A Philosophy of Aristocracy 2^] 



Carlyle condemned democracy, which he identified 

 with laissez-faire, as "a self -cancelling business," a 

 government which only achieved the negation of any 

 government. Representative institutions, a free and 

 broad electorate, in a word all the paraphernalia of 

 democracy, were in his eyes a matter of mere palaver 

 and ballot boxes — "nothing except emptiness" and 

 zero. To get governance, men must turn to those who 

 are able to govern, the silent few, standing aloof and 

 alone in their wisdom, who are nature's appointed 

 Hero-Kings. . . . Wise, and in their wisdom also 

 virtuous, they must guide and even drill their lesser 

 fellows, who shall find in obedience their chief end and 

 highest pleasure. 



. . . Guidance, regulation, drill became his ideals: 

 military metaphors recur in his writings. He even 

 advanced to the military doctrine that might is the 

 measure of right. If a man be able, wise of heart, 

 strong of will, firm in his resolution to do his duty 

 among his fellows, he must govern according to the 

 measure of his strength, and his right over his fellows 

 is according to his might. "The strong thing is the 

 just thing" : rights are "correctly articulated mights."^ 



To men holding this philosophy, "social Dar- 

 winism" made an especially strong appeal; it 

 proclaimed the idea of the survival of the fittest; 

 it strengthened their faith in the triumph of the 

 best; it affirmed that Nature practices an incor- 

 ruptible justice, — that the idea of justice is found 

 even in the biological realm. Thus the philosophy 



' Ernest Barker, Political Thought in England from Herbert 

 Spencer to the Present Day, p. 184. 



