Dang, you beat me to it...
“The ‘copybook headings’ to which the title refers were proverbs or maxims, extolling virtues such as honesty or fair dealing that were printed at the top of the pages of 19th-century British students’ special notebook pages, called copybooks. The school-children had to write them by hand repeatedly down the page.”
We can tell that the fools who rule us were never much concerned about virtues or wisdom. And when I ponder the reference to ‘the Gods of the Market’ I can think of more than a few on “our” side it applies to. How did Kipling foresee the GOPe....