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    natural , and that all other persons feel as they do ; they do not philosophize on it , and make a theory to justify it ; they leave that to their French apologist . And the truth is , it is not properly the love of money which is actuating them ; in nine cases out of ten it is not properly a . passion at all , —it is a mere habit ;

    the acquisition of money is of such immense value in their eyes , not because they really care much for it , but because they care for nothing else . Where they are conscious of a motive , what they are aiming at is consequence : to keep up their importance in the eyes of others , by keeping up what almost alone gives importance in England , the appearance of a large income . But

    they are often unconscious even of this ; they are following a blind mechanical impulse , which renders money , and the reputation of having money , the immediate end of their actions , without their knowing that it is so , far less why it is so , and they are merely astonished and incredulous when they meet with any one who acts as if with him the case were otherwise . But if theiiJ *

    eyes could be opened to the real state of their own souls , if their imaginations could be cultured up to the bare perception of the existence of riches which are above money , and which money will not purchase , believe me they would be the last persons to make the kind of defence for themselves which M . Chales makes for them . If they knew what they lose by caring for nothing in the world but to get on' in it , they would laugh at the bare idea of

    sacrificing the tranquillity of their lives for the sake of la prosperite de la Grande Bretagne . ' Yes , it is too true that in England a man is but one wheel in a machine ; and that the human race , judging from English experience , would seem to have been created in order that there might be ' immenses fabriques , ' ' gigantesques usines , ' and * admirables ports . ' But though this is the result , it is not the intention . A foreigner

    lands in London or Liverpool , and seeing such docks , such warehouses , such manufactories as he never saw before , thinks it vastly fine to belong to a country which has such things ; but the merchant , or the manufacturer , does he ever think of taking credit to himself for toiling and scraping in order that his country may possess docks and manufactories ? The man has no such thought , nor would it afford him any solace if he had : he is only thinking , poor man , of how to escape from bankruptcy , or how to be able to

    niove into a finer house , in a more fashionable quarter of the town . If the writer to whom I am replying has never known such a country as that which I have endeavoured to place before his imagination , let him bless heaven that he has not ; that he lives in a country where money , though it adds to a person ' s consequence , is not necessary to it ; where a great thinker or a great writer is a more important individual than the richest landowner or banker ; where any one who has a whole coat on his back ,

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    The Journal des Debats and the English . 389

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1834, page 389, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2634/page/5/