of conventional principles that are provided by pulpit, party, or counting-house. On the whole he is suspicious of ideas, especially if they be new; thinking is irksome and largely unnecessary since he finds that a judicious regard for what "they say will solve most of his problems. The political "spell-binder " and the professional reformer, to whose interest it is to study his idiosyncrasies, find that a skilful appeal to his prejudices or to his fixed ideas never fails to bring a favorable response. On the whole, he prefers orthodoxy to scholarship in his minister, loyalty to party rather than political wisdom in his statesmen, the preservation of the profitable status quo in his business rather than the sacrifices necessary for the social or economic betterment of the community. Though our political overlord he is too often, in Mr. H. G. Wells' phrase, "state-blind ". On the other hand, the average man is not without redeeming qualities. If it be true that he is shallow and prejudiced these failings are more than offset perhaps by the homely but socially valuable virtues of honesty, patriotism, and sympathy. If he cannot be depended upon to start a reform, still less is he inclined to become a criminal. His simple and unsophisticated existence places at the disposal of the nation a mass of thoroughly sane and human sentiments to which we can safely appeal in great crises.

It is for the average man that our democratic institutions exist; they are supposed to be most nearly ideal in fact when they best reflect his view of life. In literature, art, morals, and religion he is the final arbiter; hence the questionable exploitation of elemental human instincts in the photo-play, the glorification of obscurantism in the pulpit, the tawdry and commonplace sentimentality of the cheap novel, the impossible wit of the pink Sunday supplement, the utterly inane songs of the popular vaudeville. No Oriental despot ever exercised a tithe of his sway for he rules the minds, not the bodies, of men, and there is no appeal from his arbitrament. The choicest products of literary or plastic art await his sovereign decision for the right to live. Preacher, politician, advertiser, teacher, philosopher, study to know and do his will. He is the incarnation of

modern humanity. The salvation of society is ultimately the salvation of the average man.

"Deep in the breast of the Average Man,

The passions of ages are swirled,

And the loves and the hates of the Average Man
Are old as the heart of the world-

For the thought of the race as we live and we die

Is in keeping the Man and the Average high."

Though ostensibly the stalwart champion of intellectual freedom the average man is often intolerant of new ideas. Free speech is, to be sure, a conventional part of democratic traditions. One is free, for example, to criticize the private life of a political candidate, even to the extent of circulating downright scandals. The average minister in orthodox Protestantism is not free to tell his congregation the bare facts of Old Testament history as they have been established by the critics. The average man may perhaps be able to stretch his conception of tolerance to the extent of listening to arguments against immortality or woman's rights but the like free speech in regard to the monogamous family, birth-control, the rights of private property, protective tariff, trade unions, or the "color line ", depending upon the section concerned, may precipitate a torrent of disapproval and intolerant abuse.

Intellectual freedom seems to suffer from certain disabilities which are inseparable from democracy itself. DeToqueville contends that a democracy encourages superficial thinking in that the individual citizen must constantly pronounce upon the profoundest social, economic, or political questions in the exercise of his sovereign right as a member of a democracy. He inevitably falls into the habit of thinking in ready-made generalities. This amounts to a surrender of intellectual independence. Furthermore, the average man is made uneasy by new ideas. They suggest possible disconcerting changes in the social order; he has neither the time nor the ability perhaps to think things through for himself and prefers rather to bear those ills he has than fly to others he knows not of. Hence, it may be seriously doubted whether on great national issues

the average man ever earnestly seeks an intelligent comprehension of the principles concerned. For this reason his judgment on questions involving technical knowledge is often a hindrance to social efficiency; on a plain moral issue his opinion is invaluable.

Again, the average man is hampered by the narrow margin that is always found between thought and action in the shifting, uncertain conditions of American democracy. We have few or no social habits or traditions that encourage the life of reflection. The average American, especially in the great industrial centers, is catapulted from the cradle to the grave in the mad hurly-burly of a headlong civilization that never pauses to get its bearings or to ask the meaning of life. Having neither the time nor the inclination to think, the average man is repelled by reflection. To him every thinker is a potential rebel, a possible disturber of the peace. Since reflection alone gives to men a grasp of values and a sense of perspective it is not surprising that the average man who possesses neither is lacking in poise. He is the unhappy puppet of an imperious and eternal now. Imagination alone can emancipate us from the tyranny of the present, from the crushing, maddening immediacy of brute facts.

