If ignorance and passion are the foes of popular morality, it must be
confessed that moral indifference is the malady of the cultivated
classes. The modern separation of enlightenment and virtue, of thought
and conscience, of the intellectual aristocracy from the honest and
vulgar crowd, is the greatest danger that can threaten liberty. When any
society produces an increasing number of literary exquisites, of
satirists, skeptics, and _beaux esprits_, some chemical disorganization
of fabric may be inferred. Take, for example, the century of Augustus,
and that of Louis XV. Our cynics and railers are mere egotists, who
stand aloof from the common duty, and in their indolent remoteness are
of no service to society against any ill which may attack it. Their
cultivation consists in having got rid of feeling. And thus they fall
farther and farther away from true humanity, and approach nearer to the
demoniacal nature. What was it that Mephistopheles lacked? Not
intelligence certainly, but goodness.
October 28, 1870.--It is strange to see how completely justice is
forgotten in the presence of great international struggles. Even the
great majority of the spectators are no longer capable of judging except
as their own personal tastes, dislikes, fears, desires, interests, or
passions may dictate--that is to say, their judgment is not a judgment at
all.
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