The Crowd, Gustave le Bon [read ebook pdf .TXT] 📗

heancients denominated destiny, nature, or providence, which wecall the voices of the dead, and whose power it is impossible tooverlook, although we ignore their essence. It would seem, attimes, as if there were latent forces in the inner being ofnations which serve to guide them. What, for instance, can bemore complicated, more logical, more marvellous than a language?Yet whence can this admirably organised production have arisen,except it be the outcome of the unconscious genius of crowds?The most learned academics, the most esteemed grammarians can dono more than note down the laws that govern languages; they wouldbe utterly incapable of creating them. Even with respect to theideas of great men are we certain that they are exclusively theoffspring of their brains? No doubt such ideas are alwayscreated by solitary minds, but is it not the genius of crowdsthat has furnished the thousands of grains of dust forming thesoil in which they have sprung up?

Crowds, doubtless, are always uncon