‘Not of political corruption. But it is an age of social disorganisation, far more dangerous in its consequences, because far more extensive. You may have a corrupt government and a pure community; you may have a corrupt community and a pure administration. Which would you elect?’ Neither,’ said Coningsby; ‘I wish to see a people full of faith, and a government full of duty.’ ‘Rely upon it,’ said Sidonia, ‘that England should think more of the community and less of the government.’ ‘But tell me, what do you understand by the term national character?’ ‘A character is an assemblage of qualities; the character of England should be an assemblage of great qualities.’ ‘But we cannot deny that the English have great virtues.’ ‘The civilisation of a thousand years must produce great virtues; but we are speaking of the decline of public virtue, not its existence.’ ‘In what, then, do you trace that decline?’ ‘In the fact that the various classes of this country are arrayed against each other.’ ‘But to what do you attribute those reciprocal hostilities?’ ‘Not entirely, not even principally, to those economical causes of which we hear so much. I look upon all such as secondary causes, which, in a certain degree, must always exist, which obtrude themselves in troubled times, and which at all times it is the business of wise statesmen to watch, to regulate, to ameliorate, to modify.’ ‘I am speaking to elicit truth, not to maintain opinions,’ said Coningsby; ‘for I have none,’ he added, mournfully. ‘I think,’ said Sidonia, ‘that there is no error so vulgar as to believe that revolutions are occasioned by economical causes. They come in, doubtless, very often to precipitate a catastrophe; very rarely do they occasion one. I know no period, for example, when physical comfort was more diffused in England than in 1640. England had a moderate population, a very improved agriculture, a rich commerce; yet she was on the eve of the greatest and most violent changes that she has as yet experienced.’ ‘That was a religious movement.’ ‘Admit it; the cause, then, was not physical. The imagination of England rose against the government. It proves, then, that when that faculty is astir in a nation, it will sacrifice even physical comfort to follow its impulses.’ ‘Do you think, then, there is a wild desire for extensive political change in the country?’