IV
ON ACQUIRING INFLUENCE

Now that you know about the parties and the Caucuses, your first business will be to acquire influence. Political influence may be acquired in exactly the same way as the gout; indeed, the two ends ought to be pursued concurrently. The method is to sit tight and drink port wine. You will thus gain the reputation of being a good fellow; and not a few wild oats will be condoned in one who is sound at heart, if not at the lower extremities.

Or, perhaps, you may prefer to qualify as a Good Business Man.

He is one whose mind has not been warped and narrowed by merely intellectual interests, and who, at the same time, has not those odious pushing qualities which are unhappily required for making a figure in business anywhere else. He has had his finger on the pulse of the Great World -- a distant and rather terrifying region, which it is very necessary to keep in touch with, though it must not be allowed on any account to touch you. Difficult as it seems, this relation is successfully maintained by sending young men to the Bar with Fellowships of £200 a year and no duties. Life at the Bar, in these conditions, is very pleasant; and only good business men are likely to return. All business men are good; and it is understood that they let who will be clever, provided he be not clever at their expense.

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