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Untitled Article
to personal qualities . It is evident that their claim must rest entirely upon registry and identification , for if they should happen to be changed at nurse they would not be recognised by any distinctive marks . Of course those who have rank conferred on them by " His Majesty" for certain specific services , or for acquired wealth , cannot be included in this definition . They are always considered as parvenus by the real rank-men . Should any chance deprive the aristocracy of their titles and property , as was the case in the first French Revolution , their most efficient means of livelihood would probably be in the capacity of waiters . As no persons are so insolent as waiters who rise to wealth ; so no persons are so mean as noblemen
who fall into poverty . The class of rank-men are commonl y designated as " the circles . " This is a sly satire on their want of prominent characteristics . They are ' as like as pease ' , and you may go round and round them without finding any individual distinction . Their states of rest or motion are regulated only by the circumstances of riches or povertv . If rich , they
vegetate ; if poor , they seek their prey like the sloths—stri pping and withering up every thing on which they can fix their fangs . They believe their existence the principal end for which the world was created , and all other human beings intended only to minister to their gratification . There is noway of curing them of these mischievous ideas but by destroying their certificates of birth . They might then , in the next generation , become useful members of the community .
Thirdly . —Idle-men . —This is the class of men whom the vulgar-minded of all ranks are accustomed to designate as " gentlemen , " which is a municipal misnomer . The idle-men
are those who live , as it is called , " on their own property /' 2 . e . they do nothing useful whatever , either for themselves or their neighbours , but subsist on the accumulated stores of those who lived before them and pursued industrious callings . They are the most dependent creatures in existence . They depend on their stewards for money , on their cooks for food , and on their butlers for wine ; in some cases the butlers use them very ill , for they condemn them to drink bad wine and keep the best for their own friends . They are dependent on tailors ,
shoemakers , hatters , and carriage-builders , tor clothes , carriages , and taste , and they depend on a species of human animals culled valets , for permission to rise and be dressed every day of their lives . Sometimes they get angrv and threaten those on
whom they depend , but it is mere vapouring , for they lack the energy necessary to help themselves , and they are consequently only treated like spoiled children by their benefactors , who sometimes can scarce refrain from laughing * in their faces . The class of rank-men is especially famous for the number of idleraen it produces . These idle-men never reason or even talk to
Untitled Article
Social Classification . 2 ftg
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1836, page 289, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2657/page/25/
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