t we call the life of a nation.

Everywhere man appears to us, by his customs and laws, by language and
the whole genial tendencies of his nature, as a small portion of a
greater whole. It is true also that this greater whole, appears to us
as an intellectual unity, which like an individual, is earthly and
perishable, a thing which accomplishes its earthly existence in a
century, as a man does his in a certain number of years. Like an
individual, a people developes its intellectual capacities in the
course of time, but more powerfully and on a grander scale. And
further, a people consists of millions of individuals the tide of human
life flows in millions of souls, but the conscious and unconscious
working together of these millions, produces an intellectual whole, in
which the share of individuals often vanishes from our eyes, so that
the soul of a whole people seems to us, a self-creative living unity.
Who was the man who created languages? who devised the most ancient law
of nations? who first thought of giving poetical expression to an
elevated tone of mind? It was not individuals who invented these for
practical purposes, but a universal intellectual life, which burst
forth among thousands who lived together. All the great productions of
national power, law, customs, and the constitution of states, are not
the work of individual men, but organic creations of a higher life,
which in every period shine forth in individuals, yet in all periods
seem to unite the intellectual capacities of individuals, in one mighty
whole. Each man bears and cultivates within his soul, part of the
intellect of the nation; each one possesses its language, a certain
amount of knowledge, and a sense of justice and propriety; but in each,
this general nationality is coloured, concentrated, and limited by his
individuality. Individuals do not represent the language or the moral
feelings of the whole; they only are, as it were, the single notes,
which joined together produce a harmonious chord as part of the
collective nation. One may therefore fairly, and without mysticism,
speak of a national soul.

And if one examines more narrowly, one perceives with astonishment,
that this law of development of a higher intellectual unity, differs
remarkably from that which binds or makes an individual free. A man
chooses freely for himself, between what will injure or be beneficial
to him and his interests; judiciously does he shape his life, and
prud