Social rank

“ The strong divisions of rank and the immense inequalities of means, are at variance with that ideal of human relations on which the sympathetic imagination likes to dwell; and the average conduct, under the pressure and excitement of social life as at present carried on, is in sundry respects repulsive. ”

“ Who are the “quality,”—said the Model, etc., in a community like ours?
I confess I find this question a little difficult to answer,—I said. —Nothing is better known than the distinction of social ranks which exists in every community, and nothing is harder to define. The great gentlemen and ladies of a place are its real lords and masters and mistresses; they are the quality, whether in a monarchy or a republic; mayors and governors and generals and senators and ex-presidents are nothing to them. ”

“ Our social position, and the studies we propose to take up, will oblige us to come in contact with persons of every degree in the social scale, and will force us to meet in each country that we visit all that is best in rank, intellect, and fortune. Can you imagine what is to be the far-off horizon of this brilliant existence, of this ambitious use of all your faculties, the lowest as well as the highest? ”

“ The doctrine further teaches that the most perfect union, harmony, peace, and good-fellowship are compatible with great diversity of character, rank, occupation, and office; that this diversity, indeed, renders the union and harmony all the more perfect when the different parts in the social body are duly adjusted, and one life pervades them all. It shows us that gradations of rank and character may exist without pride, disdain, or tyranny on the one hand, or envy, jealousy, or humiliation on the other ”

“ Some differentiation of rank, too, must have been found in the simplest human societies in the contrast between the old and the young, and the closely connected opposition of the rulers and the ruled. But it would be hazardous to reason that, in the early stages of social evolution, much in the way of exchange of fun passed between those who were presumably kept solemnly apart by the sense of their relative station. ”

“ In a society, also, fixity of structure is favored by the transmission of positions and functions through successive generations. The maintenance of those class-divisions which arise as political organization advances implies the inheritance of a rank and a place in each class. Obviously, in proportion as the difficulty of rising from one grade into another is great, the social grades become settled in their relations. ”

“ In certain institutions are placed those who imagine themselves to be in high social and official rank, and in possessions what they are not, who imagine it to such a degree that it is best that they be kept apart from others. ”

“ A community where every one worked and each might be needed by his neighbor would scarcely suffer very marked distinctions of rank; and in the lighter social life, which made no pretense of work, the sleighing parties and athletic sports, the suppers and dances which followed the bees, an equality of condition was assumed, very favorable to self-respect and independence of judgment. ”

“ Conversely, social change is facile in proportion as men's positions and functions are determinable by personal qualities. If, not being prevented by law or custom, members of one rank establish themselves in another rank, they in so far directly break the division between the ranks; and they indirectly weaken the division by preserving their family relations with the first, and forming new ones with the second ”

“ It is true they may entertain exaggerated notions of their natural rank and position in the social scale, but at least they have read, and reflected, and argued upon the subject, and their opinions are entitled to consideration. ”

“ But those who press this contrast must be careful always to respect the398 natural laws which regulate the distribution of wealth and rank. They have a definite social function, and that function is not to be destroyed, but to be improved and regulated. In order, therefore, to reconcile these conditions, we must limit our ideal classification to individuals, leaving the actual subordination of office and position unaffected. Well-marked personal superiority is not very common ”

“ A collective body of persons composing a community, or the aggregate of such communities. 2. A body of persons associated for a common object. 3. The more favoured class or classes, or the fashionable portion of the community."
The Extent of the social circle of any man or woman is largely dependent upon personal choice. There are persons who are exclusive in their preferences and who seek only the society of those of the same rank, wealth or profession as themselves. Hence the different classes in society at large. The pride of the poor often equals the pride of the rich in this matter. ”

“ By natural ranks he means ranks which have their roots deep in the historical structure of society, and are still, in the present, showing vitality above ground; he means those great social groups which are not only distinguished externally by their vocation, but essentially by their mental character, their habits, their mode of life—by the principle they represent in the historical development of society. ”

“ But if it be thus interesting to observe him on duty, how delightful to associate with him in society—a society to which every one distinguished for rank, bravery, or intellect, has free access: here rank is forgotten, formality is banished; every one talks and acts as he pleases, simply because those only who think and act as they ought, form the society. ”

“ So, in every private household, which is itself a little community, there are superior and inferior, master and servant, those who superintend and those who execute. Without such grades and various offices, society could not exist in order and enjoyment. Yet differences in grade and function by no means imply differences in happiness. Perfect equality of happiness is consistent with the widest difference in grades, that is to say, in the functions discharged, and the places filled in the social order. ”

“ I have found that to grow acquainted with the class that is the chief object of social legislation is to see more plainly the room for improvement, and also to see how much better, how much sounder, that class is than it appeared to be from the outside: how much might be gained, of material advantage especially, and at the same time how much there is to be lost of those qualities of character which have been acquired through long training and by infinite sacrifice. ”

“ Who are they who are held to consider and solve all questions, and how did they fall under this duty?
So far as I can find out what the classes are who are respectively endowed with the rights and duties of posing and solving social problems, they are as follows: Those who are bound to solve the problems are the rich, comfortable, prosperous, virtuous, respectable, educated, and healthy; those whose right it is to set the problems are those who have been less fortunate or less successful in the struggle for existence. ”

