normal and peculiar. The standard, consequently, is not now an
efficient standard; and it is frequently applied with some laxity to the
members of the privileged classes. A tacit conspiracy naturally exists
among people in such a position to make it easy for their associates,
friends, and relatives. The props and chances offered to a boy born into
this class make the very most of his probably moderate deserts and
abilities, and in occupying a position of responsibility he inevitably
displaces a more competent substitute. In our own country the enjoyment
of such political favors is known as a "pull," and is a popular but
disreputable method of political advancement, whereas in England the
whole social, and a large part of the political, structure is
constituted on the basis of a systematic and hereditary "pull." The
spirit thereof is highly honored in the most sacred precincts of English
life. It is supported heartily and unscrupulously by English public
opinion, and its critics are few and insignificant.

When Englishmen come to understand the need of dissociating their
national idea from its existing encumbrances of political privilege and
social favoritism, they will be confronted by a reconstructive task of
peculiar difficulty. The balance of the national life, which has been so
slowly and painfully recovered, will be endangered by the weakening of
any of its present supports. For centuries the existing system has been
wrought with the utmost patience and patriotism; and an Englishman may
well shudder at the notion of any essential modification. The good of
the system is so mixed with the evil that it seems impossible to
extricate and eradicate the latter without endangering English national
cohesion. Their traditional faith in compromise, their traditional dread
of ideas, their traditional habit of acting first and reasoning
afterwards, has made the English system a hopelessly confused bundle of
semi-efficiency and semi-inefficiency--just as it has made the best
English social type a gentleman, but a gentleman absolutely conditioned,
tempered, and supplemented by a flunky.

While the process of becoming more of a democracy may very well
injure--at any rate for a while--English national consistency, England's
future as a nation is compromised by her fear of democracy. She has
built her national organization on the idea that the national welfare is
better promoted by a popular loyalty which entails popular immobility,