le mot propriété sera enfermé comme fou furieux." If perfect social equality is the object to be attained, the language of the French Socialists is logical. Property, learning, genius, muscular strength, tend to inequality of conditions. The difficulty consists in the application of the principle of equality. If all men were reduced to absolute poverty and compelled to live as troglodytes in caves or hollow trees, some would still complain that one cave was damp while another was dry, and the principle of equality was violated. In this country the revolutionary doctrine of equality has not been formulated as the basis of social life, but it is a tenet cherished by working men. One man must not earn more wages than his fellows, do better work, or acquire any superiority inconsistent with equality of profit. To this extent personal liberty is restricted, improvement checked, and progress discountenanced. An analogous sentiment seems to animate some men against the Established Church, They cannot complain that the Church injures them; but they envy the social position of the clergy, and the honours of the Episcopate. They wish to " See no contiguous palace rear its head, To shame the meanness of their humble shed." The uneducated labourer does not require a learned clergy; and the greatest happiness of the greatest number would be better served by the preaching of some "Jeremiah Ringletub" than by the most refined scholarship which Cambridge or Oxford could produce. Rousseau's notion that equality is the ordinance of nature displays the wild predominance of his imagination. Nature knows nothing of equality. Her products are never equal. No certain measure of length or of capacity can be found in nature. Variety and inequality are universal in the animal and vegetable creation. What nature indicates, human society requires, or anarchy would reign supreme; as Shakespeare truly said :— Take but degree away, untune that string |