DEMOCRACY AND DISTINCTION THE PROBLEM -- DEMOCRACY SHOULD BE DISTINGUISHED FROM TRANSITION-- THE DEAD-LEVEL THEORY OF DEMOCRACY -- CONFUSION AND ITS EFFECTS -- "INDIVIDUALISM"MAY NOT BE FAVORABLE TO DISTINGUISHED INDIVIDUALITY -- CONTEMPORARY UNIFORMITY-- RELATIVE ADVANTAGES OF AMERICA AND EUROPE -- HAST, SUPERFICIALITY, STRAIN-- SPIRITUAL ECONOMY OF A SETTLED ORDER -- COMMERCIALISM -- ZEAL FOR DIFFUSION-- CONCLUSION
WHAT shall we say of the democratic trend of the modern world as it affects the finer sort of intellectual achievement? While the conscious sway of the masses seems not uncongenial to the more popular and obvious kinds of eminence, as of statesmen, inventors' soldiers, financiers and the like, there are many who believe it to be hostile to distinction in literature, art or science. Is there hope for this also' or must we he content to offset the dearth of greatness by the abundance of mediocrity ?
This, I take it, is a matter for a priori psychological reasoning rather than for close induction from fact. The present democratic movement is so different from anything in the past that historical comparison of any large sort is nearly or quite worthless. And, moreover, it is so bound up with other conditions which are not essential to it and may well prove transient, that even contemporary fact gives us very little secure guidance. All that is really practicable is a survey of the broad principles at work and a rough attempt to forecast how they may (158) work out. An inquiry of this sort seems to me to lead to conclusions somewhat as follows.
First, there is, I believe, no sound reason for thinking that the democratic spirit or organization is in its essential nature hostile to distinguished production. Indeed, one who holds that the opposite is the case, while he will not be able to silence the pessimist, will find little in fact or theory to shake his own faith.
Second, although democracy itself is not hostile, so far as we can make out its nature by general reasoning, there is much that is so in the present state of thought, both in the world at large and, more particularly, in the United States.
In this, as in all discussions regarding contemporary tendency, we need to discriminate between democracy and transition. At present the two go together because democracy is new; but there is no reason in the nature of things why they should remain together. As popular rule becomes established it proves capable of developing a stability, even a rigidity, of its own;and it is already apparent that the United States, for instance, just because democracy has had its way there, is less liable to sudden transitions than perhaps any other of the great nations.
It is true that democracy involves some elements of permanent unrest.
Thus, by demanding open opportunity and resisting hereditary stratification, it will probably maintain a competition of persons more general, and as regards personal status more unsettling, than anything the world has been used to in the past. But personal competition alone is the cause of only a small part of the (159) stress and disorder of our time; much more being due to general changes in the social system, particularly in industry, which we may describe as transition. And moreover) competition itself is in a specially disordered or transitional state at present, and will i.e less disquieting when a more settled state of society permits it to be carried on under established rules of justice, and when a discriminating education shall do a large part of its work~ In short, democracy is not necessarily confusion, and we shall find reason to think that it is the latter, chiefly, that is opposed to distinction.
The view that popular rule is in its nature unsuited to foster genius rests chiefly on the dead-level theory. Equality not distinction is said to be the passion of the masses, diffusion not concentration. Everything moves on a vast and vaster scale: the facility of intercourse is melting the world into one fluid whole in which the single individual is more and more submerged. The era of salient personalities is passing away, and the principle of equality, which ensures the elevation of men in general, is fatal to particular greatness. " In modern society," said De Tocqueville, the chief begetter of this doctrine, "everything threatens to become so much alike that the peculiar characteristics of each individual will soon be entirely lost in the general aspect of the world." [1] Shall we agree with this or maintain with Plato that a democracy will have the greatest variety of human nature ? [2]
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Perhaps the most plausible basis for this theory is the levelling effect ascribed by many to the facilities for communication that have grown up so surprisingly within the past century. In a former chapter I have said much upon this matter, holding that we must distinguish between the individuality of choice and that of isolation, and giving reasons why the modern facility of intercourse should be favorable to the former.
To this we may add that the mere fact of popular rule has no inevitable connection, either friendly or hostile, with variety and vigor of individuality.
If France is somewhat lacking in these, it is not because she is democratic, but because of the race traits of her people and her peculiar antecedents;if America abounds in a certain kind of individuality, it is chiefly because she inherited it from England and developed it in a frontier life. In either case democracy, in the sense of popular government, is a secondary matter.
Certainly, America is a rather convincing proof that democracy does not necessarily suppress salient personality. So far as individuality of spirit is concerned, our life leaves little to be desired, and no trait impresses itself more than this upon observers from the continent of Europe.
