isdom. Under such circumstances it is a happy thing if the
people possess enough initiative to assert themselves and, after
clearing the ground in a more or less summary fashion, allow some new
organisation, more representative of actual interests, to replace the
old encumbrances and tyrannies.

[Sidenote: Ancient citizenship a privilege.]

In the heroic ages of Greece and Rome patriotism was stimulated in
manifold ways. The city was a fatherland, a church, an army, and almost
a family. It had its own school of art, its own dialect, its own feasts,
its own fables. Every possible social interest was either embodied in
the love of country or, like friendship and fame, closely associated
with it. Patriotism could then be expected to sway every mind at all
capable of moral enthusiasm. Furthermore, only the flower of the
population were citizens. In rural districts the farmer might be a
freeman; but he probably had slaves whose work he merely superintended.
The meaner and more debasing offices, mining, sea-faring, domestic
service, and the more laborious part of all industries, were relegated
to slaves. The citizens were a privileged class. Military discipline and
the street life natural in Mediterranean countries, kept public events
and public men always under everybody's eyes: the state was a bodily
presence. Democracy, when it arose in such communities, was still
aristocratic; it imposed few new duties upon the common citizens, while
it diffused many privileges and exemptions among them.

[Sidenote: Modern democracy industrial.]

The social democracy which is the ideal of many in modern times, on the
other hand, excludes slavery, unites whole nations and even all mankind
into a society of equals, and admits no local or racial privileges by
which the sense of fellowship may be stimulated. Public spirit could not
be sustained in such a community by exemptions, rivalries, or ambitions.
No one, indeed, would be a slave, everyone would have an elementary
education and a chance to demonstrate his capacity; but he would be
probably condemned to those occupations which in ancient republics were
assigned to slaves. At least at the opening of his career he would find
himself on the lowest subsisting plane of humanity, and he would
probably remain on it throughout his life. In other words, the citizens
of a social democracy would be all labourers; for even those who rose
to be leaders would, in a genuine democracy, rise from the