Now something very like that is happening; the mere wealthy employer is
beginning to have not only the power but some of the glory. I have
seen in several magazines lately, and magazines of a high class, the
appearance of a new kind of article. Literary men are being employed to
praise a big business man personally, as men used to praise a king. They
not only find political reasons for the commercial schemes--that they
have done for some time past--they also find moral defences for the
commercial schemers. They describe the capitalist’s brain of steel and
heart of gold in a way that Englishmen hitherto have been at least in
the habit of reserving for romantic figures like Garibaldi or Gordon. In
one excellent magazine Mr. T. P. O’Connor, who, when he likes, can write
on letters like a man of letters, has some purple pages of praise of
Sir Joseph Lyons--the man who runs those teashop places. He incidentally
brought in a delightful passage about the beautiful souls possessed
by some people called Salmon and Gluckstein. I think I like best the
passage where he said that Lyons’s charming social accomplishments
included a talent for “imitating a Jew.” The article is accompanied with
a large and somewhat leering portrait of that shopkeeper, which makes
the parlour-trick in question particularly astonishing. Another literary
man, who certainly ought to know better, wrote in another paper a piece
of hero-worship about Mr. Selfridge. No doubt the fashion will spread,
and the art of words, as polished and pointed by Ruskin or Meredith,
will be perfected yet further to explore the labyrinthine heart of
Harrod; or compare the simple stoicism of Marshall with the saintly
charm of Snelgrove.
Any man can be praised--and rightly praised. If he only stands on two
legs he does something a cow cannot do. If a rich man can manage to
stand on two legs for a reasonable time, it is called self-control. If
he has only one leg, it is called (with some truth) self-sacrifice. I
could say something nice (and true) about every man I have ever met.
Therefore, I do not doubt I could find something nice about Lyons or
Selfridge if I searched for it. But I shall not. The nearest postman or
cab-man will provide me with just the same brain of steel and heart
of gold as these unlucky lucky men. But I do resent the whole age
of patronage being revived under such absurd patrons; and all poets
becoming court poets, under kings that have taken no oath, nor led us
into any battle.