[Sidenote: Mercantile interest.]
As to the mere matter of estimation of the mercantile or any other
class, this is regulated by opinion and prejudice. In England, a
security against the envy of men in these classes is not so very
complete as we may imagine. We must not impose upon ourselves. What
institutions and manners together had done in France manners alone do
here. It is the natural operation of things, where there exists a crown,
a court, splendid orders of knighthood, and an hereditary
nobility,--where there exists a fixed, permanent, landed gentry,
continued in greatness and opulence by the law of primogeniture, and by
a protection given to family settlements,--where there exists a standing
army and navy,--where there exists a Church establishment, which bestows
on learning and parts an interest combined with that of religion and the
state;--in a country where such things exist, wealth, new in its
acquisition, and precarious in its duration, can never rank first, or
even near the first: though wealth has its natural weight further than
as it is balanced and even preponderated amongst us, as amongst other
nations, by artificial institutions and opinions growing out of them.
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