But they are always a mass, that
is to say, collective mediocrity.
* * * * *
'Their thinking is done for them by one mind like themselves,
addressing them or speaking in their name, on the spur of the
moment, through the newspapers. I do not assert that anything
better is compatible, as a general rule, with the present low state
of the human mind. But that does not hinder the government of
mediocrity from being mediocre government. No government by a
democracy or a numerous aristocracy, either in its political acts,
or in the opinions, qualities, and tone of mind which it fosters,
ever did or could rise above mediocrity, except in so far as the
sovereign many may have let themselves be guided (which in their
best times they have always done) by the counsels and influence of
a more highly gifted and instructed One or Few. The initiation of
all wise or noble things comes and must come from individuals;
generally at first from some one individual.'
In all this there is too much truth; but it is truth which is wholly
unavoidable. Nor are the circumstances complained of peculiar to the
present age, or to the institutions which now generally prevail.
Democratic and representative forms of government have so degenerated,
as to fail in the vital point of bringing the best and ablest men to the
control of affairs. But has any more despotic or hereditary form been
equally successful, in the long run, in promoting the freedom, progress,
and grandeur of nations? Is the mediocrity of a whole people more
injurious to humanity than the precarious superiority of distinguished
families, or the selfish power of haughty privileged classes? One
important consideration seems to be overlooked by Mr.
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