NOTES 285 



century, it would certainly have burnt the Origin of Species, 

 and its action would have been approved by the crowd, and 

 endorsed by both Gladstone and Disraeli, and the bulk of the 

 daily Press. 



On these matters, counsel for the defence can only enter a 

 plea of guilty, with the excuse — if it is an excuse — that public 

 opinion was insane at the time ta discuss a matter which it was 

 not competent to judge. Logically, it is httle better fitted to 

 decide on politics or religion, but at first sight it seems supreme 

 in those departments. 



Yet both politics and religion distrust public opinion, and 

 try to minimise, to control, or, in extreme cases, to exclude it 

 altogether. They begin by appealing to the public ; they end 

 by denying the competence of the public to decide. This curious 

 and suggestive contrast deserves further examination. The 

 supremacy, or at least the apparent supremacy, of public 

 opinion in politics and religion is the foundation of pragmatism. 

 " The faith is true which works " ; and the doctrine is so far 

 justified that the prophet or politician who can get no followers 

 does not count. Mohammedanism nearly perished at its birth, 

 Buddhism only survived because it crossed the Himalayas, and 

 Christianity because it spread to Europe. Hundreds of religions 

 which missed the touch of the universal, have remained local 

 or tribal cults that must go down in time before the more 

 comprehensive creeds. 



In each case the process was the same, but further examina- 

 tion shows that the new faith, so far from following public 

 opinion, really goes against it, openly despises and denounces 

 it, and in the end succeeds in changing it. Every new creed 

 depends on its followers at the start, but these are a bare 

 minority conscious of the opposition of the mass, yet still more 

 conscious of the truth of their belief. They are in no sense 

 public opinion ; but this minority defies, transcends, and in 

 the end conquers and converts public opinion. It is, therefore, 

 not public opinion which makes the religion, but the religion 

 which makes public opinion. 



Politics are essentially similar. The savage chief has no 

 power until men come to his standard ; a leader is not a leader 

 until men will follow him, and only the belief that he is worth 

 following will induce them to follow in the first instance. Once 

 the effective minority is on his side the crowd will be persuaded 

 or compelled to follow, but the ruler with political instincts 

 quickly realises the weakness of his prop. Religion has secured 

 itself on the quicksand of public opinion by the anchor of 

 divine revelation, but politics from its very nature know!j no 

 such stay. For that reason the State which wishes to secure 

 permanence relies in every age ultimately not on public opinion, 



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