Even to be too
tenacious of those privileges is not absolutely a crime. The strong
struggle in every individual to preserve possession of what he has found
to belong to him, and to distinguish him, is one of the securities
against injustice and despotism implanted in our nature. It operates as
an instinct to secure property, and to preserve communities in a settled
state. What is there to shock in this? Nobility is a graceful ornament
to the civil order. It is the Corinthian capital of polished society.
"_Omnes boni nobilitati semper favemus_," was the saying of a wise and
good man. It is, indeed, one sign of a liberal and benevolent mind to
incline to it with some sort of partial propensity. He feels no
ennobling principle in his own heart, who wishes to level all the
artificial institutions which have been adopted for giving a body to
opinion and permanence to fugitive esteem. It is a sour, malignant,
envious disposition, without taste for the reality, or for any image or
representation of virtue, that sees with joy the unmerited fall of what
had long nourished in splendor and in honor. I do not like to see
anything destroyed, any void produced in society, any ruin on the face
of the land. It was therefore with no disappointment or dissatisfaction
that my inquiries and observations did not present to me any
incorrigible vices in the noblesse of France, or any abuse which could
not be removed by a reform very short of abolition.
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