The anti-intellectualism of the average man also appears in his "state-blindness". Tyrannies even when intelligent are objectionable. But the most intolerable of all tyrannies is that based upon ignorance and callous indifference. "State-blindness" is congenital in American democracy. From the days of the revolutionary fathers to the present the average American has accepted state authority only under protest. He began by throwing off the yoke of despotism and unfortunately he has always associated political authority with that memorable struggle. Politics for the average American to-day is merely a necessary evil. The actual machinery of the state, political leaders, parties, platforms, party slogans, interest him very little; more often they arouse feelings of disgust or ridicule. True he is patriotic: But the state that elicits his patriotism is a hazy idealistic entity that bears about the same relation to

actual politics that the ethics of the Sermon on the Mount does to the "rules of the game" in business. These shadowy ideals find expression at Fourth of July celebrations or are evoked by the name of Lincoln or the sight of the flag. Seldom do they provide moral dynamic in dealing with the problems of the immediate political situation.

The average American prides himself upon his energy, his business astuteness, his industrial efficiency, but in many ways his civic stupidity makes the world stand aghast. He cannot see that the corrupt party leader whom year after year he returns to office is not only a bad investment from the standpoint of political efficiency but is also a degrading influence upon the moral sense of the entire community. He cannot see that by supinely submitting while unscrupulous individuals exploit the city's franchises he is cheapening the moral self-respect of the citizenship and rendering the economic struggle more difficult for all, including himself. He cannot see that an indispensable background for a noble and worthy citizenship is clean streets, efficient public service, honest officials, and a sensitive community conscience. For without these there can be no such thing as civic pride and without civic pride no man can do his best work, whether he be an artist or a hod-carrier. A Michael Angelo without Florence or a Phidias without Athens would have been unthinkable. The hard and cruel alternative, "work or starve ", which our militant industrialism offers the toiler, is tragic in its short-sighted selfishness. It forgets that the best worker must love his work and that this is impossible without a sense of social worth.

§ 4. DEMOS, THE MODERN TYRANT

The pivotal position occupied by the average man in the moral economy of a democracy was early recognized by DeTocqueville. But he saw in that fact a most serious handicap to moral and intellectual progress. He thought that he saw in the American democracy of the third decade of the last century the suggestions of a despotism more dangerous to the welfare of man than any the world had ever known. It was a

despotism, he tells us, not of the body but of the mind. The instruments of ancient tyrants were the thumbscrew, and the faggot, fetters, and headsmen. But they attacked the body only and were unable to subdue the spirit. Demos, the modern tyrant, extends to his victim physical freedom while seeking to enslave his soul. Death was the penalty for revolt against ancient forms of tyranny. To the modern rebel Demos says, "You are free to think differently from me and retain your life, your property, and all that you possess. But if such be your course you must be content to live the life of an alien and outcast among your own people. Civil rights to be sure are yours, in name at least, but they will lack that sympathy and sanction of your fellows without which they are otiose privileges. Honors and emoluments you may indeed seek at the hands of your fellow citizens but they will most assuredly be denied you since you have dared to set your feeble will in opposition to theirs. Physical life is yours but it is not incompatible with spiritual annihilation at the hands of the com-. munity." The social, political, or religious assassinations daily witnessed under free democratic rule are none the less tragic because they are bloodless.

DeTocqueville's observations were based upon the American democracy of the early part of the last century. At best it was but a shadow democracy, "the substance of things hoped for," for it still tolerated slavery. Yet with all its crudeness and inconsistency American democracy had already become self-conscious, intolerant and even tyrannical. "The smallest reproach," writes DeTocqueville, "irritates its sensibility, and the slightest joke that has any foundation in truth renders it indignant; from the style of its language to the more solid virtues of its character everything must be made the subject of encomium. No writer, whatever be his eminence, can escape from this tribute of adulation to his fellow-citizens. The majority lives in the perpetual practice of self-applause, and there are certain truths which the Americans can only learn from strangers or from experience."

Almost a century later another Frenchman gave us a