Do you expect, my friends, that your indispensable aristocracy of talent is to be enlisted straightway, by some sort of recruitment aforethought, out of the general population; arranged in supreme regimental order; and set to rule over us?  That it will be got sifted, like wheat out of chaff, from the twenty-seven million British subjects; that any ballot-box, reform-bill, or other political machine, with force of public opinion ever so active on it, is likely to perform said process of sifting?  Would to heaven that we had a sieve; that we could so much as fancy any kind of sieve, wind-fanners, or ne plus ultra of machinery, devisable by man that would do it!

“’Done, nevertheless, sure enough, it must be; it shall, and will be.  We are rushing swiftly on the road to destruction; every hour bringing us nearer, until it be, in some measure, done.  The doing of it is not doubtful; only the method or the costs!  Nay, I will even mention to you an infallible sifting-process, whereby he that has ability will be sifted out to rule amongst us, and that same blessed aristocracy of talent be verily, in an approximate degree, vouchsafed us by-and-by; an infallible sifting-process; to which, however, no soul can help his neighbour, but each must, with devout prayer to heaven, help himself.  It is, O friends! that all of us, that many of us, should acquire the true eye for talent, which is dreadfully wanting at present.

“’For example, you, Bobus Higgins, sausage-maker on the great scale, who are raising such a clamour for this aristocracy of talent, what is it that you do, in that big heart of yours, chiefly in very fact pay reverence to?  Is it to talent, intrinsic manly worth of any kind, you unfortunate Bobus?  The manliest man that you saw going in a ragged coat, did you ever reverence him; did you so much as know that he was a manly man at all, till his coat grew better?  Talent!  I understand you to be able to worship the fame of talent, the power, cash, celebrity, or other success of talent; but the talent itself is a thing you never saw with eyes.  Nay, what is it in yourself that you are proudest of, that you take most pleasure in surveying, meditatively, in thoughtful moments?  Speak now, is it the bare Bobus, stript of his very name and shirt, and turned loose upon society, that you admire and thank heaven for; or Bobus, with his cash-accounts, and larders dropping fatness, with his respectabilities, warm garnitures, and pony chaise, admirable in some measure to certain of the flunkey species?  Your own degree of worth and talent, is it of infinite value to you; or only of finite—­measurable by the degree of currency, and conquest of praise or pudding, it has brought you to?  Bobus, you are in a vicious circle, rounder than one of your own sausages; and will never vote for or promote any talent, except what talent or sham-talent has already got itself voted for!’—­We here cut short the Indicator; all readers perceiving whither he now tends.”—­P. 39.

In the chapter, also, on Democracy, we have notions expressed upon liberty which would make little impression—­would be very distasteful to any audience assembled for the usual excitement of political oratory.