THE SYCOPHANCY OF FASHION.

BLACKWOOD has sounded the tocsin, and the aristocracy are startled. They awake to the danger which threatens their privileges, but awake too late to impede the fall. Not only have they lost their influence with the third estate, but mutiny has broken out in their own ranks. It is amongst themselves that they have sown discontent; it is to each other they have acted with a high hand; it is on portions of their own body that they have inflicted humiliation. There the injury was done, and there the evil springs. The lower orders sought not to meddle with the higher-they gazed without malice on the luxury of the latter-they were contented to be well in their own way. But in the upper classes envies and heart-burnings were caused and increased. A hundred capricious lines divided society into as many sections: the tyrant fashion fixed the scale of preferment, and assigned to each individual his place in the list. The distribution was as unjust as arbitrary. Fools were promoted above men of merit, and the latter were daily reminded of their degradation. A multiplicity of titles, unnecessary forms, and a spirit of exclusion, gave constant cause of mortification, and made each individual wish the fall of those above him. Some hid their discontent in smiles and affability; some struggled for promotion; others quitted their natural sphere, and became the leaders of an ignorant mob.

"Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven."

The invidious system still exists: gentlemen meet gentlemen, but not on terms of equality. Their education has been the same, their manners are equally polished; there is no difference in their talents, nay more, there is no difference in their fortunes: and yet, for all this, their positions in society are far apart. The (perhaps unmerited) epithet "honourable," or the poor privilege of having a "sir" affixed to the christian name, gives a false importance to the one, while the want of these distinctions leaves the other in obscurity, a "fellow of no make nor likelihood." The difference is invidious enough in itself, but the sycophancy of an upstart gentry has made it more so. They have cringed to titled distinctions of honour, till the untitled are almost disrespected. The noble mind reluctantly pays deference to anything but intrinsic merit. It will court talent, respect virtue, and bow to power; but it feels degradation in yielding precedence to an unmeaning sound. If a title necessarily implied talent, virtue, or power, the deference paid to it would be intelligible; but many a mis-named noble is ignorant, base, and helpless. The distinction of an illustrious lineage, is, at best, a borrowed glory; but even this poor pretension is often wanting in the newly-created lord. A fool, and because a fool, a favourite at court, is dubbed a lord; the title acts like alchemy, and turns the sneers of scorn into smiles of adulation. It is not the idol, but the idolaters who are to blame. Men must be

sycophants by nature, or they would not worship a word. Many a base-born idiot has risked his money at play with a Lord William, in order to have the gratification of calling the said Lord William his friend. If the untitled betray such meanness, is it surprising that the titled should act with arrogance? The favoured few think less on their honours than the uninitiated many. On the latter they weigh like an incubus. They dare not refuse the tribute of respect, and yet bow in bitterness of soul. Their feelings are humiliated till their imaginations are affected. They fancy an unreal importance in others, and exaggerate their own insignificance. Hence their want of spirit, and thence their sycophancy.

An aristocracy must exist in every organized society. Wealth or power must command deference, and the possessors of them necessarily take the lead of their less favoured neighbours. These inequalities cannot be avoided, and it is therefore useless to complain of their existence. Against them censure were unjust; but we may condemn those unnecessary distinctions which men in their perverseness have added to the original disparity of fortune.*

Such are titles of courtesy, and the miserable prostitution of the baronetage. The bearers neither obtain a seat in Parliament, nor a claim to a pension. No longer what it originally was intended to be, the possessors of the title are not raised, but the rest of society are lowered: for between the mass of the latter, and the small body of hereditary peers, the amphibious tribe intervene. It is wrong to wound the feelings of many in order to gratify the vanity of a few. Even men of independent minds cannot stand for ever in the back ground without being annoyed at their obscurity. They reluctantly yield precedence to titled fools, and burn to assert their right to an equality. They find that names, and not things, lead to preferment. Their minds become soured, and they themselves lose respect for their own caste.

The constitution requires that there should be Lords and Commons; but all subdivisions are foreign to the purposes of govern

ment.

In the olden time, every distinguished member of a good family was a knight. The word had then an honourable meaning: now it has sunk into a humiliating distinction.

