The late ’thirties and early ’forties, with their agitations against middle-class apathy and aristocratic neglect, witnessed to the reality of the disease which was known as the “condition-of-England question.” Many of the nobles were not noble; never had been “so many gentlemen, and so little gentleness.”[77] Exclusion from the suffrage prevented the natural representation of injuries, and compelled Labour to band itself covertly, and often under leaders embittered and embittering with personal and clashing ambitions. The Reform Act, contended Disraeli, had not reposed the government in abler hands, nor elevated the head or enlarged the heart of Parliament. “... On the contrary, one House of Parliament” (he is writing in 1845) “has been irremediably degraded into the decaying position of a mere court of registry, possessing great privileges, on condition that it never exercises them; while the other Chamber, that at the first blush and to the superficial exhibits symptoms of almost unnatural vitality, ... assumes on a more studious inspection somewhat of the character of a select vestry fulfilling municipal rather than imperial offices, and beleaguered by critical and clamorous millions who cannot comprehend why a privileged and exclusive senate is requisite to perform functions which immediately concern _all_....” Undoubtedly Labour is far better situated in 1904 than it was in 1844, and undoubtedly this improvement is partly due to Disraeli’s influence and action. The ideals of “Young England” have borne fruit. Our “Toynbee Halls” and university settlements, the recognition of _noblesse oblige_, the trained public opinion that superior light and leading are in duty bound to lead and enlighten as well as help the poor; that the poor are their _tenants_; that-- “Not what we give, but what we share: The gift without the giver is bare;” --these and their tone are its outcome. His policies of health and humanisation, of wholesome housing before technical teaching, for first emancipating Labour from carking cares and then entrusting it with public duties, have prospered. Chartism and its allied mutinies have subsided into citizenship. The artisans of to-day are princes in comparison with what they were. The contracted sloth of the utilitarian middle class has been shaken to follow what emanated from the universities. In his Guildhall speeches of 1874 and 1875 Disraeli could point with pride to Capital at one with Labour, and to operatives in sympathy with privileges which they shared. At this moment they are catered as well as cared for; and yet their independence is far completer than when it was aggressive because it was cowed.