NATIONAL MORALITY.

be almost expected to place our self-
complacency in the front rank. There
are phases of English vanity, insular
conceit, which would be grotesque if they were
not humiliating. Perhaps there is just now less
of this than usual. The old British catholic con-
tempt of foreigners has received a shock. And,
though we resent criticism by strangers, many of
_us seem to take a pride in showing, or at least
| saying, that as far as our place among the nations
| of Europe is concerned we have not so much to be
proud of as we had.

I have no desire to dwell upon this comparison.
Our place is inevitably determined in the long
run by our national morality. The old rule holds,
righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a re-
proach to any people.

And occasionally we get glimpses of kinds of
| unrighteousness which ought to make us very un-
comfortable. We are eminently a commercial and

manufacturing nation. It is in this, perhaps, that
we should chiefly look for the tests of our morality,
_and any signs of our national decadence. In some
respects we have not deteriorated. For instance,
it is affectation to complain, as some do, that no
works of the present time have the solid and
substantial character which used to mark those of
what are called the good old days. We do not
really believe it. Why, the latest of what are
called Metropolitan improvements have been carried
out with a slowness and solidity which seems
intended to defy Time itself. The walls of Jeru-
salem could hardly be stronger than those of the
Thames Embankment. And if cynical criticism is
aimed at the so-called flimsy growth of our suburbs
—which is a favourite item in which to depreciate
the work of the day, and sneer at its superficial
character—it must be remembered that these are
notoriously built for temporary purposes. They
are mere brick and mortar tents, no better and no
worse than they are intended to be. Where strong
work is wanted it is not wanting. Even the iron
of our railroads is being gradually replaced by
steel, and in spite of the disastrous carelessness
which has lately issued in the loss of the old
“Megera,” which ought never to have been sent to
sea, and the loss of the new “ Captain” which, being
| what she was, had no right to affect an equality
with other sailing-ships, and was over-masted, I
suppose there never was a time when our ships,
a chief feature of British industry, were stronger
than they are now. There is no sign of decadence,

vanity, or emptiness in our material manfactures,
when we wish to produce serviceable fabrics or
structures. But, unhappily, it would seem that

NATIONAL MORALITY.

many who are conscious of producing or selling
inferior articles make no scruple of attempting to
pass them off as better than they are. And not
only so, but that they hardly make a mystery of
this dishonour, at least among themselves.

Thus, though we have not fallen into such de-
cadence as to lose the power of doing excellent
work when we choose, we cannot deny that the
body of English industry is in some measure
tainted with deceit.

It is almost impossible to trace the mischievous
ramifications of such unfair customs as in some
instances prevail. What ¢.g. must be their moral
effect on the artisan who knows that his employer’s
produce goes forth with counterfeit marks ? or on
the shopman who sells goods of any kind which he
knows to be not what they are called. He may
reply, it is not his business; he is not responsible
for the fraud. But no man can assist in, or sell his
skill for, the manufacture or disposal of what he
knows to be a lie, without hurt. It familiarizes
him with deceit, sure to reappear and reproduce
itself somewhere else in his life and work. He
loses the sense of distress which an untruth pro-
duces in an honest mind. If ever he excuses him-
self for his share in the process, his very excuse
deteriorates him. He cannot dissever himself from
the duplicity he may condemn. It could not be
compassed without the assistance of such as he.
The head and the hands cannot be altogether
separated. It cannot suffice to a man’s conscience
to say, when he does what he sees to be wrong,
that he is bidden to do it; or that he could not
afford to disobey. His conscience may not trouble
him much, but that is because he has wounded it,
and it is weak. The result is a degradation of the
national conscience, a weaker ability to. distinguish
between truth and falsehood, a weaker ability to
refuse the evil and to choose the good.

Whether the chief blame lie upon employer or
servant, the result is a radical deterioration in his
Christianity, however he may try to set himself
straight by the profession of religious opinions.
The result is increased incapacity to learn or teach,
however loudly he may plead for education. The
result is an inereased unfitness to discharge the
duties of an honest citizen, however proud he may
be of some local office. The result is increased
unfitness to choose political representatives, how-
ever warmly he may claim the suffrage. The
result is less ability to render due obedience to the
law, however he may plead for what, in his blind-
ness, he calls a better government. This is the
result in head and hands, in masterand man. And
so we see growing occasional indications of the
difficulty which people feel, from one cause or

| another, in doing what they wish, and have a

right to do.

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