occupied by rank and birth. The middle class has been obliged to fight
for its rights against the feudal class, and it has, during three or
four centuries, gradually invented and established institutions to
guarantee personal and property rights against the arbitrary will of
kings and nobles.

In its turn wealth is now becoming a power in three or four centuries,
gradually invented and the State, and, like every other power, it is
liable to abuse unless restrained by checks and guarantees. There is an
insolence of wealth, as there is an insolence of rank. A plutocracy
might be even far worse than an aristocracy. Aristocrats have always
had their class vices and their class virtues. They have always been,
as a class, chargeable with licentiousness and gambling. They have,
however, as a class, despised lying and stealing. They have always
pretended to maintain a standard of honor, although the definition and
the code of honor have suffered many changes and shocking
deterioration. The middle class has always abhorred gambling and
licentiousness, but it has not always been strict about truth and
pecuniary fidelity. That there is a code and standard of mercantile
honor which is quite as pure and grand as any military code, is beyond
question, but it has never yet been established and defined by long
usage and the concurrent support of a large and influential society.
The feudal code has, through centuries, bred a high type of men, and
constituted a caste. The mercantile code has not yet done so, but the
wealthy class has attempted to merge itself in or to imitate the feudal
class.

The consequence is, that the wealth-power has been developed, while the
moral and social sanctions by which that power ought to be controlled
have not yet been developed. A plutocracy would be a civil organization