The Faubourg Saint-Germain took to playing with batons, and fancied that all the power was in its hands.It inverted the terms of the proposition which called it into existence.And instead of flinging away the insignia which offended the people, and quietly grasping the power, it allowed the bourgeoisie to seize the authority, clung with fatal obstinacy to its shadow, and over and over again forgot the laws which a minority must observe if it would live.When an aristocracy is scarce a thousandth part of the body social, it is bound today, as of old, to multiply its points of action, so as to counterbalance the weight of the masses in a great crisis.And in our days those means of action must be living forces, and not historical memories.
In France, unluckily, the noblesse were still so puffed up with the notion of their vanished power, that it was difficult to contend against a kind of innate presumption in themselves.
Perhaps this is a national defect.The Frenchman is less given than anyone else to undervalue himself; it comes natural to him to go from his degree to the one above it; and while it is a rare thing for him to pity the unfortunates over whose heads he rises, he always groans in spirit to see so many fortunate people above him.He is very far from heartless, but too often he prefers to listen to his intellect.The national instinct which brings the Frenchman to the front, the vanity that wastes his substance, is as much a dominant passion as thrift in the Dutch.For three centuries it swayed the noblesse, who, in this respect, were certainly pre-eminently French.The scion of the Faubourg Saint-Germain, beholding his material superiority, was fully persuaded of his intellectual superiority.And everything contributed to confirm him in his belief; for ever since the Faubourg Saint-Germain existed at all--which is to say, ever since Versailles ceased to be the royal residence--the Faubourg, with some few gaps in continuity, was always backed up by the central power, which in France seldom fails to support that side.
Thence its downfall in 1830.
At that time the party of the Faubourg Saint-Germain was rather like an army without a base of operation.It had utterly failed to take advantage of the peace to plant itself in the heart of the nation.It sinned for want of learning its lesson, and through an utter incapability of regarding its interests as a whole.A future certainty was sacrificed to a doubtful present gain.This blunder in policy may perhaps be attributed to the following cause.
The class-isolation so strenuously kept up by the noblesse brought about fatal results during the last forty years; even caste-patriotism was extinguished by it, and rivalry fostered among themselves.When the French noblesse of other times were rich and powerful, the nobles (gentilhommes) could choose their chiefs and obey them in the hour of danger.As their power diminished, they grew less amenable to discipline; and as in the last days of the Byzantine Empire, everyone wished to be emperor.
They mistook their uniform weakness for uniform strength.
Each family ruined by the Revolution and the abolition of the law of primogeniture thought only of itself, and not at all of the great family of the noblesse.It seemed to them that as each individual grew rich, the party as a whole would gain in strength.And herein lay their mistake.Money, likewise, is only the outward and visible sign of power.All these families were made up of persons who preserved a high tradition of courtesy, of true graciousness of life, of refined speech, with a family pride, and a squeamish sense of noblesse oblige which suited well with the kind of life they led; a life wholly filled with occupations which become contemptible so soon as they cease to be accessories and take the chief place in existence.There was a certain intrinsic merit in all these people, but the merit was on the surface, and none of them were worth their face-value.
Not a single one among those families had courage to ask itself the question, "Are we strong enough for the responsibility of power?" They were cast on the top, like the lawyers of 1830;and instead of taking the patron's place, like a great man, the Faubourg Saint-Germain showed itself greedy as an upstart.The most intelligent nation in the world perceived clearly that the restored nobles were organising everything for their own particular benefit.From that day the noblesse was doomed.The Faubourg Saint-Germain tried to be an aristocracy when it could only be an oligarchy--two very different systems, as any man may see for himself if he gives an intelligent perusal to the list of the patronymics of the House of Peers.
The King's Government certainly meant well; but the maxim that the people must be made to WILL everything, even their own welfare, was pretty constantly forgotten, nor did they bear in mind that La France is a woman and capricious, and must be happy or chastised at her own good pleasure.If there had been many dukes like the Duc de Laval, whose modesty made him worthy of the name he bore, the elder branch would have been as securely seated on the throne as the House of Hanover at this day.
In 1814 the noblesse of France were called upon to assert their superiority over the most aristocratic bourgeoisie in the most feminine of all countries, to take the lead in the most highly educated epoch the world had yet seen.And this was even more notably the case in 1820.The Faubourg Saint-Germain might very easily have led and amused the middle classes in days when people's heads were turned with distinctions, and art and science were all the rage.But the narrow-minded leaders of a time of great intellectual progress all of them detested art and science.