system which stops and paralyzes any power in interfering with the free action of individuals....  As Feudalism, which with its ideas and habits of subordination was for many centuries behind the British Constitution, dies out, and we are left with nothing but our system of checks, and our notion of its being the great right and happiness of an Englishman to do as far as possible what he likes, we are in danger of drifting towards Anarchy.”  Aristocracy, according to Arnold, who strangely mingled admiration of it with contempt, had been doing what it liked from time immemorial.  It had enjoyed all the good things of life—­great station, great wealth, great power—­with a comfortable assurance that they belonged to it by divine right.  It had governed England with credit to itself and benefit to the country.  As Lord Beaconsfield said, it was only because a Whig Minister wished to curry favour with the populace, that an Earl who had committed a murder was hanged.

The Middle Class also, had, at any rate, since the Reform Act of 1832, “done what it liked,” in a style not quite so grand but excessively comfortable and self-satisfied.  It had carried some great reforms on which it had set its heart.  It had established, enormously to its profit, Free Trade, and it had accumulated vast wealth.  Its maxim had been—­“Every man for himself in business, every man for himself in religion,”—­and the devil take the hindmost.

But now, said Arnold, is the judgment of this world.  The Aristocracy and the Middle Class had come to an end of their reign.  A “tide of secret dissatisfaction had mined the ground under the self-confident Liberalism of the last thirty years (1839-1869) and had prepared the way for its sudden collapse and supersession.”  So far, the young Liberals and Radicals of the day did not disagree.  They liked this doctrine, and had preached it; but from this point they and their new Teacher parted company.  The working-man was now enfranchised; and of the newly-enfranchised working-man, or at least of some of the most conspicuous representatives of his class, Arnold had a curious dread.  “His apparition is somewhat embarrassing; because, while the Aristocratic and Middle Classes have long been doing as they like with great vigour, he has been too undeveloped and too submissive hitherto to join in the game; and now, when he does come, he comes in immense numbers, and is rather raw and rough.”

The dread of the working-men, and the apprehension of the bad use which they might make of their new power, can be traced to certain incidents which happened just before they were admitted to the Franchise and which perhaps precipitated their admission.  In June, 1866, the Reform Bill, for which Lord Russell and Mr. Gladstone were responsible, was defeated in the House of Commons, and the Tories came into office.  The defeated Bill would have enfranchised the upper class of artisans, and its rejection led to considerable