MANNERS.
If the worship of incompetence reverberates with a jarring note through
our domestic morals, it has an effect hardly less harmful on the social
relations of men in the wider theatre of public life. We often ask why
politeness is out of date, and everyone replies with a smile: "This is
democratic." So it is, but why should it be? Montesquieu remarks that
"to cast off the conventions of civility is to seek a method for putting
our faults at their ease." He adds the rather subtle distinction that
"politeness flatters the vices of others, and civility prevents us from
displaying our own. It is a barrier raised by men to prevent them from
corrupting each other." That which flatters vice can hardly be called
politeness, but is rather adulation. Civility and politeness are only
slightly different in degree; civility is cold and very respectful,
politeness has a suggestion of flattery. It graciously draws into
evidence the good qualities of our neighbour, not his failings, much
less his vices.
There is no doubt that civility and politeness are a delicate means of
showing respect to our fellow-men, and of communicating a wish to be
respected in turn. These things then are barriers, but barriers from
which we derive support, which separate and strengthen us, but which,
though holding us apart, do not keep us estranged from our neighbours.
It is also very true that if we release ourselves from these rules,
whether they are civility or politeness, we set our faults at liberty.
The basis of civility and politeness is respect for others and respect
for ourselves. As Abbe Barthelemy has very justly remarked: "In the
first class of citizens is to be found a spirit of decorum which makes
it evident that men respect themselves, and a spirit of politeness which
makes it evident that they also respect others." This is what Pascal
meant by saying that respect is our own inconvenience, and he explains
it thus, that to stand when our neighbour is seated, to remove our hat
when he is covered, though trifling acts of courtesy, are tokens of the
efforts we would willingly make on his behalf if an opportunity of being
really serviceable to him presented itself.
Politeness is a mark of respect and a promise of devotion.
All this is anti-democratic, because democracy does not recognise any
superiority, and therefore has no sympathy with respect and personal
devotion. Respect to others involves a recognition from us that we are
of less importance than they, and politeness to an equal requires from
us a courteous affectation that we consider him as our superior. This is
entirely contrary to the democratic ideal, which asserts that there is
no superiority anywhere. As for pretending to treat your equal as though
he were your superior, that involves a double hypocrisy, because it
requires a reciprocal hypocrisy on the part of your neighbour. You
praise his wit, only in order that he may return the compliment.
Without, however, insisting on this point, democracy will argue that
politeness is to be deprecated, because it not only recognises but
actually creates superiority. It treats an equal as a superior, as
though there were not enough discrepancies already without inventing
any more. It seems to imply that if inequality did not exist, it would
be necessary to invent it. It is tantamount to proclaiming that there
cannot be too much aristocracy. That is an opinion which democracy
cannot endure.
Considered as a promise of future devotion, politeness is equally
anti-democratic. The citizen owes no devotion to any person, he owes it
only to the community. It is no small matter to style yourself "your
most humble servant"; it means that you single out one man from among
many others and promise to serve him; it means that you acknowledge in
him some natural or social superiority, and according to democracy there
are no superiorities, social or natural, and if there were such a thing
as natural superiority, nature has no business to allow it. This is
tantamount to proclaiming a form of vassalage--a thing which is not to
be tolerated.
As to the absence of politeness considered as "a means of giving free
play to one's feelings," we recognise that in one sense this also is
essentially democratic. The democrat is not proud of or pleased with his
faults; not at all; only _ex hypothesi_ he does not believe in their
existence. A failing is an inferiority of one man in relation to
another; the word itself implies it; it means that something is lacking,
that one man has a thing which another has not. But all men are equal,
therefore, argues the democrat, I have no failing; therefore I need not
try to conceal and control my alleged failings, as they are at worst
merely mannerisms, and are possibly virtues.
The democrat, in fact, like young men, like most women, and like all
human beings who have begun to think but do not think very profoundly,
knows his failings and assumes that they are virtues. This is very
natural, for our faults are the most conspicuous parts of our character,
and when we are still at the self-satisfied stage it is our faults that
we cherish and admire. Consequently, politeness, in that it consists in
concealing our faults, is intolerable to a man who is impatient to
display qualities that to him appear commendable and worthy. The usual
reason why we do not correct our faults is that we mistake them for
qualities, and think that any practice which requires their concealment
must be quite absurdly tyrannical.
The democrat is therefore profoundly convinced of two things; first,
that all men are equal and that there is no such thing as inferiority or
failing, and secondly, that what men call faults are really natural
characteristics of great interest. He believes that faults are popular
prejudices invented by intriguers, priests, nobles and rulers, for their
own base purposes to inspire the poor with humility. He looks upon this
sense of inferiority as a curb on the people's power, all the more
potent that it works from within and has a paralysing effect on its
energy. He is persuaded that, from this point of view, politeness is an
aristocratic instrument of tyranny.
This explains why, when the wave of democracy swept over France, it
brought with it a perfect frenzy of rudeness, all the more curious in a
nation remarkable for courtesy. It was an affirmation that, appearances
notwithstanding, neither superiorities nor excellences of human
character had any real existence.
Rudeness is democratic.