296 THE SCIENCE OF POWER 



end. The influence affects all the processes of 

 mind. It colours and directs in after life the con- 

 clusions of the thinker so that these are in reality 

 predetermined in him by the emotion of an ideal 

 imposed on him at an earlier stage. The influence 

 reaches to the uttermost workings of mind, so that 

 in the development of abstract systems of thought 

 the main problem which has continually beset the 

 mind of the philosopher in history is simply, as 

 Leslie Stephen has described it, " how conclusions 

 which are agreeable to his emotions can be con- 

 nected with postulates which are congenial to his 

 intellect." 



In nations the inheritance transmitted in social 

 heredity may be very complex. Geographical, 

 economic, and material causes of many kinds may 

 contribute important factors to it. But the essential 

 element of Power in all social heredity is the emotion 

 of the ideal. Once effectively imposed, this idealism 

 becomes the expression of the living soul of a 

 people. Its influence cannot be estimated. It 

 subordinates everything. It becomes Power 

 incarnate. There is no object which a people or 

 a race can set before itself which is not possible 

 of attainment through the organization and the 

 transmission of an ideal in its social heredity. In 

 the days when modern Germany was on the anvil 



