Political Science Of The State

532 POLITICAL SCIENCE.
toward the state cultivated in state schools as they should be?
This fault of modern education is greatest in democracies.
Even the democracy of Athens, that humane, public-spirited
state, had no public education for the poor, except what they
got from the public exhibitions of intellect and taste, which
were not originally a part of a system of education, but
aimed rather to give pleasure to a highly-gifted people. The
moral sentiments akin to rhythm, order and composure, were
not directly cultivated. How much more in modern times is
this neglect visible. And where, by means of collections in
art accessible to all, and of music, the people are cultivated in
their tastes, as is the case in some parts of Europe, the satis-
faction of the eye and ear are aimed at more than the rhythm
and elevation of the soul. <
The reason why this higher aesthetic education seems to be
less at home in democracies than in some other polities, lies
perhaps in the individualism there prevailing, which is op-
posed to order and harmony. The man who is surrounded
by a kind of fence of rights, who, as a member of the body
politic, is under constant excitement, who is expected to pur-
sue his own way with all his energy, is not the man to be
subdued and calmed by aesthetic appeals to his sentiments.
Hence the greater need to him of a moral and religious disci-
pline appealing to the quieter departments of his soul.
5. The control of general opinion has nowhere a greater
sway than in democracies. Where society is stratified there
is no opinion that circulates through the society, and in the
lower strata of such polities opinion will be local, until the
means of communication enable artisans and laborers to learn
the news and travel, and to give and take opinions touching
their own art and the state. In the higher strata of society a
sense of personal importance, if nothing better, qualifies indi-
viduals to defy the opinion of their class, and thus a certain
freedom of action is mutually conceded by the admiration
which is felt for moral courage. In democracies there is not the
same amount of moral courage, because the weight of opinion
over against the individual is there greater. And asthere are