CHAPTER LXXIII.

THE LAW OF GOOD MANNERS.

ENIOR was a man who had thought deeply on all the

SENIOR

great questions which concern the political and ecclesiastical, the domestic and individual, welfare of society. But national questions he considered of minor importance. A coming man for a nation he merely smiled at. "What is the use of him?" he said; "will he lead us to battle against the French, or conduct an ingenious coup d'état against Louis Philippe, or a coup d'église against the Irish Roman priests? And what could be the use of such things? We have had such men of national genius already. They are men of blood or mere cunning; their mission is strife. Their very success is an outrage to all but their own compatriots. Nations may be pleased with such men in rude and barbarous ages, but society never. The man for society is the man of all nations.”

He therefore even abhorred the idea of a coming man for England as a common curse for England and the world. The days of nationality were in his estimation the days of hatred, envy, jealousy, and war. His beauideal was a system of Imperialism, in which all the nations of the world would be governed by the eternal principles of one Divine and universal law. He would

not destroy nationality, he would only reduce it to its proper position in society as a secondary, not a primary principle. He would make nations subordinate, not supreme powers. He would organize an imperial supernational power, to which all nations would be subject, as if they were merely provinces of a universal kingdom. In fine, he would realise the beau-ideal of the Roman Empire, which he regarded as a Divine idea, co-ordinate in politics with that of Jerusalem in Ecclesiastics. And the restoration of the Holy Roman Empire was, in his estimation, the inevitable and indispensable accompaniment of the restoration of Jerusalem or the unity of the Church.

Senior was therefore an Imperialist in his politics, and he looked for an emperor who should conquer Christendom, and unite it as one living body, but not with the sword. He was well aware of the apparent impossibility of such a result. But he looked at it as the consummation of a drama by a Divine Artist, and as a thing that must inevitably be; nor did he himself see any great difficulty in its accomplishment when once the preliminaries for the grand dénouement were fully completed. He knew well that all men must be made to believe alike before this great result could take place; but he also saw the train that was laid for accomplishing even this most magnificent consummation by a Divine coup d'église. The rest would be very easy. When this coup d'église had taken place which would reconcile all sects by showing them all to be right in one or other aspect of truth, and all wrong in their uncharitable treatment of each other's mission-the next thing that would be done for the amelioration of society would be a general training of the

people in the principles of good-manners.

The moral law he regarded as merely the rough outline of a law-a germ to be developed. It was good in itself, and would be sufficient if thoroughly carried out in spirit. But the carrying out of this spirit, the Deutero-Nomy, or second law, was nothing else but the law of politeness, which must be formally taught, even as it is in China, which is the imperfect but still the divinely-ordained type and precursor of a celestial empire. The rites and ceremonies of the old law must be translated into the rites and ceremonies of the new. Men must sacrifice to one another, as they did of old in the Gentile world to the Elohim or the gods, and these sacrifices are the true and everlasting sacrifices of righteousness for a regenerated world.

He had no idea of attempting to realise the magnificent idea himself; he merely elaborated it mentally, and prepared it for reception by other minds that it might take root, grow, and come to perfection by degrees. And he looked with pity, not unmixed with contempt, on the social experiments which were made to realise a heaven on earth in small farms or workshops upon associative principles, based rather upon a rejection of all religions than an intelligible and satisfactory conciliation of all. He had no plan, no system of his own, and he attempted nothing final. He looked on faith for the coming of the Gatherer, and the Deutero-Nomy or Law Divine. But being possessed of some property in the neighbourhood of London, he was induced by a Right Honourable friend, who deeply admired his ideas of good-manners, to make a practical experiment with a law of refinement. This friend, Lord Belmore, was particularly nice in his per

sonal deportment, never guilty of any indecorum either in speech or behaviour, but so exceedingly sensitive as to be always in a state of painful excitement in the presence of a person practising any breach whatever of the law of strict propriety, as he understood it. Moreover, he understood it very stringently, so that, so far from being regarded as a good-natured person, he was generally looked upon as peevish, fidgety, and ill-natured. This, however, was a mistake; he was a most generous and

amiable man, who never hated the person of any one, but

merely the rude behaviour, and who felt the aversion which he seemed to experience for the individual immediately disappear so soon as the action ceased which rendered his presence disagreeable. His affection also for the well-bred and the delicate in taste and manners was unbounded; whilst beauty of person was an abomination to his sight whenever it became the agent or the vehicle of any indecorum.

Lord Belmore was therefore a very singular man; a man of whom the most contradictory judgments must be formed by different persons. Senior was one of his greatest admirers; in fact, he regarded him as almost the only gentleman that he knew. Unrivalled in taste, inimitable in tact-every word that he spoke, every action that he performed, conveyed to your mind the impression or the conviction that he acknowledged your right to respectful and delicate treatment, and that he was not the man who would sacrilegiously violate the sanctuary of the nervous system.

The two gentlemen having come to an agreement of partnership respecting this experiment in manners, Senior

made such arrangements in his property as enabled him to accommodate one hundred families, all in one street. The street was almost isolated, and well accommodated with spacious gardens on each side. The houses were small, but sufficiently large and respectable-looking for small tradesmen or the better class of thriving mechanics. But they were let upon terms which were so rigidly enforced by Senior and Belmore, that the nonconformists were almost immediately turned out and deprived of their privileges, which were very great. For instance, so long as they adhered to the rules they had their winter coals at summer price; for Senior and Belmore laid in a sufficiency in summer to serve for the winter. They had also the garden gratis-sufficient to keep them in kitchen vegetables throughout the year—and the houses were let, moreover, at a lower than the average rate. The motives to obedience, therefore, were very powerful. But then the law! what a singular law! It was drawn up by Senior and Belmore.

It did not forbid the people to steal, or to break any of the ten commandments, or practise witchcraft, or idolatry, or perjury, or simony. It made no mention whatever of such crimes, which being secret crimes might be denied, and which, moreover, were all amenable to the vulgar tribunals of the country. The offences forbidden were innocent crimes; such crimes as perhaps a radical reformer would consider it an instance of personal tyranny to find fault with; such crimes as a good-natured, jolly old English Boniface would consider perfectly legitimate, and not to be interfered with.

In the first place, the houses were to be kept clean, and