Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1852-1859, 1859-05-25
WHEE
THE INTELLIGENCER.
The Professor n1 .he RrenI.fna. Tnble.


The atlantic Monthly, for June, has been on
our table for day or two, but as yet we have
had only time to look in on ''the Professor at
the Breakfast Table," and seas we are al
ways eager to do-what he has been lately dis.
coursing about. We find him engaged in a con.
verSation with the boarders on "good breeding"
in the course Of which occurs the following:
The whole essence of true gcntle-brecd-
ing Zone does not like to say gentility)
lies in the wish and the art to be agreeable-
Good-breeding is surtace- Christianity. Every
look, movement, tone, expression subject Of
discourse, that may give pain to another is ha-
bitually excluded from conversational inter-
course. This is the reason why rich people are
apt to be SO much more agreeable than others.
thought you a great champion of
equality,-said the discreet and severe lady who
had accompanied our young friend, the Latin
Tutors daughter.
Il go politically for equality sale, and So
cially for the quality.
Who arc the equality, y,"-said the Model, ETC.
in community like ours?
I confess find this question little difficult
to anSwer,-I Said.-Nothing is better known
than the distinction of social ranks which exists
in every community, and nothing is harder to
define The great gentleman and ladies' ora
place are its real lords and masters and mistrcs-
Ses; they are the quality, whether in mon
archy or republic; mayors and governor and
generals and senators and cN-presiddents are
nothing to them. How well we know this, and
how seldom it finds distinct GXprGSSiOni Now
I tell you truly, believe in man as man, and
diSbeevc in all distinctions except such
follow the natural lines of cleavage in society
which has cryStai%ed according to its own true
laws. But the essence Of equality is to be able
TO say the truth; and there is nothing more Gu
rious than these truths relating TO the Stratii.
cation of society.
or all the facts that in this world do not
take hold of immortality, there is not one so
intensely real, permanent, and cngrossing as
this of social postion,-aS you see by the cir
cumstances that the core Of all the great social
orders the world has seen has been, and is still,
for the most part, privileged class of gentle
men and ladies arranged in regular scale Of
precedence among themselves, but superior as
a body to all else.
| Nothing but an ideal Christian equality which
we have been getting farther away from since
the days of the Primitive Church, prevent
this subdivision of society into classes from ta-
king place everywhere, in the great centre Of
our republic much as in old European uAon-
archieS. Only there position is more absolute
| ly herdtary,-h it is more completely eec.
tive.
Where is the election held? and what are
the qualifications? and who are the clectors?-
said the Mode.
Nobody ever sees when the vote is taken;
there never isa formal vote The women settle
it mostly; and they know wonderfully well what
| is prcsentabe, and what can't stand the blaze
of the chaneliers and the critical eye and ear of
people trained TO know staring shade i'll Il rib.
bon, false light in jewel, an ill-brcd tone, an
angular movement everything that bctrays a
coarse fibre and cheap training. AS Il general
thing you do not get elegance short of two or
! three removes from the soil, out of which our
| best blood doubtless comGS,-Quite as good, no
| = - sl... 4 l Ts--l,E
er3 with iron pots on their heads, to whom some
great people so fond of tracing their descent
through line of small artisans and petty shop
keepers whose views have held base lud enough
to fill the ClOaca MaXima!
Docs not money so everywhere ?-said the
Model.
Almost And with good reason. For though
there are numerous exceptions, rich people are,
as said, commonly altogether the most agrcea-
BILE companions. The influence of a fine house
r:ce(ul furniture, good libraries, well-ordercd
tables tim servants, and, above all, Il position
| so secure that one becomes unconscious OF 1t,
gives harmony and refinement to the charac-
ter and manners which we feel, even if we can
not cXplain their charm. Yet We can get at the
reason of it by thinking little.
| All these appliances are to shield the sensibi-
| ity from diSagrecabe contacts and to sOOthc it
by varied natural and artificial influences. In
| this way the mind, the taste, the feelings, grow
|
when saved from toll and incascd in soft gloves.
The whole nature becomes subdued into suavi-
ty. confess like the quality Indies better
than the common kind even of literary oneS.-
They haven't read the last book, perhaps, but
they attend better to you when you are talking
to them. If they are never learned they make
up for it in tact and elegance. Besides, think,
on the whole, there is less Scf-aSScrtion in dla-
rnOndS than in dogmas. | don't know where
you will find swccter portrait of humility
than in Esther, the poor play-girl of King Aha.
suerus; yet Esther put on her royal apparel
when she went before her lord. have no
doubt she more gracious and agreeable
person than Deborah who judged the people
and wrote the story Of Siscra. The wisest wo-
man you talk with is ignorant of something that
you know, but an elegant woman neve: forgets
her elegance.
Good dressing, quiet ways, low tones Of voice,
lips that wait and eyes that do not wander,
-shyncSs of personalities, except in certain in
timate communiOns,-to be light IN h9nd in
conversation, to have ideas, but tc be able to
make talk, if necessary, without them,--to be-
long to the company you. arc in, and not to
yourself,-to have nothing in your dress or fur
niture SO fine that you cannot afford to spoil it,