“ The Social Classes.—There is a natural line of social cleavage that has made it a customary expression to speak of the upper, the middle, and the lower classes. It is impossible to separate them sharply, for they shade into one another. ”

“ In reference to those social structures which are characterized by the superiority of a number of persons, a social totality over individuals or other totalities, it is to be noticed at once that the consequences for the subordinates are very unequal. ”

“ They find themselves subjected to almost identical conditions in all sections and begin to recognize themselves as a class, regardless of races, nationalities or creeds. Recognition of class generates that sense of duty known as the social conscience—the moral sense of the working class. ”

“ Among the middle classes, the gradations and varieties of social position are more numerous, less distinctly marked, and therefore fenced round with a world of form and ceremony. And as we descend, and enter the lower ranks, and approach the lowest, the distinctions and grades multiply. ”

“ There are certain deferences and mutual submissions which custom requires of the different ranks of men towards each other; and whoever exceeds in this particular, if through interest, is accused of meanness, if through ignorance, of simplicity. 'Tis necessary, therefore, to know our rank and station in the world, whether it be fixed by our birth, fortune, employments, talents, or reputation. 'Tis necessary to feel the sentiment and passion of pride in conformity to it, and to regulate our actions accordingly. ”

“ For so long in the future as prevision can reach, however, we may contest the possibility of a social constitution without superiority and inferiority, just as we may assert that the natural differences between human beings, which no common education can remove, will press for expression in external gradations of ranks, in differences of superordination and subordination. ”

“ These are the measure of our rank in the ordering of society. “Man has received of nature certain faculties—faculties of loving, of knowing, of acting. But these have by no means been given him in order that he should exercise them solitarily; they are but the supreme indication of that which each one owes to the society of which he is a member; and this indication each one bears written in his organization in letters of fire. If you are twice as strong as your neighbor it is a proof that nature has destined you to bear a double burden. ”

“ And will so continue to be; for, as long as men are unlike one another, there will be a distinction of ranks, though the distinction may be maintained by a better principle than heritage. Rank and wealth will, I trust, be in time distributed according to natural laws; but degrees of rank and wealth there will always be; and the advocates of a system of equality would greatly promote their cause by a frank recognition of this truth. ”

“ Some employments are liberal, others mechanic. They require different talents, and inspire different sentiments; and whether or not this be the cause of the preference we actually give, it is certainly reasonable to form our opinion of the rank that is due to men of certain professions and stations, from the influence of their manner of life in cultivating the powers of the mind, or in preserving the sentiments of the heart. ”

“ The friends of humanity start out with certain benevolent feelings toward "the poor," "the weak," "the laborers," and others of whom they make pets. They generalize these classes, and render them impersonal, and so constitute the classes into social pets. They turn to other classes and appeal to sympathy and generosity, and to all the other noble sentiments of the human heart. Action in the line proposed consists in a transfer of capital from the better off to the worse off. ”

“ First of all, it is necessary to decide what one's personal idea of position is, whether this word suggests merely a social one, comprising a large or an exclusive acquaintance and leadership in social gaiety, or position established upon the foundation of communal consequence, which may, or may not, include great social gaiety. ”

“ Respect for rank, for experience, for parents and old age, have been already noticed among the features of their character; but the excess to which deference to rank is carried by the political institutions of the country, deserves more particular remark, whether we consider it as illustrative of the nature of the government and the quiet and orderly disposition of the people, or endeavour to trace, in the early periods of their history, the causes which may have contributed to the existing constitution of society among them. ”

“ We turn to some of the normal uses of this form of social organization, and mention first the satisfaction of transitory wants of society or the needs of a local group or of a limited class. Differentiation carries with it variation of tastes. We must expect with higher civilization a growing unlikeness of aptitudes and inclinations. People who like the same things drift together. ”

“ Much, too, and this in the pleasantest fashion, may be done to extend one’s knowledge of good form by observation of people who have unusual tact and social discrimination. In every city, town and village, there are such persons who are distinguished above their fellow citizens by social instinct, by the talent for performing gracefully and acceptably the offices of society. ”

“ And this is the form of a society characterized by status—a society, the members of which stand one toward another in successive grades of subordination. From the despot down to the slave, all are masters of those below and subjects of those above. The relation of the child to the father, of the father to some superior, and so on up to the absolute head, is one in which the individual of lower status is at the mercy of one of higher status. ”

“ He is one of an indefinite number of men designated as head men. These head men may be considered as the social aristocracy, holding their place in society in the same indefinite and uncertain manner as the social leaders of our own communities. ”

“ The origin of these divisions we have found in the hard and fast walk which mark off social groups and classes within a group: like those between rich and poor, men and women, noble and baseborn, ruler and ruled. These barriers mean absence of fluent and free intercourse. This absence is equivalent to the setting up of different types of life-experience, each with isolated subject matter, aim, and standard of values. ”

“ Instead of their improvements, and their success and prosperity altogether, producing admiration, if not envy, they have a social discipline, the thought of which reduces these feelings to ridicule and contempt: that is to say, with regard to the mass; with respect to their leaders one's feelings are apt to be stronger. ”