ichelet, not Renan, not Hugo, who set
fire to the Palace of Justice and imperilled the Sainte-Chapelle.

And yet, notwithstanding all these vices and excesses of the democratic
spirit, notwithstanding the meanness of the middle classes and the
violence of the mob, there is one all-powerful reason why our best hopes
for the liberal culture of the intellect are centred in the democratic
idea. The reason is, that aristocracies think too much of persons and
positions to weigh facts and opinions justly. In an aristocratic society
it is thought unbecoming to state your views in their full force in the
presence of any social superior. If you state them at all you must
soften them to suit the occasion, or you will be a sinner against
good-breeding. Observe how timid and acquiescent the ordinary Englishman
becomes in the presence of a lord. No right-minded person likes to be
thought impudent, and where the tone of society refers everything to
position, you are considered impudent when you forget your station. But
what has my station to do with the truths the intellect perceives, that
lie entirely outside of me? From the intellectual point of view, it is a
necessary virtue to forget your station, to forget yourself entirely,
and to think of the subject only, in a manner perfectly disinterested.
Anonymous journalism was a device to escape from that continual
reference to the rank and fortune of the speaker which is an inveterate
habit in all aristocratic communities. A young man without title or
estate knows that he would not be listened to in the presence of his
social superiors, so he holds his tongue in society and relieves
himself by an article in the _Times_. The anonymous newspapers and
reviews are a necessity in an aristocratic community, for they are the
only means of attracting attention to facts and opinions without
attracting it to yourself, the only way of escaping the personal
question, "Who and what are you, that you venture to speak so plainly,
and where is your stake in the country?"

The democratic idea, by its theoretic equality amongst men, affords an
almost complete relief from this impediment to intellectual
conversation. The theory of equality is good, because it negatives the
interference of rank and wealth in matters that appertain to the
intellect or to the moral sense. It may even go one step farther with
advantage, and ignore intellectual authority also. The perfection of the
intellectual spirit is the