172 THE SCIENCE OF POWER 



The level at which the argument proceeds in any 

 great question of the day in the West is, therefore, 

 above everything remarkable. It is almost as if 

 we saw continuously the leaders of civilized men 

 making an appeal before an audience of savages. 

 It is the same kind of emotions which are being 

 stirred, the same feelings of combativeness which are 

 being aroused, the same kind of arguments which 

 are being used. Every device, every ruse, every 

 absurdity, even to grotesque distortions of the 

 truth, are pressed into service to move or excite 

 the feelings of combativeness. 



It is a wonderful sight. As party government 

 has developed in the West under democratic in- 

 stitutions, a new world of literature and art has 

 come into existence in the press to supply all the 

 machinery of this appeal to the instinct of com- 

 bativeness. Every capable editor understands 

 that in all the leading questions of the day the most 

 effective appeal to the multitude is the emotional 

 appeal through the spirit of combativeness. An 

 appeal to the pure instinct of the fight or to that 

 class consciousness upon which combativeness is 

 based, and which man shares with the animal world, 

 is known to be the most direct and effective means 

 of moving the general mind on public questions. 



In such circumstances, the standards of effective- 



