Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1860-10-05
MISCELLANEOUS READING.
AMERICAN ARISTOCRACY.

Whenever mans settled income is deci-
dedly larger than his customary annual out.
lay, ne is in fair way to get q position
among the moneyed aristocracy, especially
II no part OF his revenue depends upon his
own exertions. There is some thing very de-
grading about work, when it is daily ne
cessity, and it does not affect the case in the
least whether the labor is handicraft or brain
work. A retired gentleman may amuse
himselfin his private workshop during
part of every day without losing caste, but
if the product of his industry yields him any
pecuniary benefit, he can move in the ''bess
circles" only by sufferance-never by right.
His intellectual status has nothing to do with
the matter. His integrity, truthfulness and
native pollteness are only accessories-good
enough in their place, but they are never in
the first place. The glittering dust of the
earth-the one grand object Of human ido-
latry-yieids precedence to nothing else in
the world or out of it.
Now the man who can earn q hundred
dollars per month by the labor of head or
hands may be positively richer than his non
working employer. He has the revenue
arising from a permanent investment Of
twenty thousand dollars, and if he can only
regard his daily labor as pleasant occupa-
ton, ne may consider himself capitalist
whose principal is equal to that amount of
money which would yield an interest equal
to his salary. And We may 90 farther and
say that his capital is as we'll secured to him
as it could be if he had it in dollars instead
of brains and sinews. No man has any alb
solute security against loss. Banks may break
and their stock certificates become utterly
valueless; we have had more than one exam
pie of such disasters in our own city. A
conAagration may destroy his property and
ruin the insurance company whose policy
he holds at the same time. And if the un-
fortunate loser happens to be only the inheri-
tor of another's earnings, without any prov
ed ability to earn himself, he is in far worse
condition than the man who has been accus-
toned to depend upon his own physical or
mental powers for support.
We have got into the habit of talking about
"purSe-proud aristocracy" in America, as
if there were no other social distinctions or
this is not the fact. In some localities an in
dividua's position is assigned him on 40
count of his family connections, and as the
country grows older the disposition. to in
quire into family antecedents is getting more
common. There are plenty of FIRST fami-
lies" elsewhere than in Virginia. In anoth-
er place, even in Boston for example, there
is a veritable republic of letters" and the
modern Athenian, with all his fondness for
transcendental foolery, has a real regard for
solid requirements There is more than one
upper ten dom" in New York, the MEM
bers of one circle regarding only money, and
the members of the other regarding birth
and breeding more. The possession of
wealth, or Of something like a competencei is
necessary, but it is not the bank account
that regulates the fashion.
In the earlier days of the Republic, there
was some promise that We should have an
arstocracy of statesmen. We cannot win
titles, that we may transmit to our children,
on the battlefield, because we are not q
blood thirsty race. We can do very fair fight
ing when there is occasion for it, but it is
clearly contrary to the genius of our institu-
tions to make IL rank to which access is pos
sble only through blood and powder-smoke.
4 nobility could not be formed in this fash
ion, so we made rnorables of our Congress-
men. The result has proved that we were
decidedly before or behind the age. Politics
AS profession is not science-it is trade.
and is fast becoming a disreputable one. The
men we place in the highest public Offices
are not remarkable for anything but their
unG,ness for their positions. And there are
undoubtedly circles in this country from
which man with NJ. c. on his card, is as rig
idly excluded as if the initials indicated that
his business was to steal sheep. What is the
reasons Are there no respectable men in
Congress, and. if not, cannot We offer bet.
ter class some inducement to 60 there.-Ba<-
tin,ore Americdn.