re, in the words of "X," "immensely
and incalculably" more efficient than the great mass of their fellows,
and so long as their efficiency requires, as "X" admits that it does,
some exceptional reward to induce these men to develop it, these men
themselves, in virtue of their inherent characters, must primarily
determine what the reward shall be; and not all the majorities in the
world, however unanimous, could make a reward sufficient if the
particular minority in question did not feel it to be so. The majority
might, by making a sufficient reward unattainable, easily prevent the
services from being rendered at all; but, unless they are to forgo the
services, the majority can only obtain them on terms which will, in the
last resort, depend on the men who are to render them.

Now, in what I have been urging thus far--which practically comes to
this, that the sovereignty popularly ascribed to democratic majorities
is an illusion--not socialists only, but other advocates of popular
government also, will alike be against me, as the promulgator of some
blasphemous paradox. It will be easy, however, to show them that their
objections are quite mistaken, and that the exceptional powers of
dictation which have just been ascribed to a minority are so far from
being inconsistent with the real powers of the majority that the latter,
when properly understood, are seen to be their complement and their
counterpart. For, though socialists and thinkers like "X" ascribe to
majorities powers which they do _not_ possess, we shall find that
majorities do actually possess others, in some ways very much greater,
of which such thinkers have thus far taken no cognisance at all. I have
said that minorities can dictate their own terms to majorities which
desire to secure their services, the reason being that the former are
alone competent to determine what treatment will supply them with a
motive to exert themselves. What holds good of minorities as opposed to
majorities holds good in essentials, though in a somewhat different
form, of majorities as opposed to such minorities.

Let us turn again to a matter to which I have referred already--namely,
the family life of the citizens of any race or nation. This results from
propensities in a vast number of human beings which, although they are
similar, are in each case independent. These propensities give rise to
legislation, the object of which is to prescribe rules by which their
satisfaction ma