also the exercise of no small degree of moral courage to
resist the corrupting influences of what is called "Society." Although
"Mrs. Grundy" may be a very vulgar and commonplace personage, her
influence is nevertheless prodigious. Most men, but especially women,
are the moral slaves of the class or caste to which they belong. There
is a sort of unconscious conspiracy existing amongst them against each
other's individuality. Each circle and section, each rank and class, has
its respective customs and observances, to which conformity is required
at the risk of being tabooed. Some are immured within a bastile of
fashion, others of custom, others of opinion; and few there are who have
the courage to think outside their sect, to act outside their party,
and to step out into the free air of individual thought and action.
We dress, and eat, and follow fashion, though it may be at the risk of
debt, ruin, and misery; living not so much according to our means, as
according to the superstitious observances of our class. Though we may
speak contemptuously of the Indians who flatten their heads, and of the
Chinese who cramp their toes, we have only to look at the deformities
of fashion amongst ourselves, to see that the reign of "Mrs. Grundy" is
universal.

But moral cowardice is exhibited quite as much in public as in private
life. Snobbism is not confined to the toadying of the rich, but is quite
as often displayed in the toadying of the poor. Formerly, sycophancy
showed itself in not daring to speak the truth to those in high places;
but in these days it rather shows itself in not daring to speak the
truth to those in low places. Now that "the masses" [146] exercise
political power, there is a growing tendency to fawn upon them, to
flatter them, and to speak nothing but smooth words to them. They are
credited with virtues which they themselves know they do not possess.
The public enunciation of wholesome because disagreeable truths is
avoided; and, to win their favour, sympathy is often pretended for
views, the carrying out of which in practice is known to be hopeless.

It is not the man of the noblest character--the highest-cultured and
best-conditioned man--whose favour is now sought, so much as that of the
lowest man, the least-cultured and worst-conditioned man, because his
vote is usually that of the majority. Even men of rank, wealth, and
education, are seen prostrating themselves before the ignorant, whose
votes are thu