is not
possible, if it is not complete, if it is not thorough, that it ought to
be applied to differences of fortune, social position, intelligence,
perhaps even to our stature and personal appearance, and that no effort
should be spared to bring all things to one absolute level.

For its good, since it is natural enough that it should dislike heavy
taxation, sentiments of patriotism should be reinforced; it is taught on
the contrary that military service is a painful legacy left by a hateful
and barbarous past, and that it ought to disappear very soon before the
warming rays of a peaceful civilisation.

In a word, to use again the language of Aristotle, the pure wine of
democracy is poured out to the people as it was by the demagogues to the
Athenians; and from the quarter whence a remedy might have been expected
there come only incitements to deeper intoxication.

Aristotle has made yet another wise and profound observation on the
question of equality: "_We must establish equality_," he said, "_in the
passions rather than in the fortunes of men._" And he adds: "And this
equality can only be the fruit of education derived from the influence
of good laws." That is indeed the point. Education should have but one
object; to reduce the passions to equality, or rather to _equanimity_,
and to a certain equilibrium of mind. The education given to modern
democracy does not lead to this, but leads in the opposite direction.

CHAPTER XII.

THE DREAM.

What remedies can we apply to this modern disease, the worship of
intellectual and moral incompetence? What is, as M. Fouillee puts it,
the best way of avoiding the hidden rocks which threaten democracies? It
is hard to say, for we have to do with an evil which can only be cured
by itself, with an evil which is more than content with itself.

M. Fouillee (in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_ of November, 1909) proposes
an aristocratic Upper Chamber, that is to say, one that would represent
all the competence of the country, inasmuch as it would be appointed by
everything which is based on some particular form of excellence, the
magistracy, the army, the university, the chambers of commerce, and so
on.

Nothing could be better; but the consent of the democracy would be
necessary, and it is precisely these incorporations of efficiency that
the democracy cannot abide, looking on them, not without reason, as
being in a sense aristocracies.

He proposes also an energetic in