The barons were once the great owners of the soil: now a marquis may exist without an acre of land. The title of baronet is an anomaly. To the latter, it almost amounts to an insult: for by singling

We do not go the length of the author in wishing to repudiate the whole class of the baronetage. Some of the oldest families may be found amongst them; and when baronets are ascertained to be of ancient family, they always spring from a worthy source, knights bannerets being formerly made only on the field of battle. The order has been, in modern times, dreadfully degraded, by admitting into its ranks parvenus for services that many of their descendants will blush to avow. This desecration of the class is surely a justification of a part of it, of really honourable descent, for retiring haughtily within the circle of an inviolable exclusiveness. The editor of this periodical does not wish to be identified with the sentiments of every writer who may appear in its pages, which will be ever liberally open to the canvassing of opinions and principles, always excepting those that may be inimical to morality, or repugnant to social order.-EDITOR.

out a few of the gentry as gentle, it implies that the rest are not so. So anomalous is the distinction, that it cannot be stated without a contradiction in terms. Titles are so multiplied, that between the duke and the plain mister, six distinct classes intervene. Etiquette is carried to so ridiculous a point that precedence is granted, not only to the titled individuals themselves, but to their sons and brothers.

These trifles are ingredients of the cup of humiliation, which many a worthy man is daily doomed to taste. His own proud mind despises the petty system: he cares not for its effects in his own regard, but feels the mortification it inflicts upon his wife or family. Their field of ambition is confined to the salons of fashion. There they seek gratification, but often only find discontent. Wearied out by constant annoyances, they at last shun society, and repine in seclusion. In this manner thousands are estranged from the side of aristocracy, and finally, act in opposition to the body of which they should form an integral part. Neglect and contumely leave their baneful effect, even when their victim is withdrawn from the scene of disappointment. The mind broods over past wrongs; generous feelings, once nipped by unkindness, seldom regain their pristine vigour. Social duties are neglected, and the houses, where hospitality ought to preside, resound with little else but the complaints of their tenants. This is not all the evil. The disappointed man does not vent his spleen against the highest ranks of society, but against the cringing members of his own class. The former only accepted the homage which the latter forced upon them; but the latter neglected their natural associate to gain a humiliating acquaintance with the former. Thus are dissensions sown in the very heart of society. Men are at variance with men of their own standing. Jealousy in some, and contempt in others, keep them apart. Apparent equality is so studiously avoided, that the mind actually becomes infected with a notion of gradation. There is no resting-place, no level in society, and the sole employment of those who compose it, is a constant effort to ascend.

Society is more magnificent, but perhaps less agreeable, in London, than in any other capital of Europe. Few, I might almost say none, of the individuals who compose it, are satisfied with their natural station. An imaginary scale of merit exists: it is divided by no rule, and fixed on no principle. It is undefinable, and is commonly known by the term-" Fashion." Those who are at the foot of the ladder are continually trying to attain the topmost round; those who are above are occupied in impeding the advance of those below them. Neither office nor wealth are certain claims to promotion. Talent is little recommendation, and honesty none. There is nothing, even at the summit, to repay the trouble of ascending. Mr. man of considerable talents. He finds genial associates in the coterie of Mrs. and is bored to death at Lady clusive parties. Yet he prefers being neglected at the house of the latter, to being courted in the circle of the former.

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This it is which drives so many of the middling classes to the continent. In France, Italy, and the baths of Germany, they find society

