CHAPTER XVIII. INFLUENCE OF CIVILISATION ON THE LOWER CLASS. Civilisation not without Disadvantages. - Effects of Machinery. - - Page 360 HISTORY OF CIVILISATION, &c. INTRODUCTION. Civilisation and Public Opinion depend on each other. Definition of the several Classes of Society.-Upper, Middle, and Lower Class.- Popular Clamour.-Public Opinion.. Middle Class the most important in a Civilised State.-Increased by the Use of Machinery. - Machinery increases Civilisation.Enumeration of the several Stages of Society as they advance towards Civilisation.-Savage Tribes.-Pastoral Tribes. Agricultural Population.-Feudal System. Arbitrary Power. Increase of Happiness in the People caused by Civilisation. Ancient States have decayed from a deficiency in Moral Principle. - CIVILISATION and public opinion do not coexist exactly in an equal proportion. The latter, nevertheless, depends so much on the former, that the history of one includes, in some degree, that of the other. Civilisation, uninfluenced by public opinion, has been recognised, to a certain extent, at various eras in different parts of the world. It is said to have been found in the Grecian Republics, in the Augustan Age at Rome, and during the reign of Louis XIV. in France. But at neither of these periods do we discover that diffused and all-reaching civilisation which can alone exalt the destiny of nations, give comfort to nearly every class, and make each man feel that, in his degree, he has a stake in the country to which he belongs. To be clearly understood in the following pages, let us define the meaning we attach to the words "Civilisation" and "Public Opinion." From an attentive perusal of British history and the annals of other parts of the world, we find that civilisation is formed and gains strength according to the information, moral principle (based on religious faith), facility of communication, and amount of wealth possessed by individuals composing a given community. These elements we shall style the requisites for civilisation, and we shall attempt to show that the form of any government, and its measures, becomes adapted to the interests and wants of a people as public opinion grows and is disseminated, and the efficacy of this national sentiment depends, in great measure, on the relative proportion of those persons not forced to labour with the number who are compelled to gain their daily bread by daily of defining work; and no other means appear the component parts of any society, than by estimating the property, real or personal, possessed by individuals. The most correct manner, therefore, of determining the income of persons who can be placed in the several classes of society, will be (as the value of precious metals is liable to fluctuation) to ascertain the number of dependents qualified for labour that the means of an individual will allow him to support. A separation of the community into three classes of society, the upper, the middle, and the lower, is that which is most generally recognised. In the upper class may be included all those who can command the work or time of one hundred labourers or more. Admitting the average wages of a day-labourer, throughout the year, to be about £30, this would place in the upper class all those who have a permanent income of £3000 a year or upwards, an income which may be transmitted to their descendants. In the middle class we include such individuals as can command the labour of from five to one hundred men. The lower class may consist of all those persons not comprehended in the other classes who could command only their own labour, or the work of not more than five others. The upper class, therefore, will consist of those who have an independent income of £3000 a year and more. The middle class, of those who have from £150 to £3000. The lower class of those who have their own labour, or from £30 to £150 a year. The most important of these three classes for the influence of public opinion is the middle; the upper not being sufficiently numerous, and the lower not sufficiently informed, nor possessed of the leisure necessary to give strength to that sentiment. Before we proceed, it will be necessary to distinguish between popular clamour and public opinion, words often confounded with, and mistaken for, each other, yet essentially different, and emanating from totally opposite causes. Public opinion is powerful in a community where the requisites for its formation are spread among the people; that is, where moral principle, information, wealth, and facility of communication exist, and where the |