England can no more be relied on to bring it about, when we remember what renewed executive vigor and cohesion existed with the Commonwealth and the fiery foreign policy of the first republic of France.  For three years past we have seen the British Empire in peril on all sides, with the addition of depression and incipient rebellion at home, but her horizon is not as dark as it was in 1780, when, with a failing cause in America, England had the whole of Europe against her.

In any estimate of the prospects of England we must take into account the recent marked changes in the social condition.  Mr. Escott has an instructive chapter on this in his excellent book on England.  He notices that the English character is losing its insularity, is more accessible to foreign influences, and is adopting foreign, especially French, modes of living.  Country life is losing its charm; domestic life is changed; people live in “flats” more and more, and the idea of home is not what it was; marriage is not exactly what it was; the increased free and independent relations of the sexes are somewhat demoralizing; women are a little intoxicated with their newly-acquired freedom; social scandals are more frequent.  It should be said, however, that perhaps the present perils are due not to the new system, but to the fact that it is new; when the novelty is worn off the peril may cease.

Mr. Escott notices primogeniture as one of the stable and, curious enough, one of the democratic institutions of society.  It is owing to primogeniture that while there is a nobility in England there is no noblesse.  If titles and lands went to all the children there would be the multitudinous noblesse of the Continent.  Now, by primogeniture, enough is retained for a small nobility, but all the younger sons must go into the world and make a living.  The three respectable professions no longer offer sufficient inducement, and they crowd more and more into trade.  Thus the middle class is constantly recruited from the upper.  Besides, the upper is all the time recruited from the wealthy middle; the union of aristocracy and plutocracy may be said to be complete.  But merit makes its way continually from even the lower ranks upward, in the professions, in the army, the law, the church, in letters, in trade, and, what Mr. Escott does not mention, in the reformed civil service, newly opened to the humblest lad in the land.  Thus there is constant movement up and down in social England, approaching, except in the traditional nobility, the freedom of movement in our own country.  This is all wholesome and sound.  Even the nobility itself, driven by ennui, or a loss of former political control, or by the necessity of more money to support inherited estates, goes into business, into journalism, writes books, enters the professions.