Page:A thousand years hence. Being personal experiences (IA thousandyearshen00gree).djvu/211

 land loves a lord," if there be nothing else than the title in his lordship. In the old times, when the mass of the people existed in ignorance, poverty, and degradation, the headship of the country, and its property as well, were easily secured by a comparative few, who formed a hereditary monarchy and nobility. But the people have since advanced to more equality of condition with those thus originally and hereditarily above them; and the tendency has consequently been to disparage the hereditary element, and advance that of real and personal quality.

A somewhat odd mixture, arising out of the past combination of the new with the old idea, now presented itself to the reforming mind of the country. The Public Bank of the time might be viewed as of four distinguishing kinds. First, there were those who stood solely and entirely upon personal deserts, who mostly led the world's business and the world's science, but whose rank was usually of the humblest. Indeed, the energetic and commanding minds, by which the world's progress was mainly carried on, were usually the least of all represented there. Second, those who, although not conspicuous in the personal element in particular, were of noticeable wealth, or had bestowed some of their means upon some noticeable public object. Third, those who had the happy luck to be in prominent office on the occasion of national events, such as a royal visit or birth or marriage, or the opening of a park, a bridge, a railway, or other chance-medley of the progress of their time. And lastly came the culmination of rank in those who had no concernment whatever with personal quality or services or national progress, who