s necessary to get the work out of
such a man, however harsh that be! When a world, not yet doomed for
death, is rushing down to ever-deeper Baseness and Confusion, it is a
dire necessity of Nature's to bring in her Aristocracies, her Best,
even by forcible methods. When their descendants or representatives
cease entirely to _be_ the Best, Nature's poor world will very soon
rush down again to Baseness; and it becomes a dire necessity of
Nature's to cast them out. Hence French Revolutions, Five-point
Charters, Democracies, and a mournful list of _Etceteras_, in these
our afflicted times.

To what extent Democracy has now reached, how it advances irresistible
with ominous, ever-increasing speed, he that will open his eyes on any
province of human affairs may discern. Democracy is everywhere the
inexorable demand of these ages, swiftly fulfilling itself. From the
thunder of Napoleon battles, to the jabbering of Open-vestry in St.
Mary Axe, all things announce Democracy. A distinguished man, whom
some of my readers will hear again with pleasure, thus writes to me
what in these days he notes from the Wahngasse of Weissnichtwo, where
our London fashions seem to be in full vogue. Let us hear the Herr
Teufelsdroeckh again, were it but the smallest word!

'Democracy, which means despair of finding any Heroes to govern you,
and contented putting-up with the want of them,--alas, thou too, _mein
Lieber_, seest well how close it is of kin to _Atheism_, and other sad
_Isms_: he who discovers no God whatever, how shall he discover
Heroes, the visible Temples of God?--Strange enough meanwhile
it is, to observe with what thoughtlessness, here in our rigidly
Conservative Country, men rush into Democracy with full cry. Beyond
doubt, his Excellenz the Titular-Herr Ritter Kauderwaelsch von
Pferdefuss-Quacksalber, he our distinguished Conservative Premier
himself, and all but the thicker-headed of his Party, discern
Democracy to be inevitable as death, and are even desperate of
delaying it much!

'You cannot walk the streets without beholding Democracy announce
itself: the very Tailor has become, if not properly Sansculottic,
which to him would be ruinous, yet a Tailor unconsciously symbolising,
and prophesying with his scissors, the reign of Equality. What now is
our fashionable coat? A thing of superfinest texture, of deeply
meditated cut; with Malines-lace cuffs; quilted with gold; so that a
man can carry, without difficulty, an estat