on an easier footing than in their own country. Petty distinctions exist there as well as elsewhere; but it is the native, and not the foreigner, who suffers by them. Some half dozen of the old nobility maintain the exclusive system in Rome: their pretensions are founded on antiquity of family, not upon titular honours. The rest of society do not attempt to intrude on their seclusion. Few leave their natural sphere, and none yield precedence to the worship of a name. Place is given to advanced years and official capacity: further distinction is carefully avoided. From these circumstances society is more stable, and at the same time more agreeable on the continent than in England. Thousands annually leave their native soil to sojourn in foreign countries. If they return, they return to discontent; if they remain, they encourage others to follow their example. A lengthened sojourn on the continent unfits an Englishman for English society. Many a countenance which beamed with cheerfulness under the sunny sky of Italy, is darkened by melancholy in the aristocratic quarter of Grosvenor Square. The time is come when the aristocracy must think of these things. The absentees on the continent are so many champions lost to their cause. Those of their own caste at home, whom the higher orders have estranged from their side, are their deadliest enemies. They lead the march of revolution, and from them the heaviest blows will be dealt. Let the aristocracy conciliate, or the hour may arrive when conciliation cannot be effected. The lower orders will remain quiet unless stirred up against the higher by renegade leaders. It is within the pale of what is commonly called society, that discontent has broken out, and it is there that peace must be offered. Let those who are interested in the question think betimes. An inquisitive spirit is abroad, and the peerage itself can scarce stand the test of an analysis. If antiquity of family be required, many a noble lord cannot trace his pedigree higher than his grandfather. If wealth be indispensable, one-third of the peerage must plead guilty of poverty. If public services are essential, the House of Lords must be reduced to a small number indeed. These imperfections are inseparable from an hereditary peerage. Vacancies must be supplied by new creations: wealth does not always descend with titles: few have the opportunity, though many have the will, to serve their country. No power on earth can make worth hereditary, and a patent of nobility sounds like the assumption of a divine prerogative. This opinion would be dangerous if adopted by the people; but dangerous as it is, it is not new. Many men have thought, and one has beautifully expressed the truth.

"A prince can mak' a belted knight,

A marquis, duke, and a' that;

But an honest man's aboon his might."

What Burns addressed to lowly poverty, is read by the educated rich. Amongst the middling, and not amongst the lowest classes, his words have found an echo. The latter are too far removed to envy the garter-star, and a' that. They judge their superiors according to their works. With them

"The rank is but the guinea's stamp,

The man's the gold for a' that."

Those who associate with, but are not of the nobility-those who constitute the largest, and yet the inferior portion of the aristocracy-those are the men who writhe under the mortification of titular distinctions: they silently, but maliciously, analyze the peerage; they bow subserviently, but while they bow, they fain would sap the gorgeous structure which casts their minor pretensions into shade: they are the mean spirits who deny the royal capacity to create a noble mind, and yet inconsistently crouch to a noble name. These, and such as these, have brought the nobility into odium: their loathsome sycophancy has forced titles into an invidious pre-eminence: they have unrobed the idol to the people, and yet they are the vermin which the nobility carefully foster by their side.

A proud gentleman disdains to mingle with the subservient herd: he avoids them, but in avoiding them, he avoids also their patrons. The name of a tuft-hunter is so hateful to his feelings, that he carries disrespect for titles beyond the limits of independence. He is the avowed enemy, while the sycophant is the false friend, of nobility. In the day of revolution both parties will strike at the privileged class. That class will stand alone and unfriended. In vain will they display their heraldic honours. The baron's supporters cannot exclude violence from his house, nor an earl's coronet save his property from spoliation. The herald may trumpet forth their titles; but the high-sounding words will only reverberate with their hollowness. Then will they learn that coalition should have been formed on firmer bases than a nominal distinction. Property and education should have been the ties which bind men in mutual support. For the worship of a word they have sacrificed substantial interest. Men who should have joined in a common cause, will stand opposed in unnatural enmity. While civil dissension occupies the wealthier classes, the reckless mob will share the spoil. This may not befall in our days; but who dare prophesy security for our children, or for our children's children?

It is easier to foresee the danger, than point out the remedy. A legislative act cannot alter the discrepancies of society. The example of a few high-minded individuals cannot make the sycophant many blush at their meanness. The hundreds whom accumulated riches send in all the pride of purse from the counter to the drawingroom, purchase a borrowed lustre from the dearly-paid intercourse with the titled poor. To them they give fêtes-to them they lose their money on their notice they force their plebeian daughters. For themselves they have no respect. Manly pride and independent spirit are not in their nature. Like all narrow souls, they value that the most from which they themselves are the most excluded. Hence their fawning manners to other classes, and their insolent behaviour towards their own.

We cannot conclude this article, without saying a few words in defence of those individuals, commonly called exclusives. The society of London is more extensive than that of any other capital. There are more families in affluent circumstances, more men of education, and ladies of refined manners. The number increases, and will continue to increase. All may have claims to be introduced to the best