I was browsing as I put my books away and came upon this
little gem from Modern Chivalry by Hugh Henry Breckenridge.
It was written about the same time as the Declaration of Independence.

"There is often wealth without taste or talent.I have no idea that because a man who lives in a great house and has
a cluster of bricks and stones about his backside, that he
is therefore fit for a legislator. There is so much pride
and arrogance with those who consider themselves first in a
government that it deserves to be checked by the populace.
Men associate with their own persons the advantageous
circumstances of birth and fortune; so that a fellow blowing with fat and repletion, concieves himself superior,
to the poor lean man that lodges in an inferior mansion.
But in all cases, so as this, genius and virtue are independent of rank and fortune and it neither the opulent
nor the indigent but the man of ability and integrity that
should be called forth to serve his country."

Good thinking, I would say.

The author graduated from Princeton and it goes on to
say that in his younger years, he was no stranger to the
axe or hoe as he helped his family hew out a place in the
wilderness. I like him.