It is not only that any aristocracy becomes unduly absorbed in the consideration of its own interests. Its depression of the people has the dangerous effect of persuading the latter of its necessary inferiority. It is unable to carry on its own affairs with order and intelligence. It does not know how to represent its wants with decision. It develops a sense of indignation because its interests are neglected; but it does not know how to attach its indignation to the right objects or, when so attached, how to remedy the ills from which it suffers. An aristocracy, in a word, deprives its subjects of character and responsibility; and as the revolutions of 1848 so clearly demonstrated, while they can destroy, they have never been taught how to create. The success of the Puritan Rebellion and the American Revolution was built upon the fact that, in each case, the exercise of power had been a habit of the general population; in the one case in the management of Nonconformist Churches, in the other in the governance of local legislatures and township meetings. In each case, a blind government confronted men who knew how to formulate their wants, and to organize their attainment. But, in general, aristocracies do not provide their subjects with this opportunity. Their own effort is substituted for popular effort, their own will for the popular will. The development of the total resources at their disposal is postponed to the preservation of their interest and convenience. They dwarf the masses that they may the better contemplate the stateliness of their own state. But that, in the end, always means that the vital power of the people is absent at the moment when it is most required.