NOTES ON DEMOCRACY by H. L. MENCKEN JONATHAN. Contents include: I
DEMOCRATIC MAN 1 HIS APPEARANCE IN THE WORLD 9 2 VARIETIES OF HOMO
SAPIENS 15 3 THE NEW PSYCHOLOGY 21 POLITICS UNDER DEMOCRACY 29 5
THE ROLE OF THE HORMONES 35 6 ENVY AS A PHILOSOPHY 42 Jx LIBERTY
AND DEMOCRATIC MAN 51 THE EFFECTS UPON PROGRESS 58 9 THE ETERNAL
MOB 7 2 II THE DEMOCRATIC STATE 1 THE TWO KINDS OF DEMOCRACY 79 2
THE POPULAR WILL 85 3 DISPROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION 97 4 THE
POLITICIAN UNDER DEMOCRACY 1 07 5 UTOPIA 115 6 THE OCCASIONAL
EXCEPTION 124 7 THE MAKER OF LAWS 131 8 THE REWARDS OF VIRTUE 139 9
FOOTNOTE ON LAME DUCKS 148 5 CONTENTS PAGE III DEMOCRACY AND
LIBERTY 1 THE WILL TO PEACE 157 2 THE DEMOCRAT AS MORALIST 1 62 3
WHERE PURITANISM FAILS 1 77 4 CORRUPTION UNDER DEMOCRACY 187 IV
CODA 1 THE FUTURE OF DEMOCRACY 2O7 2 LAST WORDS 2l8. DEMOCRATIC
MAN: HIS APPEARANCE IN THE WORLD. DEMOCRACY came into the Western
World to the tune of sweet, soft music. There was, at the start, no
harsh bawling from below there was only a dulcet twittering from
above. Democratic man thus began as an ideal being, full of
ineffable virtues and romantic wrongs in brief, as Rous seaus noble
savage in smock and jerkin, brought out of the tropical wilds to
shame the lords and masters of the civilized lands. The fact
continues to have important consequences to this day. It remains
impossible, as it was in the eighteenth century, to separate the
democratic idea from the theory that there is a mystical merit, an
esoteric and ineradicable rectitude, in the man at the bottom of
the scale - that inferiority, by some strange magic, becomes a sort
of superiority - nay, the superiority of superiorities. Everywhere
on earth, save where the enlightenment of the modern age is
confessedly in transient eclipse, the move ment is toward the
completer and more enamoured enfranchisement of the lower orders.
Down there, one hears, lies a deep, illimitable reservoir of
righteousness and wisdom, unpolluted by the corruption of
privilege. What baffles statesmen is to be solved by the people,
instantly and by a sort of seraphic intuition. Their yearnings are
pure they alone are capable of a perfect patriot ism in them is the
only hope of peace and happi ness on this lugubrious ball. The cure
for the evils of democracy is more democracy This notion, as I
hint, originated in the poetic fancy of gentlemen on the upper
levels - senti mentalists who, observing to their distress that the
ass was over-laden, proposed to reform trans port by putting him
into the cart. A stale Chris tian bilge ran through their veins,
though many of them, as it happened, toyed with what is now called
Modernism. They were the direct ancestors of the more saccharine
Liberals of to-day, who yet mouth their tattered phrases and dream
their pre posterous dreams. I can find no record that these
phrases, in the beginning, made much impression upon the actual
objects of their rhetoric. Early democratic man seems to have given
little thought to the democratic ideal, and less veneration. What
he wanted was something concrete and highly materialistic - more to
eat, less work, higher wages, lower taxes. He had no apparent
belief in the acroamatic virtue of his own class, and certainly
none in its capacity to rule. His aim was not to exterminate the
baron, but simply to bring the baron back to a proper discharge of
baronial busi ness. When, by the wild shooting that naturally
accompanies all mob movements, the former end was accidentally
accomplished, and men out of the mob began to take on baronial
airs, the mob itself quickly showed its opinion of them by
butchering them deliberately and in earnest. Once the pikes were
out, indeed, it was a great deal more dangerous to be a tribune of
the people than to be an ornament of the old order...
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
