Now, it is the particular honour of Europe since it has been Christian that while it has had aristocracy it has always at the back of its heart treated aristocracy as a weakness – generally as a weakness that must be allowed for. If anyone wishes to appreciate this point, let him go outside Christianity into some other philosophical atmosphere. Let him, for instance, compare the classes of Europe with the castes of India. There aristocracy is far more awful, because it is far more intellectual. It is seriously felt that the scale of classes is a scale of spiritual values; that the baker is better than the butcher in an invisible and sacred sense. No Christianity, however ignorant or extravagant, ever suggested that a duke would not be damned. In pagan society there may have been (I do not know) some such serious division between the free man and the slave. But in Christian society we have always thought the gentleman a sort of joke, though I admit that in some great crusades and councils he earned the right to be called a practical joke. But we in Europe never really and at the root of our souls took aristocracy seriously.
This sounds good, in part because the traditional caste system in India is such a low bar to jump over. But the other reason Chesterton sounds good is because many read him as a Christian apologist and not as a Roman Catholic apologist who believed the Protestant Reformation was a disaster.
The fact is that Medieval Christendom was becoming much more like the caste system. In fact, that was what got it started. The wealthy were able to buy their way out of purgatory. Money meant a difference in the afterlife. Perhaps a duke would still be damned but the social stratification in medieval Europe did claim to be present after death.
Not only were the rich able to buy indulgences, but they could sponsor masses. They could pay priests to offer up the supposed “sacrifice” for years and years after they were dead. Each mass would be an intercession for their souls in the afterworld. Again, earthly prosperity and power made an eternal difference.
Some practical joke.