i-Millennium. ERRATA. V- -"Though" for "through" (line 4). 11-Rational. Note 100: totum, omnia. 14 "Individual" for "individuals" (line 13). 15-"From" for "for" (1st line). 16-Odious. 24-Expedience. 45-Plausible. 48-Insert "not" between "has" and "only" (line 11); "be exercised" for "be excused" (line 12). "6 49-Nullo modo. 55-Insert "in" between "is" and "the" (line 10). 62-Opprobrious. 63-"Neat" for "near." 109-Guage. 117-Carthaginian. 124-Disparage. 129-Principantes. 131-Delete lines 1, 2, 4, 11, 14, 17. 150 "Make it impossible" (line 19). 167-"Ever" for "even" (line 17). 179-Insert "but" between "not" and "be democratic" (line 12). 180-Procuring. 188-"For then" for "for them" (line 8). 276-Conscience. INTRODUCTION Though the political panacea of the day, democracy is still insufficiently understood by the many whom it affects most. The qualities of it are better known than are the qualifications for it; the ends than the means. It is airily esteemed the great emancipation, the crown of the glorified people, the tomb of autocracy, the gate-way to the millenium, etc. But its demands are proportionate to its favors; and there can be no true concept of democracy which ignores the preliminaries which induce it and its success. The meaning of the word, from the time of Thucydides1 who first used it, until now, is popular rule.2 As one reviewer says, "Democracy is the state of an autonomous people". Still, if a people are not intellectually and ethically equipped for self-government, a democratic régime would not be democratic at all. It would be demagogic, or "the government of the people by the boss of the group." It would be, save by miracle, or through the discipline of experience and time, a species of chaos. Tyranny and its equally odious opposite-lack of all rigor—are none the less political calamities when they obtain in the many. The definition of democracy would be improved by the linking of the adjective "qualified" to "autonomous." Democracy is an ideal form of government; but, like all ideals, it has not always proved the best for practical purposes. For nations have not invariably measured up to its requirements, and hence have not always been prepared for its privileges. Since it is a system which, in a manner, makes rulers of the many, it demands that the many have the mental and 1 I, 15. 2 "Demos", people, and "kratos", rule. 3 Borrell, Art. L'Idée de Démocratie, Revue de Philosophie, XII, p. 114. 4 This is why democracy is criticized as a disintegrating force which "dissolves communities into individuals, and collects them again into mobs." Criticism should more justly be reserved for the abuse of democracy and the disqualification of certain peoples for its reign. The fault is not in democracy, but in democrats. Cf. Croiset, Les démocraties antiques, p. 335. moral virtues requisite to regency. Until a people have evolved to the due political degree, democracy could only be a Pandora's box in their possession. If it is the best of the forms. of government, its place in political progress is last; and the belief that it is the best for the future implies at least a concession that it may not always have been the best in the past. Athens was ready for a democratic era only in the Golden Age of Pericles (445-431 B. C.); and even then her particular brand of popular rule which Lloyd calls "the most pure and the most important democratic government the world had ever,—nay has ever seen",5 was far from ideal. Theoretically, the people ruled; practically, Pericles. His spirit and influence leavened the whole polity, as in a form of monarchy. The Demos discussed and decided; but it was only a segment of the population. In a city-state where one regarded it a real hard-ship to have to live with less than half a dozen helots at beck and call, and the number of free citizens, Attic-born and bred, who alone enjoyed the right of suffrage, was a startling minority, democracy, in our modern sweeping sense, was far from regent. But the truth is that to support even this narrow democracy, which was really but a broad aristocracy, Athens needed a citizenry with brains. That she happened to have it, is the great reason why the era was golden. Galton declares? that the average ability of the Athenian race was at the very lowest estimate two grades higher than our own; and this, if so, means that the Hellenes intellectually surpassed us quite as much as we ourselves out-step the African negro to-day. He recalls as evidences of the nimble intelligence and keen aesthetic sense of the Attic, the elaborate works of literature and art which were presented as a matter of course by their creators for his criticism and appreciation. If Athenian morals 5 The Age of Pericles, Vol. II, p. 97. 6 Wilson in The State, p. 600, mentions the difference between ancient and modern democracy. (a) The former was immediate; modern is immediate, or representative. (b) In the former the officers were the State-unimpeachable, and accountable only after their term; in the latter, all officers are representative. (c) Ancient democracy was really a glorified aristocracy; in modern, citizenship is co-extensive with population and suffrage is as wide as qualified citizenship. (d) In former, the individual lived for the State; in modern, the State exists for the individual. 7 Hereditary Genius, p. 342. |