or the many? Take the wisest few you can find, and one man of genius
not a tithe so wise crushes them into powder. But then that man of
genius, though he despises the many, must make use of them. That
done, he rules them. Don't you see how in free countries political
destinations resolve themselves into individual impersonations? At
a general election it is one name around which electors rally. The
candidate may enlarge as much as he pleases on political principles, but
all his talk will not win him votes enough for success, unless he says,
'I go with Mr. A.,' the minister, or with Mr. Z., the chief of the
opposition. It was not the Tories who beat the Whigs when Mr. Pitt
dissolved Parliament. It was Mr. Pitt who beat Mr. Fox, with whom in
general political principle--slave-trade, Roman Catholic emancipation,
Parliamentary reform--he certainly agreed much more than he did with any
man in his own cabinet."

"Take care, my young cousin," cried Mivers, in accents of alarm; "don't
set up for a man of genius. Genius is the worst quality a public man can
have nowadays: nobody heeds it, and everybody is jealous of it."

"Pardon me, you mistake; my remark was purely objective, and intended
as a reply to your argument. I prefer at present to go with the many
because it is the winning side. If we then want a man of genius to keep
it the winning side, by subjugating its partisans to his will, he will
be sure to come. The few will drive him to us, for the few are always
the enemies of the one man of genius. It is they who distrust,--it is
they who are jealous,--not the many. You have allowed your judgment,
usually so clear, to be somewhat dimmed by your experience as a critic.
The critics are the few. They have infinitely more culture than the
many. But when a man of real genius appears and asserts himself, the
critics are seldom such fair judges of him as the many are. If he be not
one of their oligarchical clique, they either abuse, or disparage, or
affect to ignore him; though a time at last comes when, having gained
the many, the critics acknowledge him. But the difference between the
man of action and the author is this, that the author rarely finds this
acknowledgment till he is dead, and it is necessary to the man of action
to enforce it while he is alive. But enough of this speculation: you ask
me to meet Kenelm; is he not coming?"

"Yes, but I did not ask him till ten o'clock. I asked you at half-past
nine, because I wi