We are all implicated. We all, whether with self-approbation or not, give expression to the established feeling. Even he who disapproves this feeling finds himself unable to {147} treat virtue in threadbare apparel with a cordiality as great as that which he would show to the same virtue endowed with prosperity. Scarcely a man is to be found who would not behave with more civility to a knave in broadcloth than to a knave in fustian. Though for the deference which they have shown to the vulgar rich, or the dishonestly successful, men afterwards compound with their consciences by privately venting their contempt; yet when they again come face to face with these imposing externals covering worthlessness, they do as before. And so long as imposing worthlessness gets the visible marks of respect, while the disrespect felt for it is hidden, it naturally flourishes. Hence, then, is it that men persevere in these evil practices which all condemn. They can so purchase a homage which, if not genuine, is yet, so far as appearances go, as good as the best. To one whose wealth has been gained by a life of frauds, what matters it that his name is in all circles a synonym of roguery? Has he not been conspicuously honoured by being twice elected mayor of his town? (we state a fact) and does not this, joined to the personal consideration shown him, outweigh in his estimation all that is said against him; of which he hears scarcely anything? When, not many years after the exposure of his inequitable dealing, a trader attains to the highest civic distinction which the kingdom has to offer, and that, too, through the instrumentality of those who best know his delinquency, is not the fact an encouragement to him, and to all others, to sacrifice rectitude to aggrandizement? If, after listening to a sermon that has by implication denounced the dishonesties he has been guilty of, the rich ill-doer finds, on leaving church, that his neighbours cap to him, does not this tacit approval go far to neutralize the effect of all he has heard? The truth is that with the great majority of men, the visible expression of social opinion is far the most efficient of incentives and restraints. Let any one who wishes to estimate the strength {148} of this control, propose to himself to walk through the streets in the dress of a dustman, or hawk vegetables from door to door. Let him feel, as he probably will, that he had rather do something morally wrong than commit such a breach of usage and suffer the resulting derision. He will then better estimate how powerful a curb to men is the open disapproval of their fellows, and how, conversely, the outward applause of their fellows is a stimulus surpassing all others in intensity. Fully realizing which facts, he will see that the immoralities of trade are in great part traceable to an immoral public opinion.